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Tuesday, June 3, 2014

Sweet, Redux And Sugar Pops Pete

I begin with an excerpt from an old post from 2012 :


I am not sweet. My wife told me. She thinks I'm grumpy, always has, probably right. We met in a library in the 1960s. I looked like this:               She looked like this:

Norma was studying a book on physiology in the library in the 1960s. The page she was on had a picture of the human heart. It looked like this:
It was Valentine's Day, so I took out my pen and wrote "Happy Valentine's Day" on the picture. Then I asked her out. She said no.

Ok, maybe that was sweet, but I never got sweet again. Guys learn early on whether or not girls appreciate that sort of thing. Norma consented to go out with me a year and a half after I did that.
                                             
                     We now look like this:

But I'm really trying to write about a great hero of the American Old West. Before Norma and I met in the library, there was a breakfast cereal called Sugar Pops. It was advertised on early tv by a rodent called a prairie dog. His name was Sugar Pops Pete and he was ever-vigilant for Bad Guys. Bad Guys were outlaws, belligerents and assorted fusty rustics who refused to be sweet. Pete would pop onto the scene and Bad Guys would yell, "Look out, it's Sugar Pops Pete and he'll tarn ya sweet!" Then Pete would shoot them with his Sugar Popper and they'd be sweet. It was practically a religion. Observe:


Sugar Pops used real sugar, a sweetener that occurred in nature. By and by it was replaced by artificial sweeteners that did not. This political correction made Sugar Pops disappear from the world, and Pete too! Things changed after that. The world was different and more confusing. That's all I know about love, American history, vanishing prairie dogs and religion.

38 comments:

  1. I think they took the same photo of everyone during that, my, era. I had the same tie, as all of us did.

    I bet Sugar Pops are a good metaphor for all of those, and more.

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    1. It was either that tie or the necklace, not much of a choice for kids --but we were simpler mechanisms then.

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  2. Love, love, love the Sugar Pops advertisement. It has a great deal more charm (and humour) than any I have seen recently. And by recently I mean for a decade or more.
    I am pretty impressed with your photos too. And the Valentine's Day note. Which of you preserved it for posterity? Or am I being niaive (again).

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    1. Ah, admittedly, I recreated the Valentine note. But yes, advertisements were way more fun back then.

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  3. I'm sorry...I got stuck at the part where you defaced a book. I mean, even in the name of love....you can't deface a book. That's where the problem started you know...we didn't DO things like that back then. You changed the whole flow of history with that one act of defiance. How are you going to live with yourself?

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    1. Yes, I confess myself guilty of dead-boring book defacement, but I had to, you see, to find out whom I was dealing with and if she was good-natured. I live with myself by visiting my cardiologist twice a year. Plus, as an antique book collector, I value the doodles over the text.

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  4. There's no Sugar Pops anymore? And wait, prairie dogs are vanishing?

    I have to go now. :(

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    1. I believe they were called Corn Pops after that and rodents of all types still flourish.

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  5. Hey sweet ums, I loved my Sugar Pops, and Pete , where have you gone Pete? On principal, I am against pistol-packing rodents, but by the things I read in the news, maybe we need old Petey again to shoot real sugar back into this sorry old world.

    Geo, you and your beautiful Norma have not really changed much. You are still a happy looking couple. Did you store up a 30 year supply of Sugar Pops.

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    1. Arleen, I hope you won't think less of us but we didn't really like Sugar Pops very much. But yes, still happy.

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  6. Dear Geo.,
    You two look marvelous - now and then!
    Sugar seems to be the newly discovered evil for everything. I love "Sweets for my sweet, sugar for my honey" - in moderation, though. Will always prefer real sugar to the artificial version, real butter to artificial one, and real men to - oops!

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    1. Thank you dear Brigitta. Preference of real over artificial certainly seems to work well for you, "oops" included!

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  7. I certainly remember Sugar Pops, but I had completely forgotten about Sugar Pops Pete - - until you refreshed my faded memory. The world was a better place when real sugar was utilized. People were sweeter.

    I loved hearing the story of how you and Norma met. It was truly sweet. I couldn't imagine you being a grumpy person, Geo., but if you are - it's undoubtedly from all the artificial sweeteners that have lately been forced upon us.

    Norma still has the same sweet smile that she had in the older photo. And you seem to have the same expression, too. I'd say that neither of you have changed.
    That's a good thing.

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    1. Kind Jon, I get grumpy when I have trouble letting go of troubles.

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  8. "That's all I know about love......."? From the the photograph of you and Norma together, with you looking so pleased and proud, methinks you understate your case.

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    1. Most perceptive. I overgeneralize sometimes to wrap a post up.

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  9. Glad she finally consented to go out with you a year and a half later. Persistence pays off :)

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    1. I'm glad too, Keith. We made friends that day and let go of any romantic social pressures. It was years before we realized how much we loved each other.

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  10. Ah, the fifties. What a great time to be alive!

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    1. I had little choice in the matter but yes, it was a good time to live.

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  11. You and Norma are a beautiful couple
    Smiles Geo, I bet you can be very sweet just like sugar pops

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  12. I remember Sugar Pops and I'm impressed your wife kept that book that you wrote in!

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  13. Sweet couple:-) I could swear that Sugar Pops are still around...my kids ate them. I was fond of them, too, back in the days, but the Captain (Captain Crunch, that is) was always my main squeeze.

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    1. You got me curious so I checked with Wikipedia: "The name was changed to Sugar Corn Pops in 1978, and finally to Corn Pops in 1984, a time when many cereals dropped the word "Sugar" from their titles."

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    2. Yes, and probably high fructose corn syrup pops was not very marketable, anyways.

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  14. Like Delores, I had a "WHOA!" moment at you writing in that book. Dude, you could have at least used a PENCIL! HA! That was actually a very sweet thing to do, and I'll betcha her heart softened for you right then and there, whether she admitted it or not.

    Not a big fan of Sugar Pops, but I did like those commercials. Thanks for reminding me.

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    1. A justifiable "Whoa", Susan, and I am sorry about it, but suspect it stirred some sense of civic duty in Norma. It has taken her almost half a century but my reformation is nearly complete.

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  15. I love the before-and-afters! You are a great-lookin' couple, then and now. I love your how-we-met story.

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    1. Most kind Stephanie, I love it too --but still, I live in fear of the Library Swat Team surrounding the house.

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  16. I think that's a sweet "how we met" story. It has just the right amount of sappiness not to be too sappy!

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    1. Most kind. You describe a formula I am still working on!

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  17. Natural sugar... sounds familiar...

    I'm betting you're sweeter than you let on!

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    1. I confess, my glucose level falls within normal parameters.

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    2. It's a great origin story the two of you have.

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    3. Truth is, I recognized the quality of quiddity in her --the inherent ability to know what's what. She has since presided as my stabilizer. When she leaves, I chew holes in the couch.

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    4. I knew I met the right woman when I found myself wishing I were more like her. 15+ years later, I still do.

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