Watch a lot of commercials whenever you’re able
It’s Friday, the snow is a-coming down, and I’ve already written about serious and valuable things this week. And so, here is a post about nothing at all important. If you’re one of the majority of my readers, you’re not from the New York area, and therefore are unfamiliar with the topic at hand or at least the specifics. I have ReplayTV and not only that, the last model they made that comes with “commercial skip” and automatically skips all the ads by working on some fancy algorithm involving the bit of dark space that comes between them and the content. So I rarely watch commercials outside of live sporting events (people always ask me, “does it skip the commercials on live TV?” uh, no, that’s not really possible.) and the morning news. This last one is the worst because I watch NY1 and they only seem to have local (read: cheap, cheesy, awful) commercials. So much so that when I saw a national commercial this morning for cranberry juice, I was startled.
Thus, I thought I would highlight the very best and worst local ads I’ve seen. You know, because you don’t see enough in your own locality.
This first one is 100%, no question, my least favorite ad running on TV today. All of TV. Which sucks for me because it’s on every single morning on NY1, usually multiple times. I often change the channel or mute the TV as soon as I hear the opening notes and it’s not like I’m sitting in front of the thing holding the remote. I’m doing morningy things like brushing my teeth and bemoaning having to go to work when it’s a-snowing. It’s obviously a take-off on Sex & the City but I find it smarmy, stereotype-indulgent, poorly acted, and ridiculously stupid. The women in it grate on me like the beep of an alarm clock. Which you know from an earlier post I don’t actually own.
I couldn’t even find it on YouTube, I had to record it and post it on there myself. Of course I knew it would be on. It’s on every fucking day.
[youtube width=”425″ height=”335″]http://youtube.com/watch?v=wrcPctp6Acg[/youtube]
The second one is the polar opposite. Fun! Catchy! Entertaining! And around here either totally beloved or completely loathed. But always known. As a matter of fact, because it’s for a rival cable company, they don’t show it on NY1 which is owned by Time Warner. People used to sing it at work! And I had no idea what they were talking about. And then I saw it. And then I saw it four hundred times. It was inescapable, but in a good way! Because I just adore it, it’s catchier than an Abba song. It was even on Gawker. A guy at work actually has an interpretation as to the subtext of the ad, that the lobster guy at the end is an evil presence, a harbinger of bad things (like having Time Warner cable, I guess). But I don’t believe that at all. Look at his dopey smile, mi gente. If you live in this area, the phrase “mi gente” has already clued you in, I’m sure, on which ad I’m referring to. If not, you will have this phone number memorized in the next 30 seconds. And it will permeate your dreams.
[youtube width=”425″ height=”335″]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9EVxI0uGzeY[/youtube]
Title comes from the above commercial, natch. Have a great weekend!