Febreze Presents: the Vacant Contentment of the Suburban Housewife

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Original Commercial here:  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=biI2fw8x_Mg

Everything that once made this woman an individual human being with hopes, dreams, ambitions, personality, etc. died so long ago that nobody can remember what she was like back then, no matter how many times they look at home videos or scroll through the High School Yearbook.  

What is left behind is this vacant, standard-issue-pretty zombie taking in her surroundings in her standard-issue suburban home,  which include her stand-issue-pretty children, furniture, and Pet.  She's got a cell phone in her hand because she's an American, but she's not using it because she has nobody to call or otherwise be in contact with.  Completely deprived of stimulation, she's settled into a near-comatose state that she'll come out of just in time to get dinner ready for the Lord of the Manor.  

She doesn't notice odors for the same reason she doesn't notice much of anything else- because her senses have gone the way of everything else that once made her a Person, replaced by this soulless vessel for Making Children and Maintaining a House and being Mrs Somebody Else.  Not that her standard-issue Equally Vacant children are much better, sitting on rug doing standard-issue children things that don't bother lobotomized mommy as she just sit there with her contented I'm a Successful American Woman Because I Got Rid of my Last Name and Everything Else that Made me Me When I Was Younger look on her face.

Oh, and why worry about going "noseblind?"  Because occasionally, she'll be visited by other Stepford Wives who still have at least one functioning sense left in their empty heads, and she wouldn't want to be judged for anything beyond the size of the house and the SUV parked in the driveway. 

Care.com-- choose wisely....

https://youtu.be/x6FZK0tsJqs

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...because this has got #choosepoorlyandyouvepickedyourhusbandsnexttrophywife written all over it. 

If I were any of these wives, I certainly wouldn't be asking my husband for his help in choosing the next "babysitter" to come into the home.  I've seen enough Lifetime Channel movies this summer to know that that would be a BAD idea, unless you're ready and able to veto anyone HE likes.  

(BTW, very sorry about the lack of instant video and the appearance of the embed code instead; I hope it's just a temporary connectivity issue while I'm here in Vermont.  I can't think of any other explanation, but I'll look into it if the problem continues when I'm back in Maryland, the land of Regular, 21st century internet.  In the meantime, just cut and paste, you lazy twats!)

Kelly Clarkson, Wayfair, and the last gasps of the Easily Triggered

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1.  How does the sudden appearance of Kelly Clarkson cause a very hot dish to suddenly not be very hot anymore?  I mean, one second this guy is frantically looking for a place to lay something he just took out of the oven, and the next he's just standing there wondering why Kelly Clarkson is standing in his kitchen bleating a pitch for Wayfair, everyone's favorite source of crap furniture not named IKEA.

2.  What does Kelly Clarkson have to do with ordering crap furniture, anyway?  Wikipedia tells me that this woman has a net worth of $45 million.  She doesn't need to do this.  But then again, Shaq doesn't have to pitch garbage car insurance and Alex Trebek doesn't need to pitch garbage health insurance and Tom Selleck doesn't have to push Reverse Mortgages.  Money is money and there's never too much, I guess?

3.  Does Wayfair also sell the space you need for crap furniture?  Because this thing doesn't solve any "where do I put this" problems I have when taking something hot out of the oven.  I have to leave my kitchen in order to change my mind.  Oh right, I forgot- Wayfair is for people who live in typically large TV houses.  Who also have zero taste in furniture.  I'm only in the second category.

4.  Two guesses why this ad irritates some people.  Hint: It's not because Kelly Clarkson randomly shows up in the kitchen.  

Xfinity's answer to people who forgot to care

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OR....you could, you know, just raise your kids to NOT be addicted to their electronics. 

Oh, but that's too hard.  Never mind.  Here's an App that allows you to see at a glance that the WiFi in your home is being used.  So you never have to assume that rules that were put in place- and modeled by the adults- are actually being adhered to.  Instead, you can just skip all that parenting crap and just spy on your kids, assuming that without direction they'll just do whatever they want, whenever they want (after all, getting them out of your hair was the original point of getting them addicted to their devices before the started first grade anyway, right?

The most depressing thing about this Geico Commercial...

...isn't all the stuff about Neighborhood Associations.  Yes, they can be this tyrannical, allegedly in the name of keeping home values up but more often to feed the little Fascist that exists buried inside all of us, waiting for an opportunity to spring out. 

Nor is it the idea that I'm supposed to feel sorry for this couple who just want to enjoy their vast Suburban McMansion.  Everyone in TV commercials lives in a house like this, or an almost equally massive luxury apartment- doesn't matter if the inhabitants are dog walkers, kindergarten teachers or hedge fund managers, they can all afford sprawling housing units that look like they have bedrooms the residents haven't discovered yet.

