So Round, So Firm, So Fully Packed

The first time I heard the phrase “so round, so firm, so fully packed” was in this page of Tales of the New Teen Titans #3:


As you can see, the character that uses the phrase was NOT referring to cigarettes. Technically, he was referring to hot dogs. But this being 1982 and me being 13 years old, all that I remember about the phrase is that he used it to comment on his curvaceous team mate.



So, ever since then I’ve been thinking that the phrase refers to well-built women. Or… impossibly built women.

But now it’s 2012, and I’m … not 13 years old anymore. And I’ve been listening to Jack Benny’s radio show on the treadmill at the gym, as you all know. It’s 1948 in Jack Benny time and he’s been hocking Lucky Strike cigarettes for a couple of seasons now, having switched over from Jello. The phrase “So round, so firm, so fully packed, so free and easy on the draw” is pelted at me pretty regularly over the program. As is the phrase “LSMFT… LSMFT… Lucky Strikes Mean Fine Tobacco”. It’s really a case of repetition in advertising. They repeated the phrase so much that it became part of our cultural lexicon. Chances are you’ve heard of the phrase, even if you were ignorant of the origin, like I was in 1982.



As an experiment, I asked my Mother if she knew what ‘LSMFT’ meant when we were at the beach together last June. She rattled off “Lucky Strike Means Fine Tobacco” immediately.


Now… cigarettes aren’t being advertised on the radio or TV anymore. I don’t think it’s even legal. So it’s not as if my mother was exposed to the phrase recently. It was probably repeated so much on the television and the radio back in the day that it just became part of the cultural lexicon.


And chances are, in twenty more years it’ll be unheard of.


It’s kind of disconcerting to hear Jack Benny and the gang hock cigarettes like they do. And they have such fun while doing it. Don’t they know that’s considered taboo now? Don’t they know they’re promoting sickness and death wrapped up in a disgusting habit? Yet they go about it the same way as they pushed Jello on us a couple of years previous. The Jack Benny cast of my treadmill runs are COMPLETELY unaware that it’s 2012 now and we have different sensibilities.


Odd. So I think about that a lot.

Natch.

Thanks,
DCD