Protip: Do not use obscure phrases and references from a non-native language in your marketing efforts.

Example: In a junk mail I received from Geico today it started off with “Warren Buffett and the Gecko. They go together like pie and chips.”

My first impression: Yuk, those don’t go together at all.  Was Warren Buffett involved in some kind of hostile takeover attempt of Geico and they’re so pissed about it that they are calling him out in all of their print media?

Upon further research apparently this is a reference to one of their tv commercials (yet another “drawback” of not watching commercials).  Given that the gecko speaks ‘british’, it seems that the phrase “pie and chips” refers to french fries paired with some kind of meat pie.  This is quite different than my initial mental image of pecan pie paired with sour cream and onion Pringles, ick.  I may have just found another exception to the Independent Food Theory.

http://shine.yahoo.com/channel/food/taste-test-frozen-pizza-409319/

I was going to discount this article as being completely worthless seeing as though they rated possibly the worst frozen pizza I’ve ever tasted as the First Runner-Up.  But then I was just confused when they placed my current go-to immediately after it.  Perhaps since they were doing cheese-only (I assume to be “fair” through being consistent) none of the overly offensive ingredients were present.

The really wierd thing about CPK is that the restaurant itself is actually quite good, but the frozen pizzas are awful (I’d honestly rather have a “death pizza” [stupid Flash, I can't directly link to the 'page']).  And it’s not just me, everyone I’ve talked to until now agrees.

I knew I should have written this down as soon as I got home that day, as now I can’t with 100% certainty remember exactly what the letters were.  I’m still positive about it being 3 letters a space then eighty eighty.  So I think this is what it was, if I see it again I’ll update accordingly…

PMS 88

The first part, if that’s what it really was, is self explanatory.  Then for the second, Heil Hitler!  If you don’t know where that comes from, look here.

Some people still don’t believe the light turning off ability until they see it for themselves first-hand. Granted this is a fictional TV show but still, I felt it was worthwhile to show that someone somewhere decided to write a script about it. Perhaps my infatuation with all things German the last couple years is because I’m really a “recruit” and just don’t know it.

You can watch the episode at the link below.  The entire story line is pretty much about turning off lights.  The particular scene this screencap comes from starts around the 40:00 mark.  Looks like I can even make the link jump right to that part, sweet!

http://www.hulu.com/watch/57145/fringe-ability?c=2428

I set the marker slightly into the scene so you don’t have to deal with the dreaded double commersh.

Over the past couple of days I’ve seen a couple of personalized plates that struck me as a little strange.

GDBLES

On a license plate a D looks a lot like an O, especially from a distance, so at first I was thinking “uhh, ‘gobbles’ as in something turkey related?”  When I got a bit closer I could see it was a D so I proceeded to make sure to get by the vehicle so they wouldn’t affect me with any crazy driving (see the Mega-Religious-Psycho entry on the Words page if this statement doesn’t make any sense).  I was a bit surprised by the lack of fish on the back; I guess they figured the plate was enough.

ALKY13

As for this one my reaction was “hmm, do you enjoy getting pulled over every single day???” as surely a plate like that is a cop magnet.  Unless you’re going the reverse psychology route and thinking that you might get a free pass along the lines of “nah, there’s no way someone would openly advertise on their car that they’re an alcoholic.”

When I was telling someone about this sighting I also added “hmm, I haven’t checked a Periodic Table in a while but I’m pretty sure none of the alkali metals have an atomic number of 13 so I can’t play the benefit of the doubt card in that way”.  I have since confirmed this, however I did notice that Aluminum (AL) is #13, although there’s no KY, so unless this person is really into metallic sex toys I’m gunna have to stick with the original interpretation on this one.  I suppose it could be Aluminum, Potassium (K), Yttrium (Y), but still what would the 13 part be never mind the fact that that would be a pretty bizarre compound.

If I try reading it as 1337 5P34|< I suppose the driver’s name could be Kyle, that does fit, but then what of the AL part? Certainly no one’s name is Al Kyle or A. L. Kyle or Al Kyle Something.

Ok, enough of this stretching to attempt for a benefit of the doubt play, I’m sticking with Alky-13, which makes me worry that there are at least 12 other ones out there.

Another year, another round of commercials.  This year I was quite interested in the game itself, having watched a good bit more NFL than usual and actually following the Steelers through their season (at least for the games that actually got aired here).  But of course for a lot of folks it’s all about the commercials.  This year I decided to go pretty hardcore.  Since I have a little more time on my hands now I figured I could afford to put in the extra effort (translation: find a way to kill some time).

