I pulled up the Yahoo.com homepage today, and as usual it's full of stupid gossip.
"Oscar's Best, Worst Dressed" - of course they're talking about women - the men can only wear tuxeodos, presumably, but the women can wear all kinds of dresses, and do. But who cares?
"James Franco falls flat as Oscar host" - why do they even have actors as hosts. Shouldn't it be comedians?
and of course, there's "Oscar flub sparks chatter".
I'm not even going to read the article, but apparently she must have said a four letter word. Big deal.
The fact that people even care about this type of thing says a lot about the world today.
Monday, February 28, 2011
Wednesday, February 23, 2011
Bridgestone Tires (commercial)
The commercial is supposed to be funny, but what it really shows is a stupid man uses Bridgestone.
Two guys in an office. One man sends an email to the other. The other guy says, "Oh, no, you hit "Reply all."
So the first man goes zooming around (we don't even see the car he's driving, let alone its tires) stealing people's computers.
Here's a tip for you - the email stays up in the ether, and people can access it from any computer. Stealing everyone's computer accomplishes absolutely nothing.
So it ends with the second guy saying, "oh no, I was wrong, you just sent it to me."
ha ha, really clever.
Not.
Two guys in an office. One man sends an email to the other. The other guy says, "Oh, no, you hit "Reply all."
So the first man goes zooming around (we don't even see the car he's driving, let alone its tires) stealing people's computers.
Here's a tip for you - the email stays up in the ether, and people can access it from any computer. Stealing everyone's computer accomplishes absolutely nothing.
So it ends with the second guy saying, "oh no, I was wrong, you just sent it to me."
ha ha, really clever.
Not.
Why Do Businesses Not Realize the Tastelessness Before they Put up the Bullboard?
If you read message boards, whether sports or political, you'll always find references to someone "drinking the Kool-aid."
Perhaps it was this constant use on message boards that caused the advertisers of an Indiana restaurant to think that no one would be offended by a reference to the Jonestown suicide massacre.
Billboard Comes Down After Outcry Over Jonestown Reference
Consumerist (from whom the link above comes) has a poll - 60% of respondants don't think it's offensive at all. (But it has only 763 total votes.)
Perhaps it was this constant use on message boards that caused the advertisers of an Indiana restaurant to think that no one would be offended by a reference to the Jonestown suicide massacre.
Billboard Comes Down After Outcry Over Jonestown Reference
You know what puts me in the mood for Mexican food? References to '70s suicide cults. I must be the only one, though, because an Indiana restaurant chain ended a billboard campaign after complaints about its Jonestown theme. "We're like a cult, with better Kool-Aid," the billboards read. "To die for!"
The reference, of course, is to the 1978 mass suicide at the Peoples Temple Agricultural Project in Guyana, better known as Jonestown: a cult that began in Indiana. More than nine hundred people, including children, died of cyanide poisoning: the poison was mixed into vats of Flavor-Aid, a drink similar to Kool-Aid.
"[W]e are not getting the reaction we expected," a company executive told the South Bend Tribune. "It went the wrong direction, hit a nerve, and we have come to realize we should not have done this billboard. We lose the core message."
Cory, the tipster who sent this in to Consumerist, noted, "This was over 30 years ago and I kind of like the billboard." What do you think?
Consumerist (from whom the link above comes) has a poll - 60% of respondants don't think it's offensive at all. (But it has only 763 total votes.)
Slazenger Raw - commercial
I'm watching Match Play on the Golf Channel, and just saw a commercial I'd never seen before.
It was a commercial for a Slazenger driver.
A foursome - all white - are playing golf. One guy hits a long drive, and the obnoxious character - the "obnoxious character" is a trope in many commercials - all of which I regard as devolution commercials - starts talking very loudly, very ethnically - about "Call Miss Daisy, we've got ourselves a driver," and other crap like that...I believe he was trying to do a Jim Carey as Ace Ventura pet detective imitation - loud, abrasive...thinks he's all that...
Does Slazenger really want to give the impression that brain dead morons use their drivers?
It was a commercial for a Slazenger driver.
A foursome - all white - are playing golf. One guy hits a long drive, and the obnoxious character - the "obnoxious character" is a trope in many commercials - all of which I regard as devolution commercials - starts talking very loudly, very ethnically - about "Call Miss Daisy, we've got ourselves a driver," and other crap like that...I believe he was trying to do a Jim Carey as Ace Ventura pet detective imitation - loud, abrasive...thinks he's all that...
