N: Crotchety Old Crocheters (Reader Comments and Addenda)

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Note: An earlier version of #14 went: "Fourteen sophomoric, soporific supper songs that sound like this: [roughly to the tune of "The Mexican Hat Dance"] A crew of crabs with croup / Is cooking a cockroach soup / Lolita's lethal goop / Will make your gut loop-de-loop / Fibonacci's Apache hibachi / Manned by murmuring mad mariachi / Makes gazpacho that's bloated and blotchy / So I'll probably stick with dessert."

We've discovered that the original list may have derived from an enunciation test for radio announcers, but that may be a canard. Stay tuned.

(Last updated: 6 November 1997)

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One Response to “N: Crotchety Old Crocheters (Reader Comments and Addenda)”

  1. Jed

    Update: Wikipedia says that it did indeed originate as a radio announcer test, and that Jerry Lewis turned it into a performance piece, and many other people picked it up.

    Wikipedia adds, “One variant is known as the Tibetan Memory Trick and has been performed by Danny Kaye as well as Flo & Eddie of The Turtles.” Which explains why someone told us it originated as a novelty song.

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