Infomercials in general have become ridiculously insulting. Before now, I wasn’t aware that I couldn’t live without a blanket with sleeves. That's right, I'm talking about Snuggie™. It looks like it was invented by the Franciscan Monks of St. Flannel. I’m no genius, but here’s a little advice. If you’re having problems covering all your extremities, buy a bigger blanket. Or indulge in a few more degrees on the ole thermostat. Snuggie™ propagandists purport that you can now eat popcorn and change channels without exposing your arms to the threat of hypothermia caliber room chills. I say this speaks more to the poor circulation of an assuredly obese and couch-ridden populace. But like lotteries and other taxes on stupidity, infomercials never fail to cash in on the less than cerebral masses. I mean, honestly, has anyone ever said “wow!” over a sham?
And the Can’t-Live-Without-This-Piece-Of-Feces market has its celebrities too. The longstanding patriarch has been Ron Popeil, whose endless array of Crap-O-Matic inventions has littered the airwaves since the early 70’s. But now the new Sultan of Shit is none other than Billy Mays. This loud-mouthed Al Borland clone has unleashed a cornucrapia of wasted human ingenuity in the form of: OxiClean™, Mighty Mend-it™, Mighty Putty™, Orange Glo™, Kaboom™, Awesome Auger™, Vidalia Slice-It Wizard™, Mantis Roto-Tiller™, and Gator Grip™. And I love the timeless mendacity of the sales pitch Mr. SuperBeard employs. Act now, and you can get the Hercules Hook™ for only $19.95. But wait!!! If you call now within the next five minutes, you can get 48 more Hercules Hooks™ for the same price!! That’s like 7 hooks per wall in your home, and who couldn’t use that?? Why don't people use this ballooning technique in other areas of life? Probably because it would sound something like this... Mr. Ferguson... I'm sorry, I don't know how to tell you this, but... you're going to die within 24 hours... Nah, just kidding, you're not going to die. Yet, anyway. You do, however, have an aggressively malignant neoplasm of the brain, which gives you 3 to 4 months at best. Which is better than dying today, in my book, so... good news.
There is simply no excuse for the surge in dog movies the past few years. Not just heartfelt dog movies à la Marley and Me (NOT a date movie, FYI). No, I'm talking about the "talking pet" variety of dogsploitation cinema. I think it may have started with Milo & Otis, in which a cute tabby and pug, both with inexplicable British accents, detail their adventures outside the farm of their youth. And as they weather the toils of that merciless bitch Mother Nature to make it back home, we as the audience are supposed to draw some alleged parallels to the human condition, the cycle of life, blah blah blah. Then came Homeward Bound. Then the vehicle went completely south with Air Bud. Somehow, viewers are supposed to suspend disbelief and embrace the idea that a golden retriever can emancipate itself from its owner, cultivate enough skill to play basketball without opposable thumbs, and save the day and the championship by capitalizing on the "no anti-canine player" loophole in the rules. What makes it all worse is that Air Bud warranted 7 sequels. SEVEN. The latest being Space Buddies, an endless exercise in mind-numbing labrador puns. The very idea of talking puppies in weightless orbit is ridiculous on so many levels. What's missing is the realism and historicity of canine cosmonauts, i.e. Air Bud: Sputnik 2. Join Laika, the stray-come-soviet-stepping-stone-to-manned-missions as she leaves the cold abandonment of the Moscow streets for the cold abandonment of space! And the remote possibility of even accidentally viewing the latest installments, Hotel For Dogs and Beverly Hills Chihuahua, is enough to make me want to stab myself in the face.
James Bond once had me convinced that there was a classier if not sexier facet of alcoholism. The classic martini is comprised of gin and vermouth and is garnished with lemon peel or an olive. Bond put his signature spin on it, going for the vodka martini and iconically insisting that it be shaken and not stirred. But the king of cocktails has all but disintegrated with the advent of martini madness. First, the appletini started making waves at Chili's, Applebees, and any other establishment that serves fried onion petals as an appetizer. Now, it doesn't matter where you go, you will inevitably be bombarded with someone's improvisation of the drink, because apparently any fluid served in a conical cocktail glass constitutes a "tini." Be it a Chocolatini, pomegranate tini (or Pomtini), a Pickletini or a Jalapiñi (they exist). Fill a thimble with grain alcohol and you've got an Itty Bitty Teeny Weeny Tini. Hell, urinate in a salt-rimmed glass and you've got a Pisstini. Everybody has them and it's getting ridiculous. Martini bars have become all the rage in metro areas, as people have seen fit to consistently reinvent the wheel.
