Buick asks us to imagine a world....

...in which people have a set idea of "what a Buick looks like," and the NEW Buick "shatters" their expectations of "what a Buick looks like."

I'm here to clue you in, Buick.  Nobody knows what a Buick is "supposed" to look like.  That's because nobody cares.  And nobody cares that you are desperately trying to grab our attention by putting out a series of cars that look like pretty much every other car out there.

"That doesn't LOOK like a Buick?"  Uh-huh.  Nice try.  If it makes you feel any better, Buick, people aren't stunned at the idea that KIAs have four doors, either.  The only thing that stuns us about KIAs is when we see models more than two years old still on the road.

Cheerios- never miss an opportunity to miss an opportunity

I hear conversations like this between "parents" and their children all the time- kids asking questions, "parents" going out of their way to not answer them in a way which might make their kids just a little smarter.  The kid in this commercial is not being especially annoying- he's not bleating "can I have it can I have it" or "whats that" or throwing a tantrum or anything.  He's asking his father why he is picking a particular cereal.

Hey, dad- that really, really loud knock you are hearing?  That's opportunity.  Here's a chance to share.  Here's a chance to give your kid some information.  Some of us call these Teachable Moments.   I'm not a parent, but I was a kid, and I know these Moments come up only about 4000 times a day.  And from my experience out in the public, I also know that they are ignored about 3999 times a day.  You seem pretty determined to avoid doing anything to help your kid understand why you are buying that Cheerios.  I wonder why.

Instead, you respond with half-sentences delivered in a monotone which sounds like nothing more than "stop talking to me."  "Why did you buy that?"  "It's my cereal."  "Is there a prize?"  "Yes."  "Is it a dinosaur?"  "No."  It's like you are allergic to the idea of providing information to your kids.

And this is something else I witness a lot - parents who instead of answering questions insist on having the questions asked again and again AND AGAIN until everyone within twenty yards is grinding their teeth wishing they could work up the guts to answer for them.

I heard this question at my local Shoppers Food Warehouse just TODAY:

"Why do we need to buy bread"
Parent:  No Response.
"Why do we need to buy bread"
Parent:  No Response
"Why are we buyin' bread?"
Parent:  No Response
"Why are we buyin' bread?"
Parent:  "To make sandwiches for your lunch."
"Oh ok."

(Seriously, do you morons think we are in love with your kid's voices, or what?)

Ok, back to this commercial.  Instead of the cryptic smarmy "there's a prize all right," how about talking to this kid about how some foods are healthy and make us feel better and live longer, happier lives?  You know, instead of this non-informative crap about prizes?  I mean, anytime you want to start actually RAISING that kid instead of just making sure he doesn't play in traffic until he's 18 and can kicked to the curb would be fine with us.  Moron.

Oh, and by the way- when there's someone behind you in line, scan your own goddamned groceries and don't let your kid do it, unless you are actually willing to show him how and not just to let him fail for ten minutes before you mutter something in disgust and do it yourself.   We have lives too you know.

Oh shut up, Martyr Mom

Here's some advice for this woman- when you nail yourself to that cross, bring a friend.  It's a pain in the butt to get that last spike in.

Seriously, lady.  You've got diabetes, but you've also got a husband and kids and a big house which means you are always on the go Doing Everything For Everyone Else so it's Really Hard to keep your blood sugar balance, blah blah blah.  So you guzzle these nasty milkshakes because you are just soooooo busy taking care of your family and keeping that house clean you selfless, forever sacrificing angel you.  Seriously, I can't believe two Saints are being added in Rome this week and we can't fit you in too.

Hey, look, stupid.  If you can't eat a balanced diet because you are married and have kids, you are doing a really crappy job organizing your life.  My mom had five kids and a job and she managed to feed herself- it wasn't that complicated, she was making food for her family anyway.  I think the idea here is that Joan of Arc is such a whirlwind of activity, packing lunches, playing chauffeur, and cleaning cleaning cleaning that she's basically decided that actually eating a balanced meal just doesn't fit into her schedule.  If that's true- lady, your schedule sucks.  You are doing it wrong.  And drinking Glucerna until you graduate to Ensure isn't anywhere close to the best solution.

