Noodle Ode
Earthworms'
Castings
By Jean Ponzi
This
summer husband Dale and me are celebrating eight great years - of
the FunNoodle in our circle of friends.
We were
newlyweds in '95, on a steamy midnight Schnuck's date, stocking up
together for a big annual summer party. Cruising the store in festive
bliss, we rounded the end of the "seasonal" aisle and halted
at a boxed display of multi-colored foam tubes. Dale seized a pink
one and I grabbed a blue and a fierce, waggling battle ensued. Out
of the detergent aisle charged Jay Schober, co-host of the KDHX "Brain
Sandwich" and a former professional wrestler of note (Insane
Abdul Hussein), yelling, "Break it up now, that's enough you
two!" So we pulled green and yellow ones from the box and whapped
him into frozen food.
I read
the box in the afterglow. "FunNoodle - The Floating Water Toy."
In a high, dry leap of faith, we splurged and bought four.
Our noodles
were the hit of that summer party, winning dozens of buoyant friends.
You could lounge on them, ride them - shallow or deep. Their elegant,
slender five-foot length was the Italian chair of flotation design.
At the
next big party, on the Fourth of July, a rainbow of noodles bobbed
in the lake. Inner tubes were abandoned, black do-nuts on the shore.
FunNoodles in the big time, Wal-Mart, were a product line to rule
the waves.
A FunNoodle
requires no assembly, needs no source of power. Though they're not
official safety devices, I've watched swimmers at all levels of ability
gain confidence with noodle aid. They come hollow, solid, ridged or
smooth, and the average noodle can support 260 pounds of flesh!
I have
packed a noodle off to summer conferences, lithe and mobile, curved
into the end of my suit bag. During afternoon breaks in a hotel pool,
I can perch on my noodle with ends in the air, one hand and a novel
and the other hand's beverage held safely dry above the water.
Many
times I've exclaimed, astride my noodle, "I hope whoever invented
these got really rich!" But who was that hero of civilization,
and what's the unsung noodle story? In the wake of this year's summer
party, I dove into noodle lore.
A couple
of online research hours washed up no clue. Inventors of that closed-cell
polyethylene foam seemed less open to publicity than their product
is to air and water. I roamed a world marketplace of Water Logs and
Pool Noodles, but no proud company claimed ownership.
Fitness
proponents hailed the noodle's "added resistance for strengthening
and toning" for baby and kid classes to therapy with arthritis
patients. Web reviews around the country praised one Karen Westfall
and her noodle's "phenomenal abdominal workout" ($21.49
for 47 minutes, but no guarantee the videocassette is waterproof).
Aqua-aerobics sites detailed noodle maneuvers to slap your splashing
heels while jogging, "sitting on the noodle (like a pony), sitting
tall, shoulders back, traveling forward," and "to cool down,
on our sides, noodle under back and arms: Mermaids (light flutters,
scoop over and do the other side) then Esther Williams (long, slicing
legs using hip flexor and gluts)."
Product
variations were abundant noodle spawn. The Original Noodle Chair,
while fully stitched (no loops to break) requires 1 noodle (not included),
and The Amazing Noodle Lounger is fun for ages 8 & Up to Cool
Off Effortlessly! in purple or red. Noodle connectors floated complex
building plans, or you could have "Fun-In-The-Sun, just noodling
around."
An article
from the August 12, 1995 Raleigh News & Observer finally named
the founders of FunNoodles, in a business section profile. Nomaco,
Inc., of Zebulon, North Carolina, extrudes those cylinders from a
specialty niche in the "foam profile" industry, but their
noodle power is international. Nomaco is not only part of a manufacturing
group based in Belgium, the U.S. and United Kingdom, with marketing
partners throughout Europe and North America, they are "The Recognized
Leader In Engineered Polymer Foam Technology."
Nomaco's
name never appears on its products, not even the fabulous FunNoodle,
made in partnership with Kidpower in Brentwood, Tennessee. Kidpower
is elusive too. Except for the option to check on your order, their
website is a single, watchdog page that growls, Our customers know
who we are.
Nomaco
makes Nomafoam ®, an extruded, closed cell thermoplastic (low-density
polyethylene) foam, "so versatile you can cover, float, insulate,
play, protect, ship, and wrap with it..." into automotive and
gardening products and into toys. CEO Marc Nöel is quoted on
their website by a photo of a pile of grinning kids playing in a colorful
mountain of noodles. I'm sure those noodlers are really rich, and
it looks like they're also pretty happy.
And FunNoodle-making
waste gets recycled! Twenty-six grades of LDPE are listed in the plastics
section of recycle.net, an industry waste exchange. While it's true
we consumers can't take old noodles out to curbside in recycling bins,
noodle durability is green built-in. My family's four original noodles
are still floating strong.
So noodle
away, summer fans - 'tis the season to be floating - on an acme of
human invention, one great use for petroleum.
Perhaps
some future researcher will unearth a vivid, linear, closed-cell relic.
She may happily whack a fellow explorer, then test it's powerful buoyancy.
May she ponder, with cold drink in hand, the civilized mystery of
FunNoodles.
Jean
Ponzi hosts the environmental talk show "Earthworms," Tuesday
evenings, 7-8 on FM-88 KDHX St. Louis Community Radio. Summer is her
favorite season, and her favorite noodle matches her swimwear.
