a word from our sponsors

I saw a commercial this morning while I was getting ready for work that made me mad. It showed a bunch of flight attendants gathered around a sick flight attendant. This flight attendant looked so sick that I thought she was going to die in the air. "I'll be okay by morning," the flight attendant bravely whimpers, and I, the viewer, fully expected this to be a commercial about dying from tuberculosis. But no, then another flight attendant gives her some Vicks and she's bright and sunny and serving coffee the next morning.

I don't mind that she got better. I mind that even though she is probably still contagious, she's serving drinks to passengers on a plane. That is how epidemics start, lady.

So anyways, here are some other commercials that have really gotten my goat in recent months:
--Remember when Katie Holmes was going to be on the ABC show "Eli Stone"? And they promoted the hell out of it? I really thought I was going to shoot myself everytime Eli said to Katie Holmes, "I think I was meant to meet you," and Katie Holmes said in her ridiculous way, "Lucky me." Does anyone watch that show? Any chance Katie Holmes' character died during the episode? Because if she's coming back, I should get rid of my tv now.

--There's a Just for Men commercial in which two little girls go up to their father and say, "Dad, it's time for you to move on," or something like that. Then they make him dye his hair. Cut to the young-looking dad out with a pretty lady much younger than he. The dad and his lady friend take a cell phone picture of themselves eating, and send it to the little girls, who apparently are home alone without a babysitter. They high-five, I guess to celebrate the fact that their dad is no longer sad about their dead mom, and maybe soon they will get a new mom, but have they ever seen The Sound of Music? What if that new mom just waits to get a ring on her finger before she ships them off to boarding school? This commercials freaks me the fuck out.

--Speaking of freaking me out, there's this commercial for the toilet paper that those cartoon bears endorse. In one version of this commercial, the bear gets toilet paper stuck to his ass. And the mama bear gives him some of the preferred toilet paper and everything is better. But…I mean….a bear got toilet paper stuck on his bum? Why couldn't they have picked another thing about toilet paper to highlight?

--I don't like anything that has a song about Viagra in it.

--I also don't like commercials where "real teens" talk about how embarrassing their acne was and how much happier they are now that they use an acne product. Because it should be no less embarrassing to be on a commercial talking about how well your acne product works.

--The Kroger prescription lady. We have this grocery store called Kroger and you can get cheap prescriptions at their pharmacy. I know because there's this commercial with a lady who meanders up an aisle toward the camera, all the while talking about how hard she's working to save money for her family, which is why she gets her prescriptions filled at Kroger. It would be quite admirable if she wasn't pushing around a grocery cart that is FILLED TO THE BRIM. Seriously, she must have $600 worth of merchandise in there. Surely if she's on a budget she wouldn't be buying so much? Also, on top of her cart are two jugs of milk. Maybe it's just me, but as soon as I have milk in my cart, I like to race toward the check-out aisle and get home. I don't like my milk to be unrefrigerated for very long. I like to protect it from the elements.

--Obviously, no one likes internet ads, but let me highlight a website that does internet ads particularly badly: USA Today. Look, USA Today, as far as I'm aware. "Interstitial" means that when you do something that takes you between sites, an ad comes up. What you do, when you separate your own articles with an ad, is technically "intrastitial." I know times are tough in print media but you have too many ads between all your articles.

But you know those annoying internet ads that promise you a free ipod if you identify a ridiculously obvious picture? Usually I'm kinda immune to those, but recently I clicked on one because it said that I would get a free ipod if I tickled the fat kid til he barfed. Sure enough, there was a cartoon fat kid and my cursor had turned into a feather and I tickled him like twice and he threw up all over cyberspace. It was sort of a sweet, uplifting, and perfect internet experience.

Alright, to keep this entry from being a total downer, I figure I better highlight some commercials that I actually do like, or at least ones I can tolerate:
--Remember when Neil Patrick Harris sold Old Spice because he was a fake tv doctor? That still makes me giggle.

--Mr. Opportunity. While I wish he would stop knocking on my tv screen to an annoying sound effect, because if I'm not paying attention to the TV I start looking around for what made that sound, I do find him weirdly attractive.

--Pretty much any shampoo commercial makes me feel good about being a girl.

--Flex's Atlanta specific commercials. So there's this car called the Flex. To highlight what a cool car it would be for a trendy young person in the Atlanta area, there were these commercials in which people drove the Flex to hip Atlanta spots. It started with the kids going to an art gallery and they likened the things they saw to how beautiful the Flex is. Then in another commercial, they went to dinner at a fun place and talked about how the Flex has a compartment that keeps sushi cold or something weird like that. Then in the last commercial they go bowling and they talk about how fun bowling is and also how fun the Flex is. I became OBSESSED with these commercials because I didn't want to miss any of the stops on their journey and the weird associations it brought up with the Flex. If I find out I missed any of the commercials, I might have a meltdown. If you live in an urban area that also has specific Flex commercials, could you let me know? Where did the Flex go in your town?

And lastly, my all-time favorite commercial is one from my childhood in which the harried blonde mom makes Rice Krispy treats, because she loves her family so darn much. But making Rice Krispy treats is so darn easy that she has time to read a romance novel and make out with Snap, Crackle AND Pop. Then she puts flour on her face to show how hard she's been working. As a result of this commercial I thought most hard-core cooking was supposed to end with someone getting flour on his or her face.

Here, I found the commercial. Watch it and you'll really have something to be thankful for on Thanksgiving.