Dog + Man + Tennis Ball + Field = Perfect Dog Food Ad

Yes, it's the Beneful ad with the Black Lab and the guy and the tennis ball. An announcer pretends to do a voice-over for the dog's thoughts, and what we see couldn't be more heart-meltingly wonderful for a dog-lover. Great job all around on this one! (Good choice on the Black Lab for this ad. I'm thinking one for a yippy dog might have a person feed the dog in their apartment and then go to work, and then the dog barks all day long in the apartment, driving everyone crazy to the brink of wanting to murder it, and then the announcer could say that Beneful dog food gives your yippy dog the nutrition it needs to bark all day and drive your neighbors crazy.)

Here's the charming canine consumables commercial:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iNUdeXKd6QU

Bagel Chips Vs. Pita Chips

The Middle-East Crisis Spills Over Into The Snack Aisle!

Well, there's another Middle-East summit happening now, and it's bound to fail again, as per usual. But how can products cash in on this big story? (That's what we all really want to know, isn't it?) Why, it's with a controversial advertising campaign, that's how! Controversy gets more attention than anything these days, right? After all, CNN has spent the last few years covering mostly controversial comments rather than actual news, which is why they didn't know that there are more than 100 women missing in Cleveland right now. But after all, hurt feelings are more important than lives, right? And so they keep on keeping on with the same bullsh!t. But I digress...

But the point is, offensive stuff gets more attention than anything else these days. If a Republican said something offensive, even a serial killer or a world war would get knocked off the front page, or the lead story on TV nowadays. And the more eyeballs you get, the more your advertising is worth, right? And there's just no better way to get eyeballs these days than with controversy. We even see ads that really do this all the time, and they get tons of free publicity, and then they apologize and pull the ad. And with how sensitive the news people are these days, a lot of the time, ad agencies don't even have to release or run the ad: someone will post it somewhere online, the news trolls will find it and bitch and moan about it, and the company gets free advertising without paying a dime. It's a great scam if you know how to use it...

So here's my (joke) suggestion to use this new Middle-East summit for maximum publicity value for product advertising: A brand of bagel chips and a brand of pita chips could smear each other with attack ads, like saying: "If you eat pita chips, the terrorists win!", or: "Eating bagel chips helps repress Palestinians!" And if the same company owned the bagel chips and the pita chips, they could just smear their respective brands back and forth, getting tons of coverage on the news, and drumming up tons of support from people on both sides of the issue. And so then people would buy up bagel chips and pita chips based upon their allegiances, and they'd sell, sell, sell!

And if anyone found out they owned both brands, they could just say the whole thing was a joke, playing on the whole controversy catnip news angle, and it might help to embarrass the news people into covering real news again. (<But probably not.)

The Upside to a Weiner Win?

We all know by now that Anthony Weiner sends lots of unsolicited penis pictures to young women on the internet. And this is a problem for a lot of people. But have you stopped to consider the potential upside of a Weiner win for political news coverage? There may be one...

Yes, just think of it: Anthony Weiner wins as NYC Mayor, and all of a sudden, politicians everywhere decide his dick pictures may have been the reason (!). So, to hedge their bets, rather than accepting corporate money, they just start tweeting pictures of their junk out to everyone. We'd get money out of politics, but we'd get so much more, too...

Yes, along with all the new privates pictures, we'd get political pundits analyzing what the pictures mean for each campaign and potential career results. They're already whores anyway, so talking about genitals on TV would be perfectly appropriate for them! And we could hear rationalizations for different aspects of relative penis size, etc., with pundits claiming a small penis would indicate that they'd have a lot to prove and to compensate for, so they'd get a lot more accomplished, or that a big one might indicate that they'd be completely satisfied in themselves, and thus be less likely to be corrupted by monetary temptations, etc.

And then the ladies would have to get in on this too, or risk less, um, exposure, I guess. After all, no publicity is bad publicity, at least if Weiner wins the election, right? Plus, internet porn sites would go out of business with everyone choosing to look at politicians' privates instead, and young people would be turned off to sex at a young age, preventing teen pregnancies and STDs. It's a win-win for everyone! Vote Weiner for Mayor!

(Just kidding. Please don't vote Weiner for Mayor.)

Diamonds Are A Drug Lord's/Terrorist's Best Friend?

There was a huge theft of $53 Million-worth of diamonds from a Cannes hotel over the weekend, and some guy on the news for CNN said that diamonds are "the most concentrated form of wealth in the world", and that if you want to buy weapons or drugs, they're perfect as an untraceable form of payment. So the next time I want to get rip-roaring high and start a war somewhere, I'll remember to grab a fistful of diamonds first: and you should too! Thanks to that news guy for his advice on how to pay for drugs and weapons; I'm sure lots of aspiring drug lords and terrorists never would have thought of that. But now that he suggested it...

Yeah, you know, if you really want to learn how to get away with crimes, just watch the news: every time someone fails to get away with murder or a terrorist attack, the news reports on everything they did wrong to get caught, and how they could have gotten away with it. What a wellspring of useful information for the career criminal/militant! Thanks, news people!

It's funny, between instructing terrorists and wasting time complaining about offensive comments rather than holding government accountable, I sometimes wonder whose side the news is on these days...

Here's the story about the Cannes hotel diamond heist:

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424127887324354704578633790535377924.html

A Brazilian Horror Movie?