Does Slazenger really want to give the impression that brain dead morons use their drivers?
Sunday, February 20, 2011
Argh!
I'm watching the final round of the Northern Trust. Since the announcers - not to mention the commercials - annoy me, I've got the sound off. And having a lousy short term memory...
There's this one office commercial - I believe it is for Canon photocopiers but I'll have to see it again to make sure - in which a young man is making copies and these two "schoolyard" bullies come over to him, get all up in his face, and tell him how bad things were in their day.
It's a stupid commercial, and it does glorify bullying. And of course, it's inneffective, since I've seen it many times over the past few weeks and although I can remember how distasteful it is, I can't remember what product it is their advertising!
There's this one office commercial - I believe it is for Canon photocopiers but I'll have to see it again to make sure - in which a young man is making copies and these two "schoolyard" bullies come over to him, get all up in his face, and tell him how bad things were in their day.
It's a stupid commercial, and it does glorify bullying. And of course, it's inneffective, since I've seen it many times over the past few weeks and although I can remember how distasteful it is, I can't remember what product it is their advertising!
Thursday, February 17, 2011
Oh, and about shoplifting...
There's an old saying, you'd never believe it unless it happened to you.
Well, it did happen to me, so sometimes when people make these "phony sounding" excuses about shoplifting, I'm willing to give them the benefit of the doubt.
Not sure about this particular case - the beauty pageant woman who said the items had "rolled under her purse" - but there was a case a few years ago when a prominent black businesswoman - prominent in her own city, anyway, was arrested for shoplifting because she'd picked up some photos from the back of the store photo shop, and forgot to pay for them when she got to the front of the store. The judge didn't believe her, but hell, I found it totally believable.
Anyway, here's my story.
Many, many years ago I owned a triplex. Lived in one floor and rented out the other two. In one of these floors lived a couple of friends of mine, a girl and her brother - one was 19 the other 20, and they didn't have a car, so I'd take them shopping.
It was winter, I had on a long winter coat with deep pockets, and I'm wandering around the various aisles with these two, my mind on other things. They had their own cart, I wasn't thinking of buying anything.
So we're in the salad dressing aisle, and I see some brands I'd never seen before, so I decide, what the heck, I'm going to try two of these.
So, I picked them up.
A few minutes later, we're in the checkout line. I let them go first, meanwhile I'm looking through the cart for my two bottles of salad dressing and I can't find them. And I'm pawing through the items and saying,"I know I picked them up, what the hell?"
And finally the girl said, "You put them in the pockets of your coat."
And I stare at her and say, "No way."
And then I thrust my hands into my pockets and sure enough, there they were. So I pull them out and stand ready to pay for them, meanwhile I ask the girl, "Why didn't you say something earlier? [i.e., when I'd first done it?] And she'd just shrugged. I guess she hadn't wanted to call me a thief to my face when I was providing her and her brother with a place to live at reduced rent.
But that's what happened. I had put the bottles into my coat pockets, presumably because I hadn't wanted to put them into their cart, because it was their cart, and yet within the 5 or 10 minutes it took us to get to the check out line, I'd totally forgotten that I'd done that.
And I'm sure you reading this have had a similar experience. How many times do we put our car keys down, and then, an hour later, have to spend hours and hours looking for them because we can't remember where we put them?
I'm not saying that people don't shoplift - obviously they do. I'm just saying that depending on the circumstances - at least those revealed in the newspaper articles - sometimes I'm inclined to believe the accused rather than the accuser.
Well, it did happen to me, so sometimes when people make these "phony sounding" excuses about shoplifting, I'm willing to give them the benefit of the doubt.
Not sure about this particular case - the beauty pageant woman who said the items had "rolled under her purse" - but there was a case a few years ago when a prominent black businesswoman - prominent in her own city, anyway, was arrested for shoplifting because she'd picked up some photos from the back of the store photo shop, and forgot to pay for them when she got to the front of the store. The judge didn't believe her, but hell, I found it totally believable.
Anyway, here's my story.
