There are a lot of people talking about sex on TV over the past week or so.  Even when I was a kid back in the stone age, there were some sexy babes on TV. You had to use your imagination a little bit more back then, but they were there. “Gilligan’s Island” had a couple, “Get Smart” featured the lovely Agent 99. Elly May Clampett could be counted on to occasionally show up at the cee-ment pond in a one-piece. “I Dream of Jeannie” featured a hot, subservient blond in harem-wear. Of course Major Tony Nelson was too pure and chaste to take advantage of Jeannie’s generously offered lovin’. If Roger Healey had found that bottle on the beach, the show would’ve never seen the light of day.

In this particularly graphic publicity still, you can just make out the hint of a navel. Oooh! I'm getting light-headed. (Image from fanpop dot com)

In this particularly graphic publicity still, you can just make out the hint of a navel. Oooh! I’m getting light-headed. (Image from fanpop dot com)

Now, a hundred years later, TV has a different kind of sexy. Billy Ray Cyrus’ daughter humps foam fingers as Alan Thicke’s son sings and Will Smith’s children watch in horror from the audience.  Talk about yer family entertainment!

Like old farts everywhere, I yearn for the good old days. Luckily, the internet is just as close to my fingertips as my steaming cup of Metamucil.  With a quick search, I can rediscover the hotties from the idiot box of my youth.

The internet is a dangerous place though.  I should have stuck with recording shows from TV-Land on cable.  With one ill-advised click of the mouse, I found Elly May.  Despite being older than dirt, or me for that matter, actress Donna Douglas has clung to her Elly May character.  For all intents and purposes, she looks like an octageniarian version, complete with the blond hair and country duds.  Luckily for me, in the photo I saw, she had ditched her daisy dukes and midriff shirt for Sunday-Go-To-Meetin’ attire.  Her love of critters looked to have morphed from an endearing trait to the reason she now has so many cats.  I had no intention of viewing the geriatric edition of my childhood fantasy, but the damage was done.  I clicked the back button on my browser before I burned any additional images onto my retinas.  Granny’s never going to find her a nice feller now.

The Elly May internet search should have served as warning enough, but I foolishly sought out a Barbara Eden image, only to find a video clip of her on some stage wearing her Jeannie costume at the ripe old age of 82.  Now don’t get me wrong, Ms. Eden looked great for 82.  Let’s be realistic though, looking great for 82 in most people’s minds means not being dead.  Seeing an 82 year old dressed like the sexy genie of yesteryear is not suitable for anyone except those with an insatiable wrinkle fetish.

Lesson learned.  It’ll be a cold day in Cocoa Beach before I do any additional searches for the sexy sirens of a bygone era.

There are some perks to being an old timer, and now I’m adding one more to the list;  I’ll be long gone by the time the video surfaces of Miley twerking with her fellow residents in the nursing home.  You kids out there have been warned.