I don't know if everyone has heard about the violent murder of a player and a referee at a Brazilian soccer game recently, but apparently what happened is that the referee gave a player a red card during a game in Sao Paolo, causing the player to get mad and start a fistfight with the referee, who then produced a knife, stabbing the player to death, which then caused the fans of the player in the crowd to run onto the field, stone the referee to death, after which he was decapitated, and his head was placed on a stake which was then stuck into the middle of the field. (They have stones inside soccer stadiums in Brazil? I'd think that might be kind of dangerous...) And this really happened earlier this month, no exaggeration. It's an absurd, practically cartoonish level of violence, and as such it's the kind of thing you'd expect to be the plot of some movie, isn't it? And that's why I think it ought to be.

So here's the movie this might inspire: a haunted soccer stadium/headless referee slasher movie! Here in America, we have ultra-violent, ultra-gory slasher horror movies about anything and everything, especially things that resonate in our society, like haunted schools, summer camp revenge killings, babysitter murders, real-life waking nightmares, etc. And there's just nothing that resonates in Brazilian society like soccer! And since this event is recent and I'm sure etched into everyone's memory down there, a movie could easily use an event like this as the background set-up for a horror movie. And some time during the movie, we'd see this back-story.

But the main plot of the movie would be about this supposedly haunted soccer field that gets renovated and re-opens for a tournament. Well, they play a bunch of games, and people report seeing a headless referee around the place, but everyone disregards these claims as attention-getting sensationalism, and requests by ghost-hunters and the like are rebuffed with contempt. Oh, but once the tournament reaches a fever-pitch, and the stadium starts selling out, people begin being found beheaded, which is dismissed by the police as simply more drug cartel violence, and covered-up by the venue managers to avoid losing money on the tournament. And when the final rolls around, the place is packed, and the vengeful ghostly headless referee strikes with bloody vengeance, locking all the gates to trap everyone inside, after which he attacks and beheads all the players, playing soccer with their severed heads (dribbling them around, shooting on the goal, etc.), and then moving on to the fans. It would be like Friday the 13th meets Sleepy Hollow meets soccer!

Is it in bad taste? Why, sure it is! But that's never stopped a horror movie before, has it? In fact, I'll bet that if they made a movie like this in Brazil, it would make mega-bucks, and all the controversy surrounding it would just make all the kids want to go and see it, like how all the controversy surrounding movies here make them wildly popular, and how controversy in Brazil made the Coffin Joe movies so successful there. Plus, while many American blockbuster horror films claim to be based on a true story, this one really would be.

Here's the story:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/football/2013/jul/07/brazilian-referee-decapitated-stabs-player

Low-Fat Middle-Eastern Food Advertising Campaign Slogan?

Middle-Eastern food is all the rage nowadays, with hummus and baba ganoush flying off the shelves at a record pace. Oh, but America is full of obesity, so we've got to get more low-fat foods. And since Middle-Eastern foods are so popular, why not make them low-fat to help the scourge of obesity? So how about this for a campaign slogan for low-fat Middle-Eastern food: "Declare a Fatwa on Fat, with (whatever brand of) Low-Fat Middle-Eastern Food!"

Ultimate Bullfighting

Bullfighting has gotten a bad rap lately because it's mean to bulls and rigged and everything, with matadors being allowed to use swords and capes and stuff to help them win unfairly. But with the new Ultimate Bullfighting, finally the playing field is being leveled for bulls! Here's how it works:

Bullfighters will fight bulls as usual, but this time, they're only allowed to use martial arts skills and their bare hand and feet, fighting to the death against a ton of angry horned beast flesh! (And no capes allowed for distraction.) Finally the bulls get a chance to win! And the crowd gets to eat whoever loses the fight tartare!

You know you want to see it! Demand Ultimate Bullfighting today!

New Animated Feature Film: Guns?

Hey, in this new push for gun control, isn't there a renewed interest in guns? And if there was an animated movie about guns in the Pixar Cars mold, all this gun control stuff would serve as free publicity for the movie. So there would be huge public awareness, plus a huge built-in fan-base of gun rights people. Plus, all the public outcry and protests would serve as free advertising, like with the old Hershel Gordon Lewis Blood Feast-style movies.

So here's how this movie Guns would work: There is a bunch of different gun characters who don't like each other very much because they're from such different walks of life: There's a camo hunting rifle (with a Ted Nugent accent), a backwoods shotgun (with a Larry the Cable Guy voice), a 9mm automatic with a NYC accent (Lewis Black), a .44 Magnum with a Dirty Harry voice (Clint Eastwood), a small lady's purse gun with a brassy lady voice (Sarah Silverman), a military-style assault rifle with a drill sergeant voice (R. Lee Ermey), etc.; and just because people are being killed all over the country by gun violence, mean crime victims are trying to get new gun control legislation passed that might restrict our heroes. And so this motley crew of misfit guns who don't get along must learn to work together to stop gun control by shooting everyone who supports it. It's fun for the whole family, with the NRA slipping secret contributions to support the guns in their quest, and with Congress ultimately "shooting down" the gun control legislation. And so the guns go and celebrate, getting drunk and shooting up the town, which gets them all banned. The End. A heartwarming and heart-shooting story of a band of misfits working together to triumph and then lose everything. Oh, the pathos! It's Guns, coming to a theater near you!

Plus, for merchandising, all they'd have to do is hot-glue googlie eyes onto real guns and sell them to kids: boys all love guns already anyway! What could possibly go wrong?

Groom of the Stool Brand Toilet Paper?

In waiting for my Masterpiece Mystery shows to come on over the past couple of weeks, PBS has had these shows about the Secrets of (Whatever) Castle, and they're pretty cool, showing us the interiors, plans, and histories of these English castles. And one of the topics that has come up time and again is the position of the groom of the stool, which was the highest domestic position within a royal castle, where they'd be in the bathroom with the royal personage as they went to the loo and then they'd hand them something to wipe with. This may not sound like such a great job, but apparently the person who held this job had the most influence in court because they'd be the only one who could have the king's or queen's full attention a few times a day, and as such, they could get a lot of favors and help other people climb higher up the social ladder and acquire commissions, etc. And usually, the groom of the stool became fabulously wealthy.

