Apple redefines Chutzpah with it's "Mind Your Own Business" ad

 

I wish I had a dime for every time 

1.  I overheard completely private information being bleated over a phone while I was innocently standing in line, sitting at an airport gate, sitting in a subway, or simply walking down the street.  I don't eavesdrop.  It's just that there's something about cell phones that seem to automatically zap the part of the brain that gives us our sense of place and surroundings.

2.  I was forced to listen to some stupid-as-f--k Netflix comedy, music video etc. while in a confined space (like the airport gate or subway) because the Sociopath with a Cellphone couldn't be bothered with ear buds. 

3.  I've seen warnings NOT to use a cell phone to access bank or any other sensitive information while using public WiFi, which fall on deaf ears because Wait A Minute I Have to Wait Till I Get Home to Do Something?  What is this, Russia?

So when I see an ad in which Smart Phone users are encouraged to use a tool which basically tells the people around them to "mind their own business," well...seriously, the vast majority of us want to do nothing more.  It's the Smart Phone users who are constantly shoveling their business on the rest of us.  Is this really so hard to understand?

Miller Lite ignores the real "big mistake:" buying Light Beer in the first place

 

Your friends sent you to the corner grocery to buy crappy beer, and you came THIS CLOSE to accidentally buying the wrong crappy beer.  Fortunately you got beer shamed by the cashier, who shouldn't give a flying damn which beer he chooses to stock you decide to buy unless one costs more than the other, and you're already high on SOMETHING* because you think that the bobbleheads are also passing judgement on your choice of beer. 

So you are going to go back to your friends with a beer which, you'll explain, has "more taste" and "only one more calorie" than the beer they thought you were going to come back with, and explain that you know this because the look on the cashier's face, the bobbleheads, and the voice in your head told you so.  That'll teach your friends to never, ever send you on a beer run again.  And I mean NEVER.

*whatever it is, it isn't light beer. That's a physical impossibility. 

What Nissan calls "Fiercely Imagined..."

 

...is just More of the Same Stale Trope we've all seen ten thousand times:  A boring suburban family (being diverse doesn't make you interesting by default, sorry.  It's 2021.  That ship has sailed) overcompensating for their miserably bland existence with an overpriced toy featuring overpriced toys like a dial which allows you to switch from 2-wheel to 4-wheel drive instantly, and never you damn mind that 99.9 percent of the Already Dead Let's Schedule the Funeral losers who are the market audience for this Blandmobile will never, ever have use for more than 2-wheel drive.  Because they won't ever find themselves driving in a desert, up a mountain, or any other interesting place with their Nissan Uppermiddleclassmobile.  They just like to play Pretend with it, and now they can, because it will compensate for your daydreaming with a smart-tech braking system.  It won't compensate for anything else that's lacking in your life- and that's obviously a lot- but it will prevent you from murdering an innocent person with your desperate need to feel like you are doing something adventurous by buying something that screams Safely Conformist Whole Foods Shopper. 

I'm angry at Oura, and I know it

 

I swear, there are so many people out there who just have money burning holes in their pockets.   You can tell who they are; they live in palace apartment buildings which loom over every other structure in their city, they drive cars with every bell and whistle imaginable, and they have no problem plunking down God Knows How Much money for stupid Woo nonsense like Oura.  

As for the comments, well....money can buy pretty much anything, can't it?

Nissan Rogue Presents: the most Boomer commercial of all time

The dumbest line in the history of television commercials, clearly written by an overpaid assclown who didn't even attempt to come up with any ideas but just threw together some dialogue in his otherwise-empty head as he walked into the pitch meeting:  "When I was your age, we didn't have the 2021 Nissan Rogue with Intelligent All-Wheel Drive...."*  to which any self-respecting kid should reply "when you were my age, you didn't have a 2021 anything, you ridiculous moron" before throwing himself out of the car, consumed with mortification that he shares way too much genetic material with this disgustingly fruitful idiot.  

Here is the actual description of this ad, courtesy of iSpot.tv.  I would argue that there's no way that this guy has any youth to wax poetic about, because anyone who would utter that dumbest line in the history of television commercials was born middle-aged:

While the family's Nissan Rogue casually out-paces a fearsome dust storm in the middle of the desert, a dad reminisces about his bygone youth, when people had to make do driving average cars on normal roads. For a limited time, qualified customers can get special offers on the 2021 Rogue.

