Mad about Mad
The photo above is of three delighted new subscribers to Mad magazine, courtesy of me. They arrived home from whatever it is they get up to during the day — who knows? could be anything — and found this surprise waiting for them alongside stacks of bills and mail appeals intended for their parents.
Who are those parents? They are my niece and her husband. Which makes these three my Great Nephews. Used in this way, though, the term may be misleading — I think they’re really pretty good, but “Great” seems like overstepping — so better to say that I’m their Great Uncle. (Much better.)
Why did I buy them an unsolicited subscription to Mad magazine? To ruin their youth, that’s why. Mad magazine has been a thumb in the eye to parents for 60 years and counting, and I’m proud to help continue that tradition. (That, plus I got a great deal on gift subscriptions.) Look again at the burst of excitement etched across their faces. I wish I could go back in time and do it again! It’s sure to be pandemonium in that house for quite some time.
It’s not just my niece I’m bedeviling with my mischief. Here’s a photo of another happy new subscriber, who was also surprised with a subscription that began on the same day:
Clearly, the derangement took hold immediately. (The leering Mexican demon masks in the background of the photo can’t hold a candle to this lunacy.) Here’s another shot from the same milieu, taken later that night:
No video games in sight. The Usual Gang of Idiots must be proud. Later, I saw this boy’s adolescent-anxiety-drenched sister reading this copy of the magazine, and then when I went looking for it later it was gone. I found out that my wife had taken it to read at work. Where does she work? She’s a respiratory therapist. At a hospital. (I have visions of patients dropping like flies while co-workers struggle to do the Mad Fold-In.) Seems everyone in our family is mad about Mad.
January 30th, 2013 at 5:50 am
Simply beyond comprehension, generation after generation watches
the slow tearing away at the fabric of civilization – simply by the placing
of a Mad Magazine into the hands of a ten-something boy, Uncle Rich being
exemplar in the highest.
I can remember grabbing a hold copy of Mad belonging to my brother Bob,
and that copy literally snatched from my hands, and had the Riot Act read to me
by my rather Catholic mom. But that singular exposure nearly 50 years ago was all that was needed. Another life ruined, along with scores of others, it would seem.
The look in eyes of these guys (especially in that first photo un-staged photo) is only a foretelling of the mayhem they will deliver in the future – complete and utter bedlam. Lee’s gift is ingenious,
old world technology still reaching out to wreak havoc more effectively than
any i-Pad or video game. I fully realize that these active little minds are going to pay into my Socialist Security in the decades to come! Wrap your age-addled heads around that!
February 9th, 2013 at 5:19 pm
[…] this a vision of those boys’ […]