I can't believe we are supposed to think this woman is even sensible, let alone worthy of admiration.  You are being a idiot, mom.  Get some rest.  Get some exercise that doesn't involve changing a diaper or packing a lunch.  Eat three decent, balanced meals a day.  This frentic "I can't stop and breathe 'cause I'm a MOMMMMMYYY so I must live on an expensive version of Slim Fast" is just insulting.

Anyone in Advertising ever exercise, ever?

Because after a brutally hard workout, what's better than a big bowl of cold strawberries topped with Reddi Whip?

Pretty much anything, actually.

Unless, of course, you like to wrap up a good round of exercise with nasty stomach cramps.

Hey, desk jockeys of the advertising world:  Here are some good ideas for after-workout consumption:  Water.  Gatorade.  Powerade.  Pasta.  Potatoes. Cold fruit and fake whipped cream? Ehhhhh....not so much.

Typically nice house, though.  Everyone in every commercial lives in a nice house.  In this case, I guess that's the compensation for really bad intestinal pain.

At the moment, I don't feel like a priority, USPS

I've trashed the US Postal Service on more than one occasion through this blog.  It usually involves my annoyance at the dwindling number of boxes available in the neighborhood and the habit the local post office has of delivering mail every other day or so, and pretty much never on Saturdays (when I heard that the post office was going to cancel Saturday mail delivery, I had to remind myself that such a thing still existed.  The good people of Takoma Park Maryland will not miss Saturday mail delivery because it's been basically non- existent for years.

Here's my latest rant, triggered by this commercial which tells me that I am a priority of the United States Postal Service.  On Thursday April 10 I flew to Vermont for spring break.  Before leaving, I arranged to have my mail held by that wonderful US Postal Service which considers my convenience a priority.  I checked the box which stipulated that mail delivery would be resumed on Monday April 21, and all held mail would be delivered on that date.

Here's the confirmation I received from USPS:

Your hold mail request April 14 - April 21, 2014

You have requested Hold Mail Service for 04/14/2014. Keep your confirmation number handy in case you need to edit or cancel this request. If your mail is currently being held, it can not be cancelled. But you can still change the end date.

Ok, so I had a great time in Vermont and got back on Sunday.  USPS let me know they hadn't forgotten about me, because I had this notice in my email box (the only mail box USPS currently seems to recognize:)

The last day for your hold mail request is April 20, 2014 .

Your Hold Mail Service for April 14 - April 21, 2014 is ending. We'll be resuming your regular mail delivery on 04/21/2014. Remember to pick up your held mail at the Post Office® if you're not having it delivered to your address.

Can you guess what the problem is?  You got it- it's Wednesday afternoon, April 23, and I have yet to receive my accumulated mail- or any mail, period.   Hmm.....acknowledgement of hold request.  Notification of resumption of mail delivery.  Everything working fine....except.....resumption of mail delivery.

Thanks, USPS.  It's great to know I'm a priority.  Maybe you could let the people at the Takoma Park Maryland post office know.  They haven't got the memo.  Maybe you sent it USPS?

I wonder what the "Certificate of Authenticity" says

I heard this commercial on the radio this morning, and really hoped I could find a television version.  Imagine my delight to discover EXACTLY the same commercial in video form on YouTube.

Ok, there's not a whole lot going on in my life right now.  Sue me.

