In the 1970s, most of my peers were fans and frequent watchers of Saturday Night Live. It was a golden era for the show, with actors who became heavyweight hitters in the entertainment business in later years. Steve Martin, Gilda Radner, Dan Ackroyd, and John Belushi were the regular cast and had a long stay on the show with many memorable skits.
Anyone who watched in that era must remember the famous Dan Ackroyd segment where he advertised the “Super Bass-O-Matic 76” blender designed to pulverize fish. The segment was so gross and bad that if you saw it, you could not “unsee” it. The skit is burned in your memory forever.
To those of us who appreciated the show in those days, the term Bass-O-Matic is real. We know what someone is referring to if they say the word. But unlike many strange terms that make it into Webster’s, Bass-O-Matic remains in the neverland of fictitious words. Ackroyd followed up the Bass-O-Matic with the Bat-O-Matic for mixing magic potions, but nothing topped the original Bass-O-Matic.
In preparing this recap, I was surprised by an interview I found with Dan Ackroyd, where he explained that the idea for the skit came from real events in his life. His aunt, Helene Gougeon, was a Canadian food columnist and writer. She ground up whole fish as an ingredient in dishes she served. Yes, fact can be stranger than fiction.
“After fishing all day, Jane just did not feel like getting out the Bass-O-Matic 76 and preparing dinner.”
“The fish tacos Jack made using the Bass-O-Matic 76 were tasty.”
Somehow, the word voluntold makes several dictionaries as a slang term, but it is not flagged by many spellcheckers. We have no idea how it can make the list when Bass-O-Matic does not, but it is there. This is obviously another example of a portmanteau using the words “volunteer” and “told.” The meaning is that you are told to volunteer for a task, making it an involuntary action.
“The Private was voluntold he would report for duty in Guam.”
Example of being voluntold by someone. “Attendance at the lecture is voluntary, but I told them you would be happy to attend.”
“My supervisor voluntold me to stay and clean up after the work was done.”
“My wife voluntold me to clean the Bass-O-Matic 76 after we cooked dinner.”
