Cha-Cha-Cha Charmin!

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I am willing to contend that making advertisements for toilet paper is a supremely challenging and often thankless job. Recently, there has a vast improvement in the quality of toilet paper commercial. I attribute this recent improvement to the fact that every possible mistake has already been made (mostly by Charmin).

The Tolerable:

Cottonelle: The major offense is that it doesn’t make any sense, but it is redeemed by the fact that there is a cute lab puppy.

Angel Soft: This is actually humorous, but has an absurdly long jingle at the end.

The Rest:

Quilted Northern: Let’s begin our tour of bad toilet paper commercials with Quilted Northern. I am sure you are familiar with the three women who sit around quilting and chatting about current toilet paper issues. Where did the creators go wrong? These women are quilting toilet paper! They are creating something that people are literally going smear with poo. This is not a quilting club; it is a toilet paper sweatshop.

Don't let the fact that it is a cartoon fool you, toilet paper sweatshops are no laughing matter

• Charmin: Business Section: I cannot speak for bears, but I have never had a problem with a bath tissue “that leaves lots pieces behind.” This seems to be a recurring theme in toilet paper ads (see Angel Soft and Quilted Northern above), but Charmin is the only one with the audacity to give the audience a close up of a bears butt. Also, why does a bear need glasses?

Yet another example of "lots of pieces"

• Charmin: Dinner Conversation: I am starting to think this bear family is far too open about what they do in the bathroom. You know how I know texting is not cool anymore? It is featured in a Charmin commercial.

• Charmin: Beach Trip: Nothing like good old fashioned bear segregation.

• Charmin: In the Mood for Love:
  Who is the target audience for this commercial? Men? Women? Bears? Is this some sort of strange bear mating ritual? Can the female bear (the one with the bow) see the male bear (the one on the toilet) or is she listening to him sing through the door? Is he singing to her or to the toilet paper? Why does he rub the toilet paper on his face? Since when does a bear use a toilet? Or a sofa? Or live in a house?

So there you have it, the worst toilet paper commercials of recent history. If you made it this far I am impressed.

God Bless Texas

A debate ensued about how to start this entry.  Sean, not being a true blooded Texan, suggested it start as follows:  There are so many great things about California, so instead of listing them all, we wrote what we miss about Texas. 


Now, I disagree.  As a native Texan, I feel like that would imply that California has more to offer than Texas, which is obviously incorrect.  Therefore, this list is things we miss about Texas but in no way implies that California is better than Texas.  (Although I do feel a little bit traitorous about how much I am loving San Diego) 

Things Sean and I Love About Texas

0) It's big!  Although California apparently is too.  Did you know that all the major cities in California are not close together and that San Diego is close to Mexico?  (Sean would like to note that he knew that already)


1) Wide open spaces (Isn't there a Dixie Chicks song about that?).  We love that in Texas it only takes twenty minutes (at most) to be in the country surrounded by nature.  While it is also possible to drive out to the country here in San Diego, it takes longer than that to leave civilization behind.


2) Texas BBQ...I refuse to try BBQ here because I already know it isn't going to be as good as Texas's.  I've seen signs for California BBQ, Hawaiian BBQ, etc.  I miss the sausage, potato salad, apple cobbler, brisket, baked beans...Now I'm making myself hungry!


3)  Cowboy hats and cowboy boots and the stores that sell cowboy hats and cowboy boots.  It's not like I need another hat nor boots at the moment, but it was nice that I knew where to go when I someday would.


4) Breakfast tacos.  No where else does breakfast tacos like Texas.  No one in Texas does breakfast tacos like Taco Taco in San Antonio.


5) Festivals, fairs, and rodeos.  Large plates of homemade potato chips, Frito pie, and margaritas.  Petting zoos, music acts, and lots of people watching (large people, small people, tall people, larger people, weird people...).


6) Dance halls, honky tonks, and saloons where people partner dance instead of doing lame line dances.  (Sean wanted it to read: "suck ass line dances").  We went to In Cahoots, the only honky tonk in San Diego, and while it was a nice reminder of home, we didn't get to dance very much because of the overwhelming line dancing.  When line dancing wasn't going on, rap music was played, and, on a couple occasions, there was line dancing to the rap music.  


7) The ocean...wait, that's actually better here in California!  It IS really nice that Texas has access to the ocean.


8) Texas twangs and idioms.  Example:  "You might better slow that train on down."