Many, many years ago I owned a triplex. Lived in one floor and rented out the other two. In one of these floors lived a couple of friends of mine, a girl and her brother - one was 19 the other 20, and they didn't have a car, so I'd take them shopping.
It was winter, I had on a long winter coat with deep pockets, and I'm wandering around the various aisles with these two, my mind on other things. They had their own cart, I wasn't thinking of buying anything.
So we're in the salad dressing aisle, and I see some brands I'd never seen before, so I decide, what the heck, I'm going to try two of these.
So, I picked them up.
A few minutes later, we're in the checkout line. I let them go first, meanwhile I'm looking through the cart for my two bottles of salad dressing and I can't find them. And I'm pawing through the items and saying,"I know I picked them up, what the hell?"
And finally the girl said, "You put them in the pockets of your coat."
And I stare at her and say, "No way."
And then I thrust my hands into my pockets and sure enough, there they were. So I pull them out and stand ready to pay for them, meanwhile I ask the girl, "Why didn't you say something earlier? [i.e., when I'd first done it?] And she'd just shrugged. I guess she hadn't wanted to call me a thief to my face when I was providing her and her brother with a place to live at reduced rent.
But that's what happened. I had put the bottles into my coat pockets, presumably because I hadn't wanted to put them into their cart, because it was their cart, and yet within the 5 or 10 minutes it took us to get to the check out line, I'd totally forgotten that I'd done that.
And I'm sure you reading this have had a similar experience. How many times do we put our car keys down, and then, an hour later, have to spend hours and hours looking for them because we can't remember where we put them?
I'm not saying that people don't shoplift - obviously they do. I'm just saying that depending on the circumstances - at least those revealed in the newspaper articles - sometimes I'm inclined to believe the accused rather than the accuser.
Today: Beauty Pageants
Beauty Pageants have been going on for decades... women slink around in swimsuits and evening gowns, while men ogle them, and then a few winners get college scholarships.
Teaching the whole country once again that it's only looks that count.
Of course there are other kind of pageants. Body building competitions are not quite the same... you've got muscle-bound guys walking around in swimsuits, but they're so...musclebound...that it's difficult to find them attractive...
Anyway, Today aka MSNBC has a whole page of Beauty Pageants (in their "fashion and beauty" section). There's the Miss San Antonio who was told to "lay off the tacos" because she'd been gaining weight - though she denies it. There's the 1992 Miss USA, now 38, who was arrested for shoplifting beauty products recently - and of course they had to show a pic of her being crowned in 1992, and an inset of her mugshot.
http://today.msnbc.msn.com/id/38566595/ns/today-today_fashion_and_beauty/
This stuff isn't news. If she hadn't been a Miss USA it wouldn't have rated a line in the newspapers.
Teaching the whole country once again that it's only looks that count.
Of course there are other kind of pageants. Body building competitions are not quite the same... you've got muscle-bound guys walking around in swimsuits, but they're so...musclebound...that it's difficult to find them attractive...
Anyway, Today aka MSNBC has a whole page of Beauty Pageants (in their "fashion and beauty" section). There's the Miss San Antonio who was told to "lay off the tacos" because she'd been gaining weight - though she denies it. There's the 1992 Miss USA, now 38, who was arrested for shoplifting beauty products recently - and of course they had to show a pic of her being crowned in 1992, and an inset of her mugshot.
http://today.msnbc.msn.com/id/38566595/ns/today-today_fashion_and_beauty/
This stuff isn't news. If she hadn't been a Miss USA it wouldn't have rated a line in the newspapers.
Monday, February 14, 2011
Two and a Half Men (TV series)
I've never watched an episode in its entirety, but I don't really need to to know that this show, like Married With Children, How I Met Your Mother, and others are similar drek.
Drek...and popular. It's lasted for 8 seasons.
The characters are a "straight-laced" divorced man, kind of a wimp, his son, a bit overweight, and the straight-laced guy's brother, played by Charlie Sheen. Sheen's character is a more sanitized version of Sheen himself. Presumably the TV character doesn't do drugs, but he jumps from woman's bed to woman's bed, drinks too much, and is generally irresponsible.
And, based on the advertising still which has Sheen at the forefront of the three characters, the "bad boy" Sheen is the most important character on the show, and the most popular.