Hi, welcome to Tina's House of Tinis. How can I help you?
Yes, I'll have two Linguinetinis and a Cheesymactini, a Ricekrispietreattini for dessert... My throat's a little sore, so I'll have the Brothtini... a Sake To Me Tini... and oops, can't forget my baby... he'll have an Enfamiltini.
Speaking of offspring, since when were humans compelled to employ the reproductive methods of rabbits? Thus what now follows is an unabashed bashing of the media entity affectionately known as Octomom. (I think her real name is Greedy McFertilewench) Putting aside her blatant dependence on public assistance (they really are America's Octuplets) and her freakish resemblance to Angelina Jolie (also high on kid-rearing), Octomom strikes me as someone who is genuinely surprised that the birth of her children is overshadowed by the media's preoccupation with her complete and utter inability to care for them. And now with 14 mouths to feed, one has to wonder when reality will set in for this slippery breeder. Even with 18 kids, at least the Duggar family has seen fit to take things one placenta at a time. Whatever you make of their homestead, they're a testament to the efficacy of the "if it ain't broke" mission of colonial baby-making. Octomom's efforts invoke a completely contrary sentiment, that of "if it's broke, please don't fix it."
Showing posts with label home life. Show all posts
Showing posts with label home life. Show all posts
Friday, March 27, 2009
Tuesday, September 23, 2008
Riot of Passage
There was a time for me when staring the 10 year high school reunion in the face was a mortifying thought. Our culture’s freakish obsession with youth aside, there’s room to blame my guidance counselors. Perhaps not par for the course as far as vocational counseling goes, my high school experience was nothing short of force-fed optimism and unrealistic notions of limitless opportunities on the other side of the diploma. You can be anything you want to be! While I certainly understand their desperation to compel youth against the grain of an assured tenure at the WIC office or an untimely end via Astrovan meth lab explosion, the baseless motivational speaking throughout the years has been too much to take.
Simply put, adults and younglings alike cannot hide how badly they hate growing up. After the fleeting excitement of our three-tiered rites of passage at 16, 18 and 21, cheaper car insurance at 25 is a veritable slap in the face. Women’s cosmetics are inundated with anti-aging agents that are somehow supposed to mysteriously and magically abate the reaper. Let’s not mention that the most fashionable form is botulism that’s injected into your face. But my favorite exercise in denial is the often employed euphemism: He ages gracefully, which is offensive on so many levels. You might as well say: He decomposes at a less alarming rate than most.
My disdain for the mourning-for-loss-of-youth camp notwithstanding, I haven’t exactly endorsed run of the mill adulthood. That is to say, at 27 years old, I’m still not a homeowner. *gasp* And it’s not on account of insurmountable debt, deficient credit, a lack of monetary means or any of the other well-worn paths to financial freedom. Just good ole indifference. And it hasn’t mattered to me that I’ve just been throwing my money away as a renter, as I’ve been frequently told. Equity, schmequity. I realized pretty soon after graduating college that there are just certain aspects of adulthood that will never appeal to me. Among them, complying with an HOA’s onerous regulations. That’s right. I find no interest in the color of brick, nor do I espouse the urgency of addressing maverick homebuilders. The way I see it, a 30 year financial raincloud over your head warrants some measure of autonomy.
As of late, however, my avid disinterest in home ownership has turned to nominal curiosity in other residency possibilities. I’ve never been one to drive around looking doe-eyed at the 5,000+ square foot behemoths in doctorville, but my time in the land of tenants has run its course. Though there’s something to be said for paying to have a good landlord take care of you, there’s absolutely no appeal to living within a whisper of a few dozen people. Similar to the college experience, I am constantly bombarded with mystery smells that generally fall into the categories of ethnic food or BM, which themselves are becoming increasingly difficult to distinguish. Though I have a back yard, it’s barely big enough for my dog to be able to bend a biscuit. It also must have a sign that says “City Dump” because sidewalk litterers and my generous upstairs neighbors have seen fit to dispose of the following: half of a cell phone charger, an OSU-orange condom, a month’s worth of cigarette butts, a partially unwrapped tampon, an impromptu abortion rusty wire hanger, an iced honey bun wrapper, an empty pack of Newports and a rogue racquetball.
