Those crazy Swedes.

After eight months in my current apartment, I finally got some furniture for my room. I had a bed and dresser, and now I have a desk and bookcase. What this means is that I can finally, theoretically, have a clean and organised room. I say theoretically because I have unloaded most of my boxes, but now I have the empty boxes sitting in my room, along with all of the new furniture. But there is a reason.
You see, the desk I bought is from Ikea and it is unfinished wood. That means I get to stain and varnish it. I probably don't have to, but I want to - I like how stained wood looks, and the varnish will help protect it and make it washable. So I have kept the boxes so I have a surface that is not carpet on which to stain. It also means my room is a mess until I get this done.
I'll post pictures when I am done. Maybe.
In the meantime, get a mild chuckle from today's edition of Thunderfunk the Superchicken.

Ads That I Like

Here are some ads that I like.

Mr. Lube
They have a series right now featuring a guy working at a generic oil change place. Someone will come up to the counter and he will interact with them to hilarious results. In one, oil change guy (OCG) tells the customer (TC) that he (TC) has to call the appointment line to make an appointment, even though he is already at the shop. So TC calls the number causing a phone on the counter to ring. OCG answers the phone, tells TC over the phone to hold, and the lowers the phone and shakes his head in amazement, saying to TC that "they are swamped". My favourite part is how OCG tells the guy to call the number, points to a sign, and then looks down, pointing at the sign again to encourage him to call the number.
Another features the same set up, but this time when the guy calls the number, OCG starts saying "for service in English pres..." only to be interrupted by TC pressing one. OCG then lowers the phone and tells TC not to interrupt. There are a couple of others as well, and all of them make me laugh.

The Alberta Institute of Recycling (or something like that).
These are ads made to encourage people in Alberta to recycle. They are set up much like the old Bud Light institute commercials where a pseudo-scientific lab is set up for hijinx and hilarity. One has a dog that has been trained to retrieve recyclables that have been thrown in the garbage, but when it is released to get the bottle that the tester has thrown in the garbage it jumps and latches onto his crotch, with cringe worthy results. The other features a pill that makes people more likely to recycle. The 'official' of the 'institute' who is explaining these products goes into a testing room where a woman, with her back to the camera, has a bottle in her hand and she is vacillating between the garbage and the recycling bin. Finally she tosses it into the recycling bin and the 'official' seems pleased. And then the woman turns around and she has hair growing out of her face - a huge spot of really long hair from the middle of her cheek, more from her forehead, etc. It's kind of creepy. She smiles at the 'official' and says "hello" in a slightly sultry manner. The official looks distressed and slightly repulsed and says "Sweet Mother!" It is mostly how he says it that is amusing. He quickly closes the door and turns back to the camera. "Of course," he says, "there are still some side effects." Meanwhile, the woman has come up to the door, which has a large window in the top half, and started licking the glass. The man moves to block her from sight, which works until she moves to the other half of the window, which he is not blocking, while still licking it. His reaction and then her licking the glass make me laugh every time.

Ford
Not much to this ad, just a bunch of people extolling the virtues of Ford. It is one of those ads that features a bunch of people saying the same sentence or paragraph, and each person says a few words and then the next person says the next few words, and sometimes the next person will repeat what was just said to emphasize a point. It's been done before, and will be done again. It is executed without any real problems. They repeat things a bit too often for my taste, but that's my only quibble, and it is a minor one at that. I'm honestly not sure why I like this ad except to say that the music, I think, seems to tie it all together rather well. I just like the ad.

Shaw
They have two commercials extolling their contractless cable service. The point of the ads is that contracts for cable service are monoliths of rudeness that leave you trapped. Both ads feature a giant man (eight feet tall or more) made out of paper (or made out of contracts, if you will). The first is a guy on the couch with this man, watching TV. The guy wonders why they are watching the show because it is not funny. He then asks to watch something else, to which the contract replies by spitting a piece of paper onto the man laps which simply reads 'no'.
The second, and more amusing, ad has a woman come home to this giant paper man. She is carrying bags of groceries and the man offers to help her, taking the bags. She then gazes at him lovingly and says "can you believe it has been three moths already?" The man mutters "oh really" drops the bags and sits down, telling the woman to "go make me a sandwich". The woman looks hurt and says "where's the nice contract I fell in love with?", to which the contract replies "he's right here. And he wants a sandwich." And as the picture changes to the information screen and fades out, his voice can be heard one last time saying, "and no crusts".
These ads amuse me because of the voice of the contract, which is slightly accented, and very deep and rumbly even as it is soft. I also like the blatant lack of subtlety on the part of the contract. The second the three months is up, he becomes a boor, demanding a sandwich. The humans do a good job too.