Anyway, I can imagine that these "Angel Coins" are big sellers in places like Kentucky, Tennessee, Oklahoma, Kansas- you know, the "Bible Belt."  Where people are long on faith and very, very short on brains and common sense.  I'm not talking about the entire populations of these states, mind you- there are plenty of naive, superstitious idiots in my old neighborhood, too- but silly people with notions of guardian angels and magic coins and amulets and charms and lucky numbers and such do seem to congregate in such places.  These people always seem to be worried about money unless there are Stormin Norman Commemorative Plates or Seal Team Six Commemorative Coins or Remember 9/11 Medallions or Tributes To A Coin That Was Worth Something in 1883 Clad With A Tiny Bit of Actual Silver being sold on late-night tv shows.  Then they seem to go a little nuts, because after all- these things might be worth something someday- right?

I don't know if the story this commercial starts with is true or not- nor do I really care.  So a prisoner of the Committee on Security prayed to a piece of money (good as any deity, I guess) and then he was spared execution- so what? What if he had used that money to bribe the jailer to set him free-would that have made the "Angel Coin" even more magical?

And besides, the coin this guy inexplicably decided to pray to isn't being offered for sale here- just a copy.  An alleged copy at that- how do the sellers even know what the original coin looked like?  Why would a copy carry the "powers" of the original "Angel Coin," even if I could be convinced that the original had any power at all?

Oh well, I guess it doesn't really matter, since I'm not the target audience here- I'm not an uneducated, middle-aged rube who thinks that the universe (and the everyday life of individuals) is being governed by invisible spirits who live in bits of metal.   But cheer up, suckers- if I'm wrong, you'll get the last laugh during the next revolution, when I'm beheaded and you get away unharmed because you locked in your Dazzling One Ounce Historic Surprisingly Affordable Low Price Angel Coins minted in London, England (as opposed to London, Ontario I guess) and I was being a snarky non-believer.

Only funny if you are the audience this is aiming for.

The joke here is that this twee cutesy song is the background in a commercial for yet another vicious, stupid, pointlessly violent video game.  Funny, huh?

Here's an even bigger joke- the pasty, allegedly "adult" losers who are wasting their lives on this crud.  If they are "Mature," that word does not mean what I thought it meant.   Me?  I'm heading outside again.  Beautiful day, interesting people, and all that.  Don't expect I'll be running into the zombies who devote so much of their lives to this brain-dead junk.  Fine with me.

The next time this thing hits my tv, I'm throwing a brick through it

The only believable thing about this god-awful insulting pile of dung is that it features Vanilla Ice working as a grocery store stock boy.  Hey, everyone has to earn a living.

The rest of it- oh lord, every time I think commercials can't possibly get any worse, something like this pops up.  It's not even that Vanilla Ice seems genuinely excited about stacking infinite boxes of Kraft Macaroni and Cheese shaped like characters popular 25 years ago (when I had pretty much the same job 25 years ago, I was nowhere near this enthusiastic, sorry.)  It's that this insane woman goes into weird convulsions which I guess are supposed to be a combination of ecstasy over actually meeting Vanilla Ice (she doesn't look fifty, how does she even know who he is?) and the thrill of anticipation over consuming orange cheese-flavored fatty crud with her idiot kid who Now Thinks She's An Idiot.

Anyway, I expect I'll need a new tv soon, because they are playing this commercial during Cosmos, which is rapidly becoming my favorite show.

Craftsman (n:) Combination of Epic Laziness and Deep Confusion over what it Means to be an American Male

Notice how not one of these Suburban idiots even remotely needs a riding mower?

I spend my summers at my boyhood home in Vermont.  Our combined front, side and back yards consist of maybe two acres of hilly land.  I spend one day a week for two months mowing those lawns.  With a push mower.

That's right- when my parents went shopping for a new mower a few years back, I insisted that they skip the self-propelled nonsense.  I'm the self that will be doing the propelling.  It's good exercise, and when it's over I can cool off with a dip in the pond.  Good times.

Meanwhile, these jackasses don identical worn-out plaid shirts, faded jeans, two-day stubble and (oh please!) safety goggles so they can cruise around their postage-stamp lawns for roughly thirty seconds.  Give me a freaking break- these "lawns" could be reduced to piles of dirt with less than a full bottle of Round-Up.  "Up to 7.5 MPH?"  The commercial concedes that to reach any speed at all, the owner must trespass on to the property of his neighbors.  Yeah, I guess if you want to use your "tractor" to race the Lesser Mowers on Clapton Drive, this is the vehicle for you.  But if you an actual adult, what the hell?