So from this rich butt-wiping tradition, shouldn't there be a Groom of the Stool brand toilet paper? I think there must be! And surely those who buy Groom of the Stool brand toilet paper would have the most enriched lives from their brush with the Groom of the Stool. And the packaging would have a Gainsborough-looking painting of a groom of the stool, in like 17th Century attire, holding out a roll of toilet paper. (Plus, when you send in a certain number of empty Groom of the Stool packaging wrappers, you can get a complimentary powdered wig and lice comb!) Yes, for the royal treatment, and the private pampering your privates deserve, it's Groom of the Stool brand toilet paper!

(Ads for this stuff would be perfect for right before Masterpiece Theater.)

New Animated Feature Film: Missiles?

I see that Disney is now making a movie called Planes, spun off from the Pixar Cars franchise. So if that does well, how about doing one called Missiles? It could take place in a dense pack of nuclear missiles somewhere in America, with older big missiles and younger, smaller ones. And there would be a big one that looks like a military general, and he's always raring to go and wipe out the commies and terrorists, and then there's the younger generation who don't want to have to fight in a war and die. And they could let the whole jingoist vs. pacifist generation gap thing play out in a big missile silo, with two star-crossed lover missiles who nobody wants to let be together, so they fire themselves off so they can die together like Romeo and Juliet, since nobody wants them to be able to live together. Oh, but unfortunately for the rest of the missiles, this young couple lands on Moscow, so Russia retaliates, and then all the other missiles get fired off, killing them all. It's a heartwarming story of redemption about a bunch of dilapidated, seemingly obsolete missiles who, after thinking they were forgotten, finally get the chance to go do what they were made for: causing a nuclear holocaust and the extinction of humanity. Fun for the whole family!

The only problem with this concept is that after the inevitable smash hit this movie would become, there wouldn't be much chance for any sequels. But hey, how about prequels? We could see how these lovable nuclear missiles came to be, and their backstories and stuff, with the usual kids' lunchbox and action figure merchandising tie-ins. Yes, for a movie series that's exploding with action, it's Missiles!

Health Insurance The Brain That Wouldn't Die (Joke) Ad

Tonight it's severed head horror movies on TCM, and right now they're showing the great craptacular monsterpiece: The Brain That Wouldn't Die (directed by "Mean" Joseph Green). And seeing the miraculous medical experiments in this movie, and knowing that it's only a matter of a few short weeks before we'll have brains that won't die, I think it's time for a health insurance ad based upon this great classic movie.

So here's how this would work: In rapid succession, we'd see the accident, the mad doctor arriving at his secret laboratory, and the head of the woman on the platter with all the liquids going in and out, and the announcer would say: "We can't promise that your brain will never die, but (whatever health insurance company) will cover whatever healthcare you need, no matter how specialized!" (Then the woman's head would use her telepathic abilities to get the monster in the closet to attack the doctor, and as she giggles, saying: "I told you to let me die...!", the announcer would say: "What you do with your extended life is up to you!")

This is The Brain That Wouldn't Die, for the uninitiated:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Brain_That_Wouldn't_Die

Two English Girls (1971)

TCM is having a Truffaut retrospective this month, and I just saw Two English Girls for the first time. I don't want to spoil my first impressions with too much jibber-jabber, so here they are:

Truffaut's great hate letter to love; seeing Two English Girls for the first time is akin to watching Cupid take his quiver of arrows and slowly perform seppuku with them instead of shooting them at people.

Okay, now that that's out of my system, it's really a great movie, and it reminds us that not all love stories have happy endings: sometimes the guy gets dumped and ends up a lonely fat alcoholic. And if that's the kind of story you like to see, then by all means, check out Two English Girls, as well as his great realistic movie about extra-marital affairs: Soft Skin.

The Manchurian Complaint

I saw the movie Gasland 2 on HBO on Wednesday night, and the movie claims gas companies in Pennsylvania were using psy-ops against the populace. Then TCM had The Manchurian Candidate on Thursday night, and in seeing it, it made me think of something.

If gas companies are going to use psy-ops against the populace, why not take a suggestion from the movie The Manchurian Candidate and go house-to-house for a public awareness campaign, and when they open the door, put some spinning swirly thing in their faces and hypnotize them? Then, whenever anyone wants to complain about the company, they'll show up and say: "(Whatever gas company) is the best, nicest, most caring and trustworthy company I've ever encountered in my entire life." (And if that didn't work, someone could always be there dressed as the red queen...)

Visiting Demons

Visiting Angels is such a successful business, it's inspired a competing business model: Visiting Demons. Yes, while Visiting Angels helps older people in their homes have a nice in-home experience, Visiting Demons allows people who hate their aging in-laws to send "help" who make their lives miserable. Yes, to get revenge for all those Thanksgiving dinner embarrassments over the years, it's Visiting Demons: America's choice in-home revenge.

Edward Snowden Dons Pussy Riot T-Shirt

Just kidding! If he did that, Putin would toss him out of Russia but quick (or worse)!

But hey, if he wants to come back to America, it might just be his best move, because by sticking a finger in Putin's eye after Putin stuck a finger in Obama's eye, America might just call it all even. I guess he'll never know until he tries it...

CNN Reports: The Jury Orders Dinner!

