Only the nose knows

In fourth grade I sat next to this girl named “Lucinda.” I’m giving her an alias so that I may mock her gleefully.

Lucinda loved my cartoons. While the other kids in class were hard at work practicing their penmanship and perfecting the ultimate spitball, I drew cartoon characters with grotesquely exaggerated features -- drooping eyes the size of bowling balls, mouths that could chomp the legs off a meerkat. One day, as I was toiling over various creations, I concocted a character with a nose so outlandishly huge it could double as a flotation device in the event of a transatlantic plane crash. It was shaped like a bratwurst and boasted a set of nostrils that dwarfed the wintertime dwellings of hibernating black bears.

At the time I had no idea that I’d still be drawing him a quarter century later.

Looking back, I have Lucinda’s obliviousness to thank for this. She wasn’t what you would call the swiftest boat in the fleet. Every day I would doodle and sketch an assemblage of random faces, horrid monstrosities who looked as though they had mutated in a vat of radioactive sludge. Every day Lucinda would glance at my notebook and ask, “What’s this character’s name? What’s that character’s name?” Always with the vapid stare of a lobotomy patient.

None of them had names. I told her this repeatedly. They were random, I insisted, nothing more than stream-of-consciousness distilled in pictorial form. She never internalized this information. As an overweight child with Coke-bottle glasses and a high-pitched squeal of a voice, I should have been thankful for any female attention I could get; even then it was clear my most trusted companions throughout adolescence would be a Nintendo controller and a bag of fun-sized Three Musketeers bars. But my nerves were starting to fray, Lucinda’s golden locks be damned.

So when I drew my big-nosed goofball and she asked me what his name was, I studied my sketch for a second.

“Nerdy Nose,” I said. “His name is Nerdy Nose.”

It was an easy enough name to conjure, if a little uncreative. He was nerdy-looking and he had a big nose. Nerdy Nose. Simple. As a naming strategy it had all the sophistication of looking at a crimson-bottomed snow monkey and calling it “Red Butt.” I spat it out primarily to get Lucinda off my back, but something strange and a little miraculous happened: It stuck. The simple act of naming him -- combined with his unique look -- gave him a kind of life, and before long I was getting requests from classmates to draw Nerdy Nose on brown-bag book covers, on notebooks, on soapy-smelling forearms. I felt like a rockstar, only I wasn’t riding a cocaine high and biting the head off a bat.

I still draw Nerdy Nose to this day, and with some regularity. He turns 25 this year.

Image drawn in Mario Paint, 'cause I'm that good.

Curious how we often define ourselves by our creations. Not that I would ever compare Nerdy Nose to iconic cartoon characters like Bugs Bunny or Scrooge McDuck, but surely they’ve become an everlasting part of the illustrators who drew them. Matt Groening will forever be trailed by the shadow of Homer Simpson; Jim Davis and Garfield are as interconnected as a parent to his or her child. Orson Welles has become synonymous with “Citizen Kane,” Michelangelo with the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel. At some point the creator and the creation become indistinguishable.

This isn’t something that’s limited just to traditional “art,” either. Maybe you build a house and come to think of it as your baby. Maybe you rebuild the engine to a classic car, or are known throughout the community as a master knitter of epically awesome scarves. Whatever it is, there’s something in most human beings that needs to be externalized, made permanent. Corny as it sounds, I think it’s spurred by an innate sense of mortality. We want to leave a trace, carve “I was here” into the tree bark while we can still hold the knife.

The same subconscious drive that inspired cavemen to draw bison on rock walls also spurred Kool and the Gang to write “Jungle Boogie.” That’s some wild, wacky stuff.

On a remote island in Indonesia is a site called Maros, home to some of the earliest known cave paintings ever produced by human hands. They date back about 35,000 years. Not surprisingly, these paintings depict animals, which makes sense when you consider that animals and geological formations were about the only subject matter available at the time -- no teapots or cityscapes, no frilly dresses, no melting clocks. There’s no residual evidence suggesting that these were dwellings, which means the paintings were just kind of left there, like an “I was here” message scratched painstakingly into the wooden bench seat of a picnic table.

Given the available technology and creature comforts of the time, it’s hard to know what would constitute evidence of a “dwelling.” The decomposing shells of La-Z-Boy recliners? They wish. But if it’s true that the site is more art installation than abode, that means the yearning to make a mark is quite literally prehistoric.

Which in turn means that all of our little creations, our mittens and folk songs and Nerdy Noses and Tweety Birds, are part of a lineage that stretches back before recorded time.

Whoa. Think about that the next time you bang out a doodle of a talking cow.

I don’t expect to ever run into Lucinda again, but if I do, I’ll have to thank her for unwittingly inspiring my inner caveman; she may never know the role she played in spawning my own humble mascot. Annoying at the time, perhaps. But 25 years later, it sure seems worth it.

Scout's dishonor

Note: Here's a column I wrote for the Journal Tribune last year, and forgot to tack up here. Consider it a "lost essay," only not lost, and an essay just barely. Enjoy!

