The Greatest Marketing Ploys of my Lifetime (That I Can Think of Right Now)

The marketing wizards exploit our psychologies all the live long day, and our only power against them is to realize how ridukulus their diabolical schemes are.  So here are a few observations I've made in which I hope we can all enjoy a boisterous guffaw.

1.  Labeling food products as "Trans-fat free."  Trans-fat is an artificial laboratory product that our bodies aren't really able to break down, so they build up in our arteries.  Therefore, by being responsible and socially conscious food manufacturers, they certainly bring a new level of reassurance to my heart when they stamp their "Trans-Fat Free" seal o' approvals on their products.  In other words they are saying, "Congratulations, we spared you a heinous artificial poison that should have never been in food anyway."

2. Pepsi One.  They already had a diet option with no Calories, but they really stepped it up by adding a Calorie.  That's what I call progress.  I assume this is their attempt to one-up Coke Zero, and I guess they did, sort of.  That's like adding a single gram of trans-fat to your bag of chips just to prove you can do more than the other guys.

3. Eco-friendly water bottles.  Bottled water is already hyper-lame.  Some goof convinced our country that you have to drink 2 gallons of water a day, and then the bottling companies tricked us into forgetting that cold tap water costs like $5/month, so here we are buying pallets of bottled water from our local grocer.  But to top it off, they've convinced us that we're helping earth by buying their extra thin plastic bottles that they only started because it saves them a bunch of money.  And they're charging the same price.

4. Putting the word "Xtreme" in the name of anything.  Why buy just antiperspirant, when you could have XTREME deodorant.  Why spell it "extreme" when you can spell it "XTREME!"

5. Any James Bond movie.  For some reason, there's always this hope that the new one will be better.  This is especially true when they anoint a new James Bond who has even bluer eyes and an even more British accent.  But you know what...they all blow, like Kenny G on a bagpipe.

6. The Magic Bullet food processor (As Seen on TV!).  This is a fantastic product if you're looking to create a full 1 ounce of ground-up goodness.  I've seen these things in action, and they don't do anything more than what my cheap blender does, and they have the volume capacity of about 2 grapes.

7. The Power Glove.  I think we all remember the disappointment that shattered our young hearts when we saw what a bogus piece of crap this was.  I couldn't ever get Little Joe to deliver a left jab, and you had to use the built-on controller for most of your moves anyway.  Freakin' lame, Nintendo.  On the up side, the Wii is a fine redemption of this failed project.

Well, I'm sure you all can think of some more good ones.  I'm gonna go wash some whites.

Anti-Politic Politics

I've been making a strong effort to avoid blogging about politics because there are few things in life that destroy logical thinking, open-mindedness, and love like politics.  Also, I just don't keep up with the news like I should to be able to exercise my right to have an opinion about anything.  But I'm going to exercise that right anyway because that's the beauty of America--you don't gotta know nothin' about nothin' to say what you think about it. 

I've been very troubled over the past two elections by the fact that neither major candidate represents a large sector of our society.  I will label that sector the social conservative-fiscal liberal sector, which is those of us who believe strongly in the goodness of the principles of Christ yet don't like much of anything else about the Republican party.    And I think some people unite so strongly with the GOP around the social/moral issues that they sometimes unconsciously or passively take on the rest of the of party's platform as if the moral stances bought the Republican leaders some infallibility in all areas.  No abortion!  Protect the sanctity of marriage!  Allow prayer in public places!  Drill for oil in wildlife preserves!  Give tax breaks to the corporate tools so a couple pennies will trickle down my way!  Make the world speak English!

To quote black Michael Jackson, "If they ask, 'why, why?'  Just tell them that it's human nature."  (Thriller album, check it out).  People don't just sell themselves to one party at political rallies.  We do it in our churches, our schools, with our athletic teams.  It's human nature.  It's funny, because we are social beings, and we need each other so much, yet disunity is our natural tendency.  I guess that's what happens when you mix selfish desire with relational longing.  We unite in small groups and justify everything we do to the point of excluding others.  But if we could just build a big ol' wall along the border of Mexico all of our economic problems would be solved.

Human Trivia, part 2 (see previous post for part 1)

I don't want to let my reader down for the next installment of random goodness about the human organism and medical facts, so...

1. After years of research, scientists have finally confirmed that sex is the leading cause of pregnancy worldwide.

2. Pound for pound, human bone is stronger than steel.  That's true.  I'm not trying to make a joke.

3. The white, foamy bubbling action of hydrogen peroxide is caused by the breakdown of hydrogen peroxide into hydrogen and oxgen by an enzyme in your blood and tissue, called catalase.  It has nothing to do with its disinfecting properties.   

4. Generally speaking, women have a stronger sense of smell and of touch than men.  But men can describe their poo with greater fortitude than women.

5. Stretching prior to exercise has pretty well been shown to be useless and may even be harmful.  It doesn't prevent injury, and in some studies it increased the risk of injury to joints and muscles.  A condition called stretch-induced weakness is a common phenomenon in which the muscle fibers are stretched to the point of being less effective due to stretching.  It leaves your muscles feeling like Jell-O if you've ever experienced it.  The most important thing is to warm up muscles before engaging in strenuous exercise.  Also, it's still good to stretch after exercise or when feeling stiff, because it can help keep up your flexibility.  If it's good enough for Jean-Claude Van Damme it's good enough for me.

6. The original Hippocratic Oath, a statement of ethical purpose said by graduating med students, had a statement about not performing abortions.  It stated in Greek, "Nor will I give a woman a pessary to procure abortion."

7. Getting punched in the face smarts.

8. I had a less-than-psychologically-healthy patient call my home phone at 6:20AM the other day.  That's what I get for having an unusual last name and being listed in the phonebook.

8. You are really disturbed by the fact that I listed number 8 twice.  It just goes to prove that humans like rules.

10. The stimulants used to treat ADHD will help most people have a greater ability to focus, whether or not they have ADHD.  But caffeine is easier to obtain.