Rinky Dink

 I’m really good at connections rounds on quizzes. It’s my brain’s fault. It just doesn’t let me stop. It thinks to itself, “There must be some way I can file everything in the same drawer.” My brain, as a filing clerk, would be the the one that told you that Fred Smith’s notes were the the B drawer for blacksmith, next to Susan Field because she always wears black.

After writing about Peter yesterday I fell down a bit of a rinky dink rabbit hole. This was after I realised that there was no such thing as a goat-monkey, which was quite disappointing, although if you check the internet it seems as though monkeys do quite enjoy riding a goat.

Before I left the house my daughter looked up rinky dink because she also thought the worthless definition was wrong. As she’s young and trendy Urban Dictionary told her that it meant handsome, cute and cool cool from the Romany word rinkano, which means good looking. Why does the Urban dictionary give a different answer depending upon the age of the person googling?

“See, I was right. I knew it couldn’t be what you said because didn’t Velma say it on Scooby Doo?”

I wasn’t sure but tried to Google as I walked out the door. I wouldn’t be able to explain. 

“I’m sorry I’m late but I had to find out whether the phrase rinky dink was used in the Scooby Doo cartoon.” 

I couldn’t find it in the time I had but I did discover that Velma’s surname was Dinkley. I didn’t know they had last names and then the coincidence of the Dinkley name felt serendipitous. Maybe she did say rinky dink.

I told my colleague about the co-incidence. She had been trying to get another (senior management) colleague to slip the word into a collective worship, so is also heavily invested to find the answer.

“What? They have surnames? That’s mad,” she agreed.

When I got home, I checked: Shaggy Rogers, Fred Jones, Daphne Blake and Velma Dinkley but Velma’s catch phrase was “Jinkies!”

I still had the nagging feeling that rinky dink was a good thing, in a cartoon and maybe a song. I found a recent children’s song by Andy and the Odd socks called Rinky Dink Doo (she’s coming for you) about a little superhero, which I have noted for future superhero lessons but that wasn’t what I was thinking of.

As I lay in bed, my mind refusing to switch off until it had replayed the whole day, checking for embarrassments and errors that it could use to keep me awake, it came to me. At lunchtime, after we’ve served the children their dinner in their class bubble we put on a film. Most of the classes love Pink Panther cartoons, which are on YouTube - free and in full and I suddenly remembered the theme tune. 

Think of all the animals you’ve ever heard about, Like rhinoceroses, tigers, cats and mink, There are lots of funny animals in all this world, But have you ever seen a panther that is pink? Think! A panther that is positively pink.,

Well here he is Pink Panther, The pink panther, Everybody loves  panther that is pink, He really is a groovy cat, A gentleman a scholar and an acrobat.

He’s in the pink Pink Panther, The rinky-dink panther, And it’s the plain as your nose, That he’s the one and only, truly original, Panther pink from head to toe!

That’s settled then. Rinky dink means ‘cool’, just like the Pink Panther.