No potshots at television commercials here. Sure, there are plenty of really, really, bad ads on TV. For those came the invention of the remote control Mute Button.
I'll admit it here. I shun the mute.
Commercials are as much a part of the popular culture as the programming. (Some shows are only filler material between commercials...)
Some spots (that's what we call them in the business) are a cut-above because of the writing skills, and some are addictive because of their use of graphics or technology. (Think about those truck commercials where only the outstanding brakes keep the thing from driving off the cliff into the Grand Canyon.)
Some are great just because of the fantastic casting of the actors.
The guy on the Verizon ad, the older gent behind the motel check-in desk is an example. When he can't scare off the guest with the cell-phone 'dead zone,' he pointedly admits that the "Towels are kinda scratchy!" He has that Stephen King, man from Maine, New-England-crotchety-thing working perfectly.
Expressions can do it. Another cell-phone ad. The executive is checking with his secretary about the day's agenda, which involves texting his wife, his kids, and just about everybody - until late afternoon, when, she explains, there is a budget meeting. The executive purses his mouth in a Steve Martin sort of way (in fact, I think it is Steve Martin's mouth, superimposed...), and she immediately replies that she can reschedule it. "Let's go with that," he says. There is really nothing special about the spot - but the guy is perfect. I can imagine the casting director. "Let's go with him," she says. "Let's go with that," he replies.
I actually turn around to watch the Sonic commercials (the TV is at my back when I am at the computer), the ads that feature the wimpy guy and his friend/wife. The friend is goofy, the wife is condescending. The car-driver-guy is just wimpy - in a good way. Good wimpy. The spots are inoffensive and sometimes idiotic. Just my type. I loved the one where the goofy friend is eating tator-tots and talking basketball, when suddenly Mr. Wimpy darts out a hand to his buddy's mouth to block the tot. "Rejected," he shouts, in his wimpish way.
Then, there are the esoteric Target ads set to the Beatles song "Hello Goodbye." Maybe its the song. Maybe it's all the red targets that pop up. Maybe it is the manner of the horrid Walmart ads, by comparison. I don't know why you say good buy.
I say Hello.
McHuston Booksellers
http://mchustonbooks.com/
Inlandia Press
http://inlandiapress.com/
Thursday, November 20, 2008
Big Stage, Small Town
First of all, there is nothing wrong with small-town living. Nothing at all. Well. . . admittedly, there are a few drawbacks. Restaurants are limited and recreational activities after dark are largely self-prescribed.
The cars on the lot at the true-small-town dealerships look just the same, and the Walmart aisles carry the same products. Music, though? Outside of CD sales, there is only the occasional concert at the high school auditorium. (Rock concert? Heaven forbid! We're talking piano here.)
Tulsa has turned the small town corner. We now have a venue large enough to draw top flight entertainers, and we just can't get over it. We love it. It's our new sandbox. We can't look at it often enough. It gotta be shown off to all our friends. Come touch it!
We're still small-town enough in Tulsa that the TV news crews trot out to the BOK center when a Metallica fan has to wait in line longer than she thinks is reasonable. Cell-phone call to the news hotline.
Fan: Hello? TV News? I just wanted to let you know that we're in line at the new BOK center and we're having to wait!
Reporter: What? You're having to wait?
Fan: That's right! There's a whole group of people here. We've formed a - I don't know. . .I can only describe it as a crude sort of - line. I think that best describes it. A line.
Reporter: You're talking about a line of - people?
Fan: Exactly. A line.
Reporter: Hang on. I'm getting my camera. I'll be right there.
In the end, the reporter is seen, standing in front of the BOK center (it makes a great visual at night, all the glass and back-lighting), where he explains that - should you find yourself with tickets to a show by a popular entertainer, you might need to arrive EARLY to avoid delays.
Now, that's news. Arrive early. Why didn't we think of it? Oh, yeah. We're a little big city and we're just figuring out the new toy. This just in: There are lots of kids. Arrive Early.
Then - the reporter closes the story by mentioning the name of the next artist due to arrive to play in the sandbox. Can you believe it? Coming to our town? Wow.
It is a good thing. Great, even. Just a little embarrassing how we have to keep drawing the shiny coin out of our pocket to look at it.
It's still there. Still shiny.
Check out the bookstore!
http://mchustonbooks.com/
Authors - visit a publisher!
http://inlandiapress.com/
The cars on the lot at the true-small-town dealerships look just the same, and the Walmart aisles carry the same products. Music, though? Outside of CD sales, there is only the occasional concert at the high school auditorium. (Rock concert? Heaven forbid! We're talking piano here.)
Tulsa has turned the small town corner. We now have a venue large enough to draw top flight entertainers, and we just can't get over it. We love it. It's our new sandbox. We can't look at it often enough. It gotta be shown off to all our friends. Come touch it!
We're still small-town enough in Tulsa that the TV news crews trot out to the BOK center when a Metallica fan has to wait in line longer than she thinks is reasonable. Cell-phone call to the news hotline.