 

In a way, I’m glad I was never a Boy Scout. I’m sure it’s a fine organization once you get past the chipmunk-colored uniforms and the homophobia, but there’s something about wearing a maroon ascot that’s a little too jolly for my tastes. I’d always feel like I was a pointy hat and a pair of leggings away from being one of Santa’s elves.

 

They have a good motto, though: Be prepared.

 

That’s what I’ve kept in mind while making a list of things to pack for my upcoming trip. For the next several days, I’ll be on a cruise ship bound for Bermuda, and the challenge now before me is to select which belongings to bring, while not toting anything that I’d mind being stolen by a preteen pickpocket in Oliver Twist garb. In my mind, every pickpocket looks like Oliver Twist and smokes Camels with a cigarette holder. Pretty sure that’s the uniform.

 

Human beings have this funny way of being attached to the objects they’ve amassed. As traits go, it’s fairly unique among creatures of the animal kingdom; bears don’t line the walls of their cave with ceramic cats and birthday cards, and rarely do you see a beaver sporting a shiny leather carrying case for his iPod. When you do, it’s usually a peyote hallucination.

 

People stand out in this regard – especially Americans, who have been conditioned by centuries of capitalist impulses to define themselves by their possessions. Our attachment to material things is rarely more evident than when we’re cobbling together trip accessories. Does one absolutely need to bring along that lucky cow skull discovered while riding a knock-kneed camel through the Australian Outback? Most certainly not, but there it is anyway, stuffed tight into a suitcase next to the fishing magazines and monogrammed toenail clippers. Its name is “Betsy” and guarantees you a winning hand at blackjack, according to legend.

 

Not to pull the curtain back and reveal all my tricks, but I typically bang out these screeds a few days in advance. By the time you read this, I’ll already be on the boat, assuming customs doesn’t stop me for carrying aboard a fossilized animal head. Right now, however, I’m sitting in a room making a list of essential bring-alongs. It’s like a who’s who of my stuff – essentials I can’t survive without for the duration of even one week.

 

Now right away, that’s something which sets me aside from the cave dwellers. Fifty-thousand years ago, the very concept of “essential items” would have seemed alien. It was the era of the woolly mammoth, so the only real must-have portable possessions were basic clothes, hunting implements, and the body’s own vital organs. As long as you had a spear and a spleen you were pretty much all set. Never did a Neanderthal plan a vacation and make a packing list, and especially never did he carry around a suitcase crammed with Cabana shorts and citrus-flavored Binaca breath spray.

 

We modern humans surround ourselves with various acquisitions – stereo systems, bath towels, shot glass collections and ear wax removal kits – and when we travel, we whittle these things down to an appropriate scale, our life in microcosm. We decide, more or less on the spot, what’s extraneous and what’s not. I can go for a week without the Ninja Turtle action figures lining my windowsills; they’re decorative (literally window dressing), and taking a break from them might actually make me feel like a real, live, adult man. I can’t, however, go a week without any implements for trimming my nose hair. Otherwise it looks like my upper lip is being attacked by a pair of giant paintbrushes. At some point, without my knowing, this became an important enough accessory to bring halfway across the Atlantic.

 

Sunblock will prove to be an essential item, especially with my skin. My pigmentation is so white that it mirrors the pristine glow of a faraway neutron star – which is great for pretending I’m sick, but no so much for spending any amount of time beneath a subtropical sky. In about four seconds I brown like a piece of toast; left unprotected, I burn up in about the time it takes for Barry Manilow to sing “Copacabana.” Tossing the Banana Boat SPF 30 into my carry-on bag is an easy call, but again, it’s hard to imagine a caveman looking up at the sky and thinking, “Hmm, it’s a long walk to the saber-toothed tiger’s watering hole. I’ll get crispy if I don’t lather up!” If present-day materialism has taught me anything, it’s that the human race has collectively evolved into a bunch of weenies.

 

Odd how we rarely examine our attachment to physical objects until we’re forced to go without them. For better or worse, our identities are tied up with our things – our favorite armchairs, our grandfather clocks, our frosted beer mugs etched with the likeness of Rita Hayworth. All of these things in aggregate may not equal a life, not quite, but they do provide a backdrop for one.

 

Let’s say the human race goes extinct sometime in the next few hundred-thousand years. (Not inconceivable.) From the ashes of our once-great global civilization arises a new, intelligent species: Giant otters with enlarged brain cases. These super-smart otters develop their own culture with their own vocations, and one day, an otter becomes a paleontologist and examines the ruins of your former home. He’ll learn a lot about you from what he discovers there. From your DVD collection, he’ll know that you enjoyed French war movies and, randomly, season six of “Cheers.” From your toiletries, he’ll know that you were obsessive about controlling armpit odor, and apparently had a difficult time quelling those itchy rashes.

 

Then he’ll stumble upon your suitcase. Recognizing it as a travel item, he’ll determine that its contents were the most important possessions in the world to this now-extinct human: a Super Mario beach towel, a Fodor’s Guide to Papua New Guinea, and a weathered deck of Star Trek playing cards.

 

Brow furrowed, our brainy otter will roll out his clipboard and jot down the following: “Definitely a nerd. Has all the hallmarks of either a sad recluse or a serial killer. Could have been both. Pretty well prepared, though. Must have been a Boy Scout.”

