[Meredith Bergmann]

To return from the sublime to the ridiculous for a moment, we used to sing:

It's raining, it's pouring
The old man is snoring
He went to bed with a hole in his head
And he didn't get up in the morning

which made no sense. Many of these seem to have been improved, though, by aural misunderstanding. There's a collector of misunderstood lyrics whose site is fun:
http://www.sfgate.com/columnists/car...degreens.shtml

[Seree Zohar]

I remember this one:

I one a horse
I two a horse
I three .... etc etc until the child who was OUT was the one who got to say: I eight (ate) a horse...

[VictoriaGaile]

Meredith, I learned a more sensible version as a child:

It's raining, it's pouring,
the old man is snoring:
Bumped his head when he
went to bed and he
didn't get up in the morning

Obviously, the man had a concussion...

[Catherine Chandler]

Here's 1 I remember skipping rope to:

Fudge, Fudge,
Call the Judge
Momma's got a brand-new baby

It's not a boy
It's not a girl
It's just a plain ol' baby!

Wrap it up in tissue-paper,
Send it down the elevator,

Third floor, Stop!
Second floor, Stop!
First Floor and out the door!!


Catherine



[This message has been edited by C. Chandler-Oliveira (edited March 08, 2006).]

[Terese Coe]

Rhymes for "choosing up sides":

One potato, two potato,
three potato, four

five potato, six potato,
seven potato, more.

[So the eighth person was always counted out. The last person in was "it." Oh, the relief we felt not to be IT! And while this counting rhyme went on, everyone's hands had to be placed in front of you in a cylinder as if grabbing a vertical pole; one hand goes behind your back when it's marked out, until the next one is marked out and then you're out.]

An infants' and toddlers' hand game:

Round bally, round bally,
Pull Jilly's (any name there) hair!
One slice, two slice,
Tickle under there!

(In the above, the first line requires making simultaneous circles in the child's palm; the second, a slight tug on her hair; the third, a pretense of making slices in her forearm; and the fourth, tickling her under the arm.) Pretty vicious, but the youngest ones don't seem to notice; they're too busy giggling. I think we picked that one up in Utah.

"A my name is Alice" was slightly different in Brooklyn (it should be mentioned most syllables were shouted out while singing):

A my name is Alice,
and my husband's name is Al!
We come from Alabama
to bring you apricots!

[Julie Steiner]

[EDITED to group the innocent chants at the beginning, and the offensive ones at the end. An essay explaining why I chose to include the offensive ones appears a few posts down in this thread. Original post, re-organized:]

I'm late to the party, as usual, but I can't believe that no one's mentioned these yet:


The thumb wrestling rhyme:

One, two, three, four,
I declare a thumb war.
Five, six, seven, eight,
Try to keep your thumb straight.


Never-ending scripts:

"Pete and Repeat were sitting on a fence.
Pete fell off. Who was left?"
"Repeat!"
[Somewhat exasperated] "Pete and Repeat were sitting on a fence..." etc.

"I know a man."
"What man?"
"The man with the power."
"What power?"
"The power of hoodoo."
"Who do?"
"I do!"
"Do what?"
"Know a man."
"What man?"
etc.

"That's life!"
"What's Life?"
"A magazine."
"How much does it cost?"
"Ten cents."
"I only have a nickel."
"Well, that's life."
"What's Life?"
etc.


Counting rhymes:

Engine, Engine Number Nine,
Goin' down Chicago Line.
If the train should jump the track,
Do you want your money back?
Y-E-S spells YES and you are not IT!
(or)
N-O spells NO and you are not IT!

Bubble gum, bubble gum, in a dish.
How many pieces do you wish?
1,2,3...and you are not IT!

Inka, binka, bottle of inka,
Cork fell out and YOU STINKA! (Meaning, you're IT.)


Favorite hand-clapping rhymes:

Lemonade. (clap clap clap)
Crunchy ice. (clap clap clap)
Sip it once. (clap clap clap)
Sip it twice. (clap clap clap)
Lemonade,
Crunchy ice.
Sip it once,
Sip it twice,
Turn around,
Touch the ground,
FREEZE!

Down by the banks of the Hanky Panky
Where the bullfrogs jump from bank to banky
With an EEP! OPP! RIBBIT! FLOP!
Watchin' the bullfrogs go ker-plop!
[There were many variations on the third verse.]

=================================================
OFFENSIVE RHYMES

Sung to "A-Hunting We Will Go"

My father is a German,
My mother is a spy,
And I'm the little blabbermouth
Who told the F.B.I.

My father is a butcher,
My mother cuts the meat,
And I'm the little hot dog
Who runs around the street.

There were many, many verses on this theme--I'm sure some of you know more of them.

Staring contest chants, in order of ascending cultural insensitivity:

THIS!
Is a VER-y!
SER-i-ous!
GAME!
[Chant faster and faster, in ascending pitch, while staring into each other's eyes, until someone breaks eye contact or smiles.]