Kia Forte
Somehow Kia followed up a massively disappointing (to me) ad campaign with one that I am enjoying. They have a new vehicle called a Forte. The ads feature people doing things very poorly, saying that "'whatever' is not my forte." Then they indicate their vehicle and say "But that is". Simple but effective. One starts with children in a park suddenly running madly away from a horde of bees, and then it switches to a guy who has a bunch of empty bee...keeping...things. "Bee keeping. Not my Forte," he says before pointing at the car. "But that is." Another is karate (he gets kicked through a window), and another is 'Minding my own business' (he gets tied to a pole by some thugs who didn't have their dog on a leash). Despite their failures, they are all really proud and excited about their car. It makes me feel glad for them, that they have something good going for them.
Also, in very tiny letters at the bottom of the screen on the beekeeping ad, it says "Child actors. No children were harmed in the making of this commercial", which I'm glad to see because I assumed at first that they ambushed some kids in the park by shaking beehives until the bees were frothing at their mouths from anger and then throwing the hives at the children and taping the results, all the while laughing at the pain inflicted on the poor little gaffers.
Was that sarcasm? I can't always tell.
(Yes. Yes it was.)

Grasp the Nettle

I know, I've overanalayzed them.

I've realised something. I don't watch commercials (or listen to them on the radio) - I critique them. Of course, I often critique them from the standpoint of how relevant they are to me, which means tampon ads make me roll my eyes because I don't need tampons so why are they even bothering to show those commercials. I don't know how it happened but it seems that I've somehow come to the view that advertisers are targeting me all the time, which is absurd. Irregardless (yay for non-words that people use way too often), here are some commercials I have seen recently that I like and dislike.

Sico Paints
Right now Sico Paints has an ad out that features a visual of different paints in different colours splashing around the screen, much like this ad. As a side note, I actually like the ad I just linked to, but it is not the ad to which I am referring. No, the ad I am talking about (BLOGging about?) has similar visuals, but has the song 'True Colours' as its theme, though not sung by Cindy Lauper. The visuals are okay; it is the song that bothers me. To be more specific, it is the combination with the song and the commercial. I have no problem with liscencing a popular song for an ad, but this one doesn't work simply because it is mismatched with the content. Someone obviously heard the song one day and thought to themselves 'hey, this song has the word colours in it and I have to make an ad about paints. It's an obvious match." This ignores the fact that the song is about someone looking beyond what is seen on the surface, past the ugliness that is only surface deep to the pearl that may not be often seen but is in fact truly beautiful. The ad, however, says 'we can put colours on your wall'. If you really want to delve deeply into it, the commercial says 'the true colours are what is on the surface', which is the exact opposite message of the song. That dichotomy really makes me think that the person who decided to use the song only cared that: a) the song had been popular at one point, and b)it had the word 'colours' in the most reconisable part. There was no real thought put into the commercial and that irritates the heck out of me.
The visuals are kinda cool, though.

The Keg
I like the Keg. It's a good restaurant. The song they have on their latest commercials (I think there are two of them) actually makes me not want to go to their restaurant. I actually try to block out the sound of the ad when it comes on. I have no real explanation for why, I just despise the song. I also roll my eyes at what is happening in the restaurant - everyone is having a good time and it's like everyone is one big family: the servers are all in fantastic moods and very perky and friendly, and the group of attractive twenty-something girls are buying drinks for the ruggedly handsome twenty-something attractive men and everyone is just happy and laughing. Maybe it's because I worked in restaurants and know that it is rarely anything like how the ads present it at all, and maybe I'm a bitter old man. Either way, I don't like the ad, but mostly because of the music.