9) The full line of Shiner beers, not just Shiner Bock.  This is totally Sean's since I could care less about beer.  [We can get Shiner Bock and Shiner Blonde at Ralph's sometimes, but I want Shiner Hefeweizen--Sean]


10) Y'all.  I miss being surrounded by people using the word y'all instead of being the oddity who says it, drawing laughs from friends and students.  Y'all's is almost even better than y'all, although my iPhone doesn't recognize y'all's although it does y'all.  


11) The Czech Stop.  We tried not to mention another food since reading through our list a lot of entries are food-related, so we compromised by listing the Czech Stop which sells more than just food.  The reason it gets mentioned though is because it sells such amazing kolaches for a ridiculously cheap price.  It doesn't even matter than you have to sit outside on the cement to eat them.


12) Texas Country on the radio.  No Pat Green or "God Bless Texas".  Nothing!


13) H.E.B.  A grocery store named after someone with the last name of Butt!  Everything at one place for a cheap price including school supplies and reasonably priced medicines!  Every time we have to go to Trader Joe's, Ralphs, and Henry's to get all our groceries for the week, it makes us long for H.E.B.


14) Living in the largest state in continental United States.  Stupid Alaska.


15) And more.


"You may all go to Hell, and I will go to Texas."--Davy Crockett

Pitch-In!

Pitch-In!

 This image in stenciled on many, many trashcans across the United States (except in Texas) and is the second greatest anti-littering campaign of the modern era (the greatest anti-littering campaign of all time: “Don’t Mess With Texas!”). In case you are unfamiliar with the image above, I have labeled all the important parts below.

Pitch-In! Explained!

The unforeseen drawback of the Pitch-In campaign, is that wire-mesh trashcans only exist in two places: public parks in suburban Nebraska and on ABC’s family-friendly “TGIF” evening line up (and then only when the characters are in a public park in suburban Nebraska). Nowadays, when the average person sees the Pitch-In logo, they really have to rack their brain to figure out what that person might be doing. What follows are merely some suggestions.

Going Shopping

Dunking a Basketball

Feeding a Parrot

Playing Badminton with a ridiculously
over-sized shuttlecock 

Destroying a City

Punching a Clown

Getting a Major Ice Cream Headache

A Dime

I hate parallel parking.  I'm not good at it.  I dread doing it.  I have successfully parallel parked only a few times...generally when no one is watching, I'm alone in the car, and all I have to do is pull straight forward into the spot.  I think one of the reasons I'm so bad at parallel parking is that when I learned, my dad had me practice with imaginary cars.  I did really well then.  Unfortunately, it did not translate to real life.


Tonight I was driving to craft night with the girls, and to park in Hillcrest where my friend Juli lives, involves my archenemy, parallel parking.  On previous trips to her place, I have lucked out and found parallel parking spots that fit the description above (no one with me, no one watching, pulling straight forward).  This was not to be tonight.  After circling several times, hoping against hope every single time I circled that someone would pull out and leave their very large spot open for me.  No one did.  I finally found a spot on the street with metered parking.  I sighed and prepared myself to navigate into the spot.  Luckily I got into the spot with relative ease (all I had to do was back up into it).  So, that was good.  


Now, I very rarely have cash or change on my person.  I always put any spare change I have in my bear bank that I've had since I was very small.  My car does however accumulate forgotten change (generally in the form of pennies), so I hoped that I would have enough for the meter.  I pulled out all of my coins, put them into the meter, and it totaled to 27 minutes.  This was clearly not enough time for craft night.  It would barely get me through the first 30 minutes of Glee (which we watching during craft night, obviously).  I was wondering what to do and searching the bottom of my bag at the same time.


A homeless man came up and very politely asked me if I had any change or food.  I had to respond, "No, I'm sorry, I don't."  (And then for some reason I felt the need to add...), "If I did, I would be able to pay the meter for this spot!"  


The nice homeless man then said, "I have ten cents.  Would that help?"


That's right.  I got offered money by a homeless man.  

Gobstoppers

For two years following Sarah’s graduation from Trinity, she taught freshmen biology in Rio Grande City, TX, which is about 250 miles due south of San Antonio. Now, I know what you are thinking, “I thought driving 250 miles south of San Antonio would put you in Mexico” and you would be correct. Rio Grande City is pretty much in Mexico; it is as far south as you can be in the United States and not be in Mexico.

I am in Rio Grande City, Texas, USA... Sarah is not.

For two years Sarah and I made the trip. One weekend she would drive up to San Antonio after school on Friday, stay for the weekend, and then drive back down to Rio Grande City on Sunday afternoon. Two weeks later I would drive down to Rio Grande City on Friday afternoon and back to San Antonio on Sunday and so it went.

