Lets go back to playing the quiet game now

Does it bother anyone else that all of these "I Like And Better" commercials require the same implausible elements to come together to make even the slightest amount of sense?

1.  The driver of the car has to wait until the passenger inexplicably praises the car he or she is travelling in.  I have never, ever done this, but I'm pretty sure that if I found myself saying "hey, this car is really nice" it would be a very strong signal to the driver that A)  I was sitting here feeling really awkward, and felt I should say SOMETHING, and B) I am the worst conversationalist in the history of the known universe.

2.  The driver then gets to respond by pointing out two positive attributes of the automobile which have absolutely nothing to do with each other.  "Yeah, it has anti-lock brakes AND great gas mileage."  "Yep, electronically adjustable mirrors AND Sirius satellite radio."  "You got it- heated seats AND a foot-controlled hatch."*

3.  Idiot passenger, realizing that he's unwittingly stumbled into a lame "lets talk about my awesome car" conversation which promises to be even worse than the heavy silence that forced him to vomit up his stupid "hey, this car is really nice" comment, ramps up the dumb by observing that "and" is better than "or."  I'll give the idiot passenger credit for quite reasonably believing that THIS should so totally flummox the driver that he finally agrees to turn on the fucking radio and end this torture.

But noooooooo.......

4.  Cotton Candy For Brains Driver, believing that no conversation is so utterly vapid that it should be allowed to die a natural death, actually challenges his Dying Inside, Wondering How Much It Would Hurt If He Just Jumped travel companion to imagine fun other situations in which "And" is better than "Or."  Fun, that is-- if they were, say, six years old and the DVD player in the SUV was on the fritz.  "That would be like black OR white photography."  "That would be like sweet OR sour chicken."  "That would be like 30-day paid vacations OR stock options."

5.  Shared mental image.  Who is the originator of the image?  Who cares?  Both people in the commercial manage to create the same unimaginative, ludicrous scene in their heads at the same time.

6.  Well, that conversation is over, Thank God.  Now what will we talk about?  Let's play the quiet game, shall we?  Nah, let's just continue to make the Geico "Happier than..." series look like high art.

*99.9 percent of the time, foot-controlled hatch used by drivers overburdened with pizzas or KFC buckets.

The Future of Brain-Dead, Fat, Pasty, Socially Retarded America. I Get It.

This summer, commercials trumpeting "the future of Awesome" are becoming even more aggressive, with the narrator taking a hammer labeled "When You Get It, You GET IT!" to our brains every other ad break.  What we are supposed to "Get," of course, is that while the sun is streaming through the windows and there are flowers to pick, balls to throw, bikes to ride and lakes to swim, what's REALLY AWESOME is when everyone in the family has their own screen to gaze at while drool drips down their chins (yes, that's a plural) and there is absolutely no lag time between downloads which might encourage someone to, I don't know, GET UP AND WALK AROUND EVEN A LITTLE BIT.

Or, hell, even TALK to those other life forms which seem to inhabit that house with you.  Because conversations might move beyond "check out this movie" to dangerous stuff like "what the hell are we doing indoors on such a lovely day" or "I'm blowing my summer vacation watching tv?  Really?"  Can't have that.

So let's all listen to the very insistent narrator, sign up for Fios, equip everyone in the house with personalized idiot boxes, and settle down for "Endless Fun" until our eyes melt out of our heads and our bodies atrophy into warm, useless mush.  Because that's the Future of Awesome, after all, and the future can't come fast enough for us, right?

But, geesh..at least, pull the damn shades.  The glare off my screen is really annoying, besides the fact that it gives me this unpleasant feeling that there might be something more to life than becoming part of the couch while my waistband expands.

Issues that a Credit Card isn't going to help you with....

Seriously, Erica- if stepping in gum, getting a parking ticket, and forgetting to make a payment to your credit card sets you off like this, I can only encourage you to hold on to that trendy boxing center membership.  Especially since you don't seem to be all that interested in oh, I don't know, Anger Management Therapy....

