More Stupid Commercials
Jun 4th, 2008 by Micah Tillman | 6 Comments |
1. A Radio Spot for the American Petroleum Institute (I think)
You hear, in a female voice (recently, the commercial has started using a new reader; the text hasn’t changed, however), essentially the following:
Pumping gas hasn’t been very pleasant lately, and everyone’s wondering, “Why?”
No they haven’t! Everyone knows why pumping gas hasn’t been very pleasant lately.
As the commercial goes on, you find out that what the commercial writer meant was what everyone else would mean by, “Everyone’s wondering why the price of gas has gotten so high.”
But there’s a huge difference between wondering why pumping gas isn’t fun anymore (as if we’re all at the pump, squeezing the handle thing, puzzling over why it just doesn’t feel the way it used to . . .) and wondering why gas prices — the wet blanket at our gas-pumping parties — have risen as far as they have.
(And besides, pumping gas has never been like the gas-fight scene from Zoolander.)
2. The “I’m All Advil” Commercials
I’ve never met anyone who was a “different pains, different pain relievers” person. The commercials start to play, and I start to wonder, “Who are you talking to?”
One wants to quote Ahmadinejad, in the spirit of Yakov Smirnoff: “In [America] we do not have this phenomenon.”
Well, I despise taking meds…. yuck. BUT, I think I’m one of those people advil could be talking to. Because acetaminophen is *supposed to be* better for aches and pains, and ibuprofen is better for swelling, naproxin is good for something else (but gives me stomach aches), etc.
Anyhoo… :) maybe this comes from marrying a doctor’s son…
Here in New England, there is this local gym advertising on cable. They’ve enlisted the help of some sort of calendar model, who not only stars in the commercial but apparently wrote her own script. (oops. That was so stereotyping.)
Anyway, she has “I’m a model, and in my field, staying in shape is not an option.”
I gather she means that “staying in shape is not optional.” But what she actually says is, of course, much funnier. Those poor models. They apparently aren’t allowed to stay in shape. Who knew? Airbrushing and digital technology must be more advanced than I thought.
Nice. I’m mocking somebody else’s poor choice with words and I wrote “she has” instead of “she says” in the middle of that comment.
Someday, I ought to try that whole wacky “proof reading” thing that everybody keeps talking about.
Amanda–
I believe that the logic of my argument entails that you and Tim do not now and never have existed. Clearly I said that no one in America has different pain relievers for different pains. Sorry. I’m not listening to you anymore.
Jeff–
That’s hilarious. Ah! Ha!
I love it. Staying in shape isn’t an option. That is entirely too good!
And “she has” works grammatically, so no need to beat yourself up about it too much. (E.g., “What do you have on Line 7, George?” -”I’ve got, ‘Exercise is not an option’. Is that wrong?” -”Nah. We’ll keep it.”)
Micah – LOL
*blinks*
LOL
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