You can watch these at Hulu.com, I briefly considered linking each one individually but that’d take more time than even I have.  I find it rather funny (in that annoying sort of way) that when you view them you get the experience of “this commercial is brought to you by this other commercial” heh.

And so now the list, and here’s a color coded rating scale:

Blacklist – Fail – Poor -  Neutral – Passable - Good

Bud Light – Tossing around ideas to save money -  Not funny; this one hit particularly close to home as The Man was rejecting ideas to cut down on frivolous spending (even if it was supposed to be in jest, it was just too damn soon).

Angels & Demons – Some movie, and I have no idea what it’s about thanks to the uninformative trailer.  DaVinci Code II perhaps?

Audi - Multiple car thefts – One of the main reasons I don’t like commercials where you can’t tell what product it’s for until the end (if at all) is that usually it loses all meaning.  At the end I was forced to wonder “hmm, was he stealing only Audi’s the entire time?”  The pictures of the older cars also reminded me of when they were notorious for bad quality.  They do however get minor bonus points for the very brief glimpse of the hot chick on rollerskates.

Pepsi – Forever Young – WTF, that was some horrible music (the hip hop part at least made it marginally better).  Again, no idea what it was for till the end; I was hoping maybe it was a personal promo for Vince Young.

Doritos – Crystal Ball – meh, lame

Bud Light – Conan ad in Sweden – Slightly funny, good music.  They got a circumstantial bonus point for getting the bad music from earlier out of my head.

Year One – I guess this is a movie, but I’m not even sure if that’s the name of it.  Another trailer with not enough info.

Toyota Venza – My interpretation of the sales pitch: “This vehicle is only for people who are heavily into their African roots who are also into Battlestar Galactica”

Brigestone – Mr Potato Head – Very annoying for a while, but at the end it’s clear that was essential for the set up, therefore it gets a rating of funny.

Fast And Furious – Another movie in the series I guess.  This trailer had a much better real car to rice car ratio, but I’m still extremely skeptical.  Unless I see numerous reviews that state the movie is entirely devoid of all fart cans and rear spoilers on front wheel drive cars then hell no.

Castrol Edge – Grease Monkeys – This one was pretty wierd, but in a way I guess that was the point particularly since they used that very word.  However I think the bad acting kinda killed it for me.  Plus the whole grease monkey / code monkey thing hit on a (again due to the timing) sensitive subject.

Land of the Lost – Might be a good movie but my logical mind just cannot let go of the following: While the phrase “did we go back in time?” is uttered there are broken down supertanker ships and what appears to be what’s left of the Golden Gate bridge in the background.  So unless they started in the year 3000 or something then uh wtf?  My guess is that the editing team spliced together random parts to create this, at least that’s what I hope. The one saving grace: “Matt Lauer can eat it!”

Doritos – Crunch – Shockwaves blowing clothes off of hot chicks, hell yeah!

Go Daddy – Shower – Exactly what is to be expected from them, and I’m not complaining. An implied nude Danica Patrick and the “German woman from the dean’s office” in a shower together, cool.  Although the “see ‘unrated’ version online” ruse was completely transparent; yet another marketer trying to make you think “unrated” means anything more than precisely that.

Pepsi Max – Diet Cola For Men – This was the “I’m good” one.  One of the guys kinda looked like a previous manager of mine, so given the timing that spooked me a bit. Upon rewatching, this wasn’t as bad as I was thinking it was the first time around.

Pedigree - Adoption Drive – Nothing too fancy with the exotic pets in domestic places theme, but I gotta admit I laughed when the frisbee hit the water buffalo.

Bud – Fetch – eh

Bud - Dating Pony – Now that American Idol is recently back on the air I could’ve done without yet another “ain’t no mountain high enough” although I do get that the song did fit rather well with the story, as blah as it may have been.  I do also feel like I must subtract points for the “Indian” guy at the end, temporal effect and all.

Star Trek – Very first thing I noticed, the Bad Robot logo.  Pretty much everything I watch these days has that company involved with it so I was already thinking “whatever is about to be shown surely will be badass” and indeed it was.  Now please don’t get me wrong, I’m no hardcore trekkie by any means, but the trailer itself was quite good.  Even better than the first one where it had the fly-by of the engines or whatever.  This one was exciting, although I’m pretty sure I saw Harold (as in Harold and Kumar) flash by on the screen, man that’s going to wierd me out, I don’t think I’m gunna be able to “suspend [character] disbelief” for that one.