Kelsey's
This ad is very similar to the Keg ad, except that the song is the theme from Cheers. I like the song, but the ad is too similar to the Keg's. I think I saw the Keg ad first and this one suffered for that.

ScotiaBank's 2% cash back credit card
I've already discussed this ad (March 23, 2009). It drives me nuts.

Boston Pizza
They came out with an ad that featured a family (Father, Mother, Daughter, Son, Baby boy) who were very alike in manner and appearance - they all wore black rimmed glasses and were very conservatively dressed, and they all questioned the price of the BP's $9.99 menu, wondering if each item was actually that price, if the price was the first of three easy payments, etc. The hook at the end was that the baby, no more than ten months old and also wearing the same glasses, also piped up with a question. That ad was okay. Now they've come out with a sequel promoting their 'italian' food special, where the baby reminices about his time in 'Roma'. I understand why it was made - even if it hadn't been planned from the start, the original was interesting enough to be somewhat popular, and companies want recognisable 'mascots' (for lack of better term). I just don't think the concept lent itself enough to be ongoing, and the initial surprise of the talking baby is gone, so now it is boring and somewhat obvious: "Hey, the baby talks. Let's make him talk every time now and make him do things that he obviously wouldn't do alone because he's just a bayyyybbbbeeeeeeeeeee!"

Chevy
They have two I'm thinking of right now. One has a guy talking about how the Chevy...Traverse (I think?)(their midsize 'crossover') has more storage space than Honda's comparable vehicle. I just don't like the guy who is doing the talking. For some reason, I don't trust him. And this isn't my anti-Chevy bias (which I picked up from Peter) shining through because I always thought it was an ad for Toyota or Honda until recently. I never paid attention to which car had better storage.
The other Chevy ad is promoting their warantee (that's a hard word to spell)(I think I got it wrong) plan and their three years of inclusive service or whatever it is, and their various other guarantees. It features a different guy walking through various buildings as he is giving the information. I think I don't like this one largely because I don't like how they filmed him walking and talking. I'm not sure if I would dislike any method of him walking and talking or if it is just the approach used in this commercial, but either way, I don't like it. Makes me want to go buy a Ford.

Kia Soul
There were some teaser commercials a little while ago that featured people doing something or about to do something, and then they would stop and walk right up into the camera like it was a window they were looking through, and they would peer intently at... A website would then pop up: peerintoasoul.ca. That was the entire commercial. They lasted maybe fifteen seconds. I saw these many times and was very intrigued, always telling myself that I should check out the website because this had some potential. Optomistic me thought that this was advertising a website that might discuss philosophical, ethical, moral, and spiritual issues in a very serious way - somewhere that people could go and it would be moderated so that stupid comments (and so called Trolls) would be prohibitted and eliminated immediately. Either that or it was something very artistic, fraught with questions not answered.
Nope. It was a car.
To be fair, the full length commercials are actually amusing. One has some Mafia thugs distracted by this new car, and while their backs are turned their victim, with arms and legs still bound, hops away to freedom. Another has a cabin surrounded by the forest at night while a group of pyjama clad sorority girls are inside, listening to music, painting their nails, having a pillow fight, etc., just waiting for the psycho to come slaughter them. On the way, the psycho gets distracted by the car, and when the scene cuts, it is now morning and the sun is up, the birds are chirping, the still living sorority girls are beginning to stir from their slumber and the axe-weilding, mask wearing psycho suddenly realises it is morning and he runs off into the woods. The ads aren't bad, but they are tainted by the potential that was wasted.
On a car.

Tomorrow I'll post the commercials I have seen that I actually like, just so you don't think I am merely a hater. I might have too much free time on my hands.

I drank milk that was a week past its expiration date and it tasted fine. My fridge scares me sometimes.

And then I updated Grasp the Nettle.

Grizzly Adams indeed.

In the hockey playoffs, the players stop shaving until their team is eliminated. That is the only reason I hope Anaheim Ducks go deep in the playoffs. Scott Neidermeyer has the best playoff beard. It's awesome!
Mike Commodore looks like a chia pet exploded. I want him and Neidermeyer to face each other in a battle of the beards.
To the death!