( If I ever heard one of these guys complain about the cost of gasoline, I seriously think I would lose it. And I'm not even going to mention the White Suburban Housewife who is rendered mute and breathless by the Awesome Manly Man On The Tractor- jeeeesh, lady.  Every want more out of life than this?)

Craftsman?  I have to congratulate you for your success in selling your riding mowers to people who simply have no use for them.  This is right up there with the residents of Levittown sticking Ford  F150 Trucks or (gag) Humvees in their driveways- just more evidence that in this incredibly unfair world, there are way too many people out there who have tons of money and not Clue One what to do with any of it.  Must be nice.

(Oh, and "kicking grass and taking names?"  Hey, whatever helps you keep a grip on your manhood as you cruise around in your little I'm a Lazy Douchenozzlemobile, buddy.)

Personally, I'm more than ready to be "used"

The woman is this ad finds the fact that her new boyfriend keeps taking her out to dinner- and picking up the tab-rather odd.  Yeah, that IS very strange behavior.  Taking a date out to dinner?  Weird- maybe he's a serial killer or something.

No, turns out that he's much, much worse- thanks to her- um, "friend," she realizes* that her horrible user boyfriend is just "racking up thank you points" by using his CitiBank Visa card.  What a scumbag, using her innocently healthy appetite and equally innocent "guys pay" philosophy in order to get rewards from his credit card.  She ought to do a little more thinking now- those flowers he sent?  I bet he used his card to buy THAT, too!  What a jerk!

I really hope she tells him off- maybe something like "ok, buster, I'm on to you- from now on, we are going DUTCH TREAT-- no, forget that, I'M PAYING FOR BOTH OF US!"  That'll teach him!  And if it doesn't- can this woman please give me a call?  Because unlike her insane friend, I don't look for nefarious motives behind my date's willingness to pick up the check....;>)

*Or maybe he's just being a kind of old-fashioned gentleman.  Naw, couldn't be.

Stupid, Sexist Garbage and DirecTV: Perfect Together

Ok, does anyone else think that it's more than a little creepy and weird to see a commercial featuring two men being served by an actual female puppet in a commercial in the year 2014?

And I thought the whole "TV Genie" bit, with the scantily-clad slave-girl type recording, storing and playing your favorite shows on demand (as she drapes herself across the set) was bizarrely sexist.  This takes it to a whole new level of bad- this guy's girlfriend/wife doesn't just act like a puppet, chirping brainless pleasantries while serving up lemonade to the Two Males In The House-- she's actually being controlled with wires.  I'm sure her puppet master-errr, husband- is very nice and all, but this doesn't change the fact that she's a fricking puppet being controlled by wires.

And her only function in this ad is, again, to provide drinks for The Guys as they discuss the new DirecTV setup. Maybe I should be grateful that this is her only function in the ad.  I don't think I really want to see what happens when there's no company and Master and Puppet are alone.  Maybe I should give a little credit to the fact that the punchline seems to be "don't call wires weird, because my girl has them and we don't want to hurt her feelings," but sorry, no- I'm not getting past the fact that this guy has a disgustingly-thin mannequin handmaiden who comes- umm, running- with drinks when The Guy has a friend over.  Sick.

April 15 cant' come soon enough

It's bad enough that this ugly idiot's ugly mug is grinning at me from every freaking metro bus and every other freaking billboard in the DC area.  Now I have to watch him pretend to care about my money on TV ads too?