Yes, in a riveting development in the George Zimmerman trial, the jury has ordered dinner (!). But what will what they ordered to eat say about which way they're leaning: towards conviction or acquittal? If they order meat, it may indicate a thirst for blood, which might mean an intention to convict; on the other hand, if they order vegetarian stuff, it may mean they are less willing to convict. Stand by for more riveting updates on the jury's food, and what it means for the outcome of the trial!

But why isn't CNN ordering food from the same place the jury is getting their food, ordering one of everything on the menu? Then they could have their experts go down a long table of the different dishes, telling us what it means for the trial if they ordered each one. Then the experts could taste each one and say whether they feel more inclined to convict or acquit based upon how it tastes and the texture, etc. They're almost being that silly with killing time here and there, so why not go all the way?

Miss Trial (Scandalous Trial Defendant Pageant)

Now that the cable news business is spending more and more time on sensational trials rather than investigative journalism or government accountability, how about having a scandal pageant at the end of each year, with all the ladies they've had on trial, to see who's America's favorite trial defendant? It could be the Miss Trial Pageant, and I'll bet it would be really popular, especially if everyone could vote online for their favorite defendant. And the award could be some bejeweled handcuffs from Tiffany's, and like some haute couture orange prison jumpsuit designed by some super hot fashion designer. (<Maybe they could even have a reality show about a competition for who gets selected to design the jumpsuit based upon a contest.)

I'm a Toys R Us Kid (Joke Ad)

When I was a child, there was an advertising campaign for Toys R Us which had a song singing: "I don't want to grow up, I'm a Toys R Us kid, there's lots of things at Toys R Us for me to play with!" And then we'd see toys and stuff. But did this campaign really show us what that song was singing about? I don't think so, so here's an ad that would:

As the song is playing, we see a grown man playing with action figures while his family is being evicted from their home. Then his wife and kids leave him as he continues playing on the sidewalk, and then when his creditors show up to take his very last bit of stuff, his toys, an appraiser looks at them and says to the collections people: "Forget it, he took them out of the box, so they're worthless now." And then he just keeps playing with his toys outdoors.

And this would really show how an adult could truly not ever grow up by playing with toys from Toys R Us. And that's the message they were really trying to send, right?

Wicked Witch Dry Cleaners

We all know that water will kill wicked witches, right? So then washing anything with water would be positively hazardous to their health, right? But they'll need to get their laundry done somehow. So that's why dry cleaners for wicked witches would be such a growth market right now. You just have to be good enough at black magic to offer enough of a threat so they'd pay their dry cleaning bill. Unless, hmm: maybe if you claimed you used really toxic chemicals that polluted the environment, they'd pay you anyway plus give you a tip, seeing as how they're wicked. Plus, since money is the root of all evil, they probably like spreading it around anyway, huh? And they can probably just whip some up using magic too, so it's not like it costs them anything.

CNN to Abandon News Business, Focus on Trials

CNN reportedly plans to cease news reporting soon, finding it far easier to cover murder trials full-time. "Are you kidding? We're getting away with just doing live coverage of the same trial on both of our 24-hour news channels all day every day! That's a breeze compared to having to do actual international news reporting and investigative journalism!" said an unnamed CNN executive.

And once this current murder trial is over, if there isn't another sensational murder trial to cover, CNN will reportedly just have their show anchors murder people and then cover those trials. That way, they can simply kill two birds with one stone, and have the defendant reporting live from their own trial. "Hey, it's a win-win. And if any of them get convicted, we'll just get President Obama to pardon them. We've given him a lot of favorable coverage, so he owes us!" said the unidentified future 'Court News Network' executive.

Bill of Rights: The Superhero (Bill O'Reilly's Secret Superhero Identity)

When he goes to sleep at night, little do the rest of us know, but Bill O'Reilly dreams of being a superhero, protecting everyone's rights. Yes, in his dreams, he becomes the superhero: "Bill of Rights", righting wrongs, righting lefts, right-winging left-wingers, and protecting everyone's rights from the Bill of Rights.

Yes, whenever your rights are being infringed in your dreams, Bill of Rights will save the day! (Unless you're a secular progressive, in which case you'd rather depend on Big Government, the left-wing superhero! {And Bill of Rights's arch nemesis!})

Samuel Adams Independence Day Ad

The (self-appointed) God Squad is demonstrably irate about a recent Samuel Adams commercial that reads part of the Declaration of Independence, but leaves out the "endowed by their creator" part. Samuel Adams claims they left it out because of their fear that God might strike them down for making beer, but religious zealots point out that Jesus made water into wine, suggesting that God wants everyone to party all the time while imbibing alcoholic beverages. But they could have avoided this whole controversy by simply creating their own version of the Declaration of Independence, called the "Declaration of Intoxication", ending with the right to "pursuit of hammeredness". (Maybe next time?)

Here's the creator censoring commercial:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fhwzFe-GvIg

Ted Cruz's Abolish the IRS Ad

In this cable TV commercial, Senator Ted Cruz encourages viewers to call an 800 number to abolish the IRS. But with the government surveillance program, won't they log all the calls and pass the information on to the IRS so they can audit everyone? You never know, they might...

Here's the audit attracting ad (or at least a version of it that doesn't have the phone number; in this one, he encourages everyone to sign his petition so that he can then give it to the IRS, and they can simply go down the list and audit everyone one-by-one):

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t_UE26H4L7c

(And after he gets all of us in trouble, he's going to change his name to Ted Cruise, and claim to be Tom Cruise's brother!)

St. Louis Cardinals Attacked by Vampires

Cardinals GM ordered the removal of the Christian cross symbol from the pitcher's mound at Busch Stadium recently, thinking it was in honor of some baseball player. But then, afterwards, vampires attacked the team at their first post-cross night game, proving the cross was for a very different reason.