 

What's in a name

At the bathroom where I work, the toilet lids are made by a company called Sexauer. I’m not okay with that.

Obviously the good folks at this fine crapper supply company didn’t name themselves “Sexauer” to intentionally gross people out. If that had been their goal, they would have called their outfit “Poopums,” or “Take a Whiff!” But I have a very strict rule that I just now invented: No piece of porcelain on which I take my morning constitutional should have the word “sex” written on it. Sex should be connoted with nice things -- rose petals and bubble baths and the like -- not a bathroom stall that smells like it’s in the flamingo habitat at a petting zoo.

By all measures, it’s a perfectly fine toilet seat. (Although who could tell?) It’s just the name that’s unfortunate.

Good products can sometimes be doomed by bad names. Look no further than Hydrox for proof. Anyone remember Hydrox? If you’ve ever had an Oreo cookie, then you’ve basically had a better version of Hydrox that also is not named Hydrox. The cookie-filling-cookie configuration is so similar that only subtle variations in flavor and texture distinguish the two brands. And yet Oreos effectively drove Hydrox out of the market in the late 1990s. A lot of people thought Hydrox was a cheap knock-off, but it actually debuted first, in 1908, whereas Oreos hit shelves in 1912.

Hydrox was just reintroduced to the market this past September after a 16-year absence, but now it’s basically a nostalgia item, available only on Amazon and in the panic rooms of wild-eyed end-timers. It’s amazing the brand was revived at all. I mean … “Hydrox.” It sounds like bleach. Might as well dunk each cookie in a bucket of Clorox and be done with it.

You don’t have to be a marketing expert to know that a brand name should sound appealing to the consumer.

Yet astoundingly awful monikers abound. Granted, many of these terrible brand names are for products sold in foreign countries; shoppers in Thailand, for instance, may not immediately recognize how disconcerting it is to buy a bag of kitty treats called “Frenzied Cat Meat” (a real product), or a case of bottled water called “Zephyrhills” (also real). But some names are just too wacky, gross, or outright shocking to merit any kind of excuse.

The following are totally real products being sold somewhere on the planet Earth as we speak: an ice cream called “Asse”; a beverage called “Pee Cola”; “Lemon Barf” laundry detergent; “Boudreaux’s Butt Paste”; “Colon Cleaner”; Starburst hard candies named “Sucks”; “Only Puke” soup crackers; “Golden Gaytime” ice cream bars; and the topper, pork on a stick called “Mr. Brain’s.” And those are just the ones that can be printed. Maybe.

You’d have to be trying pretty hard to make a worse first impression with consumers. Maybe there’s an underground club of company CEOs and marketing executives secretly trying to tank entire product lines. We may be on the verge of seeing sports drinks named “Captain Booger’s Jock Phlegm,” or craft beer with a label reading, “Imminent Liver Failure.” Actually, I’d probably drink that one.

Perhaps these seemingly hapless companies deserve our sympathy. After all, it’s really only been over the past 100 years or so that corporate brands have emerged as national and global entities. In 1900, it was inconceivable that developed landscapes in first-world locales would be pockmarked with Coca-Cola billboards and star-bright storefronts proudly displaying Nike’s trademark “swoosh.” Heck, in 1900 you didn’t even buy Nike shoes. You killed a beaver and tied its skin to your foot with baling twine.

Most companies that existed back then were local, so names were less of an issue. All you had to do was call your product something that appealed to those consumers living within a 10-mile radius of your “headquarters,” which was probably a small downtown shop with at least two elderly gentlemen playing Canasta at a corner table. It could be the goofiest product name in the world, and it would sell because it fulfilled the needs of the local populace -- “Tim Crotchhugger’s Miracle Toothpaste” or something. “Asshat Acne Cream.” And so on.

Look at what’s happened in the intervening century. Nothing’s local anymore. The common plea of “Buy local!” arose because buying local is becoming almost impossible; civilization has rapidly shifted from isolated pockets of people to an interlinked web of communications and commerce. Names matter more than ever, because it’s exponentially easier to expose a product to a national or global audience. The world is the new downtown shop, and old men are playing Canasta by the millions.

Which means “Lemon Barf” probably isn’t going to capture a large slice of the laundry detergent market. Wild guess here.

Look at various industry leaders and you’ll see catchy appellations that are snappy, simple, and stick in one’s brain. Snickers, a candy bar that sounds as delicious as it tastes. Pringles, forever associated with packaging its chips in cardboard tubes designed for tennis balls. Wranglers, which sound like denim jeans worn by men who kill bears with their hands. Those are names, dammit.

The Sexauer people are lucky in a sense. Unlike candy bars and soda, toilet seats are an essential product, and there can’t be too many companies out there making them; there’s not enough variation from one seat to another to justify a lot of market competition.

That doesn’t mean I have to be comfortable with it. Fortunately I don’t have to look at their logo very much since I’m generally sitting on it. That helps. It allows me to envision what a toilet seat would be called in a world where gross doesn’t exist, and eyebrow-raising nomenclature is but  a fantastical dream.

“Bob’s Butt Clouds.” Just imagine the luxury.