I Should have gone to Hollywood University!

Sigh.

Once upon a time, there was this magical land called America In The 1980s. Everything was fun back then- we had this amiable actor in the White House, the United States was the Terror and the Hope of the World, gasoline was a dollar a gallon, phones were starting to lose their cords and your Personal Computer from Radio Shack was really cool with it's monochrome screen and floppy disks.

All throughout this magical land, kids graduated from High School and went off to college, which was basically a kind of Earth-bound Paradise, to spend four years swilling beer, playing music by The Cars, Blondie, U2 and Michael Jackson and having lots and lots of sex with stunningly beautiful young women. There were also things called classes, which were supervised by fat, dull and dimwitted versions of your parents. Classes were important to go to because it was the place to find out where the next kegger was and to meet stunningly beautiful women while they were still clothed.

I didn't live in America in the 1980s. The place I lived in had colleges, but they were nothing like the ones I've been seeing on TV and in movies for the past thirty years. Catholic University back then didn't bear much resemblance to the movie version of Revenge of the Nerds, or the TV version for that matter. Maybe Dear Old CUA was just an outlier- except that my High School didn't look a whole lot like Fast Times at Ridgemont High, either. And it sure as hell didn't look anything like "Glory Daze," the television's most recent attempt to feed on the apparently all-but-unanimous theory that college is just a four-year orgy of booze and sex. It's as if screenwriters watched Back to School and figured it was a documentary on campus life in the 1980s.

Hollywood tells me I came of age in the right decade; maybe I just grew up in the wrong country? If that's so, damn you, Mom and Dad!! Look how much fun I could have had if you had just emigrated to America before I hit my teens!! All these college kids I see on the silver screen have more fun in one night than I had in four years!

Look, I'm not complaining all that much. I got a good education in college, spent Fridays at The Dubliner with my girlfriend and my dad's American Express Card, and the Homecoming dances were pretty cool. But if I'm ever reincarnated, I'm rejecting the scholarship and going to Hollywood University. I'm joining one of these frat houses with big impressive Greek letters on the doors. And then I'm spending four years in a dazed stupor, drinking gallons of booze between one-night stands and screaming "PAR-TY!" at the top of my lungs whenever I'm at a party, or just think that it's time to start one.

Next time, I'm doing it right. And I'm doing it to the strains of Crowded House and The Boss. Thank you, Hollywood, for showing me the error of my ways. I only wish Rodney Dangerfield was still with us to provide extra guidance.

A Delightfully Adult-Free Breakfast

There's plenty to hate on here. Check out dad, who at first glance seems perfectly happy to be eating his Honey Nut Cheerios all by himself in his raggedly Old Man Robe- except that he's got a perpetual scowl on his face, insists on angrily jamming his spoon into the cereal (looks to me as if he's bitter that it's not bacon and eggs) and basically acts like a man who is being forced to take his medicine.

Check out son, who for once in these commercials is actually justified in his clear disdain for Dear Old Dad, who in all honesty is acting like a lame drama queen here. Son is not amused by dad's whiny "this is for my heart!" or his "your mom will be crying over my arteries" (what does that even mean, anyway? It sure doesn't sound like Cheerios takes the heart-healthy attributes of it's cereal very seriously.) The "nice speech, dad" is a bit over the top for me- I can't imagine saying such a thing to my dad- but as I implied, this guy almost deserves it.

When the kid finally exits the stage, Dad goes right back to applying Cheerios to his mouth (seriously- it doesn't even look like he's EATING the stuff- just trying to put it away as quickly as possible, so he doesn't have to actually taste it.) The stupid cartoon bee shows up- why? The message of this ad, I think, was that Cheerios is a heart-healthy cereal. Which suggests that it was designed to appeal to adults. Even if the adults it's aimed at are as childish and weird as this guy, do they really need the added come-on of a cartoon bee?

Maybe. Considering that Cheerios makes a practically sugar-free version of it's product (it's called Original Cheerios) and that there are a LOT of cereals out there more "heart-healthy) than this Honey Nut crap, this guy might just need extra incentive to eat a cereal with slightly less sugar than Cap'n Crunch for the sake of his poor arteries. Maybe Honey Nut Cheerios is step three of his five step Heart Health Program- first eggs without bacon, then Cap'n Crunch, then Honey Nut Cheerios, then regular Cheerios, then Grape Nuts?