But the absolute worst aspect of apartment life has to be laundry management. Having been burned by the college variant, I tend to never trust a coin-op washer and dryer. There’s a learning curve that costs about $8.25 and whatever the price tag to replace 2 to 3 loads of your clothes. Just so you know, “Warm” means “Center of the earth magma hot” and “Dryer” means “Warming dampifier.” I guess the powers that be are maximizing their profit margins by not replacing the heating coils but every 25 years. So in light of such lackluster facilities, I often appeal to local friends and family for laundry support. One particular morning a couple weeks ago, I had a three-part horrifying realization. A) At 7:40, I was running the risk of being late to an 8:00 meeting at work. B) I had left a heaping basket o’ laundry in my backseat the night prior, and it needed to be transported to my apartment stat. C) An impromptu monsoon had made its way to landlocked Oklahoma that very morning. Cue the Benny Hill music and what commenced was a humorous exercise in futility. For me, rock bottom was chasing my dress socks down the gutter as the rain carried them into a busy intersection. It was at that moment that I considered it more honorable to begin planning who will wipe my senior ass than to parade my knickers in front of unsuspecting commuters.
Simply put, adults and younglings alike cannot hide how badly they hate growing up. After the fleeting excitement of our three-tiered rites of passage at 16, 18 and 21, cheaper car insurance at 25 is a veritable slap in the face. Women’s cosmetics are inundated with anti-aging agents that are somehow supposed to mysteriously and magically abate the reaper. Let’s not mention that the most fashionable form is botulism that’s injected into your face. But my favorite exercise in denial is the often employed euphemism: He ages gracefully, which is offensive on so many levels. You might as well say: He decomposes at a less alarming rate than most.
My disdain for the mourning-for-loss-of-youth camp notwithstanding, I haven’t exactly endorsed run of the mill adulthood. That is to say, at 27 years old, I’m still not a homeowner. *gasp* And it’s not on account of insurmountable debt, deficient credit, a lack of monetary means or any of the other well-worn paths to financial freedom. Just good ole indifference. And it hasn’t mattered to me that I’ve just been throwing my money away as a renter, as I’ve been frequently told. Equity, schmequity. I realized pretty soon after graduating college that there are just certain aspects of adulthood that will never appeal to me. Among them, complying with an HOA’s onerous regulations. That’s right. I find no interest in the color of brick, nor do I espouse the urgency of addressing maverick homebuilders. The way I see it, a 30 year financial raincloud over your head warrants some measure of autonomy.
As of late, however, my avid disinterest in home ownership has turned to nominal curiosity in other residency possibilities. I’ve never been one to drive around looking doe-eyed at the 5,000+ square foot behemoths in doctorville, but my time in the land of tenants has run its course. Though there’s something to be said for paying to have a good landlord take care of you, there’s absolutely no appeal to living within a whisper of a few dozen people. Similar to the college experience, I am constantly bombarded with mystery smells that generally fall into the categories of ethnic food or BM, which themselves are becoming increasingly difficult to distinguish. Though I have a back yard, it’s barely big enough for my dog to be able to bend a biscuit. It also must have a sign that says “City Dump” because sidewalk litterers and my generous upstairs neighbors have seen fit to dispose of the following: half of a cell phone charger, an OSU-orange condom, a month’s worth of cigarette butts, a partially unwrapped tampon, an impromptu abortion rusty wire hanger, an iced honey bun wrapper, an empty pack of Newports and a rogue racquetball.
But the absolute worst aspect of apartment life has to be laundry management. Having been burned by the college variant, I tend to never trust a coin-op washer and dryer. There’s a learning curve that costs about $8.25 and whatever the price tag to replace 2 to 3 loads of your clothes. Just so you know, “Warm” means “Center of the earth magma hot” and “Dryer” means “Warming dampifier.” I guess the powers that be are maximizing their profit margins by not replacing the heating coils but every 25 years. So in light of such lackluster facilities, I often appeal to local friends and family for laundry support. One particular morning a couple weeks ago, I had a three-part horrifying realization. A) At 7:40, I was running the risk of being late to an 8:00 meeting at work. B) I had left a heaping basket o’ laundry in my backseat the night prior, and it needed to be transported to my apartment stat. C) An impromptu monsoon had made its way to landlocked Oklahoma that very morning. Cue the Benny Hill music and what commenced was a humorous exercise in futility. For me, rock bottom was chasing my dress socks down the gutter as the rain carried them into a busy intersection. It was at that moment that I considered it more honorable to begin planning who will wipe my senior ass than to parade my knickers in front of unsuspecting commuters.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)