h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Insightfully Meaningless Writings of Random Specificity #14


Here again I find myself sitting here watching my cursors insolence. The torment. You know I have tried to be polite. I have tried to be nice. I have even tried tying the laptop to the back of a ford f-150 going down the interstate at 85 miles an hour while leaking gasoline and oil and a muffler hanging just far enough to let sparks fly through the flammable material. Has any of this worked? NO. The insolence continues. Not even the 44-caliber bullet hole through the monitor has swayed its disobedience. What to do, what to do?

I am struck today by advertising. I don't really know why, because more often than not I find advertising an irritating part of my television experience. It is amazing the ideas that people come up with to advertise their particular product. Animals, children, and things totally unrelated strung together to create a message to the viewer/listener that must have this all in one soda/car/diaper/insurance policy/hair removal system. But what would happen if people were totally honest about their product. Here area couple of advertising ideas I thought wouldn't quite make the cut.

· North South Airlines. Sure those other Airline Companies have licensed pilots, but we're cheap. We guarantee slow rocky ascents and dangerously fast descents, three free barf bags and smelly unkempt pilots who don't speak English. North South Airlines, the choice of people who have no will to live.

· Kevorkian Hospice Care. You tell us when.

· Prometheancide potency aid for men. Viagra don't work, Herbal treatments don't work, well then try Prometheancide. We guarantee results in the first hour of use or we'll send you a free gift certificate to the post office. Prometheancide the choice for the excessively old. Side effects include leprosy, blindness, halitosis, explosive diarrhea and a generally bad temper. In studies, death only occurred more often with Prometheancide than with placebo.

· Weripyouoff Car service depot. We can guarantee slow service with minimal amounts of competence. You want an oil change. . we will change you oil in ten minutes or less. Of course all of the other problems that we "find" will be brought to you attention only after we have vainly tried to fix them and then realizing that we have to order the part which only costs 3 dollars, but we will give you a bill for 178 because of time and labor needed to put the plastic snap knob on the gasket. Sure you could have done this for cheaper yourself, but you won't realize this until we audit your credit report due to insufficient funds in your bank account necessary to cover our costs. And should you vehicle still be unserviceable . . .hey, it's still under warranty isn't it?

· Today's weather is brought to you by We don't Know Jack. We watch other news networks to get their reports and give information contrary to them. This is in the hopes that should we be right you might watch us more often.

· Apply now for the new Pluto Checking account. When using our service you don't need to go through the whole mess that other bank checks have to. On every preprinted check is a blood sample, social security number, a copy of last years tax return, name and address of your first born, the ransom note for your mother should we have to take her hostage do to an overdrawn account, four copies of your past three drivers licenses, your favorite color, the airspeed velocity of an unladen swallow, a copy of your voter registration, a credit card back up, and the title to your house. Apply for the Pluto account, more information than needed.

· Oldandbusted computers. Call this number and get the first three months of this 1989 apple computer free. It comes equipped with the latest in brother word processing technology and don't worry about your kids surfing the Internet with this great piece of hardware, it is too old. Call now and we also through in a padded glove to hit the computer when it freezes up for the 56th time in an hour. Oldandbusted Computers . . .120 payments of 78 dollars plus the first three months free. Call now.

So, in essence if a company were to tell you haw things really are, would you still buy from them? I think not. IT'S ALL LIES, LIES I TELL YOU!!! But seriously, I thought this would be a good explanation as to why I am not in advertising.

So to all you researchers I say Godspeed . . .and I look forward to hearing about all of your adventures.