Funeral Insurance: your last chance at Conspicuous Consumption, and to fall for a guilt trip

Ugh, this again.

To me, asking if I've saved enough money for my funeral is kind of like asking me if I've saved enough money for my future great-great-nephew's college education.  In short, I don't know why this should concern me in the slightest.

These commercials always push two buttons, neither of which trigger anything in me at all:

1.  The "you need a big, expensive sendoff" button.  You're going to die, which means you MUST be prepared to have your corpse dressed in an expensive suit, put into an expensive box, put into an expensive piece of real estate, and marked with an expensive piece of marble or granite that lets passer-bys know whose body is in an expensive box directly underneath it.   All of this is ABSOLUTELY NECESSARY OTHERWISE YOU MAY NOT BE ALLOWED TO DIE.

2.  The "your death will be a financial burden on your children" button.  This is even more vile than the first, because 99.9 percent of these ads include some line about not being a Stupid Selfish Awful Old Person who is Probably Already Creating Financial Difficulties for your Children and whose failure to Plan for the Inevitable will leave them draining the college funds of your Grandchildren in order to pay for that expensive box and decorated piece of rock.   We're always seeing a frail old person reassuring their children that they saw this Nice Man on TV offering Funeral Insurance and bought a policy, so no worries.  (If my mother or father told me this, I'd tell them to stop watching tv and answering the phone because they are way too susceptible to sales pitches.)

This is actually very simple, but I'll say it again:  Nobody is required to have a funeral.  Nobody is required to have a coffin or a pretty stone telling people that they are standing over your Probably Permanent Residence.  Of course, if you want all that stuff yes, it can be very expensive, and you'd better save for it.  But in the Reasonable World "end-of-life expenses" really should mean a lawyer to go over and certify your will, any extra hospice care you may need, etc.  Not a freaking piece of furniture to house your remains until they are dust.

I'd like to see one of the kids in these ads respond to "I've got $30,000 in funeral insurance" with the question "ummm...do we have to use the entire $30,000 on the insurance?  Because jeesh there sure are about two thousand more practical things we could be spending that money on....no offense, mom, but....really....."

Chewy.com lost me at "hey pet lovers!"

...so maybe I shouldn't snark on this particular series of commercials.  After all, they aren't trying to sell me anything.  I don't have any pets.  I don't want any pets.  You couldn't PAY me to have a pet.

I do have to say, however, that I hate this "dream come true" stuff.  I see no evidence that dogs dream at all, let alone that they dream about their owners buying them food and toys.  Then again, I've seen commercials featuring dogs "dreaming" about car loans, luxury automobiles, low-interest mortgages, annuity settlement services, carbonated soda, and any number of other things they don't ever experience, so....

Maybe I should have just stuck with my original instinct and just left Chewy.com commercials alone.  But I just hate the sickly/stupid twee/cutesy feel of all these dumb ads, so I'll probably keep it up.

Chewy.com- "where did this new mammal thing come from?"

"Hello, Chewy.com?  We seem to have a new puppy.  What do we feed it?"

"Um...food.  You are just thinking of this now?"

"Well yeah, we just got back from Petco.  It's just adorable and the kids love it.  It's a puppy! But we walked out of the store without getting it anything to eat.  So, I think we have to put food into it.  What kind of food should we put into it?"

"Ok, I can set you up with the right food.  Meanwhile, give your puppy SOMETHING to eat, please.  We'll overnight it."

"Thanks.  Oh, and another thing.  Every once in a while it starts leaking.  Is that normal?"

"Um...yeah.  It's urinating.  It's an animal.  It's dispelling waste."

"My kids do that, but they go to the toilet!  Why doesn't this thing go to the toilet?  I mean, it's so cute, but I don't want to clean up after it all the time."

"You have to train your puppy to let you know it needs to go outside.  Then you need to take it outside."

"Wow, there's more to this than I thought!  Hey, we're building a cage for it, can you help us do that too?"

"Sure.....say, do you think you are really ready to own a dog?"

"No, we don't want a dog!  That's why we got a PUPPY!  Pay attention!"

Because I do take requests: The Facebook Groups Kazoo Commercial

Though seriously, there's not a whole lot left to say about this once it's been experienced (and I've experienced this exactly once.  I'm not watching this War Crime one more time, ever.)

Let's imagine that this is an actual college, and these are actual students.  Every single one of them is at this college on a voluntary basis; they applied- they weren't drafted- and were picked over other applicants.  Every single one of them in sitting in a class someone else wanted to get into but was denied access. 

There you go, ladies and gentlemen- THESE kids were the winners in the Get Into This College Contest.

But instead of taking advantage of their good fortune, one of them decides to interrupt the lecture by blowing into a kazoo.  This is normal, young-adult, future-of-the-nation behavior.  An educated adult is trying to pass on their knowledge to you in a class you opted to take?  You're bored?  Show everyone how awesome your attention span is by blowing into a kazoo.  Don't keep it to yourself.  Don't worry that some other lame student might be trying to learn something.  This is all about you.  Blow that kazoo.

And if you are sitting in a class and you're bored because you only took the class because you found yourself in college and classes are a thing that seem to happen in college, and you hear someone blow a kazoo, take out yours and answer.  Let that person know that there are at at least two clueless jagoffs in the classroom.  It's tons of fun and it will totally prevent anyone from learning, so cool.

And when every single douchenozzle in the class has been identified, you can all meet up in your own Facebook Group when there are assignments to do and you don't want to do them because they are lame, and you can practice your kazoo-blowing until your dorm mate murders you, which hopefully will be very, very soon.  Because then that actual student on the waiting list can get into that school and get an actual, you know, Education.

