Many years ago, when the Designated Writers were far less sophisticated and erudite than you know us to be now (it’s a sliding scale), we often found ourselves in the Louisiana Tech print shop in the basement of Keeny Hall. There was a student worker there who was a typesetter for the Tech Talk and we often invented reasons to work along side her.

She was a very attractive redhead and basically just put up with us and our rampant immaturity. In addition to possessing the qualities often prized by the superficial male, her name was Sylvia. I never knew her last name, but I can still see her today, typing away to help get the paper printed.

Naturally, we constantly asked about her “mother” because of the song from the early 1970s. (If you don’t know the reference, you can stop reading now.) It was one “Sylvia’s Mother” joke after another and either one of us would have probably married her if she had just given us the time of day.

I thought of Sylvia from long ago when I got the good news and the bad news last week about the artist who brought us that classic song.

The bad news is that Dr. Hook passed away at the age of 81.

The good news, at least for me, is that I won’t have to get Dr. Hook and Dr. John confused anymore since only one of them is still alive.

Dr. Hook, aka Ray Sawyer, is probably more known for “Cover of Rolling Stone” and “When You’re In Love With a Beautiful Woman,” but it’s “Sylvia’s Mother” that knocked it out of the 8-track park in the early ’70s.

It left us with so many unanswered questions. Among them:

(1) For the love of God, why wouldn’t Mrs. Avery just put Sylvia on the phone for a second?

(2) What’s the operator’s problem? You’ll get your “40 cents more for the next three minutes” in a second. Just chill.

(3) Galveston? Sylvia really thinks it’s going to happen for her in Galveston? Has she been listening to too many Glen Campbell songs?

As it turns out, the song was autobiographical — there actually was a Sylvia whose mother had put the kibosh over the phone to some poor boy — and makes me smile to this day.

And if you run into our Sylvia from those Tech days, let her know that the Designated Writers still need some type set. We are just too afraid to call.