For people who know the price of everything, and the value of nothing

This dog reminds me of people I actually know. They are the kind of people that those cultish "Join Us" Edward Jones or just plain stupid "Ask Chuck" ads appeal too. You know who I am talking about- the people who spend their lives obsessing over money, unable to enjoy today because they live in a state of terror over the thought that Tomorrow might not be all wine and roses.

Like this dog, they like having a nest egg, but that bundle of savings brings them no real pleasure- in fact, it keeps them up at night, tossing and turning, worrying that their "portfolio" isn't "working hard enough" to provide "long term financial security" and what TIA-CREF likes to call "guaranteed income" (quick tip: the words "guarantee" and "lie" are synonyms.)

Like this dog, they worship that bundle of savings. They cuddle it, they stroke it, they check it and recheck it and seem certain that if they let it out of their sight for more than a few hours at a time, it will disappear. Someday, someone will explain to me how this is preferable to having no savings at all.

Because sooner or later, real human beings understand that Money can't buy anything that is of any value. As Charles Foster Kane admitted to his financial mentor in the greatest movie ever made, he was always using money in the worst way imaginable- "to buy things." Sooner or later, most of us realize that The Beatles were right when they sang that Money can't buy you love, and the cliche about it not being valid currency when seeking to purchase happiness is also true.

Money can buy Things- Things that provide momentary pleasure and comfort, but ultimately do nothing but gather dust and crumble away. Money can buy some people- I know of at least one or two people who sold themselves cheap, trading the uncertainties of Independence for the mirage of Security. Money can buy stuff that fills rooms but can't take the place of what John Steinbeck called the Pearls of Great Price- the things that don't come with a tag.

Sometimes, money does allow for a great investment. It's almost unbelievable that a dollar and a quarter can put a bagel in a kid's hands and reward the buyer with a smile whose worth cannot be measured in coin. The look on the face of a kid getting an unexpected slice of cake on an otherwise dreary school day- how much is that worth in dirty green paper? But examples like this just demonstrate how pointless and ugly it is to lock money up in a safe, or hoard it in a thousand other ways.

Money will always cost more than it's worth. In this commercial, it costs the dog peace of mind. It brings misery and restlessness and maybe ulcers. The treasure weighing heavily on this dog's mind isn't working for the dog- the dog is suffering for IT.

Aren't enough of us already like this dog?

(I include with this entry a scene from one of my favorite films, "Meet John Doe," because it includes two awesome lines that more of us should really take to heart. One is "I know the world's been shaven by a drunken barber." The other is an explanation of what the Pursuit of Money does to people, starting with "before you know it, you'll have a bank account." Believe me, it's worth the time investment.)

I'm a WHAT, Honda??

Oh, this is really appropriate. I'm sure the good people in marketing at Honda were just a little too busy making this stupid, pointless nub of a commercial to notice that the song they decided to use is about a teen stalker who is in a mad rush to get to the house of the object of his obsession so he can watch her undress. No kidding. Check out the lyrics (no, I'm not providing a link- go find it yourself if you are really that interested. Pretty sick.)

I guess they were also too busy to look around and notice that it's not 1985 anymore, and nobody is driving to the Arcade to play cheap-graphic video games. Not even Hoodie Ninjas (seriously, what does that even mean?)

Is it too much to expect that as soon as someone taps an executive at Honda on the shoulder and explains to them how inappropriate the background music is, or how "Do Not Attempt" should not refer to this "ninja's" use of the featured car as a freaking TIME MACHINE, this ad will cease to exist? Bleh- of course it is. My guess is that nobody at Honda ever actually bothered to listen to the song beyond the "I'm a Hoodie Ninja" line, which a focus group of People Who Really Ought To Just Die Now decided was really cool and catchy. (Focus Groups do more damage to this country than Republican governors, I swear....)

So thank you, Honda, for making me ashamed of my chosen mode of travel. My Civic EX has given me eight years and 103,000 miles of excellent service- but now I feel associated with this ugly, clueless ad campaign. Believe it or not, I don't want to be a Hoodie Ninja, whatever the hell that is. I had planned to buy a new car next year, and just assumed it would be another Honda, but now I have to rethink the situation. Toyota hasn't irritated me for a while, and the last time I checked, it wasn't using disturbing, violent lyrics to sell it's product.