Yeah, whatever buddy.  You are the reason why the phrase "Ok Boomer" was invented.  

*know what else you didn't have when you were a kid?  Legal marriages between blacks and whites.  You know, like the one you clearly enjoy and produced a child through.  There's an example of how the world is better now that might be a bit more worth celebrating instead of waxing poetic about your  stupid-ass car. 

Nissan Rogue, a lot of noise, and Brie Larson: Watch out for flying trolls!

 

Here's another Nissan Rogue commercial which apes pretty much every Subaru ad in suggesting that you can't really get anywhere in any other vehicle except the one being advertised.  In other words, its really just a commercial for the Automobile- it can take you to the beach, the mountains, the desert....because it's a car.  And that's it.

Except that I guess with the Nissan Rouge you can do something you can't do with just any old car; you can use it to take your annoyingly diverse family to 1974 and watch a movie at a Drive-In.  And Brie Larson can show up to make a comment alluding to Captain Marvel but more pointedly to trigger the insecure wannabee Alpha Male Incels who can't stand her because their favorite YouTubers told them she threatens their imagined position in society by Existing. 

Creditrepair.com just Happens. Credit Problems? Not so much.

 

It's occurred to me that each and every one of these Easy Credit Repair abortions has one thing in common:  they all portray people who have lousy credit as innocent victims of predatory credit card companies which at some point gang-tackled them, tied them down, shoved a pen into their hands and made them sign up to receive a credit card.  And then forced them to use it, over and over again, on crap they didn't need.  And then forced them to skip payments until their credit rating was in the toilet.

Seriously, listen to this whiny jackass.  He was "surrounded" by advertisements offering credit cards every time he entered the student union at college.  So of course he "had" to sign up to get the credit cards. And he "went crazy" and used the credit cards.  And he was so absolutely clueless that he had "no idea" his credit rating was in the single digits until he tried to buy a car.  All of this was, of course, the fault of the credit card companies for....offering him credit when they should have known that he wasn't mature enough to handle it, which they should have known because after all he was a college kid, never mind that the vast majority of college kids who get credit cards do NOT abuse them or fail to make payments or end up with crap credit ratings, whatever my fellow Boomers might think.

Anyway, getting slapped in the face by a great big dose of Reality convinced today's Creditrepair.com Spokeschoad to call Creditrepair.com and see what he could do to repair his credit, which remember was seriously crap through no fault of his own but because of the Big Bad Credit Providers.  Chuckling Jagoff tells us how powerful and amazing it is to finally get help for crap credit, a powerful and amazing experience I plan to continue missing out on by not establishing crap credit.  And what does this blame-shifting doofus love most about Creditrepair.com?  It's got this really cool App, you see, which allows him to see exactly what's happening with his credit report on a regular basis by using the Smartphone which he most certainly needs even though he probably never got around to actually paying for it because remember, this guy has never been big on actually paying his bills.  Spending money he doesn't have, sure.  Paying the bills? Not so much.

And in the end, Totally Deserving Credit Scofflaw got his credit fixed (for the moment) and now has his eye on a new house because Consequences are Just Not a Thing in these commercials.  Grinning Douchenozzle skated on his obligations and thanks to an artificially inflated credit score he's ready to line up a new set of victims and get that debt ramped up again.  In ten years, he'll be back on one of these commercials bitching that Rocket Mortgage offered him a really great rate and assured him that an adjustable rate mortgage with introductory $1200 monthly payments would be totally in sync with his $25,000 salary as some kind of salesman (I'm not watching this again, thank you very much.)  So it's not his fault he got in over his head- again.  He was just a typical American trying to follow his dreams....of buying stuff and not paying for it.  Like, ever. 

Aunt Wanda knows who to call in times of stress....

 

"Hi honey, I just wanted you to know that I tested positive for COVID-19, and I have to quarantine."

"OMIGOD Aunt Wanda, that's terrible!  What did they tell you to do? Did they give you End of Life advice?"

"Um, no.  They just told me to monitor the symptoms, and to quarantine."

"That's terrible, you are high risk!  Did they tell you about Monoclonal Antibody treatments?"

"Um, no.  They just told me to monitor the symptoms and to quarantine.  Mono...what?"

"Monocolonal Antibody treatments!  You need to look into this right now!  You may have only seconds left to live."

"Um...ok...I'll think about it..."