Is there more to this commercial?  Maybe. I'm not watching it again.  No way.

"Kazoo Enthusiasts?"  We need a Virus for That. 

US Tax Shield - Arguably the most aggravating commercials out there

It just seems to be the perfect company to pick on while my 401(k) melts away (for now.)  What better to warm the heart than the stories of tax scofflaws getting away with cheating the American people and keeping their luxury houses complete with SUVs and swimming pools?

"Congress just passed what is arguably the biggest tax reform in history..." well, kind of hard to call that a lie.  You can argue pretty much anything.  Darth Vader killed Luke's father, "from a certain point of view."  In other words, Arguably.  But I bet Ronald Reagan, Bill Clinton and GW Bush would disagree with the tax reform of 2019 being anything close to the biggest tax reform in US history.

Kayla owed the IRS $38,000 dollars "after her divorce." What does her divorce have to do with skipping out on her taxes to the tune of $38,000?  Was she too busy getting a divorce to pay her taxes?  Seriously, what is the connection?  We aren't told.  We're NEVER told.  Maybe divorce is Arguably the biggest cause of being a Tax Dodge?

Don made "four attempts to resolve his own tax debt" before he decided to call US Tax Shield.  I wonder if that means he called four different scam artists before he contacted this one.  It's certainly Arguable that he didn't make an honest attempt to actually pay his bill, because he could have made ONE phone call, to the Big Bad IRS, to work out a payment plan.  Clearly making payments isn't Don's thing- thus, the call to US Tax Shield.

Meh, this goes on and on but I think you get the picture.  US Tax Shield promises to "protect" you from the people you legitimately owe money to- meaning, US.  Hand me a freaking tissue. 

Superbowl Commercial Fail # 5- Tide Pods

1.  Who invited this whiny, screechy idiot?  Seriously, he probably just got over losing half his chip in the dip before this NEW traumatizing event shook his world.  You've got a food stain on your shirt, buddy.  Calm.  The hell.  Down.

2.  Is this party taking place in his own home?  If so, why doesn't he just change?  If not, does he expect the host to just start a laundry load because his shirt has a stain on it (there's a basket of laundry right there in the background?)   I have to assume he's a guest, because oh my god does he keep this hissy fit going on long after anyone else would have wiped that stain with a wet paper towel and moved on with his life.

3.  Who is this woman reminding him that it's just a stain, he's at an adult party, and he seriously needs to stop acting like he's having a full-blown autistic episode? Don't you dare tell me that's his wife or his date.  Because if that's the case, I seriously just give up- just like she obviously did.  But when he wakes up "later," she's nowhere to be seen, so....

(And no offense to autistic people, but that's the first thing I thought of when I saw this guy's reaction to getting a stain on his shirt.  He's seriously having a fit and if he doesn't have a diagnosed mental illness should be put in Time Out, if not a straightjacket.)

4.  The guy spends the rest of this ad obsessing over that stain, and it's easy to imagine that he's doing all of this Thinking About What Later Means out loud, disturbing everyone at the party.  He notices a Bud Light ad and the Pepsi Halftime Show (thanks for reminding us of the sponsor, you choad) but apparently the actual game is lost to him because all that matters is that stain.

5.  I'm going to assume that all of the other people at this party will remind themselves not to invite a certain other stain to the next Superbowl get-together, or any other get-together, for that matter.  This guy is a walking billboard for Social Separating.  He IS a virus. 

2020 Battle for the White House Chess Set- Another gem from Basic Cable!

This reminds me of that classic joke about the Time-Life Civil War chess set they were selling on late-night television back in the 1970s; you know, where you'd buy the board up front and subscribe to receive one chess piece a month for a low low price of $14.99 each plus shipping and handling.  The joke was "play your first game in 2015."

Now your family can mark the "historic 2020 Presidential election" (aren't they all kind of historic?) by purchasing this hysterical chess set featuring "hand-crafted" pieces representing all the "important figures" involved in that election.  There's Mitch McConnell and Nancy Pelosi leading the "symbolic elephants and donkeys* into battle,"  and Barack Obama is there for some reason.  Adorable.

The ad opens with the question "who will occupy the Oval Office?'  Personally, I'd vote for that question mark over the current occupant any day and twice on Sundays.

"President Donald J. Trump with Vice President Mike Pence by his side...." I wonder if you get your money back after Nikki Haley takes Pence's place "by his side?"  I mean, why not?  I mean, you're going to have to do a little extra work anyway- you aren't going to be able to use that Bernie Sanders piece at the Democratic lectern. 

"Justices Kavanaugh, Sotomayor, Roberts and Ginsburg, Bishops, stand guard to protect the Supreme Court."  I guess they figure Trump's going to win re-election.  Only way I can see why they'd have to "stand guard" to "protect" the court.

Oh, and this is the set with "optional deluxe board" being shown.  I wonder what makes it "deluxe?"  That the cheap plastic is raised?  Seriously, this thing looks so ugly it's hard to believe that the "deluxe" set would be more ostentatious than the standard one.  Why would anyone pay extra to draw even MORE attention to the fact that you traded good money for this junk?

The set cost $59.99 with a "strict limit of one per household," except the limit isn't all that strict, as with their promo code you can reserve THREE.   Because they'd make awesome gifts, obviously. 

"The fun will never end..." Ok, you said that about my 9/11 commemorative coin collection, my Stormin' Norman tea set and my Trumpy Bear.  I'm starting to doubt your word, Late Night TV

(I'm already to vote for the empty Democratic podiums myself....)

*so glad the donkeys and elephants are only "symbolic."  That will certainly save on shipping and handling.