One of my favorite skits on Saturday Night Live occurred eons ago. I can’t recite it verbatim, but the gist of it was that Steve Martin and Bill Murray were tourists (or maybe in Murray’s scruffy context, a bum) who can’t figure out what they’re looking at. The whole skit consisted of the two of them staring into the camera and asking, “What the hell is that dang thing? What’s that doing here???”
Martin was resplendent in white-man tourist couture: loud Hawiian shirt, khaki shorts and an utterly lost expression on his face. Murray wore several days’ worth of fuzz face and a scruffy white tee shirt or sweat shirt. His lilting slur was pure Groundhog Day.
Their audience never saw whatever it was they were looking at, so we didn’t know what the hell it was, either!
This is not a repeat of that skit. For each of the following images, please try to figure out what it is. The answers are below. No fair peeking!
Item A:
- Dryer fluff
- A theatrical beard, the kind attached with spirit glue
- An unusual patch of threadlike fungi
- Fake pubic hair
- One piece of an ear for what will eventually be a new Muppet.
Item B
- A Man
- A Woman
Item C
- A fire hose attachment for piercing walls
- The internal burner mechanism from a military flame thrower
- A Victorian era sex toy
- A fuel injector for a jet engine
Item D:
For this one you get a hint, sort of. This is something worn by Lady Gaga.
Is it:
- A necklace
- A pair of thong underwear
- A cleric’s collar
- A wardrobe malfunction
► Answers after the jump
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Answers:
Item A: #4 – A pubic “wig”. It’s called a merkin. While merkins were first used by prostitutes who shaved their genitalia, there are now versions available in a wide array of colors and styles, for both men and women.
Yeah, I looked it up. Maybe I was just unbearably naive, but I not only didn’t know what a merkin was, I reacted with a hearty, “Ewwww!” at the whole concept.
Item B: Trick question. This is a picture of a hermaphrodite. After a stint in Desert storm, an MRI showed he possessed ovaries and a uterus. So technically speaking the answer is #3 – both. (From the National Geographic website)
Item C: #1 – A piercing fire hose nozzle. It could be used to pierce a wall, ceiling, airplane skin or other similar surface.
As to whether it may also have been used as a sex toy, who knows?
Item D: The answer for this one is that I don’t know the answer! The answer may be none of the above, or all of the above. Is it Gaga’s idea of a necklace? Is it a backwards clerical collar? Did Gaga have a brain fart moment and trade her ass for her boobs? I don’t have a clue, so leave it for you to decide:
As for what Lady Gaga is, I also leave that for you to decide.