"NO!  Call RIGHT NOW!  I'm jogging on the beach but you call RIGHT NOW and CALL ME BACK when they tell you to come in for the treatment!  And don't take 'no' for an answer!  You are RUNNING OUT OF TIME!"

"Um...ok...I'll call right now, and call you back when I find out..."

"You damn right you will.  And if they somehow tell you that you AREN'T a good candidate for Monocolonal Antibody treatments, at least jam some Lysol into your veins or gulp down a Tide pod!  By the way, your haven't changed your will lately, right?"

"My will?  What?"

"I'm so glad you called, Aunt Wanda.  You can always count on me to handle every tough situation with grace.  Now, put your will somewhere easy to find and get to work dealing with this COVID issue!!"

Samsung's Own the Floor campaign is a high-tech version of Stupid

 

There are so many layers of dumb in this ad, it's almost hard to get a grip on it.  But I'll give it a try with an internet-friendly numbered list:

1.  The guy doing the vacuuming is having so much fun that it doesn't bother him in the slightest when his kids knock over a plant and leave a pile of dirt on the rug right and just keep on running, never mind that, yes, that IS dirt on the rug and I don't care how good that vacuum is, it's going to leave a stain and you're going to need some carpet cleaner.  It's also as if the kids intentionally knocked over the plant BECAUSE dad was having so much fun vacuuming, they wanted to give him something to vacuum.  

2.  Mom gets her turn at the vacuum and proceeds to spin all over the house, as if determined to have more fun than her husband.  Maybe she's a little worried that he's encroaching on her territory.  Next thing you know, he'll be cooking and her panic level will really shoot up.

3.  If you can afford to live in this house, then yes I guess you can afford this ridiculous $500 vacuum cleaner made by a company famous for producing overpriced, fragile electronics built to be traded in every six months or so (exactly what we're looking for in a household appliance, right?  But if you can afford to live in this house, you can also afford to have a cleaning woman come in two or three times a week to do the vacuuming for you.  And when you do that, you probably aren't all that interested in making the cleaning fun, are you?

A Soon-to-be-very-dated Progressive Insurance Commercial....

 

...because when this is all over, nobody is going to want to be reminded of those days where we HAD to work from home and communicate over Zoom.  But that's not really what any of these "stupid people doing stupid things on Zoom" ads are all about, is it?  

No, none of these "slice of life" ads featuring Conference Calls Gone Bad (the Apple "Underdogs" ads which feature more goofing off than work, the Folger's ads which feature distracted idiots who can't even remember to put their pants on or are desperate to prevent coworkers from seeing their kids, etc.) are actually about the petty annoyance of Zoom Conferencing.  They are, instead, all about how much corporate America seethes at the idea of paying people without getting them into the office and physically under the thumb of Mr. Boss Man.  You get the idea that corporations have come to see Zoom in the same way Republicans see Unemployment Benefits- just a Free Ride to goof off while still collecting a paycheck.  Apple, Folgers, Progressive etc. all feel cheated by Remote Not-Work because they hate their employees and are convinced that those employees will just pretend to be productive if they can get away with it-- and it eats employers alive to think that they just might be getting away with it. 

So no one is going to convince me that Working from Home is going to become the New Normal any time in the near future, and I find it downright laughable when CNN, etc. tries to predict the Future of Work by asking employees what they think about working from home.  As if it's going to be up to them in any way, shape or form.  Ask the employers.  They still want their workers to rise early, brave traffic, and sit in a physical office that the employer is perfectly willing to pay for if it means they can be 100 percent certain those employees are wearing pants while working the phones all day.  Because its a power thing and its a distrust thing.  That's not going to change just because we have a pandemic now and then. 

Lowbrow humor from Toyota and Highlander

 

Oh, how adorable- the most original commercial ever.  For the first time we see, in the same commercial:

1.  Precocious kids who twist their faces into weird contortions as they bleat phrases they really have no business understanding but It's Funny Because It's Kids.  I can't believe it took seventy years for someone to think of having kids say embarrassing things in front of a parent!  Hys-TERICAL!

2.  Eurotrash dweeb dad who serves up a great big plump, slow moving softball for those kids to knock right out of the park and then looks flummoxed when those kids....knock the slow moving softball right out of the park and freak out Eurotrash dad for the entertainment of the audience.

