Now for my important life threatening topic...cartoons. I've been seeing a drastic decline in the quality of the cartoons made lately. Let's take some examples: Antiques, such as 'Bugs and Daffy' are not being produced as much as they have been in the past, if at all. Remember getting up on Saturday and rushing downstairs at the crack of dawn and listening to the national anthem on the TV as they showed pictures of fields of wheat, mountains, tractors in the field, etc. And what came right after that? CARTOONS! YESSSA! I do, those were some of the most productive moments in my life, for it is one of the major factors that went into producing my personality. The only cartoons back then that sucked were the 'Tweety vs. Sylvester' (I hated that bird), and the 'Road Runner' cartoons, the exception being the cartoon where Wile E Coyote talked to the audience, it blew me away! I was viewing a rare moment in cartoon history. Instead of those little signs that said "ouch" or "uh oh", he was actually talking, to ME. All these years of him just acting as if we didn't exist or that we were only good enough for the signs, he finally thought I was ready to hear his genius plans! I LOVED IT! Where was I? Oh yes, those were great cartoons. Another great antique cartoon was 'Scooby Doo'. That was, in my opinion, the best cartoon series ever produced, despite having the same ending every time. The monster always ended up being old Mr. Smitty, the janitor, who used a simple slide projector and some red tape to produce a band of ghost pirates to scare away people from the factory so he could mine the gold secretly hidden under the floorboards by the real pirates long ago! The ending lines go something like this:

Mr. Smitty-...And I would have gotten away with it too if it weren't for you kids...and that DOG! Scooby- Scrooby Rhooby Rhooo! Shaggy-Hey! Where'd my sandwich go? Scooby- HeeHeeHee. *Sigh* That was some great cartooning there. Then we had the late 80's/early 90's cartoons such as Garfield & Friends. I LOVE THAT CARTOON! I loved some of the songs they used to do, such as Roy Rooster singing "I win, You lose", if you don't remember it let me refresh your memory: "HA-HA-HA-HA I gotcha, you lose I win, HA-HA-HA-HA, I gotcha and I'll get you again! Etc." Anyone? Hello? *Silence. * Anyway, these were better than the antique cartoons because they actually changed their plot once in awhile instead of having the same cat going after the same bird over and over again. You'd think the cat would learn to go for a dumber bird. I mean come on, when a bird has a head that big you know he's storing some brains up there. Where was I again? Ahh yes, the quality, basically these cartoons were of the finest quality produced, in my opinion. Around this time period they also produced cartoons like Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. I would bet that if you went up to anyone 16 or older and sang "Teenage mutant ninja turtles, turtles on the half shell..." they would reply back "TURTLE POWER!" That was a cool show because it had a higher level of violence than Sylvester or Wile E. could come up with, I used to want to be Leonardo (the one with the swords). I'd just be chilling and then *WHOMP* Krang would come up from under the earth with his minions: Shredder, BeeBop, and RockSteady. Then my buddies and me would kick some bad guy butt. Of course we would never just kill them, we'd let them scamper away to build another monster-earth-destroying-machine-of-doom, 'cause otherwise we would have no more show to be on. Sorry, where was I? Oh yeah, anyway, that was about the end of the really good cartoons, afterwards they started making shows like Catdog, Spongebob Squarepants, and The Mask. These cartoons have no point whatsoever, which wouldn't be a problem if they were entertaining, but they're NOT, they're just boring and irritating. Instead of learning valuable lessons such as always suspecting anyone named Mr. Smitty, especially if he's old and hate dogs; they are providing us with mindless drivel about a cat and a dog genetically fused at the butt. I mean, how much can you learn from that?!? There isn't even one four-foot tall mutant nun-chuck wielding character in it, what's up with that?!? Just so you know, I have in fact watched at least three episodes of each of those shows...and then I puked. So don't think I'm passing judgement on cartoons I haven't even seen. What's my point? My point is that we should go back to the 70's and 80's cartoons that have taught me so much. Note: I specifically left out cartoons such as Ren and Stimpy, Southpark, etc. because they are in a different category since they are geared towards adults.

Eumenids note: What happens when Catdog needs to go to the bathroom?  I think Raven clad forgot one entertaining cartoon these days: Dexters Laboratory.  The Cartoon Network also shows some nice violent ones in the afternoon, if you go for that japanese artwork.          TURTLE POWER!