G – I guess this was for Gatorade, had a bunch of “hardcore” athletes talking about dedication and stuff, meh.

Cars.com – Confidence – Nothing but problems with this.  #1 Who the hell is ever nervous about buying a car, and more importantly #2 why does a guy who’s had all those jobs drive such a shitty car???

Hyundai – Angry Bosses – Ok, they got me with the YELLING IN GERMAN!  This one is linked

E-Trade – Babies again – Marginally funny

UP – Some Disney movie, don’t care

Bud Light – Drinkability Drawings – So the guy is drawing ski jumps and stuff in mid-air with his finger yet he fails to outline a curvaceous woman?  They even got to the point of drawing bandages and saying “chicks dig this” and still nothing.

H&R Block – Grim Reaper – This had so much potential but alas wasn’t great.

Teleflora – Insulting Flowers – At least they did go with the “Well I’d like to see y…” line.

Monster – Director of Fandemonuim – meh

United - lame as usual

NBC – Jay Leno in Car – A license plate with “Fall” and a sticker with “9 Central” I guess this was some sorta ad trying to already promote Jay moving on to his new deal?  I also wonder if they somehow magically had different time-zone stickers?

Cheetos – Pigeons – Concept could have been funny, but what does a bitchy person have to do with snack food?

3D Commercials – Monsters, Sobe, Chuck – Don’t really have a review of these because the whole time I was trying to figure out why my various glasses I happen to have weren’t working.  I even tried both combinations of red on the left and on the right, still nothing really happening.  Were special (new) glasses required for this?

Toyota Tundra – Fire Spiral Ramp – They almost lost points for being very similar to the already existing ones about driving dangerously through various heavy machinery, but this one was different so whatever.

Priceline – Security Van – Tolerable, the gratuitous Shatner delivery impression was funny.

Overstock – NOT IN HD. Ladies and Gentlemen we have our first official boycott!!!

Universal – Kid Hero – meh

NBC - LMAO – An interesting concept I guess, could’ve been better.  Going for the cliched ghetto booty was a little scary.  Ironically what I found “funny” was that I don’t watch any of those shows.

Mandatory Local Block – Since all of these were not in HD I’ll just assume there was something wrong with the feed and/or they didn’t care so I’ll just skip this break, some were even repeats!

Coke – “The Sims” Characters – W.T.F. ??? I clearly saw a character at the very beginning with the green diamond above them and fully expected a Sims commercial, then all sorts of wierd non-Sims characters started showing up and I was like, ok maybe it’s some new WoW type game… nope, Coke, wtf?

Brigestone – Jump Around – Good song!  The vehicle on blocks at the end really threw me off for a second though, I was like “uh, are they trying to say the moon/mars/whatever is like the ghetto?” then I finally figured out they were trying to say “peeps will steal these tires because they’re so good/fun/whatever no matter where you are”

Denny’s – Serious Breakfast – FREE “GRAND SLAM” ON TUESDAY 6am-2pm.  Given the recent turn of events I ain’t gunna be passing up too many free meals.  I wonder if I can hit one location for breakfast and another for lunch.

Monster – Moose Through Wall – awesome (strong temporal bonus)

Bud - Great Grandfather Horse Immigrant – meh, but a talking horse named Jake and not Ed?

Witch Mountain – This might actually be pretty/really good.  But I am rather bothered by the “btw the UFO convention is in town” comment over the radio as the Stormtroopers from Star Wars are climbing in the back of the cab, that’s just whack.

Transformers 2 – Megan Fox, enough said.

Career Builder – “12 Days of Xmas” – I’ve been debating whether or not to start using this site, now the decision is extremely easy.  Way to use your marketing dept / ad agency to lose business, duh.

Coke - Picnic – Ok, the “butterfly bottle” thing was a bit cool, I’ll give em that, but the rest was a little odd.  Plus I’m still wondering if an unopened bottle of Coke would float or not.  Oh, on re-watch it looks like it was on a big lilly pad, bah.

FrostedFlakes.com – Rebuilding Parks – um, ok

NFL – Snow Cone – um, ok.  The oboe player in the grocery store one set the bar pretty high, sorry.