I mean, I'm just AMAZED that they managed to fit these two concepts into the SAME brief commercial. Well done, Toyota!  I'm off to buy a Highlander because...um, wait a minute.  Why is this ad supposed to make me buy a Highlander?  It looks more like a commercial for birth control to me.  I'm certainly convinced that I don't want anything like these kids.

Oh Seriously. It's an F---NG HYUNDAI!

 

Why bother to build a good product when you can just hire a British voice actor to narrate an artsy, overlong piece of utter nonsense which includes like "At Hyundai we build cars...year after year" like that's some kind of thought-provoking Deep Thought?

I didn't even get thirty seconds into this junk before realizing I had a gem for this blog without even really trying.  This isn't putting lipstick on a pig.  It's dumping a lipstick factory and about eight gallons of rouge on that pig before giving it a perfume bath and sticking it into a Louis Vuitton Dress.  In the end, you've reaching for an Oscar for Best Short Film with an attempt to sell a FREAKING HYUNDAI.  I mean, give me a break!

Samsung dangles another trinket and knows we'll fold

 

When you are judging yourself based on your smartphone's ability to fold compared to the phones of the people around you, you might as well just call it a day.  Or at least rethink your priorities and try to figure out what went so very wrong in your life.  But who am I kidding?  You're far more likely to respond by dipping deeper into your credit card debt and getting yourself one of these Look At Me phones so you can "flex" with the best of them.

Because you are a very, very sad person who has no sense of value, and no sense of pride, and no sense that you've actually accomplished anything that makes you at all worthwhile or valuable or even notable in any way, shape or form.  So if you want people to know you are alive, you'd better go out and spend a thousand dollars on a shiny piece of metal and plastic that can do something that might catch someone's eye and attract someone's interest- because there's nothing about you personally that is ever going to do that. 

A sad person who will be mesmerized by this blur of images, and overwhelmed with lust at the thought of owning something that might make someone else momentarily envious of you.  You've always wanted someone to me envious of you, and god knows there's nothing about who you are or what you do that is ever going to accomplish that.  And after all, this phone- an overpriced bauble though it may be- is still significantly cheaper than an Audi or a Lexus or a BMW.  

Jake from State Farm is a Walking, Talking, Scene-chewing Curse

 

For some reason, this smirking little toad with the fake smile forever frozen on his stupid face can't convince Aaron Rodgers that he isn't getting some special "Rodgers Rate."  The result seems to be that Rodgers is forever kissing up to an otherwise anonymous State Farm Insurance Choad- playing golf with him, going on car rides with him, eating lunch with him- in order to keep what he thinks is some "special rate" which by the way he really needs because money is tight when you're a franchise quarterback in the NFL.

And now Pat Mahomes- ready and waiting in the wings for the not-too-distant day when Rodgers simply cannot perform on the field anymore (probably three games into his new contract with whatever team he insists on being traded to this summer) to be Jake's Best Friend and Toady, thanking this grinning smarmy jackass every few seconds for his Special Mahomes Rate as he goes about his everyday life, getting haircuts, doing laundry, or just Hanging Around with Jake for No Reason Whatsoever Are We Aware that Mahomes has Actual Friends and a Family in the Real World.  All so this terrible actor*/wannabee comedian can do everything possible to convince NFL millionaires that they are Nothing Special All State Farm Employees Hang Out With Their Customers 24/7. 

But it seems to me that after last February, Pat Mahomes might put two and two together and figure out that hanging around with Jake might not be the best thing for a guy whose primary goal is to collect Super Bowl Rings.  Aaron Rodgers has exactly one, while his list of playoff failures just keeps on growing.  Pat Mahomes also has one ring- which is half the number of playoff losses he can count.  I think the message is pretty damned clear:  doing State Farm commercials might be good for your wallet, but it doesn't bode very well when it comes to winning Championships.  

*the original Jake from State Farm was dumped because the company decided that more extensive use of the character required the hiring of an actual actor.  So they hired....this guy.  Uh huh.  WTF-ever, State Farm.

Bambee deals with those little annoyances that go with running a sweatshop (errr, business)

 

The radio commercials for this service are so very grating- "as a small business owner, you have so many headaches!"  And the "headaches" listed are "minimum wage requirements" (HORRORS! The EVIL GOVERNMENT requires you to pay what amounts to way, way below an actual living wage to your employees, and you need to hire a manager to deal with that!) and "wrongful termination lawsuits" (HORRORS!  You went an innocently broke a contract and fired an employee, and now you've got to deal with the law!  You need to hire a manager to deal with that!)  and "Union disputes" (don't even get me started.)  In short, these commercials make running a business sound like something a very, very charitable person With A Dream wants to do but is bound to be foiled by the aforementioned evil government and it's evil, business-owner-hating rules every time.