Worth a second look this time, in any case.

And only four died in the whiskey-induced, post-funeral brawl

During the Great Storm of 1781, John Jameson, your typical, average whisky-swilling Irishman, lost a barrel of his beloved hooch, which broke loose and fell into the raging sea.

Did I mention that John Jameson was Irish? 'Cause that's kind of important in understanding why he would proceed to commit suicide by diving into the storm-tossed ocean in an attempt to recover one of the roughly 10,000 barrels of fermented corn his ship was carrying.

I'm not even going to touch the "he said goodbye to his crew" line, which accompanies a scene in which John Jameson is giving an open-mouthed, passionate kiss to a decidedly feminine-looking crew mate. Bad writing? Bad editing? You make the call.

And now we've come to the LOL EPIC punchline. You see, all of Ireland- roughly one million potato-munching, famine-fleeing, pasty-skinned, red-haired, hot-tempered and above all Liquor-Obsessed cabbage junkies- turned out for John Jameson's funeral. As the legend goes, John Jameson himself appeared during the ceremony, crawling out of the sea with the wayward barrel of whiskey on one shoulder. Good times, we may assume, where had by all.

After all, these are Irish people. And now they have whiskey. What else could they possibly want- food? Land? That's what America is for!

I wonder how many posters who complained about my take on last year's racist (sorry, but that's what it was) State Farm ad will let me know that this commercial is in no way offensive to anyone with Irish ancestry (full disclosure: I'm one-fourth Irish myself, though I don't look it.) Maybe it's just poking fun at a beloved, cherished stereotype and I just need to let it go.

Or maybe it's time for advertisers to figure out that "Irish =Alcohol-Loving Idiots" is not really an appropriate way to sell us their product in the 21st century. After all, we haven't seen "Mama Mia thatsa Spicy Meatball!" in more than thirty years (and as someone who is also one-quarter Italian, I really appreciate that.)

By the way, why did this ad even bother with the octopus? Did they think that jumping into the ocean during a hurricane wasn't lethal-looking enough?

Buy this product, unless you really do hate your dog, you monster!

Wow, I bet all you dog owners never realized how you were TORTURING and ABUSING your little friends every time you put that leash on, did you?

Well, now you know why your dogs have always LOATHED the idea of taking a walk- I mean, has there ever been any harder task than trying to get Fido out of the house for a few minutes to partake in a little exercise with his clueless master? From all the encounters I've had from dog owners over the years, I've come to the conclusion that trying to get a dog to take a walk is like trying to get a teen-ager to part with her cellphone. Like pulling teeth.

Ok, I'm being facetious, of course. Actually, every dog I've ever met must be a big fan of having it's neck bones crushed by brutal, Medieval-style "choke chains," because they can't seem to get ENOUGH of walks with their owners. I've never heard a dog whine because it's wearing one of these collars- though I suspect that if you yank on that leash really hard, you WILL hurt your dog and you WILL be rewarded with this kind of plaintive, "what did I do?" appeal for mercy. I also suspect that if you are the kind of person who would actually do this to a dog, you have no business owning one, you disgusting brute.

So according to this commercial, the "answer" to a question nobody asked is a cheap-looking vest which allows you to control your dog by applying pressure to it's breastplate rather than it's neck. I have to admit, this actually makes perfect sense.

So I'm not actually criticizing the product here- just the Massive Guilt Trip used to sell it. I believe that this little vest device, if it's built properly and with quality materials (snicker), might actually be a nice thing to have (I suspect it lasts a lot longer with smaller dogs than larger ones.) But I don't believe that we've spent thousands of years unwittingly crushing the neck vertebrae of our four-legged friends every time we take them for a walk. And I don't appreciate the accusation that using regular collars basically makes dog owners the modern Spanish Inquisition.

Short, Sweet and Stupid

Four times a week, this woman tells us, she runs. Good for her. More people out there need to run- or at least walk. Move. Stop sitting so damned much.

