June 20, 2010: Helter Skelter

When I get to the bottom
I go back to the top of the slide
Where I stop and turn
and I go for a ride
Till I get to the bottom and I see you again
Yeah, yeah, yeah

Catchy, but what the hell are they talking about?

It is from an old movie about some sailor who meets his wife after the Great war, they meet at the lonely hearts club, and the main character says how helter skelter things where getting.


However, it is neat to know what a helter skelter is.

The Cellar: You only realize life is all helter skelter once it has gone all pear-shaped.

Tora - Helter Skelters were around long before talkies.
The phrase meaning things going badly might have gained popularity from a film, but the British meaning has always been rgis type of spiral slide.

I loved helter skelters as a child. They're your first experience of the throll that adults get from rollercoasters. I have an early memory of being on holiday and going down on my Dad's lap, followed by my sister going down on Mum's lap. Mum had to slow them down because Laura was frightened. I was encouraging my Dad to go faster! faster! I would have been 4 at the most, as my brother was not yet born.

You go down on a mat btw, not just sitting on the slide. It's not smooth either, like one in a playground. It had treads on it, like a wooden escalator. I assume this speeds you up. And you used to pay by mat, hence our doubling up.

Helter skelters aren't just for kids either. Certainly when I was younger a lot of adults went on. This might have changed now that fairground/ theme park rides have moved on.

There was one in Great Yarmouth Pleasure Beach that went down into a huge wooden underground bowl. We stood for what seemed like hours just watching the riders spill out into it. We didn't have the money to go on it ourselves, but I remember just watching seemed eventful enough.

Neat, I wonder where the oldest one is and for that matter where the first was?

Mmmmmmmmmmmm...phallic.

how odd. I have never heard of or seen that. I just thought it meant all--chaotic.

While doing added research, here is a modern indoor helter skelter.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/arti...n-seconds.html

Trust the Hate Mail to inject a completely pointless dig into the article

Pretty interesting. Common people separated by a language or something like that...

This is fantastic Bruce! Thank you for clearing up this mystery for me. Now I must clearly repost!

A helter skelter could have saved the people on 9/11

But then again if you skelted down 100 floors, you'd be going so fast by the bottom that your ass would be on fire.

Aiyyo, don't wear polyester down the tube thing, man, it melts. Yeah man yesterday some guy burned his nads on that thing.

It's not truly a helter skelter, but there's an old elementary school here that still has emergency exit slides coming down from most rooms on the second floor. Never seen anything like it on any other building.

Never seen one of these before. Wouldn't you know it, last night watching the tube, there was a show about US beaches. They trotted out some movies of Venice Beach before LA annexed and ruined it,(like everything else), and there in the background was exactly one of these helter skelters!!

IotD does it again!

Quote:

Originally Posted by Undertoad A helter skelter could have saved the people on 9/11 But then again if you skelted down 100 floors, you'd be going so fast by the bottom that your ass would be on fire. Aiyyo, don't wear polyester down the tube thing, man, it melts. Yeah man yesterday some guy burned his nads on that thing.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Clodfobble It's not truly a helter skelter, but there's an old elementary school here that still has emergency exit slides coming down from most rooms on the second floor. Never seen anything like it on any other building.

I'd seen films of those cloth escape tubes. Do you have to go one at a time, or can it hold multiple people? Like links of a sausage.

Well they never let me go on it so I can't say, but I think it would have to be one at a time.
On the other hand, this was Japan, so they are probably pushed down in a solid mass that takes on self-organising structures as it goes and automatically directs itself to the officially designated assembly area.

On this particular elementary school, they are permanent and hard-sided, just like a playground slide. I think there must be a grate and lock system at the bottom to keep people from climbing up it the wrong direction.

But they are probably sized for Japanese people, not you big Australians. Wouldn't that be embarrassing?


I wonder if you would have flashbacks to being born.

Quote:

Originally Posted by HungLikeJesus I wonder if you would have flashbacks to being born.