I've never had a turkey

I just found out that five-pin bowling is a Canadian game. I knew it wasn't popular in the USA, but I assumed it was basically invented around the same time in the same place. Turns out, some dude in Ontario in the early 1900s developed it, and it's not played in the US much. I was surprised.
Duckpin bowling is basically a combination of five and ten pin bowling - three tries to knock down ten pins that are much smaller than regular ten pin bowling pins, and even smaller than five-pin bowling pins (which are smaller than ten-pin pins). It sounds kinda lame.
Candlepin bowling is much like ten pin, but the pins are very odd looking. I like the look of them, but I'm not sure what I think of the game itself. I'm intrigued by the fact that the pins aren't cleared away when they are knocked down. I'll have to try it someday, which means I'll have to go out east as it is generally only played in the Maritimes and Maine, which is odd. But hey, travel out east, that's cool.
My internet is going real slow right now.
Ten pin bowling is not really my thing, though it would be cool to learn how to make it curve. I do enjoy seeing a bowler throw the ball at the gutter and have it end up hitting on the opposite side of the pins. That is impressive.
Kegel is a German variation of bowling. I played it in Germany (as near as I can tell - I don't remember seeing what it was called...my internet is back to normal now...but from the brief description I read, I'm pretty sure it is). It could have been fun...actually, we all had a good time anyway. It could have been more fun if we had understood the rules or how to score or anything like that at all, but it was interesting.
I enjoy bowling. It's a fun game to play and not too difficult to learn, though it does take some skill to master. I'm a five pinner, so if I ever ended up living in the States, I probably wouldn't bowl much. But here in Canada, it's fun to just hang out with people and knock a few pins down.

Also, I'm updated Nettle again. Or I will in the next couple of hours. Either way, check it out.

Tomorrow

Sometimes I feel like the world is so close. I get these weird flashes of energy and enthusiasm and it feels like the solution to all of my various problems are just barely out of reach. I know that if I just call this person, pick up this thing and go to this place, everything will improve. I'm ready to go, willing to hop in my car to do it. The problem is this almost always happens at night, and by the time I'm ready to go, this person is asleep, this store is closed, and if I go outside, I'll get mugged. Okay, that last part is not necessarily true, but it is dark and scary outside.
So I decide to do whatever it is I need to do tomorrow. And then I wake up in the morning and I'm tired because my energy wouldn't let me sleep until much later than I should be up. I then have to go to work and by the time work is done, I just want to go home and I don't mind if I kick a small puppy along the way because it has been that kind of day, even when it hasn't. I get home and fall into my mind-numbing routines (because a numb mind doesn't have to think or try) and even if I have mild stirrings of the feeling, they produce fear and loathing instead of optimism and eagerness, so I just don't bother. It's very frustrating.
It doesn't help that I am somewhat cynical and pessimistic. It's not that I completely expect the worst of everything, but I do tend to think the worst of myself. Plus, I've seen enough from people in general to expect poor decisions and failure in general. Some would say the same thing and then try to tell people that they are 'not pessimistic, just realistic'. I say, call it what you want, it's pessimism, even if it is justified. But that's just a side rant. The point is, when I'm not firmly in the grips of my enthusiasm and energy, I tend to not be able to muster enough energy to care about what seemed so important only hours ago.
I think part of the problem is that I sometimes get too caught up in the big picture and start to ignore the little picture. For example, if I went to somewhere in Asia where they have the temples at the top of very high hills with massive staircases (you know the kind - with 1000 steps or more)(I've seen them in movies), I would not only have trouble getting to the top, I would have trouble even bothering to begin because I would see all of the steps and not be able to gather the energy to begin. But if I just looked at the first twenty stairs, I would be able to do that. And then, once I'm that far, I could do the next twenty-five, and then the next eighteen until I suddenly find myself at the top. Basically the solution to all of life's problems are a series of smaller steps, and it is only when I look at the entire staircase that I doubt myself and fail.
This all sounds good now, but how will I feel tomorrow?

Fact

Cheese tastes better when it is grated.

