Wallaby Wednesday: 17 more signs of a Rocko devotee

Wallaby Wednesday hits another milestone, as this edition brings the column up to 17 installments in total.

As this author acknowledged when this space broke double digits, 17 is a magic number in the Rocko’s Modern Life chronicles. In a cathartic coincidence, the same 17-year gap marked an important banana’s isolation in a fridge and Rocko, Heffer and Spunky’s outer-space detour. Then again, maybe the fates brought the lost O-Townies home as a reward for Filburt’s children freeing the fruit.

Like the first list of this kind, the release of our second scroll of 17 signs of a Rocko fanatic come amidst a similarly protracted wait for the saga’s resumption. TV audiences’ wait for a new adventure sits at 23 years, five months and change.

As of this posting, there is still no official word on Static Cling. The question of the TV movie getting the banana’s rightful release treatment keeps teetering between when and if.

Because of this continued uncertainty, the itch is liable to manifest itself more intensely among the show’s loyal viewers. On that note, if any of these actions or propensities sound like you, count yourself among the restless Rocko devotees. This way you can explain yourself to perplexed bystanders who helplessly don’t get it.

1. When faced with the choice of an escalator or staircase, you play the voice of “Granny Rocko” in your head.

2. In an honest Freudian slip, you once referred to the Boy Scouts or Cub Scouts as the “Weasel Scouts.” Or maybe more than once.

3. In another honest Freudian slip, you have referred to the late actor Joan Crawford as Joan Crawfish (or Crayfish).

4. You can only think of Bloaty and Mr. Icck when you see the clip of Mary Richards mistaking her supervisor’s scathing statement, “You’ve got spunk,” for a compliment.

5. Before embarking on a fishing outing, you suggest using cheese in lieu of live bait. If that is the case, you are either not thinking things through or hoping to encounter an anthropomorphic giant squid.

6. Upon hearing of a real-life ButtMaster exercise product, you second-naturedly chanted, “And a one! And a two!” (As it happened, the real-life workout equipment came to prominence circa 1995-96, one year after Rocko and Heffer’s go-to choice of paid programming became a recurring gag.)

7. Any sighting or mention of lima beans elicits a comically horrified scream from you. For those who are not Rocko devotees but want to know the signs of one, should see the 1:56 mark of this video.

8. You have visited Detroit and left feeling unfulfilled because you could not find the Toe Jam Towers. Either that, or you spurned the idea of checking out Motown to begin with, knowing no such landmark exists.

9. Whenever #powertrip trends on Twitter, you can only think of Rocko’s Smitty-esque moral downturn.

10. When you hear about an upcoming TV airing of Sausage Party, you ask yourself when you last saw “Wacky Delly.” And if you ever get a chance, you will ask Seth Rogen if he has seen that show. “The first season, that is. Before that new guy ruined it.”

11. When ordering meatloaf, you request a “spongy, yet firm” texture and pineapples for “a festive touch.”

12. Since 1994, “Love Shack” has, at best, taken second place among your ranking of the top B-52s songs.

13. Any time you pass by an Elks Lodge, you wish you had a pair of twigs in handy. Maybe if you glued them to your head, they could pass as antlers and get you into the club. Furthermore, when someone quotes Daffy Duck’s “I am elk, shoot me!” tirade, you kindly ask, “Don’t you mean, ‘I’m an elk! I have antlers!’?”

14. After studying Kubla Khan in an English class, you decide to pen a ballad on Mortimer Khan for your free-rein creative project. Samuel Taylor Coleridge’s poem about the palace of Genghis’ grandson is an undeniable classic. With that said, you feel someone should write of Genghis’ forgotten son, why he is forgotten and who he blamed.

15. If you still prefer models like Sansui TVM1315 over HD flatscreens, you affectionately call your TV set Mr. Sensible.

16. When you are in a state of undress and no one else is in your residence, you channel Heffer’s jail-cell whimper. For that matter, the same goes for when you notice Discovery is showing Naked and Afraid.

17. You are wary of granting anyone’s request for a high five. That is until you remember the Quarnozian High Five of Death is a misnomer. The creators and doomed recipients of the gesture only have four digits on their fingers. By that logic, a high five should still be innocuous in this world. Shouldn’t it?