Waldo-Oh-No

Years ago, I created a point-of-sale and inventory system for a local bookstore run by a friend. Today, such software is off-the-shelf, but this was back when “Where’s Waldo?” was a bestseller. And as I was developing the software, I was privy to the daily operations of the bookstore.

One day, a very angry woman in her fifties or so came into the bookstore.

Lady: “You are selling obscene literature in your bookstore!”

The owner of the store had his Master’s degree in Theology from Cambridge and considered entering the priesthood at one time in his life. Under no circumstances would we be selling smut. Nonetheless, the woman grabbed a copy of “Where’s Waldo?” and opened it.

If you’ve been under a rock and never seen one of the many “Where’s Waldo?” books, the art style is roughly that of high-school doodling. What’s impressive is the sheer amount of it in full color filling about every square centimeter with cartoon characters. Finding Waldo on a double-page spread can take a sharp-eyed adult a few minutes.

The lady turned to a page in the middle where there was a beach scene with thousands of figures scattered over the pages. There, in a remote spot on the page, was a woman sunbathing face-down. A couple of bratty boys had splashed cold water on her, causing her to jerk up in surprise; there was a tiny bit of side-boob showing, and showing through her bathing suit was a nipple about the size of the period at the end of this sentence.

Owner: “We’ll warn people, ma’am.”

Lady: “You’d better.”

With that, she huffed out of the store. I don’t know if she was trying to defend the innocent adolescents of the world, all of whom have probably drawn something worse of their own.