Nettle

Random Musings (as I watch TV)

There's an ad for Enterprise car rentals that has an elderly woman with her adult son 'discussing' the car they rented for her trip - she thinks Enterprise sounds expensive, and the fact that they are picking her up at her house definitely makes it seem very pricey. After being assured that Enterprise is not expensive, the mother then says "If it's not expensive, then why didn't you get me a bigger car?" I had only heard this ad and never watched it, but when I finally watched the end, the look on the son's face confirmed my thoughts - the son is hoping that the mother doesn't return from the trip. His internal answer to the above question is "because you are a terrible shrew of a woman and you make my life horrible"...the woman's hockey championship just ended and as the women were removing their helmets and celebrating, all of them were pulling out hair bands so they could tie back their hair. All of them did it, and I have no idea where they got them from (wore them on their wrists during the game?). Just one more way that the women's game is different from the men's...also, I never find myself thinking that the defencemen are pretty cute in the men's games...if we tell kids that they should play sports and have fun, and then lose our minds when our athletes don't do well in the Olympics, is that a mixed message?...I'm no economist, but I do truly believe that part of the reason that the economy has been hit as hard as it has is because of the neverending coverage of every little thing on TV and the internet. People don't understand the stock market and related things and when they hear things are bad they panic without really understanding why...that being said, the whole mortgage thing in the US really was a massive screw up and that part of the 'crisis' is understandable...the fact that I used the word 'crisis' shows the effect of the hyperbole that is reported - it is bad, but crisis is a bit extreme...these things go in cycles. It will pick up again...This may show my natural bias, but I like the new Ford ads and I despise the new Chev ads...I don't know if anyone has noticed, but Ford hasn't gone to the government for money like Chev and Dodge have...I also don't like Toyota's latest ad for some reason...I miss Vanessa...she was my Crown Victoria...ah, lost loves...as a white male from North America, sometimes I feel like my culture is universally looked down upon...and then I ask myself "what culture?"...golf announcers are funny...I knew a guy named Clay Chestnut...I still think he should have been a country singer...I was watching a movie and one of the actors stumbled over his line: "This whole sh...this whole shelf looks suspect". It didn't sound like it was done on purpose, it sounded like he actually stumbled over his words, like people do all the time in the real world but almost never do in the movies...it made me happy to hear that...when you do your taxes, make sure you fill out all lines properly...I think films today are often edited too slickly - many older movies are somewhat slow in their editting, leaving spaces between sentences, little moments in the film of nothing that can do a great deal to affect the mood of the film, but many movies don't do that anymore, like they are afraid of silence...that's too bad...would you pronounce 'economically' with a long 'e' or a short 'e'...I think I'd choose the long 'e' most of the time...one guy wearing an eighties style male tank top (the 'neckline' plunges to below the ribcage and it basically has no sides), tightish leatherish shorts and a fanny pack, and the other guy is wearing a pair of too short denim shorts and a white t-shirt that shows of his stomach...the eighties (and early nineties) were a dark, dark, dark, comically and nauseatingly dark time for fashion...that's why I never complain about the baggy clothes, because it way beats the alternative...and I'm out...

Squeeze Bacon

...
I'm speechless. It's bacon in a bottle!

It's enough to make me wish it were real...

I win?

Yesterday I parked at work and thought I had done a bang up job. Turns out I was a bit crooked - not enough to be in the way, but definitely not completely straight. I didn't think much of it until I looked out again later and noticed that a car had parked beside me, also crooked, at the same angle as me. As I watched throughout the day I noticed that every car that parked beside me also parked slightly crooked, despite the straight lines that were clearly painted on the ground. By the time I was finished work, the entire row of cars was parked crooked.
Apparently I'm a trendsetter.

Grasp the Nettle

Almost a Sonnet. Kinda. Sorta.

My head hurts.
I updated Grasp the Nettle.
The two are unrelated.

Is that poetry?

Sad News

I just found out today that my uncle died. He had been battling with cancer for a few years now. A while back they had amputated his foot to try and stop it from spreading. By the end, as sad as it was for him to pass away, it was for the best. From all accounts he went fairly peacefully and with a minimum of pain given the circumstances so that is merciful at least.
I don't really have much more to say right now.
Good bye Uncle Gord. You are gone, but you won't be forgotten. See you in heaven.