What a tangled web we Wove

 

I'm trying to grasp the mentality of being dropped into a war zone and having anywhere near your top 100 concerns getting a $10,000 engagement ring shipped to your girlfriend back in the states.  Like, how is this a priority?

It almost sounds like an SNL skit; if I found out that a fellow soldier deployed to Iraq was researching how to get a $10,000 engagement ring to his girlfriend, I wouldn't assume that he is looking to buy from some website.  I'd assume that some looting had gone on and he was trying to figure out how to get a valuable piece of contraband out of the country.

In any case, what the hell is wrong with just waiting till you get back to the States?  That ring isn't a contract, after all.  She can still dump your deployed ass while you are fighting for, um, your country.  She can turn that ring into a down payment for an Audi.  She can use it to pay for her boyfriend's bail bond.  All kinds of possibilities.

One more thing- I hear a lot of stuff about a woman's "dream ring."  If your dreams involve a piece of pretty rock that costs more than a year of my rent, well, I guess everyone has the right to dream.  But I have the right to call your dreams damn shallow.  And I will.

Lexus' gross "Through the Years" commercial*

 

I guess it's supposed to be "heartwarming" that "through the years," Lexus has never forgotten what's "important:"  Providing overpriced look-at-me mobiles for spoiled rotten rich suburbanites to make their perfect lives even more perfect at the very end of what was for many millions of people another rough year economically.

There are no recessions in December, or any other time, for customers of Christmas Lexuses (Lexi?)  There are no layoffs, no stock market crashes, no downsizing, and certainly no inflation stress.  The coming of cold weather and colored lights brings nothing less than the promise of another brand new Lexus to drive to the Million-dollar Old Family Homestead/Estate with your beautiful wife and beautiful children while dressed in your thousand-dollar winter outfits.  After parking the Lexus ostentatiously in front of the house, it's inside for an evening of congratulating each other being thankful for not being part of the 99 percent who has to worry about grubby things like keeping the lights on and if the SNAP benefits are going to be held up (again) in January.   And for being in a country with some of the lowest income tax rates in the civilized world, allowing the Very Best of Us to not only buy new cars but also stack piles of cash in hedge funds and trips to Disneyworld and brand-NEW outfits to wear to Grandpa's house because he and the siblings might recognize the cashmere coat from last year and that would be a real scandal. 

*equally gross is the comment section, which has to be bots or paid spokeswhores of Lexus.  I mean, come on.  These people can't be real. 

Macy's: Another Company that really, really needs to read the room this December

 

So this woman walked into Macy's with a list of all the people she "has" to buy presents for, including her college roommate and her dog walker.  

I'd like to know who is getting that ridiculous coffeemaker (those Breville Espresso machines run anywhere from $699 to over $2000.)   Or one of those cashmere sweaters, which Macy's claims usually run at $150 and up but are currently on sale for about $75.  (I'd really like the person who gets the coffeemaker and the person who gets the sweater to receive them at the same holiday party.)   I couldn't see what brand those watches are but a quick trip to the Macy's website informs me that their watches run anywhere from $150 to over $1000.  

Bottom Line:  This woman is apparently willing to drop what to real people living in Current Timeline is a ridiculous amount of money on gifts for three people.  I think it's safe to assume that she also has family, and maybe a husband and kids, who will also be looking for stuff under the tree from her.  Making this Macy's ad as tone-deaf and unrelatable as any Lexus December to Remember ad.   I mean, come on.  This is ridiculous. 

Two Questions concerning this iPhone Christmas Commercial

 

1.  How tone-deaf does Apple have to be to be pimping thousand-dollar iPhones as perfectly reasonable Christmas gifts "for the whole family?"  I don't give a damn if it's got "excellent cameras" whatever the hell that means.  For the vast majority of Americans, the only way to get one of these things is to strain their credit limits (again) or sign up for a ruinous-in-slow-motion "monthly plan" that will have them deciding between Medication and Food before the tree gets dragged out to the curb.

2.  I know who Jeff Bridges is.  But am I really supposed to know this Zoe person?  May I ask why?  And may I ask how she's connected to Mr. Bridges to the point where they appear to be living in a group home in some of these ads?  Am I just too old for this, or what?

Noise Pollution, brought to you by NFL Pass and a guy who forgot how much things cost years ago

 

Jason Kelce is currently working under a 3-year contract to bloviate on ESPN.  That contract pays him an estimated $8 million per year to do not much of anything at all while sitting in a studio wearing a suit (sometimes.)  His total career earnings in the NFL is estimated at between $81 million and $88 million. 

Oh, and his brother is engaged to a woman with an estimated net worth of $1.6 billion.  

Don't try to convince me that he gives a flying damn how much he's saving on NFL Pass, please.  Let alone that he's so excited about the savings that he can't stop screaming about it.   This is right up there with watching David Ortiz and Kevin Hart flip out about getting free "parlays" through their "favorite" online gambling apps.  Just stop this.  Read the room, and STOP THIS.

For this weird Grammarly AI Commercial, the Jokes Write Themselves....

 

It's like a buffet of punchlines that leaves you standing there paralyzed with indecision, with no idea how to start.  

"I'm a Art History Major, and this essay is due on Friday...."

Girl, your "professor" doesn't care about the essay.  She knows you're just going to punt it over to ChatGBT.  After all, if you were serious about creating something of value- or even surviving financially in the America of the 21st century- you wouldn't be the Very Last Person on the Planet on an academic path to earn a degree in Art History.  Seriously, I didn't even know that was a thing anymore.  IS it still a thing?  Or is it just the most face-palm subject the writers of this commercial could think of to assign this doofus stereotype of a college student.

So anyway, the Ridiculously Out of Touch Star of our Commercial can't string three coherent sentences together and punts the job over to Grammarly AI, figuring that its a new system and maybe if her teacher is over thirty she probably doesn't know about it yet but is regrettably aware of ChatGBT.  Maybe she figures that for at least a semester or so said teacher will remain unaware of the program that will allow her to run this plagiarized essay that no one wants to write or read and will never provide any actual value to anyone pass muster with the school and she'll get that passing grade that will allow her to continue her pointless path to a worthless degree.

(Yes, I'm aware that was a run-on sentence.  I'm not running it through an AI filter to "clean it up" though because I'm not a base, lazy hypocrite.)

I'll wrap this up by shaking my head at our "student" here, going tens of thousands of dollars into debt to take classes that will lead her nowhere and using AI to do her homework in the process.  Maybe she's got the money to waste, but what about the time?  She's never getting that back.  Maybe she's a trust fund baby who likes Art History and will be driving back home for the holidays in the Lexus Mommy and Daddy got her to make Christmas 2023 a December to Remember?  There's got to be a good back story like that here, or the epilogue is going to be really, really sad.  

"Art History Major." SMH, as the cool kids text.

The Weird Message of Every Febreze Commercial

 

"Your home is your happy place.  You'd think that would mean that you'd like to keep it clean-- I mean, keeping it clean also keeps it free of vermin and germs and all that nasty stuff.

But if, as it turns out, all you are really concerned with is the surface appearance of your house and how it smells, you can use this thing which believe it or not has a microchip to dispense chemical scents into the air and mask the filthy squalor that secretly defines your, um, 'happy place.'"

I agree with several YouTube commentators:  Poor Dog.  Poor kid, too.  Keep your damn house clean, you lazy jagoffs.