Shipping is a Hassle- which is why USPS sucks at it

Here’s another one of those commercials that only “work” if the people in them agree to act like disfunctional morons who think something incredibly ordinary is incredibly extraordinary. Oh, and it also helps if you think puns- ANY puns- are worth telling. “No Weigh?” Yes, I get it. No, it’s not worth getting.

Speaking of something worth getting....

I’m only including it in this blog because I’m pissed at the US Postal “Service” right now. Seems my new Kindle “left seller facility and is in transit” on August 29. Estimated delivery date: September 7.

On September 1, the package arrived at Martinsburg West Virginia. Only a couple hundred miles from here, but for some reason, the estimated delivery date is still September 7. Ah well, must the be Labor Day rush or something.

On September 2, an “Arrival Scan” is performed on the package. Where did it arrive? None of my business, I guess. Estimated Delivery Date is still September 7.

On September 8, at 10:05 AM, my package goes through another “Arrival Scan” in Silver Spring, MD- the delivery address is in the same town, only a matter of time now, right? Estimated Delivery Date is still September 7.

It’s Wednesday Evening, September 8, and no sign of my Kindle. Estimated Delivery Date: September 7. And yes, it does say September 7 2010.

Thanks, US Postal “Service.” Oh well, I guess you can’t do everything right. Maybe you can’t move a 1 lb. package from West Virginia to Maryland inside of a week, but at least you make really great commercials......

(Update: Just received an E-Mail telling me that my Kindle was delivered to my place of work at 12:05 PM-- I get this email at after 8 PM, when the Post Office is of course closed, and I can't call to tell someone that no, it was NOT delivered at 12:05 PM because I was there at that time, and I don't have my Kindle...again, thanks EVER SO MUCH, United States Postal "Service.")

We Really don't know Life at All

Remember when you were five?

Remember when you were five, and your imagination hadn't been burned out of your skull by the branding iron of crappy tv and instant-gratification media?

Remember when you were five, and you couldn't imagine that you'd grow up to be a greasy, hairy loser spending your days sitting on a bench looking for inspiration from a little glowing toy in your hand?

Remember when you were five, and the world looked magical because you could look at a building and imagine a monster, when you could look at clouds and imagine ice cream castles everywhere (imagery by Judy Collins)?

Well, now that you are a dull-witted, brain-dead techno-addict adult, clouds only block the sun, and rain and snow on everyone, but the latest must-see time-consuming life-sucking garbage is only a few clicks away on your cell phone. And as you sit there on your bench, so immersed in numbing pointless bullshit that you don't notice that your "life" is ebbing away all around you, you might take a moment to pretend you are five years old again. That is, you can pretend that you are five years old again if, when you were five years old, you had the imagination and energy of a rotting zucchini.

Remember when you read Brave New World, and you thought that Huxley was prophetic when he foretold a time when people would pop pleasure contained in a pill? Now we know that Huxley was far off the mark- the drug of choice for the people of the future would not be Soma, but cell phones. The "cure" for social isolation would not be Free Love, but fantasy friends on Facebook. I wonder if Huxley's prophecy was more stark than our reality.

In keeping with the theme of the last post....

Let's see- Fairbanks Alaska has been co-opted by Prilosec, so where can we find another town filled with overweight, pasty, cold white people eager to mug for the cameras?

Hey, how about St. Cloud, Minnesota? It looks every bit as frozen and boring and desperate for attention as Fairbanks, and as an added bonus, we can make some silly wordplay with the name, getting each and every member of it's population of "no really we love living here" losers to make a reference to "sleeping on a CLOUD" and that will be clever and cute and funny because REMEMBER this is St. CLOUD Minnesota, get it? GET IT?

So here we go, roughly half a minute of watching fat choads who might as well have been bused in from Fairbanks making total asses of themselves, bleating bad one-liners as they drape their flannel-wrapped, overfed carcasses across mattresses.

"Ask me about sleeping on a cloud!" enthuses one particularly loathsome old bat. Because you'd know all about that, living in St. Cloud Minnesota. This makes no sense, but it doesn't matter, because how could we go about "talking to you" about it anyway? Never mind.