And let's extrapolate that to real life. In real life, Sheen is a drug addict, an alcohol abuser if not an alcoholic, and his life has spun out of control. That is also his TV character in real life, too, I have no doubt.
And yet these kinds of characters are subtly glorified in these kinds of sit-coms.
For myself, I would think there could be nothing more degrading than being a stand up kind of a guy - a judge or a baseball coach, and drink so much that I couldn't even drive home without falling asleep at a red light. (Yes, I'm talking about Tony LaRussa.) It takes a lifetime to build a reputation - ask Tiger Woods, and a second to lose it - ask Tiger Woods.
Yet in these TV sitcoms, losing one's reputation has no consequences. And admittedly if you're a big cheese like Tony LaRussa it has no consequences either, except the fact that people make jokes behind your back about you not being able to hold you liquor, but for the "average" person, these kinds of things can effect you for the rest of your life.
Can there ever be a "wholesome" sitcom again? Bearing in mind that these days "wholesome" is a dirty word and wholesome people are laughed and sneered at.
Drek...and popular. It's lasted for 8 seasons.
The characters are a "straight-laced" divorced man, kind of a wimp, his son, a bit overweight, and the straight-laced guy's brother, played by Charlie Sheen. Sheen's character is a more sanitized version of Sheen himself. Presumably the TV character doesn't do drugs, but he jumps from woman's bed to woman's bed, drinks too much, and is generally irresponsible.
And, based on the advertising still which has Sheen at the forefront of the three characters, the "bad boy" Sheen is the most important character on the show, and the most popular.
And let's extrapolate that to real life. In real life, Sheen is a drug addict, an alcohol abuser if not an alcoholic, and his life has spun out of control. That is also his TV character in real life, too, I have no doubt.
And yet these kinds of characters are subtly glorified in these kinds of sit-coms.
For myself, I would think there could be nothing more degrading than being a stand up kind of a guy - a judge or a baseball coach, and drink so much that I couldn't even drive home without falling asleep at a red light. (Yes, I'm talking about Tony LaRussa.) It takes a lifetime to build a reputation - ask Tiger Woods, and a second to lose it - ask Tiger Woods.
Yet in these TV sitcoms, losing one's reputation has no consequences. And admittedly if you're a big cheese like Tony LaRussa it has no consequences either, except the fact that people make jokes behind your back about you not being able to hold you liquor, but for the "average" person, these kinds of things can effect you for the rest of your life.
Can there ever be a "wholesome" sitcom again? Bearing in mind that these days "wholesome" is a dirty word and wholesome people are laughed and sneered at.
Sunday, February 6, 2011
Groupon.com - Way to trivialize an on-going tragedy
Timothy Hutton talking about Tibet: The people of Tibet are in trouble, there very way of life is in jeopardy.
Which is true.
But guess what, then it segues into him in a Tibetan restaurant, getting half off his meal because he booked on Groupon.com.
And I hope every Tibetan in the audience emails Groupon.com and tells them to take their website and stuff it. What's happening in Tibet is no joke. Their culture, their country, are being usurped by China - and we, the weak and effete US, won't do anything about it. Well, of course, we can't either. But it's just an obscene commercial.
Which is true.
But guess what, then it segues into him in a Tibetan restaurant, getting half off his meal because he booked on Groupon.com.
And I hope every Tibetan in the audience emails Groupon.com and tells them to take their website and stuff it. What's happening in Tibet is no joke. Their culture, their country, are being usurped by China - and we, the weak and effete US, won't do anything about it. Well, of course, we can't either. But it's just an obscene commercial.
Teleflora.com
Well, my goodness, the commercials for the Super Bowl just get better and better. Now there's just been one for Teleflora.com.
Faith Hill - I believe she's a Christian singer - is trying to help a guy write a Valentine note to his girlfriend.
His note? "Your rack is incredible."
How incredibly tasteless. And in what poor taste - do they realize that there are young boys watching this Super Bowl, who now have had it confirmed that it's perfectly all right to refer to a woman's breasts as a "rack" - and how many girls are embarrassed now to know that boys just love their "racks" and boy, they'd better get some breast implants right away....
Faith Hill - I believe she's a Christian singer - is trying to help a guy write a Valentine note to his girlfriend.
His note? "Your rack is incredible."
