Engaging with the Gecko/Geico Fantasy Universe for a Moment....

 

So the Geico Gecko is having a yard sale, but it looks as though he's just holding the sale as a way to draw more customers to the services offered by his employer, Geico Insurance.  He's able to do this because a young couple admiring a tiny piece of furniture chirpily comment that they own a new home.  I've been to enough yard sales to know that mentioning how a particular piece of junk would look good in a New Home I Just Bought will naturally bring a sales pitch for homeowner's insurance, so this is super-realistic even if it does include a CGI lizard with an Australian Accent.

Also seems to me that if a tiny rocking chair would be "perfect" for their new home, pretty much everything else being sold by this lizard would also look perfect, because this particular couple intends to decorate their home with tiny furnishings.  To each his own, I guess.  I must say they were quite lucky to stumble into this particular yard sale;  in my previously mentioned extensive lawn sale experience, I've rarely found such a large collection of miniatures as this one has.  Aren't a whole lot of CGI Geckos out there holding yard sales?

Here's a universal rule about these sales, though:  The item is not for sale because it's on the lawn, it's on sale if the owner says it is.  The tables the items are on are also on the lawn; doesn't mean they are for sale.  The stupid talking lizard and the couple themselves are on the lawn; probably neither are for sale.  Don't think you're going to call a cop and an attorney even if a tagged item is withdrawn from sale.  These people are throwing weight around they simply don't have.  Why am I overthinking this?  Shut up, that's why. 

QuickIdea: GET A JOB!

 

"When I started my (insert ego fantasy here) company, I thought it would be fun.  I mean, I'd be a boss and wouldn't answer to anyone and I'd order other people around and my name would be on the front of the building and I'd be able to show the world how I was much, much better than those losers who go out and work a 9-to-5 job for someone else, the losers!"

"Then I realized that owning a business involved numbers and accounts and employees and insurance and salespeople and vendors and customers who didn't constantly kiss my butt or thank me for reinvigorating the local economy and all that stuff and it turned into a big headache."

"So I was faced with a serious choice:  either go out and get a real job like an actual adult and admit that nobody gives a damn about (insert ego trip here,) or get Quickbooks and be able to pretend I'm Super Special and waaaaay too good for one of those Job things for a few more months before reality hits me in the face like a frozen halibut and I have to face the reality that...well, I think I made that pretty clear at the beginning of this paragraph, didn't I?"

Just don't confuse "Permission" with "Forgiveness"

I give the cops permission to pull this guy over for being a complete and total douchenozzle and use all the pepper spray and electrodes available to put him on the pavement for recklessly crashing through the barrier because he "forgot to get his ticket validated."

I give the poor guy at the booth permission to take this guy's cellphone and just toss it on the road behind the car for wasting his time and making him consume both gas fumes and the sound of the driver's voice; I honestly don't know which one is more noxious or headache-inducing. 

I give the driver in the car behind them permission to run over the phone that is now on the road in front of him.  And then to back up and run over it again.  

I forgive absolutely no one associated with the making of this travesty. 

Coke Zero's Contribution to an old commercial trope.

 

Does this Coke Zero commercial seem familiar to you?  It should, because it uses the same "duel for the last item" bit that has been a staple of tv ads since "Leggo My Eggo" polluted the screen more than forty years ago.  That Eggo commercial never made the slightest sense, as the nasty frozen waffle thing popping out of the toaster clearly belonged to whoever put it in the damn toaster- I mean, that was obvious when I was ten years old, it's obvious now.  

This one makes a LITTLE more sense, because that Coke Zero is sitting in a convenience store cooler (I know that if I want to increase my chances of bumping into famous people, I hang out at convenience stores) and does not yet belong to anyone.  What DOESN'T make sense is that it's sitting on a shelf and not one of those sliding things that Every Actual Convenience Store on the Planet uses (there's another Coke Zero ad that shows bottles just sitting on a similar shelf- again, this doesn't happen either.)  What also doesn't make any sense is that these people are fighting over the last can (shaking it up in the process) while I'd just let the other person take it- I mean, if this is a typical convenience store, it's main clientele (other than mega-rich retired sports superstars) are rather sketchy types who have probably put their fingerprints all over that can and put it back in favor of another can...sorry, but there's usually a REASON why there's one left of any particular item.  I'm not taking the last doughnut, I'm not taking the last bag of chips, I'm not taking the last can of a particular brand of soda.  It's been rejected too many times. 