H&R Block doesn't give one flying damn about your refund.  It doesn't care if we "get our billion back."  It doesn't fight for us against the IRS or live to make our lives better by getting more cash in our pockets.  Like all tax preparation services, Block is all about convincing us to let them skim their share off the top.  If they can get us to take "Refund Anticipation Loans," all the better.  They'd love us to take our refunds in the form of gift cards, because they get a nice kickback from participating retailers.  But what they really want is to just convince us that taxes are Scary and Complicated and if we try to do them ourselves we are going to miss out on Big Money so we better let These Experts (you can tell they are Experts from the bow ties) who Care About Us And Our Money do our taxes because They Really Want Us To Get Our Fair Share.  WTF-ever, man.

Oh, and BTW- why does an old, bald white guy with no fashion sense spell "tax expert?"  Isn't it 2014 anywhere in TV land?

As sad as it gets, courtesy of Taco Bell

Hmm...let's see....we can't really get people to talk about how good our food is, because...I mean, come on.  It's greasy hamburger stuffed into cheap taco shells.

So, what else do we got?  Hey, I know!  Let's get a bunch of stupid losers with the unfortunate name of "Ronald McDonald" to talk about how much they like Taco Bell!  That'll be convincing, right?  I mean, they are all named "Ronald McDonald."  That means they should all like to eat at McDonalds- right?  I mean, that makes sense- right?

What?  It doesn't, at all?  Well, whatever.  We're out of ideas, and this concept seems kind of familiar, so let's go with it.  Hey, it's not as stupid as asking people from St Cloud Minnesota what it's like to "sleep on a cloud"- is it? Again, we don't care.  It's late, we don't know what we are doing, and I bet these idiots will be so happy at the prospect of being on television we won't even have to offer to pay them.

So just aim the camera, let these morons tell the world their names, have them shove a piece of disgusting fatty crap down their cake holes, and we've got ourselves a commercial.  This ain't rocket science, after all.

The Assistant Manager of this Dominos has a PhD in Astrophysics. He gets a 10 percent discount on Thursdays.

Yeah, whatever.  Just get it here inside an hour and I'll be happy, Pizza Monkey.

I just love these Dominos "our pizza makers are artisans who are real people check out their really cool stories about how talented they are when they aren't making pizzas for minimum wage" commercials, don't you?

I mean, it's really cool that this guy is an artist and he sees his hands as his tools- I guess.  I mean, I really don't care.  What this guy does when he's not on the clock at Dominos isn't anyone's business and it's kind of hard to see why it's of interest to anyone other than himself.   Not to be rude or anything, but, dude?  It's not that people think of you as "just a pizza maker, just a pizza boy."  It's that we don't think about you at all.
You want us to know that outside of Dominos, you paint?  Um, ok.  Mission accomplished.  Did you want us to care? You still have a long way to go with that one.

And oh, hey, Dominos?  If you respect this guy's skills so much, if you want us to think of him as a craftsman and of Dominos as a company that hires craftsmen to make your pizzas, where do you get off failing to pay these Artists a living wage or providing them with a decent health insurance package?  Sorry, but you don't get to have it both ways.  Either you hire desperate kids drowning in student loans who can't find a job in their field because the economy is still in the toilet and will work for slave wages for a massive, impersonal corporation, or you take advantage of budding dreamer artists who also are willing to work for those same slave wages.  Either way, don't expect any plaudits from me.

Oh, and your pizza still sucks.

Golden Corral invites us to kill ourselves this weekend

Ah, Golden Corral, you truly are the gift that keeps on giving....

Come in on Friday for All You Can Eat For About Ten Bucks batter-fried fish, hush puppies, and french fries!  Remember we are only open till 10 PM, so we strongly suggest that you get back on line before you actually finish the food on your plate- and don't forget the Chocolate Wonderfall!

Come back on Saturday for All You Can Eat For About Ten Bucks steak, mashed potatoes, and macaroni and cheese!  Don't forget to wear your sweat pants- and don't forget the Everyone Stick Your Hands Right In There Cotton Candy Machine!