I'd hate to think of the look on this guy's face when he gets to the Grape Nuts. At least he won't have to worry about having to share it with anyone.

I'd hate to see what's rated "Immature"

Sooo...is the game a commercial for the Jeep, or is the Jeep a commercial for the game?

Isn't Jeep basically telling us that when it's time to take a break from pretending to be a kick-ass mercenary in mommy's basement and make a run to Seven-Eleven for Cheetos and Red Bull, this is the only vehicle worthy of your insufferably clueless, juvenile ass?

Is there really a strong correlation between people who play these Hero-Wannabee games and can afford $30,000 status symbol automobiles? (Oh, who am I kidding? There probably is. Just as youth is wasted on the wrong people, so is money.)

Does Jeep know that there are real wars going on, right now, which involve real Americans dying in real firefights? If video game technology had advanced sooner, would immature losers have been able to recreate Operation Rolling Thunder in their rec rooms, complete with a Torch The Gook Village option, back in the mid-60s? Would this have been acceptable to anyone?

Finally- is there anyone at Jeep who understands what the word Mature means? Because seriously, I wouldn't use it to describe anyone who would spend five minutes of precious life playing crap like these games, and I sure as HELL wouldn't use it to describe anyone who would plop down a small fortune to play Pretend Soldier in the suburbs by driving around in one of these stupid faux-military transports. Anyone who actually would deserves to be mocked into keeping it hidden in the garage during daylight hours.

If you see one of these Tough Guy ego boosters cruising your neighborhood, feel free to join in the spirit of Jeep and strafe it with rotten vegetable sniper fire. Hey, it's all part of the fantasy, right?

In keeping with the Spirit of the Season

This is actually a pretty old commercial. GMC has been using some version of it for years, every holiday season, like clockwork.

The difference is that this year, it's narrated. And the narration sure does add a lot- it's not just the raping of a beautiful piece of classical music anymore. It's not subtle, "clever" wordplay left to be deduced by the viewer. This year, GMC has decided "to hell with the mildly grotesque, socially inconsiderate allusion." This year, GMC cuts right to the chase.

Happy Holidays. Here's a tune you've probably loved since childhood. You certainly recognize it. Well, we've got something else for you, too- a big fucking truck crashing it's way through snow drifts to give you something to look at while you are enjoying the beautiful music. But you know what? Screw the music, because you still might not get the message. This Mother is a NUTCRACKER!! Get it? This is one freaking awesome man-machine (not a Man Ship, however- that's another commercial.) This thing kicks ass! And we would say so, in exactly those words, if we thought that current standards permitted it. Maybe next year.

In the meantime, check out the NUT CRACKING capabilities of this powerful sonofabitch!!! No one's getting in your way if you are knocking over snowmen behind the wheel of THIS baby! So what are you waiting for, Mozart??

Again- maybe next year. Because nothing is sacred. Absolutely nothing.

Coors's answer to Eddie Murphy!

Some twenty-five years ago, Eddie Murphy starred in one of the truly seminal Saturday Night Live skits; a skit so damned classic that it's fondly remembered by people of my generation as one of the great moments of television comedy to come out of the 1980s. In wonderful deadpan fashion, Murphy went "undercover" as a white man to find out how white people act when there are no black people around. Hilariously, he discovered that white people "give each other things....for free!" and that life as a white person in the United States was basically paradise when those "silly negroes" were out of the picture.

Well, it took a good quarter-century, but it seems that Coors Light has come up with an "answer" to Murphy's "expose." Check out the well-dressed executive-type black guy as he abruptly dismisses his white friends outside the office building. (Ok, one of these people is a hot African-American chick; wonder why she wasn't invited?) Next thing you know, he's surrounded by other young, hip, and good-looking African-Americans on a Coors Light "Love Train" (shame on you, O'Jays, if you actually still owned the rights and sold out your plea for World Peace to a beer company owned by a family which probably thinks that Sarah Palin is too liberal to be trusted with power.) The beer and the music flow freely, and everyone has an awesome time on the Coors Silver Bullet train (well, at least there's one bullet train in the United States.) It's all good, because there are no white people around to mess things up with their Miller Lite, Mickey D's Dollar Meals and Jerad-endorsed Five Dollar Foot Longs.

