Kermit the Roads Scholar ('Sesame Street' Wednesday)

Man, that Kermit the Frog thinks he's a Roads Scholar, doesn't he?

But he can never be a Roads Scholar - let alone a civil engineer.

That's because (like Oscar the Grouch) Kermit has no regard for the Manual on Uniform Traffic Control Devices - called the MUTCD by those in the know.

The MUTCD says stop signs "shall be an octagon with a white legend and border on a red background." The all-powerful Wikipedia says ordinary stop signs shall also be 30 inches across and that the letters shall be 10 inches high. You can have stop signs as wide as 48 inches but none narrower than 24 inches. Stop signs shall also be reflective.

But on 'Sesame Street', rules don't apply. It's anarchy!

Or at least it is when you hire Kermit the Frog as the neighborhood's civil engineer.

Kermit-made stop signs are not red and octagonal. They are green and square. And they don't even use a standard highway font:



(http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RDnoFDycKLo)

In that sketch, Kermit asks some 5-year-old kid what he's supposed to do if he's driving a car and sees a stop sign: STOP!!!

I think I had a shirt like that around the time I was in kindergarten, circa 1977.