Big Comfy Bong: the story of
inappropriate children’s programs.

&

By Jay Schreiber

he other day, a friend of mine
was babysitting his sister’s two

kids and after dinner, he decided
to turn on the boob tube and keep the
under five crowd occupied with flashing
colours and moving pictures. He picked
up the remote, turned the TV on and
changed the channel to the children’s
network where a beloved show, The Big
Comfy Couch was on its afternoon slot.

After something flashy on the
television caught my friend’s eye, he
quickly found himself glued to the glass,
with his jaw on the floor. What he had
come across was a cast member of the
Big Comfy Couch blowing bubbles
out of what appeared to be a bright red
bong, and a fairly sizable one too!

In Vancouver, pot talk and items
such as pipes and bongs are a common
social topic but are kept that way
because nobody makes a big deal out of
it. Iam not one to shoot down anyone’s
beliefs but sometimes you must draw
a line. Upon hearing about this bong-
sighting, there were several possible
conclusions I pondered up about why an
item such as this would make it into a
children’s program.

The first answer is that it was a total
and complete fluke, and that the bubble
blowing device resembling a bong
was an accident. If this was the case,
most of the cast probably had to keep
themselves from laughing at its likeness.

The second conclusion is that it
was a prank played by some of the
stagehands and the actors to some
degree. This is more likely, and while
I’m surprised it made it past exit proof,
this conclusion is the easiest one to
believe.

The most logical explanation for
what looks like a major TV slip up
is that everyone who works on the
set of The Big Comfy Couch is an

     

outright stoner. That’s right; from the
guy working the boom mike to that
mailman on a unicycle, everyone on that
show is on freakin’ reefer. My friend
kept watching for any other signs of a
420-friendly cast. He even spent time
scanning the credits look for Mark
Emery or Michael Phelps. No luck, but
still, it’s the only answer that makes
sense if you think about it.

Let’s examine the facts. The dust
bunnies murmur to each other and have
secret little adventures underneath the
cushions of the couch. The grandmother
has a bright red nose and if that’s not
a hallucination, then she’s just an
alcoholic. Substance abuse... tsk tsk.

The house seems to have crazy
parties that at the end of the episode
nobody can recall, leaving the main
character to clean everything up. How
often does that happen that parties take
place and you’re knocked right out
because you decided to get blitzed along
the way? Put down the blunt, Loonette,
you need to take better care of your
place.

Tell me this: who other than a
bunch of potheads sitting in a room and
contemplating children’s programming
could come up with the idea of a comfy
couch? That idea didn’t seem to need
any back-up, the couch was to flat-out
be the main character, and the clowns
were superfluous. To be fair, that was
their backup plan, TV execs just didn’t
go for the first pitch, a show called The
Big Bag of Doritos.

Whether a cruel joke or a simple
slip, I think it’s important to spare
children from the information they
don’t need to know yet. I’m not pro-
censorship; I just think that the media
could do a better job in keeping things
a little more age appropriate. After all,
how often do you see five-year-olds
sparking up a blunt?

  

Burd.

 

 

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