Maybe you can buy some sessions with your Rewards Points?

More weirdness from the Next Big Thing

This one features a scene I have never actually witnessed in real life or in any other cell phone commercial- a techno-addicted dweeb actually using earbuds while watching something on his Best Friend In the Whole World.

This one also includes a funny line which I'm sure was not supposed to be a funny line- "it pauses whenever I turn away from the screen."  Hey, buddy- I've seen enough of you idiots to know that this is a feature which is totally unnecessary and will never be used by anyone with a cell phone.  You socially retarded zombies wouldn't look away if the people seated around you suddenly all burst into flame.  Maybe if you heard someone say "Starbucks is closing in five minutes," but I don't think even that would shake you from your obsession.

It also features an unfunny line which I believe is supposed to be a funny line- a guy who is supposed to be the Loser of this group (he's pale, fat and clean-shaven, so you KNOW he's the Doesn't Belong Guy) asks Alpha Male Because He's Got This Cool For the Moment Phone to call him- and AM, who we all KNOW has 1800 Facebook Friends of whom 1780 are total strangers, is very reluctant to do it.  Because Samsung's newest gadget lets you pause video by turning your head, but I guess it doesn't let you delete contacts or block incoming calls....whatever...

Leaving all of us just hoping that these dicks are all about to board the same doomed plane.

Another Audi "we are just asking you to hate these people" ad

All is forgiven if this guy, his tablet, and his "obsession" end up impaled together by the steering wheel of his fucking 1% DoucheMobile.  (The steering wheel he personally selected, of course.)

Seriously, Audi- as if 99.9 percent of the country could give a flying damn about a guy spending hours scrolling his finger across a screen to "manufacture" the exact Audi which would be perfect for him right down to the fricking color and tire style.  Especially those of us who can't afford one-tenth the frigging house this guy is living in - oh, or that god damned tablet, either.

So please, shove this obnoxious little nugget of hate back into that dark orifice you pulled it from in the first place, ok?

Oh, and just die. Now.  Please.

Nothing but nonstop hilarity over at Legal Seafoods

In the "grampa" commercial I snarked on a few weeks back, the "funny" tagline was that grampa dies and falls in the water, leaving little grandson hi-LARIOUSLY muttering "uh oh."

Because what could be funnier than grampa dying on a fishing trip with grandson?  Nothing, right?

Well, just hold on there.  Check this one out- a couple is out fishing together.  The female can't stop complaining.  So the male MURDERS HER AND TOSSES HER OVERBOARD.

LOL ROTFLMAO!!  I mean, someone call Nancy Grace, this one's got everything!

And to think that I came across this video trying to find the Legal Seafoods Commercial featuring a guy intentionally giving himself a concussion with a ceiling fan, and a woman crawling into a dryer and taking a spin (no, I'm not kidding.)  Neither scene even comes with a fricking "Scenes Simulated, Do Not Attempt" disclaimer.

This is better.  Which is to say much, much worse.

Summer Break for the Commercial Curmudgeon!

First- please don't feel obligated to watch this hammy idiot point at stuff that happens to be in the United Kingdom.  I didn't.  The title of this video just suggested that it met my needs so I embedded it, because....

For the next ten days or so, I'm going to be touring England, Scotland and Wales.  I've wanted to visit the UK my entire life, and having put it off for various reasons I've finally run out of excuses not to go.  I won't have any internet access while I'm there, so my blog will be on hiatus until I return, early on July 23.

Shortly after I get back from across the pond (see, I'm already at least 10 percent more pretentious, and I haven't even left yet) I'll be taking another week off for the annual family trip to the beach, and the site will be out of commission then, too, but in between I'll be sure to drop in a few posts.  I like to pretend that this site is important and that some people will actually miss it (hey, don't deprive me of my delusions of significance!)

Anyway, I'll be back on the 23rd, so until then please enjoy the archives- or better yet, get offline and go outside and do something more worthwhile.    See you in the too-near future!