Friends, are you tired?  Run down?  Listless?

Do you poop out at parties?

Are you unpopular?

The answer to all your problems is in this little bottle – VITAMEATAVEGAMIN.

Vitameatavegamin contains vitamins, meat, vegetables, and minerals.

Yes, with Vitameatavegamin, you can spoon your way to health.  All you do is take a great big tablespoonful after every meal.  Mmmmmm…it’s so tasty too!  Tastes just like candy!

So why don’t you join all the thousands of happy, peppy people and get a great big bottle of Vitameatavegamin tomorrow!

That’s Vita-Meata-Vegamin! (wink)

So reads the script Lucy Ricardo was to recite in her Vitameatavegamin commercial.   She grimaced at the first taste, and was then required to do re-takes.  After quite a few takes, the taste grew on her to the point where she began to like it and started taking bigger and bigger gulps.  The problem was that the potion contained 28% alcohol, and with every spoonful, her speech became more and more mangled.  Our beloved Lucy became quite inebriated.

This episode, Lucy Does a TV Commercial, remains one of the top TV episodes of all time.  The premise that wannabe-starlet Lucy becomes a sloppy drunk is classic, and of course, Lucille Ball played the part of a drunken housewife in only the way she could.

But Lucy wasn’t the only sitcom female that unwittingly got tanked.

In Mayberry, Aunt Bee was looking for a little pick-me-up, and was sold a few bottles of elixir from the travelling medicine man.  The “medicine” was supposed to fix her ailments and put a spring to her step.  In fact, it did, because it turned out to be 85% alcohol.  It worked so well, that she shared her stash with all her church lady friends, and Andy came home to a bunch of cackling hens, singing ”Toot, Toot, Tootsie, don’t cry”, as Aunt Bee played along happily on the piano.

Andy’s reaction?

“That stuff of the Colonel’s that supposed to purge the body and lift the spirit…actually, what it does is give you a buzz.  The Colonel calls it “elixir”.  Other names are “hooch”, “booze”, “happy water”, “old red-eye”.  In other words, ladies, you got gassed.”

That Andy always was a bit of a party-pooper.  Then again, he had a big job in front of him, being the sheriff in a dry county full of moonshine and bootleggers.  Perhaps it was a good thing that he came to Aunt Bee’s rescue though.  After all, she could have become one of the moonshine ladies.  Or worse yet, she could have started partying with Otis, the town drunk, and ended up in Andy’s jail cell.

Maybe it was Granny from The Beverly Hillbillies who had the right idea.  She WAS her own medicine man, mixing up her own “spring tonic” back in the hills in a hollow stump.  Her marketing strategy was to position her concoction as a love potion that would make people get hitched, and it seemed to work, if but temporarily.  Granny’s elixir was said to be so potent that she had to bottle it quickly or it would eat right through the pot.  Now Granny apparently had little success finding her own love match with her stash, but she was quite energetic at such a ripe old age, so there may be something to this health benefit thing.

But all this makes me wonder…where are those feel-good tonics from yesteryear?  I’m tired, run-down, and listless.  I’m actually sick and tired of being sick and tired.  I need help for my aches and pains, and long for a spring in my step.  And like everyone else around me, I’m still trying to beat this sinus thing from a couple of weeks ago.  A Z-pack just doesn’t always do the trick.  And Nyquil is over-rated.

Furthermore, I long to be popular, and I sure as hell don’t want to poop out at parties.  If my husband comes home to find me belting out show tunes with the church ladies, then so be it.   And if Granny was still around, I’d definitely have her number in my speed dial, as I’m sure her spring tonic may be exactly what I need from time to time.

Yes, I know there are stores with big red dots sprinkled throughout suburbia.  Spirits are all around in the form of breweries, bars, and beer coolers.   Furthermore, any woman can walk into a doctor’s office and return with prescriptions for Xanax or Prozac in efforts to feel good, remain stable, and generally reduce the bitch factor.

But it’s just not the same.

I want the old-fashioned cure-all tonic endorsed by the sitcom women of yesteryear.  I need a spoonful or two of that stuff that will make me forget about my woes, while preserving my pretense of being a lady…all under the guise of good health and well-being.  I want to be able to walk out on Main Street on my lunch hour and pick up a few bottles of elixir from travelling medicine man who doesn’t feel the need to share the ingredients in the bottles he’s selling.  Then I want to be able to place one of those bottles proudly on my desk, take a swig when I feel the need, knowing that I’m helping society by not strangling someone on a given day…all while retaining employment.

If I could take matters into my own hands, I would, but I feel pretty sure the homeowners’ association would go “Pow, Pow, Pow” if I had this in my backyard.

So it looks like I’ll just have to stick to the Nyquil, Z-Packs, Mucinex, and vitamins.  Unfortunately, the FDA takes their job quite seriously, and truth in advertising has put an end to the miracle elixir days of the past.  These will just have to be good ol’ days I can  appreciate only through the magic of reruns.

Where’s the Vitameatavegamin Girl when you need her?

If you liked this post, you might like What Happens At Bunco Stays At Bunco.