No, the most depressing thing about this Geico Commercial comes at the very end, when the stars of this dumb nugget of an ad let us know how we can see "more stories" featuring actors placed in contrived situations which have nothing to do with Geico but are supposed to amuse and entertain Because You Are Very Dumb.  It's depressing because you know there are people who will actually want more servings of this rotten decaying carcass of a concept because What The Heck It's Like Watching TV.  Never mind that these people were more particular in their choice of entertainment when they were babies fascinated with car keys and anything else they could shove into their mouths.

More hate for Chewy.com!

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Made the decision to have a pet?  Well, why not just farm out the most annoying part of the responsibility that comes with that decision to some anonymous guy who delivers parcels for a living?

Bags of pet food, litter etc. are HEAVY.  So....don't deal with them! Let some total stranger be the victim of your overbearing sense of privilege instead.  Just go to Chewy.com, order those 50-lb bags of kibble and 100-lb sacks of litter to be delivered to your Suburban McMansion, or your apartment on the fifth floor of a building without an elevator (and if the FedEx guy leaves it with the lobby manager, go online and throw a hissy fit about the Poor Quality of Service until you get an official Apology from the shipping company, KAREN.)  Having a pet- a 100 percent voluntary activity, btw- should not mean extra work for you!  It should mean extra work for total strangers with jobs that don't offer health insurance!

And if you're ever bothered by a twinge of conscience while pointing and clicking at pet supplies which have convenience built into their price (not that you care about price,) here's some tried and true bumper sticker logic to soothe your troubled soul.  Take your pick:

"It's their job."

"They are lucky to have jobs in these trying times."

"If they don't like it, they can always get another job."

"They are all young and strong, I have a bad back."

"I'm a hard-working professional I don't have time to shop for pet supplies" (so if Chewy.com didn't exist you'd....give up having pets? Doubtful.)

Personally, I think UPS, FedEx, Amazon, and the USPS should have strict weight limits on the packages they are willing to bring to the doorstep; all packages above that weight should have to be picked up at a central depot or should carry much larger fees in order to accommodate a second delivery person to assist in the transfer from factory to door.  This won't happen because Capitalism and Profit are King and delivery personnel are easily-replaceable assets, especially when you don't provide health insurance to deal with the injuries caused by the regular handling of heavy, bulky packages.  So keep it up, Pet Owners of America; you are truly in the vanguard of an Entitlement Craze that will someday make it possible to have Cinder Block Leggos and pre-filled swimming pools brought to our homes Because Hey the Customer.  All contact-free, of course; not because COVID will still be around, but because no customer will dare to risk making eye contact with the FedEx guy as he lugs whatever item you Simply Couldn't pick up at the Walmart three blocks away to your door. 

Eargo's Awful Hearing Aid ad that yes, is for a Hearing Aid

1.  The young man in this ad is the one who needs a hearing aid, I guess:  his stupid Significant Other is standing right next to him but he can't hear what she's whispering, but her dad- sitting ten feet away, can.  Because Eargo Hearing Aids turn you into the Bionic Man, or as I suggested before, this young man has very bad hearing.

2.  Stupid Significant Other is Very, Very Stupid.  She decides that THIS is the moment to ask- and insist upon an answer- her "hey I just realized we wouldn't be getting a hotel room tonight, this house is really small, and we'll be having sex later" question.   She won't move one step closer to her Young Gentleman when she realizes he can't hear her, either.  She'll just stand there with her mother close by, her father right there, repeating a question she can't possibly need the answer to Right This Very Moment in service of the gag.

3.  The real punchline is that the young man in this ad can do much better.  There's nothing special about this girl, unless he's really attracted to morons who have difficulty understanding their surroundings.  She could have asked her question concerning Protection in the car on the way to Mom and Dad's house.  She could ask him to step outside (not into another room, since its clear that this house is TINY and that the walls are made of tissue paper.)  But no- she needs to know RIGHT HERE and RIGHT NOW- again, because the gag requires it.  I'm not excusing her behavior, though- he can do better.

4.  Why do you want a hearing aid that allows you to hear people whispering to each other?  I thought that the best hearing aids allowed you to focus on what was being said to YOU and eliminated sounds (like other conversations) that could overwhelm those particular words?  If Eargo allowed Dad to hear a whispered conversation ten feet away, it also allowed him to hear every car driving by, every clink of every cup and plate, and a myriad of other sounds that would have left that whispered conversation just another ingredient in the wall of noise constantly assaulting his eardrums.  Eargo is making the claim made by those MAGIC SUPER EAR devices you found next to X RAY SPECS and Sea Monkeys at the back of the comic book.  Not very practical.

5.  The YouTube comments that follow this ad....oh my god, you people.  You people are the worst.