My two toddlers were watching Sesame Street the other day.  I’m just happy when they stop playing Resident Evil. So I decided to sit down and watch one of my favorite childhood shows with them.  First off, I am first generation Sesame Street watcher, so I figured it would be some good family time.  Besides, I always try to put on a good facade when the social workers are “visiting.”

Remember, Prairie Dawn?  Not the eighties movie about some Ruskie invasion, the  Sesame Street character (I sort of had a crush on her when I was a kid), Grover, Bert & Ernie (their unique lifestyle never crossed my mind as a child), Herry Monster, Kermit, and best of all, Cookie Monster.  Has there ever been a kid who didn’t like Cookie Monster?  If so, that’s a diagnosable Axis II personality disorder in my book.  Every kid wanted to eat cookies like Cookie Monster did but, alas, most of us had supervision.

While watching Sesame Street with my two young daughters, I enjoyed the nostalgia of it all…that lasted about twelve seconds.  My viewing experience was dashed with one Cookie Monster segment.  Cookie Monster wasn’t eating cookies.  No skit where Prairie tries to keep Cookie from eating her letter C (don’t go there. This isn’t the Ghetto Shaman’s column).  No Cookie Monster semi-Socratic justifications that invariably lead to a cookie feeding frenzy, no cookie crumbs flying everywhere.  Instead, he was promoting carrots. 

CARROTS…!  Are you freaking kidding me?  Is he Bugs frigging Bunny? I was ready to bitch slap Michelle Obama right then and there. So I asked my daughters about this, and they said, “Don’t bitch slap the first lady, daddy.  She has a point.” 

So Cookie Monster only eats cookies twice a week, the other days he eats “healthy” food.   Excuse me?  Did I miss something here?  Isn’t his name COOKIE MONSTER?  Not Carrot Monster, not Celery Monster, not Cabbage Monster, not Corn Monster, or Henson forbid, Carrot Top…He’s the Cookie Monster!  Well, he used to be Cookie Monster.  Now he’s not half the Monster he used to be—maybe 2/5 or perhaps even 3/7 if you count re-reruns.  Although, maybe cookies are a gateway snack to harder confectionary treats…

Do the Sesame Street producers really believe that kids eat too many sweets and get fat and lazy because of Cookie Monster’s influence?  Really?  So I suppose his unique mastery of Monster slang butchering the English language doesn’t impact them at all?  I mean, if they are eating poorly because of Cookie Monster, wouldn’t it be fair to say their language skills are being impaired by him?  Seems we should clean up his language skills too.  Even as Alistair Cookie, his language skills need some work.  Elmo probably has a similar impact, as he talks about himself in third person consistently.  Of course, Elmo suffers from Dissociative Identity Disorder, or third person disorder (PC note: DID, also known as multiple personality disorder, is a serious mental disorder that impacts 6-10% of the population).  In fact, all of those characters probably need to be cleaned up a bit in order to improve society.  Yeah, that’s the ticket.  Let’s save our youth and treat our Sesame Street characters.   The Sesame Street producers should rethink the entire cast and do their part in reducing many issues in society.  Here are some of my ideas:

• Oscar needs to take a friggin’ bath, the dude is disgusting. He also needs to stop contradicting himself all the time.  Honestly, the guy is a Grouch, he is supposed to like being miserable.  It seems, though, that anytime someone does something nice for him, he absolutely hates that he hates it.  Shouldn’t he love that he hates it?  You’d think he’d want people being nice to him all the time so he could love to hate it.  Then of course he would hate that he loves to hate it, and so on.  He sounds like a fraud!
  
  (Treatment: life skills group and anger management classes.)
• Big Bird…fess up.  We know you really love to sneak out at night to fly over NYC and crap on things. Just admit it.  Get honest.  It’s all his pent up anger from the death of Mr. Hooper.
  
  (Treatment: grief counseling and psychotherapy to get over his anal stage).
• Bert and Ernie just need to come out of the closet and stem this homophobia tide.
  
  (Treatment: rent Priscilla Queen of the Desert.)
• Prairie Dawn really did want to be a porn star.  She had a tough childhood and it wasn’t her fault. And if she gets involved with the Governor of NY, it’s OK, she can still make a living from her appearances on Muppets Gone Wild.
  
  (Treatment: self-esteem building and Muppet empowerment classes.)
• It’s OK if Elmo needs to go see the Sesame Street therapist.  Millions of Americans do it, and we shouldn’t put a stigma on it.  He’s not fooling anyone anyway, with his DID and his own show called “Elmo’s World”, I mean honestly.  Clearly the dude needs help.
  
  
  (Treatment: one session with a wood chipper or similar APA approved device.)
• We all know that Snuffleupagus really is Big Bird’s imaginary friend, and that nobody else on Sesame Street can see him.  Just be honest with Big Bird so he can get some help.  He can even tag along with Elmo when he goes to the Sesame Street psych unit.
  
  (Treatment: Zyprexa, Zyprexa, Zyprexa.)
• We can all admit that Grover can’t hold a steady job.  Send him to some job counseling and give him a nice suit.  Just show they can become productive citizens.
  
  (Treatment: vocational rehabilitation.)
• Count von Count is a vampire and he drinks blood, face it.  And yes, PETA, that means some animals have to die.  It’s OK though, because maybe he drinks the blood drained from dead cattle in Chicago slaughterhouses.  See? It’s all good.
  
  (Treatment: cognitive behavioral therapy to treat his out of control OCD and some jail time for cruelty to animals.)
• It’s obvious to me that Herry Monster has a tumor impacting his Pituitary Gland.  Giantism is a debilitating condition, and it’s preventable.
  
  (Treatment: surgery and a Hollywood Muppet makeover session.)
• Gordon and Bob smoke dope, go to Mike Weir concerts, and support various hemp legalization lobbies. They have medical conditions.  Really.
  
  (Treatment: enough medical marijuana to stone the entire eastern seaboard.)

Today’s feature article was brought to you by “what the H!”  And the “I stepped in number 2.”