Wednesday, September 17, 2003

Ch-Ch-Chilis Babyback Ribs

I don't actually have anything to say about Chili's babyback ribs, or anyone else's babyback ribs for that matter. I am just really searching for repetitive "ch" sounds to keep it going and I remember one Chili's commercial where they stuttered the Chilis. Its not even one of the uber-famous commercials but it still fucking counts. The only other thing I could really think of might not even count and I have no idea how to spell it. We shall just see then, shant we.

I guess if I needed to tie things into babyback ribs I would do so by mentioning that some guy outside of my apartment building was barbe-ma-quing today. It smelled really fucking good. I don't have a grilll primarily because I don't really have any place that I would like to use to barbecue. I mean, there are people who just leave their grills outside, but I am not so comfortable with that. I would totally have one if I had a patio or whatev, but until then I will survive with just my George Foreman model. It is all pretty and blue, even if it can't smoke a rack o' ribs.

Anyway, school has been going full nut for several weeks now. I am reading some Heidegger and some Kant as well as re-reading some Lacan and some Badiou at the moment. Hopefully Heidegger and Kant will be finished soon, enabling me to move on to Joan's new book and then maybe read Zizek's On Belief, which I picked up a while ago and haven't even opened yet.

On Monday we decided to order pizza, which was totally sweet as always, since I really like pizza, and it doesn't require us to cook. We even made the decision to add on the Pizza Hut Cinnamon Sticks, which are shockingly good. It really sucks that the Western New York area, Lockport specifically, is so lacking in national pizza chains and hence makes it very difficult for me to actually perform the experiment I had planned on to determine the world's best cinnamon pizza-dough dessert product. I have not had Papa John's and I haven't tried the newest version from Godfather's. I do love the Cinnamon Streusel dessert pizza and if I decided that it would be included in this category I think it would win by a landslide. Having only really compared the Pizza Hut Cinnamon Sticks and the Dominos Cinna-Stix and Cinna-Dots I vote overwhelmingly for Cinna-Stix style. They are buttery and delicious without lacking cinammon, dripping, or being obviously pizza dough.

Anyway, we ordered our pizza and sat around watching some random shit while we waited for it to show up. It was Monday Night Football time so I wouldnt have been surprised if it were a little late. Nonetheless, our doorbell rings and I bring the dude a check and he hands me the pizza. I say, the rest is for you, and right as I am about to close the door, he is like "Shit, we don't take personal checks."

Katie and I are like, "Um, you used to take personal checks. Like, a week and a half ago when we ordered a pizza from you, you took our personal check. Your website didn't say anything about taking a check, nor did they tell me on the phone." Regardless, he said they didnt take personal checks. I searched my wallet, Katie checked her purse, we looked in the bill area and on the desk and shit, but we both knew we had no cash. I never have cash and Katie wouldn't have written a check if she did. I told the dude, look I can give you a credit card number or call your place and give it to them or whatever, but he wasn't interested. He told me just to keep the za. I tried to talk him out of it but he was insistent. Eventually I gave in. We fished up a couple silver dollars to give the guy as a tip and he gave us our check back. Dude didn't even want to take it back and try. He wanted us to keep the pizza and the sticks, so we did. Overall it rocked. I would like to say that I would order from Pizza Hut all the time now, but I never have cash on me, so the chance is very low that this will be the case. Katie really digs the stuffed crust pizza but I am a big fan of Papa Leo's up the street.

Now that you are aware of my pizza preferences let me tell you a little something about the Zelnorm commercials that are all the rage these days. Okay, so the commercial shows all these women lifting up their shirts and it turns out that they have statsitics about Zelnorm written on their stomachs. It is clear, at the end of the add at least, that all these women are not especially attractive. I mean, some of them are damn hot and shit, but some are like really old. I should also note that Zelnorm has something to do with irregularities in the digestive track, not exactly the world's hottest illness. I am not sure what the world's hottest illness is but I am sure it doesn't involve the butt in any way. I mean, the butt is often very hot, but not when it is working irregularly. The irregular functions of the butt are never good. The regular functions of the butt aren't especially great either. Look, I know this isn't so clear but even if you are an ass-person you must understand what I mean here. Fuck you.

The point is that despite these facts which should make the commercial very unfun, I think its kinda hot. I don't know if it is that the women have something written on their stomachs or what. I mean, I am certainly not alone in the argument that the stomach is a very sexy area of a woman's body, but usually I would say that it is beaten by, I don't know, the legs, ass, breasts, and face. Since there are all sorts of commercials which feature these body parts that aren't as cool as the Zelnorm ad it must be something else. I mean, its not out of control or anything, but when I see it I think "that is pretty cute." Good job Zelnorm, you have successfully reached the exact opposite of your target audience.

Peace,

MB-K

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Zelnorm

You're right, a lot of these women are old (wild guess: average age of each woman in at least the latter half of the spot is 35). But most of these women in the 60-second spot are in great shape.

In the early half of the spot (the one where you just see women's stomachs), a few of these ladies are a little pudgy. For example, take the second stomach's message "The bloating is so uncomfortable" -- on a stomach that looks...well...bloated. I'm guessing it's the director's way of emphasing the bloating associated with IBS.

Overall, I think they wanted to make this commercial as zap-proof as possible. In other words, if you taped a show, wanted to speed through the commercials and found this Zelnorm spot was included therein, you couldn't help but back the tape up, play the spot and see what it's all about.

Yeah, the more I think about it, you're right. Zelnorm did reach the polar opposite of their intended audience.

Nelson