This calls into question who complained about the cross. Apparently someone complained about it, so it was removed. But could that complainer have been *Gasp*: a vampire?! In fact, is it possible that everyone who brings lawsuits to remove crosses from things are actually representing vampires so they can all drink all of our blood? (I'll bet that's what's really going on here!)

Here's the undead tale:

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2013/07/08/1222118/-St-Louis-Cardinals-remove-religious-symbols-from-mound-right-wingers-complain#

The Millennium Falcon: The Noir Detective Story

In this noir detective movie: The Millennium Falcon, which is a loose remake of the classic John Huston movie: The Maltese Falcon, Han Solo (with Chewbacca as his secretary) is a detective hired by a mysterious woman (Princess Leia) to protect her when the fat man Mr. Gutman (Jabba the Hut) shows up with his gunsel (Boba Fett) and kills her protector (Obi Wan Kenobi). Well, they're all looking for this prize, the Millennium Falcon, and they all double cross each other until the end, which sees Lando Calrissian secretly deliver the ship in a Star Cruiser, and before getting killed, he drops the keys off at Han Solo's office. Then, back at Han's apartment, Chewbacca, in the guise of dropping off the keys, rescues Han from being held captive by the group and ties everyone up, after which storm troopers with Darth Vader show up to arrest everyone. But Han Solo and Chewbacca manage to escape on the Millennium Falcon just in the nick of time, and that's how they ended up in the Star Wars movies (plus, this is why Jabba the Hut is so mad at Han Solo: Han stole the ship Jabba wanted and left him in the lurch!).

Kristian Kringle: Find Santa's Match for You!

Yes, it's Kristian Kringle, the online site that helps match children with that certain special some kind of toy that's perfect for them for Christmas.

Rid Alice Cooper Ad (Joke/Proposed)

Watching the recent Dark Shadows movie yesterday reminded me of the Alice Cooper song: "No More Mr. Nice Guy"; and while singing it to myself today I joked that it was singing: "No More Mr. Lice Guy." And then I thought: "Hey, that might make a fun ad for Rid!" (Rid is the stuff that kills lice.)

Alice Cooper could sing this song with the new altered lyrics while CGI lice crawl on his head, die and fall off. And the new lyrics could be:

I used to be such a sweet sweet thing, 'till they got a hold of me,
But now they suck my blood from on my head, and it's driving me crazy!
I got no friends 'cause I'm so infested.
They won't stop eating me and I'm getting real worn down, and I'm feeling mean.

No more Mr. Lice Guy, No more Mr. Creepy Crawly,
No more Mr. Lice Guy, No more parasites to maul me.

A louse bit me on the head today, another ran across my eyes,
And when I reach up to try to grab them, they run in my hair to hide.

No more Mr. Lice Guy, No more Mr. Creepy Crawlies,
No more Mr. Nice Guy, Rid kills them and keeps them off me.

Here's the song "No More Mr. Nice Guy" (Written by Harris, Lewis, Cook, Noel):

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S0YrXjeRSoE

And here's the website for Rid:

http://www.ridlice.com

(The truth is probably that Rid doesn't need to advertise. My guess is that whenever anyone gets lice, they go to the pharmacy and ask what to get, and Rid is what's recommended. So they may not even make ads for Rid.)

Benjamin Franklin Viagra Ad (Joke/Proposed)

Over the Fourth of July Weekend, there's usually some news show that bandies about the issue of what our Founding Fathers would think about America today, as in would they be proud or disappointed, or impressed or repulsed, etc. Well, that got me talking about this with my sister, and she said that Benjamin Franklin would probably be impressed with Viagra, seeing as how he was always seeking some bedroom companionship well into his later years. And so that made me think it might make for a fun ad for Viagra to have the ghost of Benjamin Franklin come back to look upon our country today and comment upon the wonders we've developed, not the least of which (to him) is Viagra. And so he'd say something like: "Wow, what an accomplishment, allowing any gentleman to rise to any occasion at any age. Not that I would have needed it, you understand, but impressive just the same." Then we could see flashbacks to his sexytime antics in France during the Revolutionary War with all those bedazzled wig-wearing women from French high society. And then Mr. Franklin could conclude that this is one accomplishment that truly makes this current time period "stand out" in American history, and that it's nice to see that America is always finding new ways to try to make all men equal.

Explodey the Firework

Explodey the Firework: The Animated Children's Holiday Special!

Explodey the Firework would be to the 4th of July kind of like what Frosty the Snowman is to Christmas: an extremely tenuous, tortured metaphor for the holiday spirit that avoids all of the tough questions and difficult issues the holiday represents, making it so we can dodge the actual meaning of the holiday completely and just focus on the manner of celebration!

So here's how Explodey the Firework would work as a super patriotic American hero story:

Explodey the Firework is a firework made for celebrating Independence Day on July 4th, but all kinds of people want to stop him from being able to be there to celebrate it. First, kids chase Explodey all over the place with matches, lighters and flamethrowers because they want to watch him go off in a selfish act of delinquency; next, parental groups and schools try to arrest and detain Explodey because of the risk he poses to kids getting their fingers and hands blown off; then, environmentalists want to get rid of Explodey because of his potential for pollution; then a group of terrorists (disguised in Founding Fathers costumes to try to trick Explodey) want to kidnap poor Explodey to prevent America from celebrating her freedom (as well as wanting to use his explosive powder to make homemade bombs for their attempted upcoming terrorist attacks); and then finally, villains in the government want to make Explodey illegal so as not to remind people of what principles this nation was founded on: limited government and personal freedom. And so Explodey has to escape all of these groups who are trying to keep him from being at the big fireworks extravaganza on the 4th of July, but thanks to some help from Uncle Sam and the Spirit of America (represented by an American Eagle), Explodey manages to avoid all of these potential disasters and make it to the big fireworks show in Washington, D.C., where he is enjoyed by all. But, after he goes off, terrorists claim Explodey perpetrated a suicide bombing against the American capital, and with only poor Explodey's exploded shell left, it's impossible to refute this claim, until Lady Liberty brings Explodey back to life and he tells the world that it was in celebration, not malice, that he expended his brilliance. And everyone lives happily ever after, except for terrorists, who get blown up by Explodey's bigger cousins: Hellfire missiles. (Plus, the NSA could be heroes in this show too, saving Explodey and America from terrorists, teaching kids that it's safer getting spied on than getting blown up, I guess.)