My name is
Owl-Eye, Owl-Eye,
Chicken-Eye, Chicken-Eye,
Pom-Pom Beauty,
Don't Like Whiskey,
Chinese, Japanese,
Indian CHIEF!
[At "chief", each kid crosses arms in front of his chest
and stares into his opponent's eyes. First kid to blink,
look away, twitch, or laugh is the loser.]

My mother's Chinese.
[Each contestant pulls outside corners of own eyelids down.]
My father's Japanese.
[Outside corners of eyelids pulled up.]
I'm Chin-apanese.
[Each contestant pulls one eyelid up and one eyelid down, and staring contest begins--same rules as above.]

The latter rhyme lost all its luster for me when my schoolmates started using it (and the last quatrain of "Not last night but the night before," provided below) to taunt my best friend, Tamiko Kobayashi. Political incorrectness does have nasty consequences!


The jump-rope rhyme of choice:

Not last night, but the night before,
Twenty-four robbers came knockin' at my door.
As I ran out, [turners keep turning rope as jumper runs out]
They ran in. [jumper runs back in and continues jumping]
Hit me o'er the head with a rolling pin!
I asked them what they wanted, and this is what they said:
Chinese dancers turn around, [jumper turns around]
Chinese dancers touch the ground, [jumper touches ground]
Chinese dancers do the splits, [jumper does straddle kick]
Chinese dancers GET OUT OF HERE, QUICK! [jumper runs out]


The fact that my friend Tamiko wasn't Chinese was lost on the bullies, who would chant the final four lines while they turned her around, threw her to the ground, etc., while I ran like hell for an adult authority figure. Adult authority figures move slowly, though, and they never made it back to the scene of the crime in time to catch anyone in the act. Although I was happy to identify the perpetrators, no one was ever disciplined because "you kids need to work these things out yourselves."

The bullies also had the following equal-opportunity nasties at their disposal for tattlers like me.


Songs of insult and humiliation:

Look up.
Look down.
Look round and round.
See my thumb?
Gee, you're dumb.

The following taunt was chanted not only in cases of accidental underwear exposure, but also when a wedgie had been administered. For the uninitiated, a wedgie is an upward yank on the back of someone's underwear, so hard as to wedge the garment in the victim's butt crack.

I see London! I see France!
I see someone's underpants!
[or]
Teacher, teacher, I declare!
I see someone's underwear!

[followed by the appropriate couplet for the color of the witnessed garment]

It might be blue, it might be white!
It might be full of dynamite!

It might be pink, it might be blue!
It might be full of doggie doo!

It might be white, it might be pink!
It might stink!

Your underwear's on fire! [Cue vicious wedgie]
Now it's out.

[Sung to some vaguely Middle Eastern tune]
There's a place in France
Where the ladies wear no pants,
But the men don't care,
As they show their underwear. [Cue vicious wedgie]


===========================

All right, I've been typing as fast as I can for two hours now, but it's time to stop. I warn you, I've got much more of this nonsense rattling around in my head. Golly, the camp song parodies alone...okay, one more:


"My Bonny Lies Over the Ocean"
My bonny has tuberculosis.
My bonny has only one lung.
My bonny can cough up raw oysters
And roll them around on her tongue.
Dentyne, oh Dentine, oh where do you get your coloring?
Dentyne, oh Dentine, oh where do you get your color?


Julie Stoner


[This message has been edited by Julie Stoner (edited March 29, 2006).]

[Marcia Karp]

Julie,

One consequence of having behaved badly when young might be to consider from then on the price of future behavior. This thread is a nice memory romp; not much poetic sensibility here, but every discussion need not have it. Is it worth joining in the fun to once again not be aware that not everyone finds stupid racism to be acceptable? Political incorrectness is a lying use of language -- a use that people who are concerned with language and how it can be used to distort might challenge; a more accurate description of your rhymes might be hateful.

You post is not the first on this thread that has moved me to reply and I mean this for the others, too. The child you were behaved self-centeredly and unthinkingly; he or she isn't my concern. Where is the adult who can acknowledge now that once again you haven't considered how others might feel, not about how PC you are, but about being treated as invisible or about seeing others treated that way? A wagging finger at your younger self doesn't show any real understanding. There are ways to discuss the nasty rhymes, but I've yet to see them here.


Marcia Karp

[Julie Steiner]

I hope my previous post is appearing for some of you, because despite reloading the page several times I can't see it. Anyway, I woke up with a few more items lodged in my head.

Never-ending script:

[First, kids assign each other numbers based on ages.]
"NUM--BER-- ONE stole the cookie from the cookie jar."
"Who, me?"
"Yes, you!"
"Couldn't be!"
"Then who?"
"NUM--BER-- TWO [or another number] stole the cookie from the cookie jar."
etc.