How incredibly tasteless. And in what poor taste - do they realize that there are young boys watching this Super Bowl, who now have had it confirmed that it's perfectly all right to refer to a woman's breasts as a "rack" - and how many girls are embarrassed now to know that boys just love their "racks" and boy, they'd better get some breast implants right away....
Brisk Commercial
Still in the Super Bowl.
A white rapper named Eminem in an animated commercial. What's Eminem's reputation? Well, he's a rapper, so he doubltless swears in his "songs" and speaks disrespectfully of women and authority. And the disrespect for authority shines in the is commercial'
He doesn't do commercials. His voice as he "sings" is so arrogant and angry, I just want to slap him. Finally he's on a roof, a guys says, "You can't do that," or something, and Eminem shoves him off the roof. Then he pulls his hood over his face and walks off screen, as if he's the coolest thing in the world, when actually he just looks like an idiot.
A white rapper named Eminem in an animated commercial. What's Eminem's reputation? Well, he's a rapper, so he doubltless swears in his "songs" and speaks disrespectfully of women and authority. And the disrespect for authority shines in the is commercial'
He doesn't do commercials. His voice as he "sings" is so arrogant and angry, I just want to slap him. Finally he's on a roof, a guys says, "You can't do that," or something, and Eminem shoves him off the roof. Then he pulls his hood over his face and walks off screen, as if he's the coolest thing in the world, when actually he just looks like an idiot.
Pepsi Max
Watching the Super Bowl.
Pepsi Max commercial.
Black wife/girlfriend apparently wants hubby to lose weight, so tracks him down wherever he goes and takes his food away from him. He's on a bench drinking a Pepsi Max, she appears, but she's drinking a Pepsi Max too.
All is well.
Then a white woman jogger with short shorts on jogs past and sits on the next bench. The man looks at her admiringly, wife/girlfriend throws her Pepsi can at him. He ducks, the can hits the girl in the head and she collapses to the ground,injured. The man and woman run away.
Is this supposed to be funny? A couple injure a complete stranger, and run away leaving her writhing in pain on the ground, and this is supposed to be funny?
Pepsi Max commercial.
Black wife/girlfriend apparently wants hubby to lose weight, so tracks him down wherever he goes and takes his food away from him. He's on a bench drinking a Pepsi Max, she appears, but she's drinking a Pepsi Max too.
All is well.
Then a white woman jogger with short shorts on jogs past and sits on the next bench. The man looks at her admiringly, wife/girlfriend throws her Pepsi can at him. He ducks, the can hits the girl in the head and she collapses to the ground,injured. The man and woman run away.
Is this supposed to be funny? A couple injure a complete stranger, and run away leaving her writhing in pain on the ground, and this is supposed to be funny?
Windows Phone
I'm watching CBS at 1.05pm. It's supposed to be the Phoenix Open, but they're showing some snippets from men's college basketball instead.
Just saw a commercial for Windows Phone, which of course I've seen before. People walking around texting with their phones instead of watching where they are going. So there's a guy in a urinal who drops his phone and his next door neighbor says, "Really?" and then there's a person on a street walking and cannoning in to another pedestrian. Then, the worst one, some dad reading his iphone and holding out a glove with his other hand while his young son says, "Really" - then throws the baseball as hard as he can at the man's head.
Not funny...since getting hit in the head with a ball has killed a few people recently, and of course there was the case a few years ago when a college pitcher deliberately threw a ball at a player in the batter's box - who wasn't even looking at him - and ended up costing that boy one of his eyes. (And did that prevent the pitcher from going pro? Of course not. But karma evens it all and he never got out of the minor leages.)
Just saw a commercial for Windows Phone, which of course I've seen before. People walking around texting with their phones instead of watching where they are going. So there's a guy in a urinal who drops his phone and his next door neighbor says, "Really?" and then there's a person on a street walking and cannoning in to another pedestrian. Then, the worst one, some dad reading his iphone and holding out a glove with his other hand while his young son says, "Really" - then throws the baseball as hard as he can at the man's head.
Not funny...since getting hit in the head with a ball has killed a few people recently, and of course there was the case a few years ago when a college pitcher deliberately threw a ball at a player in the batter's box - who wasn't even looking at him - and ended up costing that boy one of his eyes. (And did that prevent the pitcher from going pro? Of course not. But karma evens it all and he never got out of the minor leages.)
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