What could be better for getting the bad taste of church out of your mouth than a Sunday Afternoon at Golden Corral and all the fried chicken, waffles with chipped beef on toast, and pancakes you can shove down your cakeholes (oh yeah, don't forget the cake!) It's all yours for About Ten Bucks- and for a change of pace, we've got a Caramel Wonderfall to stick your macaroons in now!

If you're still alive on Monday morning, good luck rolling out of bed and squeezing your fat ass into your car and heading off for another week of wheezing and sweating in your cubicle, just a few pounds heavier and a few months closer to a premature death brought on by your truly horrible eating habits.  See you Friday!

Passive-Aggressiveness in a Jell-O Ad

Wow, really- mom* decided to show her disgust at daughter's cell phone obsession by encasing the thing in a bowl of Jell-O?

Somehow this is preferable to setting simple boundaries, like "this is how long you are allowed to use your phone each day- and if you go over that amount, you'll lose it?"  I get that "you'll have a cell phone when you can pay for it, including the monthly bill" is Totally Out There Unrealistic in 21st century America, but are parents simply not allowed to set any rules at all anymore?

Anyone else think that his family needs some serious counseling, that this ad isn't the slightest bit funny, and that daughter really needs actual parents who will actually Do Their Freaking Job and establish a few- you know, "rules" she must live by?  There's more to life than your phone, stupid- but your current parents don't seem interested in teaching you that.  They'd rather roll their eyes, shrug their shoulders, and cut off their own noses to spite their faces by ruining phones (the only way that thing got into that Jello was if it was placed in there while it was still in liquid form- if people try this in real life, they are going to end up with a broken phone.  And you KNOW these parents will replace it, quickly, because they have no interest in listening to daughter's DT-level rants if she has to go without a phone for more than a few minutes.)

(BTW, how did Daughter lose her phone in the first place?  Isn't it basically connected to her hand?  Was she in the shower while it was being swiped, or what?)

*Yes, I'm assuming it was Mom who made the Jell-O.  This is TV, after all, and on TV Moms do the food prep and cleaning and child care, and Jell-O is way too complicated for guys anyway.

Hey, Bank of America? Keep it to yourself, it's my life!*

Larry has spent his entire "life" being a disgusting, money-and-death-obsessed creep.  He started very young, using Grown-Up phrases like "under-served season" to describe winter because having a Hot Chocolate stand just for the fun of it simply would not do for Larry.  Oh, and then he walked out on his "partner" because his "partner" would not "offer a 401(k) plan" (my guess is that this happened because the little boy who just wanted to make a few extra bucks raking leaves was concentrating on being a kid and not on being too old to work anymore- in other words, wasn't willing to go through life with a gigantic pole rammed up his ass like Larry.)

Everything worked out fine for Larry- he managed to find a woman to marry him and produce a kid (being totally devoid of human emotion beyond "how has my portfolio performed since I checked it five minutes ago?") and was even willing to part with some of his precious money to buy a gilded cage--err, house-- for said woman.  Now he can pretend that his fixation on Having Enough Later has something to do with them- he's just being responsible, you see.  Never mind that he's just doing what he's been doing his whole life- he just found someone to clean up around him and have sex with from time to time in the off-moments he's not doing it.

Everything is NOT going to work out fine for that kid, though.  Check out the abacus- Larry is willing to look up from his screen now and then to make sure that the next generation is just as damaged by pointless Move Money Around Until You Die And Pretend This Is Really A Fulfilling Way To Go Through Life as he is.   That's a nice house but....still.  Poor kid.

*Title is a shout-out to the YouTube droolers who bleat "what is that song?" in the comments section of every commercial posted- seriously, what is the matter with you idiots?

Well, at least they're outside. Still- Chex Worship?

Oh, and this doesn't seem to require the use of cell phones or tablets either, so maybe I shouldn't be snarking on this so much, but....

I think we can safely conclude that The Pearsons have completely run out of ideas for family activities, don't you?  I mean, they apparently devoted an entire afternoon to making a commercial about their favorite cereal brand.  Worse, they did a lot of it on their lawn, in full view of the neighbors....I hope nobody was trying to sell their house that day.  I can see the Century 21 lady trying to distract potential buyers who might not be thrilled at moving in next to these dipsy lunatics.