Hand-clap chant:

[If two players, they stand across from each other; if more than two, they form a circle. Each "double" is a clap. Each "this" is a patty-cake slap against neighboring players palms. Each "that" is a slap of the backs of the hands against neighboring players' palms.]
Double, double, THIS! THIS!
Double, double, THAT! THAT!
Double, THIS!
Double, THAT!
Double, double, THIS! THAT!
[It gets faster each time until someone messes up.]

Julie Stoner

[Robin-Kemp]

I also knew the "nigger" rhyme mentioned earlier as "tiger" and was absolutely scandalized to read the racist version. But I started school in 1969 in freshly-integrated New Orleans.

There, both black and white girls together (for the only enforced segregation was by gender) played clapping games set to rhyme, such as:

My mama told me
If I was goody
That she would buy me
A rubber dolly
My auntie told her
I kissed a soldier
Now she won't buy me
A rubber dolly
Ohhhhh...
3,6,9,
The goose drank wine,
The monkey chewed tobacco on the streetcar line
But the line broke
The monkey got choked
And they all went to heaven on a little rowboat
Clap, clap!

The kids began to self-segregate by race about third grade, to the dismay and curiosity of the parents. It must have been something we picked up on from the scary principal, who called white kids "son" and black kids "boy," and the bitch secretary who left my black friend Angie sitting in her own pee on a paper bag in the office. My mom, the Brownie leader and PTA person, came in and found her, and took her home to change. Turned out Angie was diabetic. The old hag had always made sure I got to change out of my wet ones.

Robin

[Kevin Andrew Murphy]

Originally posted by Marcia Karp:
Julie,

One consequence of having behaved badly when young might be to consider from then on the price of future behavior. This thread is a nice memory romp; not much poetic sensibility here, but every discussion need not have it. Is it worth joining in the fun to once again not be aware that not everyone finds stupid racism to be acceptable? Political incorrectness is a lying use of language -- a use that people who are concerned with language and how it can be used to distort might challenge; a more accurate description of your rhymes might be hateful.

You post is not the first on this thread that has moved me to reply and I mean this for the others, too. The child you were behaved self-centeredly and unthinkingly; he or she isn't my concern. Where is the adult who can acknowledge now that once again you haven't considered how others might feel, not about how PC you are, but about being treated as invisible or about seeing others treated that way? A wagging finger at your younger self doesn't show any real understanding. There are ways to discuss the nasty rhymes, but I've yet to see them here.


Marcia Karp

Marcia,

Actually, "nasty" rhymes are the ones about excrement and possibly sex. For example, one I learned on the playground, from the little girls:

MILK
MILK
LEMONADE
Round the corner FUDGE is made.

This is done accompanied by pointing at one breast, then the other, then the urinary tract, then the anus.

I gleefully showed this to my mom when I got home, and while she was appropriately scandalized, she was mostly shocked that when she was a girl in Germany, she'd learned:

MILCH
MILCH
LIMONADE
und der CHOCOLADE

My guess then (and still) was that the rhyme had started with a German source, since it rhymes better.

Those are NASTY rhymes.

Racist rhymes might characterized as "hateful," but hate is a rather strong word, especially since it's very hard to actively hate something you don't understand. But it's very easy to be mean.

Trouble is, being mean is one of the underpinnings of comedy, being able to laugh at someone else's pain. You can do the schoolmarmish "That's not funny" line, but as for lying uses of language, that's another one, because if people are laughing, that's the earmark of something being funny and all the pursed lips and disapproving stares in the world are not going to stop the giggles.

People make fun of people because it's fun to be mean. Whether it's socially acceptable is a matter of context, both of who's hearing it and how mean you're being. The general dividing line between "stupid racism" (your term) and socially acceptable race-based jokes is a matter of context. In current day PC-land, you're allowed to make fun of your own group and any group who historically persecuted your group.

Related to that are the jokes making fun of stupid people, ignorant people, and people with unfashionable accents which is cousin to more socially-acceptable terms of denigration such as calling racism "stupid." Of course, making jokes about stupid ignorant hicks is crass if done by college-educated citified intelligentsia, but Jeff Foxworthy can make a career out of Blue Collar TV.

Saying "This is so polically incorrect" *GIGGLE* isn't so much a lie as it is a verbal clown suit or jester's hat, a signal that the speaker isn't speaking as himself but in persona as the clown or fool, the character all societies devise some version of to allow them to say things that would ordinarily not be spoken in polite society (but everyone is thinking) and likewise to be able make fun of SOMEONE without a purse-lipped schoolmarm coming in and saying, "How dare you be so insensitive to CLOWNS! Don't you know CLOWNS are people too? Imagine trying to escape Clownistan with your whole extended family packed into a Mini-Cooper!"

Something nobody has touched on other than to say, "We used to say THIS, now we say THIS" is the fact that the bunnies, monkeys, tigers, angels, devils, clowns, jesters and assorted race-unspecified children are all interchangeable with any racial word which fits the metrical scheme. I think, as mature adults, we should be able to report which particular racially insensitive variant we learned as children, and what currently socially acceptable variant we've passed it on as.