Miss Rabbit and Happy Jammy Toast

Some BBC shows have had an outsized impact in our lives, in terms of how frequently we tend to refer to them

Some pieces of fiction can have a much more lasting impact on your lives than you would have initially imagined. And this is especially so with children’s fiction, given that you tend to read and re-read, or watch and re-watch them.

For example, when one of us is feeling especially heavy after a meal (or meals), we remark that we “need a nice green leaf”, in reference to Eric Carle’s classic The Very Hungry Caterpillar. Here are two more examples, which are rather common in our house, from less famous sources.

Miss Rabbit

If you were to think of it, Peppa Pig, while being rather entertaining (we loved watching it, when Berry was small, at least. Not tried it yet with Billy), is a rather misogynist show.

The only adult female in the series who works is one Miss Rabbit - basically none of the mums work. There is this episode where the Rabbit children (Rebecca and Richard, I think) are playing at home and have left around some toys. Miss Rabbit trips on one of them, hurting her ankle. The episode is about how her sister “Mummy Rabbit” tries to step in to her various jobs, and fails miserably.

In our house, “Miss Rabbit” is now a term that refers to any toys that are left strewn around (recent happenings means this has become much more common nowadays). Last night, for example, after the kids had been put to bed, I told my wife “I’ll clean up the miss rabbits” (referring to all the toys strewn over the floor all over the house). This morning I stepped on a toy car and screamed “miss rabbit”!

Happy Jammy Toast

This is even more niche, buts come from another BBC series “Bing” (given that we were in London in 2017-19, we enjoyed all these CeeBeeBies shows - now hopefully we can find more of them on YouTube). Like a good TV show, the makers have decided to cash in on the franchise and make books also. And a friend had gifted us one of these books back in early 2017, soon after we had moved to London.

In this book, Bing, assisted by his “nanny” (or some claim is is alter ego) Flop, decides to make a surprise for his mummy. Among other things, he wants to make a “happy jammy toast”. The toast gets burnt, and Bing just covers it up with jam saying “I’m sure this will be very yummy”.

In our house, “happy jammy toast” now means something is burnt. The other day I was making banana pancakes (the second most common breakfast at home nowadays) for the kids. Some got caramelised a bit too much. “Happy jammy toast”, I announced, as I served them to my daughter (even though I hadn’t bothered to cover the char with jam). She demolished it anyways.

Ganeshana Maduve

In two weeks’ time it will be Ganesha Chaturthi. Our ritual for the day is to watch Ganeshana Maduve. My wife and I have each watched it enough times that we’ve mugged up most of the movie (though each time we watch it we find a new nuance - the hallmark of a great movie). Our daughter has started to get there.

If someone goes to the loo too many times in succession, or is dozing off while eating, they are called “parameshi”, after a character in the movie. Another friend, who keeps saying “let’s discuss this over beer” has been nicknamed “shastri”, after Ramesh Bhat’s character who gives ideas in exchange for beer.

And of course, there have been scenes in the movie that have been far more impactful in our lives - we have made important nomenclature decisions based on them!