And just another pet peeve here- women who narrate commercials and refer to their families as "The Pearsons" or the "McCullens" or the "Smiths," etc.  I really hate when these people are so gosh-darned proud to have dumped their birth names overboard in order to better submerge their personalities with their husbands.  I'm glad I've lived long enough to see more and more women keeping their "maiden" (gag) names or at least using hyphens, and to more or less see the extinction of the obnoxiously awful "Mrs. Henry Jones" bit, but I really hope I live a little longer and get to see the day when it becomes standard for women to just keep their last names when they get married.  It's the 21st century, for cripes sake- women don't become the branded property of their husbands when they accept a ring, so what the hell are we still clinging to this stupid tradition?

Because Being Common is for the Commoners

Know what matters?  That in this mass-produced, one-click, cookie-cutter, one-size-fits-all world, which sometimes seems to be designed for the Great Unwashed Masses known as the Middle Class and Poor, if you have a lot of money you can still have a unique driving experience by purchasing an Audi.

So leave the dry spaghetti, Prego, frozen fish sticks, and (snigger) hand-held cell phones to the Not Nearly As Good As You mob.  You are way, way above that.  Get yourself a red Audi with this "communications" system you can activate with--errr, one click-- and let the world know who is really running this place.

Bite me, Audi. Bite me really, really hard.  This commercial is Exhibit A when the People's Courts are called and the guillotines are being mass-produced (there's that phrase again) by the people you can't be satisfied to simply ignore, but felt the need to sneer at with crud ads like this.  I'll bring an extra large basket for your swelled heads.  Dicktards.

Hotels.com solves a problem which has always been very common for me

I can't tell you how many times I've faced this dilemma which I'm sure is familiar to pretty much every guy out there- or, at least, every guy out there who even approaches me in the looks department (there have got to be some, right?)

I make eye contact with a hot girl at a bar.  Since I'm obviously about to strike up a conversation with the hot girl, and since she's obviously going to want me, the first thing that pops into my mind is "uh oh....where am I going to find a hotel to shag this girl in, at THIS hour, without reservations?"  I know what you're thinking- couldn't I just use my iPhone to scroll through choices while she's stroking my leg and begging me to take her out of there (which should be happening, oh, I don't know, five minutes after I've introduced my gorgeous and awesome self?)  Sure I could- but hey, I'm a gentleman.  I put my phone away when I'm seducing strange hot girls in bars.

Hotels.com is clearly made for guys like me- guys who need hotel rooms fast, at a moment's notice, because we are always having hot women flinging themselves at us wherever we go (I was going to say "when we least expect it," but we always expect it.)  Guys who know that their apartments aren't as clean as they could be, and are just too classy to bring a strange hot girl whose name we just learned to a rumpled bed and a sink of dirty dishes.  (To guys like us, nothing is too good for beautiful strangers we've just met in bars.  That's why we are called gentlemen.)  No way- girls I hook up with know they can expect only the best- Quality Inn, Best Western, Howard Johnson's- I know them all- as long as I can get a room, fast.  And now I know I can.

And BTW, quick tip for you guys out there who have lives just like me, or wish you did- the only thing women appreciate more than a guy who is ready to follow up a chance meeting with an evening in a hotel room is a good continental breakfast.  They especially love that make your own waffles deal.  Who wouldn't?

Everyone uses it. Only women clean it.

Continuing a current theme at this blog...

Anytime anyone wants to hunt down and eliminate the chirpy ditz who provides the narration for this awful Celebration of Mommy's Ability and Willingness to Clean Toilets, I'd be happy to provide the bus fare.

Meanwhile, can someone tell me why we've never seen a man use paper towels, Lysol, Clorox or Bounce Fabric Softening Sheets in any television commercial ever made, ever?  When will it be the 21st century on TV?  Somewhere around 2250 perhaps?