Fan: Hello? TV News? I just wanted to let you know that we're in line at the new BOK center and we're having to wait!
Reporter: What? You're having to wait?
Fan: That's right! There's a whole group of people here. We've formed a - I don't know. . .I can only describe it as a crude sort of - line. I think that best describes it. A line.
Reporter: You're talking about a line of - people?
Fan: Exactly. A line.
Reporter: Hang on. I'm getting my camera. I'll be right there.
In the end, the reporter is seen, standing in front of the BOK center (it makes a great visual at night, all the glass and back-lighting), where he explains that - should you find yourself with tickets to a show by a popular entertainer, you might need to arrive EARLY to avoid delays.
Now, that's news. Arrive early. Why didn't we think of it? Oh, yeah. We're a little big city and we're just figuring out the new toy. This just in: There are lots of kids. Arrive Early.
Then - the reporter closes the story by mentioning the name of the next artist due to arrive to play in the sandbox. Can you believe it? Coming to our town? Wow.
It is a good thing. Great, even. Just a little embarrassing how we have to keep drawing the shiny coin out of our pocket to look at it.
It's still there. Still shiny.
Check out the bookstore!
http://mchustonbooks.com/
Authors - visit a publisher!
http://inlandiapress.com/
Saturday, November 15, 2008
Technology for the Young
He is seven years old. He can manipulate the internet like a seasoned computer pro. Although he can read only the simplest words, he maneuvers through the layers of word-oriented menu screens with a rapidity that borders on astounding.
It makes it all the more difficult to realize that there are so many things in the world that remain as a total surprise to him.
Like car windows.
Having personally experienced the drawbacks of electronics in automobiles, I swore that I would never again own a car with electric windows. He saw me manually cranking the glass one evening and asked what I was doing.
Rolling up the window, I replied, not giving a thought to my answer.
Rolling a window? he asked.
I looked over and realized that he had never seen a hand-cranked window.
Yeah, I explained. I turn this handle around and around, and the window goes up.
He grinned broadly, and I could tell he wanted to try it for himself.
Cool, he said.
Friday morning, I was to drive him to school for his day in first grade. Normally, I wake up without an alarm, not having to be at the store until 9:30 or so, to make the ten o'clock opening time. Not wanting to take a chance, I set the alarm for eight o'clock. As it turned out, I awoke ahead of the alarm and it went off just as I emerged from my shower. Never did like the buzz of an alarm. It was on the wake-to-the-radio setting.
He popped in seconds after I shut it off.
Who was that? he wanted to know.
My alarm, I said.
It can talk? Make it talk again.
It's a radio.
I didn't know alarms had a radio in them.
It's a clock radio, I explained. (A real eye-opening bit of philosophy, huh? Remember - it was early in the morning...)
In our video-oriented household, radio is non-existent. Akin to magic, to the uninitiated seven year old.
Then I recall the look on his face when we toured the zoo one Sunday, and he saw for the first time those strange and powerful things that are giraffes, elephants, and crocodiles.
What would the world be like if we could look at things every day of our lives with that same sense of wonder and amazement?
Visit the bookstore: http://mchustonbooks.com/
Authors - Visit Inlandia Press: http://inlandiapress.com/
It makes it all the more difficult to realize that there are so many things in the world that remain as a total surprise to him.
Like car windows.
Having personally experienced the drawbacks of electronics in automobiles, I swore that I would never again own a car with electric windows. He saw me manually cranking the glass one evening and asked what I was doing.
Rolling up the window, I replied, not giving a thought to my answer.
Rolling a window? he asked.
I looked over and realized that he had never seen a hand-cranked window.
Yeah, I explained. I turn this handle around and around, and the window goes up.
He grinned broadly, and I could tell he wanted to try it for himself.
Cool, he said.
Friday morning, I was to drive him to school for his day in first grade. Normally, I wake up without an alarm, not having to be at the store until 9:30 or so, to make the ten o'clock opening time. Not wanting to take a chance, I set the alarm for eight o'clock. As it turned out, I awoke ahead of the alarm and it went off just as I emerged from my shower. Never did like the buzz of an alarm. It was on the wake-to-the-radio setting.
He popped in seconds after I shut it off.
Who was that? he wanted to know.
My alarm, I said.
It can talk? Make it talk again.
It's a radio.
I didn't know alarms had a radio in them.
It's a clock radio, I explained. (A real eye-opening bit of philosophy, huh? Remember - it was early in the morning...)
In our video-oriented household, radio is non-existent. Akin to magic, to the uninitiated seven year old.
Then I recall the look on his face when we toured the zoo one Sunday, and he saw for the first time those strange and powerful things that are giraffes, elephants, and crocodiles.
What would the world be like if we could look at things every day of our lives with that same sense of wonder and amazement?
Visit the bookstore: http://mchustonbooks.com/
Authors - Visit Inlandia Press: http://inlandiapress.com/
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)