Four hours is a long time to drive alone in South Texas.

Between the two of us, we have many stories about The Road to Rio Grande City, but today I want to talk about passing the time. Sarah typically used this time to catch up on phone conversations or to memorize Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows on CD, while I on the other hand found these drives to be an excellent opportunity to eat as much candy and junk food as I could under the pretense that I was on a mini road-trip. Before the drive, I would stock up on candy and caffeine at the gas station and then make the trip in a sugar-fueled haze. My drug of choice was Mike and Ike, Hot Tamales, Sour Patch Kids and Gobstoppers.

One time, before my drive back to San Antonio, the gas station in Rio Grande City was out of Gobstoppers. For four hours straight I thought of nothing but the Gobstoppers I was denied, and by the time I reached San Antonio, there was nothing I wanted more in the world. Instead of returning to my apartment, I went directly to HEB (which is the grocery store in Texas) and purchased a box of Wonka’s finest.

When I got back in the car, my desire to be home and my desire for sugar were both reaching boiling-point. Instead of either, opening the candy before driving or driving home (a full five minute trip), I decided to attempt to open the candy while driving. Unfortunately, Willy Wonka is delightfully quirky in a decidedly evil way, and there is nothing more “quirky-evil” than packaging colorful candy in a box made steel. It was immediately clear that I was not going to be able to open the box with one hand while driving, so I pulled into another parking space (five spaces away from the space I had just vacated) and set to opening the box with both hands.

Before I could open the candy, there was a knock on the passenger’s window and I had to explain to the HEB parking lot security guard that I was “not having a medical emergency, I just wanted some candy.”

It was then that I realized I had a candy problem.

Why Husbands* Are Nifty! (More specifically, why MY husband is nifty!)

(*Maybe not all husbands, but all the ones I know are, especially my husband!)

The subject of this post.

1) One of my professors described marriage as having a warm blanket all around all of life.  I agree with the sentiment entirely, but I also think this statement can be applied more literally.  My husband is great at giving off heat, and this is especially nice on cold nights.  It's like having my own personal heated blanket.  On hot nights, not so nice; I prefer that he not get too close as it becomes overwhelmingly hot (especially as in California our apartment doesn't have AC).


2) He loves my cat (which is now our cat).  In fact, because our dog is staying in Colorado, Sean now spends his time trying to train Zorro.  Now, the cat sometimes knows to sit when getting fed; he also knows how to run around the apartment being crazy when he hears the jingling sound of his kitty toy.  The cat does NOT know how to balance on Sean's shoulders.  Zorro did not enjoy that training session (and consequently, Sean didn't either).  

Sean and Zorro: A classic example of mutualism.

3) He's willing to go grocery shopping by himself when I'm really busy studying.  Now, I had a co-worker who said you really know you are loved when a man is willing to buy you feminine produces.  Sean and I are not yet on that level, but grocery shopping alone seems like a good first step.


4)  He learned that when my attention is diverted elsewhere, I cannot hear him/ anyone talking (something my family well knows).  We now have a code where he says, "Are you hearing me?" three or four times, and then I do!


5) He supports my book addiction.  If you know me, that is very important.  He not only shares his Borders gift cards with me, but he also is willing to invest in more bookshelves when I fill up all the existing ones.


6) He gives the best hugs.  Need I say more?  No.


7) He knows that his violent and creepy video games (like Bioshock) will give me nightmares, so he plays them when I'm not around or in the room.  If I'm walking through the room when the video game is on, he'll pause it for me.  I think this is a result of 1) him being sweet, and 2) him having to deal with me when I have nightmares later.  


8) He pretends to notice the differences in my knitting/ crocheting every five minutes I show him my progress.  He even supports my yarn habit (he occasionally get hats out of the deal as well).

The aforementioned hats

9) He likes Harry Potter.  And Lord of the Rings.  And the Lightening Thief series.  And the Hunger Games.  And Twilight.  He'll even discuss them after we both have read them.  I guess this could probably be tied in with #4, but because books are really important to me they deserve two separate categories.  


10) He does not have stinky feet.  This is incredibly important because in 7th grade I made a list of traits my future husband had to have.  Number ONE on the list was "Must not have stinky feet".  He meets that criteria (and many more).

The Finer Points

It's been four years from our first date.  Not only have we accumulated a lot of memories, we also have accumulated a lot of pictures.  Here are some of the ones you might not have seen.

  

I think these photos speak for themselves.