Plus, it's Coke Zero for Chrissakes.  It's not that special.  And it's probably available from the freaking soda fountain anyway.  This commercial makes my brain hurt. 

Taco Bell's "The Hang" commercial is just an annoying 20 seconds of Dumb.

 

"The hang."  Because Taco Bell is down with the young people, yo. 

I'm going to set aside the fact that this commercial gave me a headache the one and only time I even tried to watch it.  All of these stupid pictures of people with their "food" (actually, it would be more accurate to say they are pictures of food, with people in the background) acting as if this greasy nutrition-deficient garbage is something to celebrate flashing on the screen made me legitimately queasy as well.  Not as queasy as I'd get if I actually tried to ingest any of this cheap heart disease booster, but probably pretty close.

Know what else made me ill?  Scrolling through the comments.  Yeah, that's some...um...."song" you've come up with here, Taco Bell.  It's a real winner- to the glue-sniffing bots who post compliments like these like puppies begging for attention and treats.  So much a winner that they are falling all over themselves to praise it.  Because they have nothing better to do, I guess.  What I don't see is any praise for the junk they sell at Taco Bell.  I wonder why that is. 

Tonya, Mom of 9, is a selfish moron.

 

"Hey kids?  I have an important announcement to make.  As the 42-year old mother of 9, responsible for your care, I have decided to make a major decision concerning my health."

"Yay mom!  We know you can do it!  We are behind you one hundred percent!"

"That's so sweet, and I haven't even told you what I am going to do yet."

"Well, it's no mystery!  We want you to know that we'll pick up the slack no matter how many nights you want to go to the gym, and we are totally on board with tossing out all of the junk snacks we've had in the cupboards and want to eat balanced, healthy meals right along with you!  We're all in this together!"

"Um...no, I'm not talking about weight loss.  I'm talking about getting Botox injections."

"What?  Those really expensive injections that have all kinds of dangerous complications?  You're going to do that to...get rid of a few wrinkles?  But what about all that excess adipose tissue that's pressing up against your heart, is hormonally active, and is opening you up to all kinds of serious health issues that might leave us without a mom?"

"Yes, those injections!  Isn't that exciting?  I'm going to look exactly the same, except younger!  And I'm even going to do an ad for them when I'm done!"

"You know, Weight Watchers hires people to do ads too...so does Planet Fitness..."

"Yep, I'm going to look at least ten years younger!  So exciting!  Finally, I'm doing something for ME!"

Bell & Howell solves another problem we didn't know we had....

 

What I love about all Not Available in Stores products - and they do all have this in common- is that they are all sold with the exact same pitch:  "Here's a minor inconvenience enormous hassle you never knew you had have always suffered with that we have a stupid gimmick miracle cure for!"  

In this case, the "incredible breakthrough technology" is a built-in vacuum cleaner for an electric razor.  Because we've all received tongue-lashings from our Significant Others who insist on standing next to us as we shave, just waiting to jump down our throats as soon as they realize that we aren't catching our facial hair as it falls off our faces (I understand this is the third-leading cause of divorce in the United States, after drug abuse and financial stress.)  And it's always such a hassle to get that hair out of the sink, if only there was a simple way to transport water to such places, I bet that would do the trick (and I'm totally flummoxed by the demonstration of the power of the vacuum razor thing here- why is there hair in the sink to pick up with the vacuum razor?  Either it didn't work properly, or this guy used a REGULAR electric razor to shave, made a mess in the sink, and then just used the vacuum razor device to clean up the hair....a level of Stupid which I believe in the fourth-leading cause of divorce in the United States....I might be wrong about that....)