Buy It By the Gross

I received an email this morning from one of my readers. Wow! I’ve never used that term before. I have a reader, a real honest to goodness reader. You tolerate me. You really tolerate me.
Anywho, she (the reader) makes some interesting points about a new era of grossness in advertising. First, let me share her thoughts:

"Hey, Steve, I've been reading your blog as often as I can (one of your "handful" of friends who is addicted to it), and I thought maybe if you wanted to do a column with a gross subject, I had an idea. I was walking around in Wal-Mart the other night and was struck by how some new cold remedies had the word "mucus" in their names. The commercials are gross, too. They have blubbery little green men (and little mucus kids, too) waddling around and setting up housekeeping in your lungs, until someone takes their mucus remedy and the little mucus people are forcefully ejected. Euuuw, thank heavens they never show you on the commercials where the little mucus people end up after the cough.
Another gross commercial is the one where the little fungus people lift some poor guy's toenail up as if it were a lid and then starts digging away in the skin under the toenail along with hundreds, maybe thousands of his buddies. Then the fungus remedy comes by and saves the day and scares the little buggers off. The first commercial had the remedy actually run over and squish the little fungus guy, but I guess they thought it was too violent and gruesome, what with the cute little fungus laying there dead with his tongue hanging out. In the newer commercials, the fungus remedy just looks threateningly at the fungus person who then runs away."

I agree with the reader. I prefer not to think about the word “mucus.” “Snot” is a much more dainty term, don’t you think?
The thing that really bothers me about those commercials, though is that it humanizes fungi and mucus and the like. When the little fellow under the toenail goes to his reward, so to speak, I’m devastated. Fungy, we hardly knew ye.
It’s the same way with the Raid commercials. I hate cockroaches in the flesh, but the cartoon roaches are just so darn cute that I’m sad to see them get it. I find myself sometimes rooting for the roach. That sounds like a lyric from a 60s rock song, doesn’t it?
Speaking of gross, I had a great idea for a toilet paper commercial a few years back, but everyone I pitched it to thought it was too gross. The commercial showed two people sitting on toilets (nothing revealing, just from the waist up). Anyway, one of the guys is looking disgusted and you see his finger has ripped through the toilet tissue.
The other guy is holding his wad of toilet tissue in the air proudly. His finger has not ripped his paper. The announcer says, “BRAND NAME is proud to announce no new breakthroughs.
Pretty clever, eh? Would you believe no one wanted to use my idea? Me either.
One more commercial that disgusts me is the toilet paper spot showing bears in the woods, with their roll of toilet paper attached to a tree. It creates a visual image that I’d rather not have.
Speaking of bears, today’s the day Governor Mayor Wilder announces the name of the second Maymont bear. I’m so excited I can hardly think straight. I had been thinking that the name Bobby the Baby Biting Bear would be good, but after rereading my column today, I’m going to make a last minute suggestion…Grunty.