What rolls down stairs?
Alone or in pairs?
Rolls over the neighbor's dog?
It's great for a snack, it fits on your back,
It's LOG, LOG, LOG!
It's Log, it's Log, it's big, it's heavy, it's wood!
It's Log, it's Log, it's better than bad, it's good!
Everyone wants a Log!
You're gonna love it, Log!
Come on and get your Log!
Everyone needs a Log!
Log was a running gag on the 1990s cartoon show, The Ren and Stimpy Show. The show ran on Nickelodeon from 1991 through 1996, and was brought back on Spike TV for a brief stint from 2003 to 2004 as Ren and Stimpy: Adult Party Cartoon, finally touting the show's appallingly off-color humor and subtle references as aimed at adults.
Log was, in fact, the very first bit to be shown on Ren and Stimpy, before the characters themselves. Each episode of Ren and Stimpy had two long plot-driven segments, as well as a bunch of short vignettes. In the first episode of the first season ("Stimpy's Big Day/The Big Shot"), before the Stimpy's Big Day segment, there was an advertisement for Log, the greatest toy that's ever been made.
What is Log? Log is…a log. You can dress it up, roll it around, take it on adventures, even try to eat it. Of course, since every Log bit was a whizzy commercial with no real content, we're led to believe that Log is, in fact, a very boring toy. But that's not really the point, is it?
Log showed up several times on the show, with new outfits (Space Log), audiences (Log for Girls), accessories (Nature Log). After John K. left the show in 1993, and production shifted from Spümcø to Games Animation, Log bits stopped appearing in the show. They did not reappear in Ren and Stimpy's final run on Spike TV, when John K. had creative control again. In a way, I'm glad; the show was fairly well played out at that point, and lacked a lot of its original sharpness (much of which apparently came from the constraints put on the writing and animation): had Log returned, there's no guarantee that it would have come back as funny as it was.
Log is a fairly straightforward parody of several toys. The most obvious target was Slinky, a similarly simplistic-seeming toy. In fact, the Log song is a satire of the Slinky song:
Who walks the stairs?
Without a care?
Shoots so high in the air?
Bounce up and down, just like a clown,
Everyone knows it's SLINKY!
…
It's Slinky, it's Slinky, for fun, the best of the toys!
It's Slinky, it's Slinky, the favorite of girls and boys!
Of course, plenty of other toys were involved in the satirical arm of Log. The Pet Rock is one, for the way in which its advertising suggested that it did a lot more than it really could. Barbie is another, for the constantly-rotating wardrobes that children were required to buy for her. And, of course, Log was made by Blammo, a take-off of Wham-O, the company responsible for the hula hoop and Frisbee.
Here's a list of episodes with Log bits. Enjoy.