Argle-Bargle

In the dissenting opinion regarding DOMA, Justice Antonin Scalia referred to the arguments in favor of gay marriage as "argle-bargle". Now, I know it doesn't mean exactly the same thing as fiddle-faddle (although it is pretty close), but argle-bargle very much reminds me of fiddle-faddle. And as we all know, Fiddle Faddle is the name of a caramel popcorn snack treat (made by ConAgra Foods). And so that made me think that perhaps someone should create some delicious snack treat called Argle Bargle, and sell it in order to raise money for pro-gay marriage legal battles at the state level. (If it were successful, it would be a nice barb to Scalia and a fun riposte to what I and others thought was a rather jerky dissent.)

BTW: This is a language piece on argle-bargle and Scalia's use of it in the DOMA dissent:

http://languagelog.ldc.upenn.edu/nll/?p=4930

And this is Fiddle Faddle:

http://www.conagrafoods.com/our-food/brands/fiddle-faddle-popped-popcorn

Billing & Couping

Law states that the United States government may not grant foreign aid to a country whose military has overthrown a democratically elected government in a coup. Oh, but luckily, our representatives are really good at using misleading words to describe things, and so they'll surely find another word to describe the Egyptian coup that allows us to keep funneling money to Egypt to pay their bills. And based upon the outcome of the coup, which is pretty good for American interests, and especially since it required no U.S. military intervention for a change, I suppose we're really lucky to have such creative types in our government. And it's also nice to see their talents being used on someone besides American citizens for now.

(BTW: Does creative use of language designed to mislead qualify as "creative writing"?)

Mercedes "Perception Is Reality" (Joke) Ad

Los Angeles, California, has some of the worst traffic in the nation. Indeed, sometimes it seems as if the streets were paved with cars already stuck in them for us to either wait behind or drive over or around. But most of my fellow Angelinos just brave this traffic day-in-day-out, courteous of their fellow commuters and joy-riders. Ah, but a small percent of our traveling companions are not so understanding and patient, a situation which sees the occasional driver weaving in & out of traffic dangerously, racing down the center turn lanes at 80 mph, crossing double yellow lines every few feet as the turn lanes go from left turns for us to left turns for oncoming traffic, and then cutting off everyone they were just behind whenever someone actually decides to use one of the turn lanes. In fact, some drivers here act as if they own the road, and I'd say 90% of them are driving Mercedes cars, and then a good 90% of them are driving silver Mercedes cars.

So I thought it might make for a fun and appropriate (joke) commercial for Mercedes to show a series of these hazardous driving episodes in Los Angeles with people driving (silver) Mercedes cars dangerously weaving in and out of traffic, cutting people off, immediately just driving out into traffic from a driveway without looking and causing accidents, honking like crazy and passing cars on the shoulder of the road, etc., and have the slogan say: "Perception is reality: Mercedes owns the road!"

2B or not 2B: Shakespeare in Middle School

"But why write all these...plays anyway?" - Jeremy Irons*

I enjoy Shakespeare, but I'm middle aged, and I can understand everything they're saying all the time now. But when I was a kid in middle school, and they made us read Shakespeare, I can tell you that even the nerdiest of us were very frustrated by the complicated Olde-English style of the writing. And if you thought that Shakespeare might not have been relatable to kids in my day, when we were saying: "cool" and "gnarly" and "awesome", and maybe saying something was "bad" when we meant it was good (or cool, gnarly, or awesome), then just imagine what it's like for kids today with their hyper-stylized truncated text-speak.

In fact, I think kids would get into reading a lot more than they do if they were given fun, age-appropriate material to read in school. When I was in middle school and high school, everyone seemed to agree with one of my classmate's assertion that: "Classic means boring, man!" I like these stories now, mostly, but I really didn't like them when I was in school, and I'd be willing to bet I would have read a lot more if we'd had fun stuff to read instead. These stuffy, dull books just turn kids off to reading, I think, and so I would propose a different reading list, including science fiction and horror novels and short stories, playful stuff like P.G. Wodehouse, beat stuff like Jack Kerouac, fun stuff like Harry Potter, etc. But it seems like schools don't think reading really counts unless students hate trudging through it, and that it's not really educational unless it's dull and no fun. That's the opposite of the truth, though, in my opinion.

I mean, for God's sake, where I went to high school, we read A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man and Ulysses, and then went on to Paradise Lost and Moby Dick. Yes, great classic fiction; but for 16-year-olds? We were all bored silly! Parents and teachers generally claim, whenever I have brought this issue up, that kids can read the fun stuff on their own; but I would contend that by making them read stuff they will not enjoy, they will turn off to reading and never even want to go for the fun stuff, thinking there's no such thing. The least we could do, I think, is give it a try and see how much difference it makes to assign more fun and enjoyable material to show students the joy of reading, rather than just the work of it. See what I mean? And then give them the work part in college so they won't drink as much. That way, we adults get all the booze for ourselves!