We even have one guy give his testimony standing on a hockey rink- LA must have been suffering from a heat wave when the Prilosec and Tempur-Pedic contracts were signed, to make the agencies want to rush off to the most God-foresaken tundras they could find to film these ridiculously cheesy ads.

Can someone please take a camera crew to Hell, Michigan to ask people how they deal with horrible, cloying, overly-cutesy, witlessly stupid commercials?

From the people who brought us Sarah Palin

There is just so much to love here, staring from the opening bell. The narrator tells us that his name is Jason, that he lives in Fairbanks, Alaska- a bleak, dark, lifeless tundra bathed in a gloomy twilight- and then gives us the hilarious line "you don't come here to stay indoors." Say no more, Jason! I mean, the pictures tell it all- when I see endless fields of ice barely illuminated by a weak sun and imagine subzero temps, the first thing that I think is "Wow, I'm heading outside!"

"There's snow machining...sit on your buttcheeks (I'm pretty sure this is what he says) ice-fishing....." let me finish your thought for you, Jason. "There's drinking, there's bowling, there's hockey, there's drinking, there's......ice fishing. Drinking. Bowling. Did I mention drinking?"

There's also watching the Travel Channel, and pretending you live somewhere, anywhere else....

And then we get to Jason's "passion," Curling, and the point of this overlong ad. Jason tells us that he's suffered from heartburn in the past, which prevented him from "concentrating" on "the task at hand"- at this point, forgive me for mistaking this commercial for an Onion News Parody the first time I saw it. "The Task At Hand?" It involves doing something on a slab of ice. Just like everything else one does in Fairbanks, Alaska, I suppose, including ice fishing, drinking, hockey, drinking....

It's Day Seven of Jason's new life on Prilosec OTC. Unfortunately for him, it's Day God Knows How Many But It Feels Like Eternity of Jason's old life in Fairbanks, Alaska, a place one does not go unless one wants to be outside, for obvious reasons I don't feel the need to repeat here.

One more point I'd like to make about this ad- I'm always impressed at the ability of agencies to convince clients to spend money traveling to out of the way places to film a commercial which could just as easily been thrown together using people living right down the street from the studio. How did these guys sell Prilosec on the idea of flying a camera crew to Fairbanks, Alaska? That being asked, why Fairbanks, Alaska? Is there something about the cold and dark that aggravates heart burn symptoms?

If not, why didn't the agency scour the letters for a heartburn sufferer from Jamaica, or Paris, or Australia, or some other cool place that one might spend a few days? You know, someplace not populated by bored out of their minds overweight dopes who are trying to convince themselves that they like the cold and dark and that Curling is a "task" that needs to be performed well, or is worth performing at all?

And with her new haircut, you can't even see the lobotomy scar

First, this lunatic throws herself at the viewer, clearly infatuated with herself, her dress, the fact that she's getting married, her teeth....

Her teeth? OH NOES, her teeth don't match her freaking dress! Everyone will notice, of course, because her obvious intention is to spend the entire reception holding her frigging veil against her face and grinning like an insane person.

What can she do? I mean, she CAN'T get married if her pearlies don't match the shade of her blindingly white dress! What would people think? It's not as if anyone is going to be looking at anything but her damned glowing teeth, right?

Crest 3D White Strips to the rescue. Quick, put these sticky, nasty little pieces of plastic in your mouth and keep them there until the naturally not-ivory color of your teeth is bleached out and replaced by an almost supernaturally artificial white glow! (Oh, and be sure to get yourself a rich, deep tan, so as to exaggerate the whiteness of your chompers. Nice try, Crest.)

Yay, now her teeth are as white as her dress! Now she can spend hour after hour flinging herself around the room awkwardly daring her guests to count every single one of her ridiculously white teeth! And when it's all over, everyone will walk away talking about how beautiful the bride was, how lovely the dress was, and boy she sure is proud of those teeth, isn't she?

Or maybe she's just insane?