Yes, it's nothing but fun on the Highly Segregated Love Train. Leaving me to wonder what is more insulting here- the idea that African Americans are expected to equate "love" with dumping white coworkers to hang out with people with similar skin tones, or the idea that African Americans equate having fun with drinking Coors Light. I'll leave that conundrum to the philosophers.

Meanwhile, Eddie, you've been served. And it only took another generation to do it.

The Proper Care and Feeding of your own Bundle of Joy

You've been an insufferable, whiny, petulant little brat all your life, why start making sensible choices now just because your driver's license identifies you as an adult?

After all, when you were a pout-faced little cherub, you had no problem dismissing your mom's attempts to keep Christmas within the family budget by steering you toward a slightly less exorbitant version of That Thing You Really Wanted And Were Quite Willing To Throw a Quiet Fit If You Couldn't Get Right This Minute. By barely acknowledging her presence, and dismissing her with a soft, but determined, "No, it's Not," you let her know that there was No Way You Would Ever Love Her Again if she didn't succumb to Her Precious One's demands.

And when you were the punk wannabee who dragged dad to the guitar store, you didn't let that lame-ass old fart suggest that the slightly cheaper Piece of Shit You Didn't Even Bother to Look At was anywhere near as good as the signature series beauty you were going to make him pay through the nose for, if he didn't want you hating him more than you already did, the cranky, out of touch old loser.

And now you are on your own (I bet your parents are heartbroken over THAT fact) and the world had better know right now that you are living life on your Own Terms, As Usual. You've always demanded the Best, and you Always Will. Right now, that means a BMW. I don't know what it will mean to you later- and frankly, I don't care. Because people like you make me want to vomit.

We all know where self-indulgent monsters who think the fucking planet revolves around their wants come from- they come from indulgent parents. They are easily recognizable, and once again we are living in an era where they are to be admired and emulated, rather than despised. Just because this prick didn't actually throw himself on the floor and kick while screaming his face blue doesn't make him any less loathsome as a child, and his calm, assured "this is the one" doesn't make him any less repulsive as an adult. Every version of him shown in this ad is equally vile. And all I can do now is hope that his decision to use gold as a hedge against inflation blows up in his face and he spends his golden years splitting his prescription meds and dining on Brand-X mushroom soup. Whether it's really "good enough" or not.

Not the Answer to Rachel's problem

Rachel wakes up with back pain. So she gulps down two Tylenol. A few hours later, she spots some hard benches, assumes that they will result in back pain, and so gulps down two more. A few hours later, it's been a few hours, and Rachel, being a creature of habit, gulps down two Tylenol just for the heck of it.

That night, she is the object of a one-person intervention by her husband, who forces her to watch an Aleve commercial on the family's big screen HDTV. "Hey honey, nobody wants to force you to give up your pill habit...but maybe if you switch to Aleve, you'll be down to a bottle a month...wanna give it a try?'

Now Rachel gets up in the morning with her ever-present friend, back pain, and gulps down two Aleve which last "all day long." Aleve's pain-numbing medicine is so much more advanced than that of Tylenol that it will keep her in drug-induced non-agony until she turns in that night. Yay. Of course, it's only a matter of time before Rachel starts popping two pre-emptive tablets before she turns off the light- why wake up with pain, after all.

I just wonder- before Rachel's kidneys and liver finally surrender to the nonstop chemical barrage they are receiving from this poor woman's constant intake of pain medication, Rachel might consider actually picking up a phone and MAKING AN APPOINTMENT WITH HER DOCTOR. Because I'm pretty sure that over the counter drugs like Tylenol and Aleve aren't really designed to deal with medical conditions which produce long-term pain. When I was in a car accident seven years ago, I suffered a back injury which required me to ingest a daily dose of Oxyprozin to deaden the pain while I completed physical therapy. Today I deal with back pain with exercise and only take drugs to deal with EXTREME pain- the kind that prevents me from getting on with life. They aren't part of my daily diet, and I kind of suspect they aren't supposed to be.

There's something very wrong with ads for over the counter drugs (or any drugs, for that matter) which suggest that it's perfectly ok to include allegedly powerful painkillers along with your coffee, orange juice and toast routine. Especially since your body doesn't want a lot of this stuff in it's system, and will let you know this, in very nasty ways, sooner or later.