Mighty Fine Burgers (local?) – Not HD

CarMax (local???) – This one was in HD, so I’m actually hoping it wasn’t local since that would completely mess up the theory.  Totally knew it was a dude, saw that one coming.

Jack in the Box (local?) – Not HD

HEB (local) – Not HD

Celebrity Apprentice – Not HD, definitely not local

Hyundai – Assurance – My thought after seeing this “damn, you know the economy must be bad if they’re starting to offer ‘bring it back within a year’ deals”  Wonder if that can be applied retroactively???

Coke Zero – Troy Polamalu – Music was lame, had those lame “we’re gunna sue coke/ourselves” guys from last year, meh

Cash4Gold – Hmm, I’m still thinking they got actors that looked very similar instead of the actual Ed McMahon and MC Hammer.  Otherwise it would’ve been like omg I can’t believe they got two guys that are famous for going bankrupt to do this commercial; it would’ve been a crazy hurting for money paradox.

Vizio – Fuck you for insulting me and my technology.  Not only was my equipment not ridiculously expensive it’s also better than whatever wares you’re peddling.  Ooh, a contest for a 55″, yeah lemme enter that so I can trade down.

Taco Bell – Speed Relationship – Wacky.  I might boycott them for this, if they weren’t already for health reasons

GE - Smart Grid – What does all of that have to do with the Wizard of Oz?

HULU – Aliens Run TV Programming – Explains a lot doesn’t it?  It was kinda funny though, and I do appreciate the fact that finally someone in media is starting to embrace the trends towards alternative media sources and non-traditional viewing methods.

GE – Capturing the wind – bah, just can’t get past the physics, plus it was wierd even aside from the bottle thing.

Pepsi - MacGruber – I was really hoping this was going to turn into an SNL skit, as that would’ve been the only way to salvage it, but alas it was not to be.  (Apparently this did actually stem from an SNL skit)  This one really had me teetering on the edge of a boycott; don’t think I’ll quite go there but the next few times I’m asked “is Pepsi ok instead” the answer will be ‘no’.  At least it had the real, original MacGyver in it.

Bud Light Lime – This was freaking loud, damn.  The surround sound surprisingly hadn’t freaked out (not even on the locals where the compression can be rediculous) until this one.  Although I did want to mention that perhaps this commercial provides a good way to illustrate what life is like for me, in a temperature sense.  You see, I am pretty much always hot, or at least I never get cold.  I suppose this is what it might look like visually to be the walking furnace that is me.

Go Daddy – Enhanced – In what might perhaps be a surprising move I’m going to give this one only a “meh”.  Partly because you could easily tell where this was going, and partly because if you’re going to go the gratuitous route you basically sign yourself up for double or nothing and this didn’t fully deliver.  At least the “unrated” (see first Go Daddy above) version online provided a bit more eye candy as opposed to the shower one which was just more story line really.

Wow, a 2-day streak… I wonder what tomorrow shall bring.  I saw a van for this company while driving around today, I found it quite humorous.

First there was AGAPE Pregnancy Resource Center, and today I saw:

Once Upon A Child

This would definitely not be my first choice for a business name, or really any choice for that matter.  My first two guesses as to the nature of this business: some kind of store catering to Priests and Bishops; or more straight to the point, a support group center for reformed sex offenders.

Believe it or not I’m really not trying to have a twisted mind on this one.  My point is that this is the name of a business; you’re trying to attract customers not scare them away.  Now that I’ve seen the site since I went searching for the link I see what they’re really about.  Perhaps they subscribe to the “any press is good press” theory, but go and tell that to the Toyota – Saved By Zero campaign.  I still to this day continue to boycott Old Navy due to the annoying as all hell commercials.

Ok so apparently I can’t directly embed this inline like I was hoping so you’re just gunna have to do a little bit of clicking, so check this out:

http://www.megavideo.com/?v=9RQA108C

Now I just have to figure out what a ‘tet’ is, or whatever it is that she’s saying.  I’ve listened to this multiple times as I was editing down the clip and still can’t decypher the word.  Somehow I doubt she’s referring to the Vietnamese New Year.

Here’s one my dad actually told me about:

And for your viewing pleasure here’s the “Site Of The Week”. Not that I’ve actually done that before or even really plan to continue it in the future, but it sounded good:
http://jalopnik.com/photogallery/InternetsVanityPlates/

Actually here’s a bonus link for you too; that way you’re covered for two weeks!
http://www.businesspundit.com/after-the-crisis-a-parody-of-15-corporate-logos/