I could have gone my whole life without seeing this ad, and I wouldn't have felt deprived of anything at all

Old man- you're incontinent.  You use the toilet a lot.  We get it.  It's not funny.

Couch potato drunk- you're a drunk.  You use the toilet a lot.  We get it.  It's not funny.

Pregnant woman- you're pregnant (again.)  You use the toilet a lot.* We get it.  You can stop touching your stomach now.  You're pregnant.  Again.  WE GET IT.

Can Lysol make a bleach capable of removing this commercial from my brain now?

*She's relieved to hear the sound of the toilet flushing, because it means someone else is using the toilet and accidentally cleaning it at the same time.  This tells me two things:

First, the other adult or perhaps older children (who knows how many this woman popped out, she seems to think that reproducing and cleaning the toilet is what she was put on Earth to do) don't clean the toilet beyond flushing it and activating the Lysol thingee.  Why is that, stupid woman?  Oh, right- because you are the woman of the house, which means the dirty jobs are your jobs.

Second, this is either one very small house, or one very loud toilet.  I'm pretty sure I could not live in a place where I heard the toilet flush every time it flushed.  I'd go insane.  Come to think of it, I wonder how sane this depressingly fertile woman is.

If their lifestyles were anything like this before, they wouldn't need this stuff now

Keep your weight down.

Eat right.

Exercise.

And stop looking for youth in a tiny bottle, a pill, or (you've got to be kidding me) an underarm deodorant.  Man I am ashamed of my fellow males today.  What the hell is the matter with you idiots- thirty years of being a pathetic, KFC-and-Doritos-gorging couch potato finally catching up to you?

Want to live forever?  Not going to happen. Want to feel young longer? Take care of yourself, and stop asking your doctor for a prescription to fix the problems you created yourself over the last several decades.

By the way- all you losers in this ad?  I don't care how you think you feel- you still LOOK old.  Sucks to be you.

Oh just bite me, AT&T

1. If it's so important to keep that baby from waking up, why did these idiots pick NOW to walk into an AT&T store and try to find a decent data plan?

2.  Is it really society's job to condescend and compensate for this stupid decision?  In other words, does everyone in this freaking store have to be oh so quiet because the moron parents brought their pwecious wittle bundle in with them?  Well, sorry, no.  Your sleeping little mammal is YOUR problem, breeders.  Don't even TRY to make it mine.  Seriously, that "SHHHHH!!" in response to "can I help you?" REALLY ticked me off.  You are in a store, people.  You walked in on your own accord.  Now the planet has to be quiet because your kid is sleeping? Who the hell do you think you are?  WHY ARE YOU HERE?

3.  Why do they even NEED a data plan with 10 gigs "to share?"  How much time is that baby going to spend on a freaking cell phone?  (Oh who am I kidding- that kid will be downloading before it learns how to talk.)

Oh, and two more thoughts-

1.  One day I woke up and found myself living in a world where $160 a month for phone service seemed like an amazingly good deal.  I wish I could get back to sleep.

2.  The guy is carrying the baby.  Why is the woman bouncing along with him?  Does she think that helps in any way at all?

Another Awful Subaru Ad

Ugh, come on.

Subaru has been making a determined effort to convince us that their cars aren't just cars but part of the freaking poetry of our lives for quite some time now.  The guy with the cheesy perm and faraway gaze in his eyes who pollutes this minute-plus bucket of pond scum is just another example of Subaru's apparently endless parade of mopey minions who credit their car with making their lives...well, with making their lives.

The worst part about these nuggets of nothingness is the conceit- we are really supposed to care about any of this?  Oh, and the fact that nothing ever happens in these ads which couldn't just as easily happen in any other model of car.

And the worst part about THIS particular commercial is the more-creepy-than-cutesy attempt by Perm Guy to snag a date with the woman who rear-ended him, and the fact that we are supposed to believe it worked.  I mean, come on.  Ick.