I just came back from a week grading AP exams in Louisville, Kentucky. I estimate that 80 percent of that town's population is obese- slow, fat, sweaty, etc. I believe that the official Sport of Louisville is Waddling. At one of the three Bats games I attended at Slugger Field, I saw dozens of overweight slobs shoveling fried chicken and french fries into their faces and washing it all down with massive cups of soda or beer. It didn't matter that it was roughly 95 degrees out. It didn't matter that these people HAD to be terribly uncomfortable with their excess bulk. It was all about the food.

We graded exams for eight hours a day, for six straight days. Three times a day, we were given buffet-style meals (I was a good boy, I stuck to the Vegetarian options all week, still gained two pounds.) At mid-morning and mid-afternoon, we had a snack breaks- granola bars, fruit, chips, cookies, slices of cake....plus, there were piles of candy sitting at our grading table "to keep our energy up." It would have been very easy to just eat, nonstop, all week. Fortunately I got bored with the food after the first day and nibbled most of the rest of the week, and got in a lot of walks along the beautiful waterfront.

Ok, enough about me and Louisville. Let's get back to this little nothing of an ad. This woman tells us that she runs. Four times a day. And she KNOWS she's supposed to drink water after her run- but she clearly doesn't know WHY, otherwise she would not make the really stupid, self-destructive mistake she makes after each run. You see, dummy, you are supposed to drink water because you've just gone through a process of dehydration- you've made your muscles work extra hard, and they need to recover.

What do you do instead? You get yourself a huge cup of ultra-dehydrating coffee, doused with sugar and fatty cream. So you are not satisfied simply negating a positive thing you've done for your body by putting back all the calories you just managed to burn. You insist on DAMAGING your body just when it is vulnerable.

And you do it with a stupid smile on your face. And a giggle. Brilliant.

Listen, lady- this is not advice I give to many people, but I'll give it to you: do yourself a big favor and cut out those daily runs. If they end with half a gallon of caffeine, sugar and fat, they simply aren't worth it. Just sit on your butt and drink water instead. Trust me- your heart will thank you. So, by the way, will your wallet.

Oh, I get it. I'm part of the problem!

Think oil company owners are greedy, avaricious bastards determined to rape every corner of the planet if it means stuffing even larger wads of cash into their already bloated off-shore accounts? Think that all their talk of "green technology" and "clean coal" (seriously. Clean Coal.) is just smoke and mirrors intended to distract the tree huggers while every last ounce of ancient black ooze is sucked out of the Earth's orifices? Think that the only thing that oil executives have in common with seagulls is that they would both steal a bagel from a baby (not an original joke, but I can't remember which comedian I heard it from?)

Well, it turns out that if you think any of the above, you are only damming yourself. Because if you have money in the bank, or drive a car, or basically do anything beyond breathe, you are the owner of an oil company. So stuff your righteous criticisms in a sack, buddy- you own an oil company, just like the guys who make hundreds of millions of dollars a year, zip around the world in private jets, and own multiple homes on every continent (ok, maybe not Antarctica, but you get what I mean.)

So stop picking on the poor oil executives, and stop bitching about what you mistakenly see as bloated profits reaped from price gouging and futures-fixing and government-purchasing and environment-destroying. Because you are only picking on yourself. Maybe you aren't sitting on a mountain of blood money, maybe you aren't directly contributing to the suffocation of the planet, but you are the owner of an oil company. So quit your bitching.

And call your Congressman, and tell him to get the government to stop asking you annoying questions about your finances, Mr Oil Company Owner- because gosh darn it, you've got enough problems without having the Hippies giving you a hassle.

Because you're an oil company owner, and don't you forget whose team you are on.

Jell-O Spreads the Hate

Unwilling to let Volkswagen, Sprint and Kraft Mac 'n Cheese corner the market in loathsomeness, Jell-O has inaugurated a series of Parents v. Kids commercials in which Mommy and Daddy terrorize their kids into keeping their hands off of the Made for Adults desserts.

In this version, Mom and Dad are perfectly willing to traumatize Son and Daughter with stories of "Choco-Beasts" instead of simply ASKING them to stop "stealing" their Jell-O. The kids, who will probably need years of therapy before they can ever sleep in a tent more than five feet from the house again, run terrified into the house, but it's all good because their parents get all the Chocolate Goo in a Cup to themselves.

All in good fun, because except for the soiled pajamas, fear of the dark and new-found distrust of their parents, no harm has been done to these kids.

Thanks, Jell-O!