Useful Idiots

I guess that here in the good old U.S. of A., there is an unlimited supply of people willing to pretend they don't know they are being filmed for "Hyundai Uncensored" commercials, cluck like chickens for Klondike Bars, or sing "Five Dollar Foot Longs," as long as there is TV face time and a few bucks involved. But you'd like to think that there is some limit to what people will say for a few seconds of fame and a little pocket money.

Apparently, there simply isn't. Because here is yet another in a long line of obnoxious, manipulative, bullshit ads paid for by the multi-billionaires over at the American Petroleum Institute, Proud Sponsors of your next local Tea Party and a major reason why we are hardly closer to a green economy now than we were thirty years ago, when President Carter installed solar panels on the roof of the White House and asked us to wear sweaters instead of bumping up the home thermostat.

Congress is considering billions in new energy taxes? API to the rescue, determined to preserve and protect it's God-given right to massive profits in the most American of ways- by purchasing Congressmen for large sums of money and everyday clueless slobs with far, far less.

Congress may let the Bush Tax Cuts- architect of the awesome economy we have right now- expire? Well, that' a tax INCREASE (if you make more than $250,000 a year), and how dare you imply that the people who most benefit from paved roads, libraries, police and fire departments, and a strong national defense pay more for those services? Better to invest money in commercials designed to convince the uneducated, fearful, easily-manipulated mouth breathers (I saw more than a handful of them at the National Mall yesterday, drinking in the words of their Lord, Savior and Financial Advisor, Glenn Beck) that THEIR taxes are about to go up. Far better to whip up the masses with the usual bleat "taxes bad, tax cuts good!" and herd them into the public square- or in front of the television camera- with ready-made signs and hats adorned with tea bags.
ANYTHING is better than to ask a small population of the super-wealthy to pay a slightly higher tax out of their unbelievably colossal profits. I mean, what is this, Russia?

But back to the idiots who populate this particular ad. Seriously, guys- have you no shame? Have you no souls? Have things really gotten so bad for you that you are willing to bleat BS off a cue card in order to get your bloated faces on tv and a few extra dollars in your pocket? Do you REALLY think that a slight increase in energy taxes is going to push the economy into the abyss?

Was there ever a time in your life when you valued your dignity at all? When you weren't for sale?

I think I'd rather see these people hitting each other

In a scene that will not remind you of Hill Street Blues, the chief of police warns his staff that the "Autobahn for All" promotion is underway again at your neighborhood Volkswagen dealer, so they'd better keep their eyes open, because people are going to be "driving crazy" in their incredibly mundane, cookie-cutter, looks-like-every-other car on the road German imports.

Ok, so what exactly is the message that Volkswagen is trying to sell us here?

That if you buy a Volkswagen, get ready to be profiled by your local police department as someone who "drives crazy" in it? Why would anyone want to drive a car which attracts negative attention of the police?

That is you buy a Volkswagen, you'll drive in a manner that police will think is "crazy?" Perhaps in a way that suggests that you don't get the whole "Closed Course" and Professional Driver" and "Do Not Attempt" disclaimer deal? Really? I've driven Volkswagens, and other than my 1974 Super Beetle, which kept me alert by freezing me to death in the winter and broiling me alive in the summer, the only emotion they've ever inspired in me is Boredom.

That the police in this ad are so sad, so depressingly dull, that they get excited over commercial clips featuring Volkswagens? I mean, come on- Volkswagens? Get out more, idiots.

And by idiots, I don't just mean the buffoons making a mockery of the Law Enforcement Profession by playing ADD-inflicted police officers in this advertisement. I also mean the people who created the ad. I don't know what the deal is over at Volkswagen's ad division, but it's nothing good. In the past year, you guys have tried a talking Beetle with a "German" accent making fun of Hybrids, a series of commercials featuring people yelling "black one!" and brutally hitting each other, and now "Autobahn for All," which is supposed to convince us that Volkswagens are wicked fun to own because you'll want to "drive crazy" in them, which will really piss off the cops, which is a good thing.

Anyone over there know what they are doing? Anyone at all?