And hiring a compliance manager?  The radio ad tells us "they're expensive- they cost Seventy Thousand Dollars a year."  As if we are talking about a piece of equipment and not a human being.  I'm sure what the commercial MEANT to say is that compliance managers CHARGE $70,000 per year for their WORK, but even this doesn't make any sense, because how is that a universal salary for compliance managers?  Are you really telling me that a compliance manager in Mobile, Alabama makes the same salary as one in San Francisco?  And again, it's so dehumanizing to refer to qualified professionals as if they are just another piece of tech the modern business needs to purchase off the shelf in order to avoid production issues.

Finally, that guy at the beginning- "I need this for my small business.  But I can't afford it.  But I can't afford not to have it..." Hey, buddy, I'll tell you what I tell every jackass who whines that they "can't afford" to pay a certain wage, "can't afford" to follow all those other rules (cleanliness, safety, tax record maintenance, etc:)  If you can't pay for those things, you can't have a business.  Sorry.  Your desire to run a business doesn't require me or anyone else to reduce standards to make that business more profitable for you.  It's not 1880 anymore, and that's a good thing.  If you can't afford what it takes to keep your doors open, then just admit you aren't ready to run a business, close your doors, and go get a job, Mr. Small Business Owner.

(Oh and BTW, don't tell me that Bambee provides an HR manager who regularly "costs" $70,000 per year for $99 a month- like she's a rental- and that HR manager is going to be as devoted to YOUR business as one you personally hired- and paid a decent wage too- would be.  That Bambee HR manager is either doing this in her spare time or your business will be one of the two dozen she's juggling every single day.   I don't own a business, but I can do math.)

Geico's well-deserved slap at suburban life

 

Know how you can avoid situations like this (situations in which you are severely restricted in your decorating, etc. choices on your own property?)  Just don't live within an area of your lily white suburb which is controlled by a Housing Association.  But if you want to pretend that you've "made it" in Capitalist America by having your own Estate consisting of a house that looks like all the other houses on the block and a postage stamp-sized piece of land (which is still mysteriously large enough to convince you that you need a riding mower to maintain,) this is part of the cost of that part of the American Dream.  You are living under a microscope where your progress is being constantly scrutinized and graded by the neighbors who are on the same hamster wheel you are.   Your every move, every choice of car, every new flower planted anywhere, every coat of paint applied or not applied, is being noted on an invisible scoresheet which is not only in the brain of that Housing Association Nazi, but each of your neighbors.  Better keep up with the Joneses, because if you falter, everyone is going to notice.  

And now that you know all this, do you still think you upgraded when you gave up that apartment downtown?

Farxiga's Band-Aid for a much bigger problem

 

Here's another way to control high blood sugar:  Stop eating sugar.  Amazingly, this One Simple TrickTM has ALSO been connected to losing weight.

No number of grams of sugar is recommended as part of anybody's daily diet.  Check out "daily recommended intake of carbs" and you'll find that carbohydrates in any form are not required for good health. And nobody is suffering from high blood sugar because they consume a serving or two of fruit per day (and if I'm wrong, fruit isn't necessary either for health, either.  I can't eat sugar without suffering arthritis pain flares, but I eat berries every day because they have anti-inflammatory properties.  So I get natural sugar, I help control my arthritis pain, and I don't have to worry about high blood sugar.  Imagine that. 

Sugar is ubiquitous in American culture.  It's stuffed into red sauces and dairy products (just TRY to find flavored yogurt that is sugar free.)  It's sprinkled on to French Fries to make them more addictive.  If sugar was classified as a drug, it would be by far the most popular addictive drug in the United States and probably the world, even more popular than Caffeine (which I can stop using any time I want to, I just don't want to, so shut up you aren't my mother!)  It's harder to avoid than any other addictive chemical on the market.  But it can be done, and for your body's sake it SHOULD be done.  Sugar is poison, and I'll take a prescription to Stop Ingesting Poison over a prescription for a drug with all these nasty possible side effects any day of the week and twice on Sundays, thanks very much anyway.