Teevee

My parents were never as into TV as me and my brother.

There is a famous story in my family about when my brother was about three.  He was outside playing on his wee plastic motor-bike and mum called him inside.  He kept saying, 'I can't!' and refused to come inside.  This worried my mother slightly.

But turns out he was copying a scene from CHiPS and yelling out something akin to 'I'm stuck in the glue!'



I remember growing up on Play School.  My favourites were always Barry (not sure why - google tells me he is now a lawyer).   http://www.andersonlloyd.co.nz/barry-dorking/

I also liked Little Ted, because I was a Little Sister, I imagine. 

My memories of the 80s are mostly of a strange mixture of macho late-night action shows and Tiger Beat pre-teen family comedies.  Once we had our bath and got into our jammies, me and my brother would be allowed to stay up and watch the 7.30pm action show; Rip Tide, Simon and Simon, McGyver, Magnum PI, Knight Rider.  My brother always liked the underdog character, the sidekick who got beaten up a lot.  So while he liked John Baker, I was left to like the more arrogant alpha male, the Ponches and the Han Solos (in the film world).  Such is the lot of the Little Sister, complementing the favourites of the Big Brother. 

I think Cody (right) from Rip Tide was one of my first crushes.  My first crushes were odd.  Another one I remember was Ray from Ghostbusters.  The theme song from Rip Tide really shows it all; short shorts, pretty ladies, jet-boat chases, a giant pink helicopter, a robot, dodging bullets.  All you could want from an 80s action show.  Are they the pre-cursor to the current spate of bro-mances?  Bro-mances with actual macho men?  Minus the self-aware need to express their loyalty to each other?



Then, in the daytime I'd watch My Two Dads and Full House and Growing Pains and TV101 (with a young Matt Le Blanc).  My family would humour me.

Sundays were the strangest of times in TV Land.  They were the day where Dad would take us out on adventures in the Austin Maxi, apple picking at the orchard or taking bamboo to the dump or taking the dog to the river.  But then if we tuned in some time in the late afternoon we would find gems.

Monkey Magic.  For years we couldn't remember what this was called and we thought it was akin to strange fragmented flashbacks from an LSD trip and we may have just made it up (though we didn't articulate it quite like this). 



We even confused it in our memories with the similar Sunday afternoon show, Tales of the Golden Monkey.



I'm sure our parents preferred TV1 and some British fare.  But to us the more exciting music and exaggerated accents and bright, saturated colours of American TV was superior.  I remember playing Summer Games on the C64 and usually picking to represent the US (or whoever had a nice anthem) and I would call my competitors 'Joey', 'JJ' and 'Leroy', which were the most American names I could think of.

Oh.  That brings me to The Greatest American Hero.  He may have been one of my brother's all-time favourites, being a completely hapless hero.  In my memory this was on Saturday morning.