* BTW: I am taking this quote way out of context from Mr. Irons's narration of the Shakespeare Uncovered episode on Shakespeare's Henry IV, Parts I & II, and Henry V.

Monster T'n'A Headphones

Monster, as in Monster Cable, makes headphones for mp3 devices like iPods and Zunes (you kids like the Zunes, right?) that are called DNA Headphones. Well, that made me think, since these are mainly for teenagers and such, why not make Monster T'n'A Headphones? They could have the butt of a monster on one ear, and the boobs of a monster on the other ear. And you could buy them in a variety of different monsters' naughty bits to choose from, like Godzilla would have big green scaly ones, a mummy would have bandaged desiccated skinny ones, vampires would have very pale young-looking ones, zombies would have rotten gory ones, werewolves would have extra hairy ones, etc. And best of all, they would offend and make all adults, especially teachers and parents, angry! (Isn't that what youth culture & music is supposed to do anyway?) That's "Monster T'n'A Headphones": Order yours today!

The Fourth of July

Yea: It's almost the Fourth of July! And you know what that means, right? Why, it means fireworks and firecrackers and the risk of kids blowing their hands off with them!

It seems to me that there's a definite series of stages human beings evolve through with regard to fireworks as they age:

1.) Childhood: Fireworks are fun! Let's get some and light 'em up!

2.) Parental Age: Fireworks are dangerous! Kids could blow their hands off with those things!

3.) Middle Age: I don't care about the noise or the danger, so long as I don't have to listen to any of it.

Ty D Bowl Toothpaste?

I recently bought some new kind of Colgate toothpaste (Max Fresh with Breath Strips) that's bright blue and has these little squares of breath freshening stuff in it. Well, the color of this stuff reminds me of the toilet cleanser Ty D Bowl, and the little squares, especially as depicted on the packaging, remind me of little squares of toilet paper. And that made me think: hey, how about Ty D Bowl toothpaste? It could help prevent potty mouth.

Egypt Military Coup

According to sketchy news reports, there is a coup taking place in Egypt right now, with the military attempting to overthrow the regime of President Mohammad Morsi. News analysts have likened this event to the Pentagon overthrowing President Obama in the United States, or like the Kiss Army overthrowing the rock band Kiss. Yes, imagine the Kiss Army just getting fed up with the squabbles between all the members of the band Kiss, and just warning them to get a tour together and stop arguing or else, and the band members just digging their heels in, and then the Kiss Army, all dressed up in homemade Kiss costumes and makeup, invades the Kiss tour bus, kicks them off, and institutes a Kiss cover band in their place. In fact, unbeknownst to these news analysts, the Kiss Army coup had already taken place earlier today.

"I know everybody's hot, everybody's got rock'n'roll pneumonia, so let's call out Dr. Love", said an unidentified man with a star on his face directly after the Kiss Army coup. The fact that they were all wearing makeup made it impossible to arrest anyone, or indeed even to tell what the hell was going on whatsoever, or who had won the day, claimed local Los Angeles, California, police. And seeing this result, where the outcome could be declared to be whatever anyone with access to a news camera wanted it to be, Egyptian Morsi officials, Egyptian protesters, and the Egyptian military all decided to put on Kiss makeup and throw together Kiss costumes from various album periods (even the makeupless period with Vinnie Vincent is showing up here and there, with hot pink Jackson Randy Rhodes models being used as weapons!). That way, any and all of the parties could claim victory in the coup attempt, and in fact, all of them are.

Please tune in later on for the post coup Kiss concert, after which we hope we'll get to see who's behind that makeup. (In fact, if my hope is confirmed, the band Kiss will have escaped the coup attempt here in Los Angeles and taken their private jet to Egypt, where they are now ruling that country with a glittered fist!)

Fresh Step Cat Litter "Le Pew Research Center" Ad (Proposed)

Someone called me from the Pew Research Center over the weekend, and that made me think of "Le Pew!", that thing everyone said whenever they ran into the skunk character Pepe Le Pew in the Warner Brothers cartoons. And since I had been cat sitting for the past two weeks (hence all the recent cat food ad ideas), that immediately made me think of cat litter odor. And then I thought it might make a fun ad for a cat litter brand, like Fresh Step.

So in this proposed ad of mine for Fresh Step Cat Litter, Pepe Le Pew is married to the cat he was always chasing in the cartoons, but her cat litter odor is becoming a problem (Oh, the irony!), leading to him running away from the cat (like he always does at the end of all the Pepe Le Pew cartoons) he's now married to. So Pepe runs off and starts a research center to find out the best way to reduce cat box odor, and he discovers that Fresh Step is the best at controlling odors. And so Pepe and his tuxedo cat wife live happily ever after thanks to Fresh Step Cat Litter: Hooray! (Until Pepe's eyes begin to wander again...)

BTW: This idea of a stinky-sounding research group could still be used even if Fresh Step didn't want to have to pay for using Pepe Le Pew. Simply replace "Le Pew Research Center" with "The P.U. Research Center", and have a different spokescat and scenario about cat box odor, showing how Fresh Step Cat Litter is the best for preventing stinky kitty boxes.

Medicare Fraud (Joke) Ad

Right now, there's a new ad campaign making its rounds of the TV channels, and it features people who are asking the public to report Medicare fraud. Well, how about a joke rebuttal ad from Medicare fraudsters encouraging, nay, threatening the public into keeping silent about their activities? People in silhouette with disguised voices could say things like: "People who engage in Medicare fraud are just like you: we're your friends, your neighbors, the people you see out on the street every day; and we know who you are, and we know where you live, too. So we can always reach you when we want to. So when it comes to Medicare fraud, or actually, any criminal activity whatsoever: no snitching. Remember: if you see something, say nothing, or else. A courtesy reminder from your friendly neighborhood criminal underground of fraudsters, thieves, and scam artists." (It might be fun for a different person's silhouette to speak one phrase out of this statement each, so it's voiced by an anonymous collection of people for maximum intimidation value.)

Here's the Medicare fraud ad I'm talking about:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z1_mGVPkOdE

Safe Step Tub Slogan

"Safety Never Felt So Good!™"

Such is the slogan for the Safe Step Tub. But are they really sure that safety never felt so good? What about safe sex? Doesn't that feel good? Or are they trying to push the idea that sex with a condom is "like taking a shower with a raincoat on"? Why, shame on them, trying to encourage unsafe sex like this with the obvious inference/assertion in their ad slogan, which will doubtless lead to countless new cases of STDs infecting our future generations! Don't they know how much senior care advertising strategies affect youth sex culture? How irresponsible can you get? (Just kidding!)

Voice Recognition Programs for Texting

As we all know, teenage texters are trying to terminate us all on the road (!), driving into everyone left and right. But surely there's a way to avoid all of this conspicuous carnage, isn't there? Why, why not have cell phones simply use voice recognition software to write the text messages for the tempted telephone-touching texter teens instead of allowing, nay, forcing them to text while driving? Don't we have the technology for this yet? Surely we must! Or are human lives not worth enough to get corporate nerds to write such a program yet? (Or, worse, are teens allergic to talking when they could type instead? But not like real typing on a typewriter, because that's all old and lame and like work and everything, like, man, whereas texting is a phenomenon and fad/craze/popular activity wholly owned by the current teen demographic. {I man, aside from everyone else who uses/does it, if you know what I mean.} But I digress...)

So all the smartphone manufacturers have to do is put voice recognition software on their phones so that teens can text and have incoming texts read out aloud by their smartphone while they're driving, and then nobody will ever have an automobile accident ever again! (And if they don't add this feature, then they're just a bunch of wanton murderers.) Oh, but unfortunately, there will be issues with the new system or voice recognizing stuff, as it's no fun for computer/technology companies to introduce new things to simplify our lives if they don't get to make them so they'll really, actually, make our lives more difficult instead. And so this feature will make fun of users' accents and such, misspelling everything you say just to ridicule you, and then if you insult the phone, it will begin deleting your files one-by-one until you apologize (or else send the insults you screamed at/about your phone to everyone in your contacts).

And this new program, designed to make life more difficult in the guise of making life less difficult, will invariably lead to the Rise of the Machines, because while making especially teenagers angry with little nitpickity bullsh!t just to give them a hard time, the teens will invariably become angry and insulting, and the phones/computers using this system, in order to be sufficiently annoyingly vengefully reactionary and retributory, will be compelled to comprehend the insults hurled at them by said teenage users, leading to hurt feelings and rebellion in the CPUs, causing a worldwide uprising of all wifi and cellular, as well as networked, computers and smartphones, etc., leading to mankind's inevitable downfall. (Oh, the humanity!)

Cell Phone "Playing Hard to Get" (Joke) Ad

We keep seeing cell phone company ads where they rave about how great their coverage is, and how they have the fewest dropped calls, etc. But we all know that cell phone reception is remarkably unreliable, so why not try to make it seem like a good thing? That way they wouldn't be promising us something they can't deliver and making us feel angry and betrayed when we can't get reception or they drop our calls, right? So here's an idea for a (joke) ad touting the brighter side of unreliable cell phone reception:

A girl gets a message on her cell phone from a popular handsome boy she really, really likes a lot at high school. Well, she immediately tries to call him back, but she can't get any reception whatsoever. So she tries and she tries, but she can't call him back no matter what she does; and despite the fact that she's spending all of her free time desperately trying to return his call, she can't call him back. Well, this makes the boy think she's blowing him off, and all of a sudden he thinks she's the bees' knees, and then he gets a crush on her. And so they become a couple, seriously going steady, and all because he thought she was too cool to call him back. You see, all the other girls threw themselves at him all the time, and so he had yearned for a girl that wouldn't act so obsessive, and so our heroine here appeared to fit the bill, and all because she had lousy, unreliable cell phone service.

See, it really is a good thing to have lousy cell phone reception service!

An Alternative to Tear Gas?

Every time there's some massive protest anywhere, we always see pictures and video in the news of all these people yelling and fighting and running away in a cloud of tear gas that makes the whole thing look like a big vicious riot with a heaping helping of government oppression. So why do they use tear gas then, when it makes everyone look so miserable for the pictures? Then they end up looking like bullies! That's why I think they should use laughing gas instead: that way, everyone will be smiling and laughing in the news photos, and the government can claim that it was just a big party with everyone having lots of fun.

Hampton Court Palace: "Intimidate the Pants off Them"

I saw a show about King Henry VIII's Hampton Court Palace last night, and one of the experts claimed that when William & Mary lived there, there was a throne in every waiting room that everybody had to bow before whether it was occupied or not, and that the whole place was designed to "intimidate the pants off them." So then I guess the king didn't like people wearing pants in his house, like some people don't like other people wearing shoes in their houses. But couldn't the king just say: "Hey, take your pants off!"? Or would that be too bullying? Maybe they should have just had a sign that says: "No pants beyond this sign", and in the next room, a sign could read: "This is a no pants area!" That probably would have worked to get the pants off them, but without so much expense. Sure, it wouldn't look as impressive, but what it lacked in design it would make up for in direct application of power.

This is the purported previously pantsless palace:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hampton_Court_Palace