The Next Snuggie
Posted: April 6th, 2009 | Filed under: Pop Culture | 66 Comments »
So, of course, I have spent the last couple of months trying to find the next Snuggie … this is just another service I hope to provide to all our brilliant readers because I know all of you will buy several dozen copies of this.
But, see, it’s not to so easy to find the next Snuggie. That’s because the Snuggie is genius. And genius is hard to replicate. I mean, yeah, Jonas Salk did that whole polio vaccine thing, but what else?*
*According to Wikipedia — which, as we all know, is the only place to look for such facts — Jonas Salk later married Francoise Gilot, who was Pablo Picasso’s lover.
The genius of the Snuggie is that it is an entirely useless product that solves a problem that did not exist. There is a lot more in that single sentence than meets the eye. Lots of infoco products are useless. In fact, I’ll just break away from generalities and tell you that they’re all useless on some level. Some are entirely useless. Some are mostly useless the way that Westley was mostly dead. But they’re all useless.
*Infoco, as I’m sure you already know, would be all the “As Seen On TV” products that combine infomercial and commercial. They give you the inanity of an infomercial in the quick 60-second commercial burst.
But that next step is a tough one. The Ginzu Knife may have been useless … but the problem it hopes to solve — “Oh, I wish I had a really, really sharp knife that could cut through a Coke can,” — may exist in some households, especially if those households happen to be on the new CBS murder mystery series “Harper’s Island.” The Sham Wow may not really be absorbent enough to soak up Coca Cola through a rug, but you might see the appeal. The Slap Chop really might make it easier to cut up onions without crying. The Riddex Plus really might rid your house of bugs and rats using digital pulses. The Fasta Pasta really might allow you to make Pasta Fasta. The Infinity Razor might really last forever and save me a fortune!
The fact that these products don’t work as well as you might hope certainly could make them a ripoff, but it doesn’t make them genius. What separates the Snuggie is that it is NOT a ripoff, not exactly, because the Snuggie never promises to be anything BUT a ripoff. It’s like a Decartes Ripoff … “I think I will get ripped off, therefore I am getting ripped off.”
Look: The Snuggie people say to America: Aren’t you sick of being wrapped up in a blanket, and then the phone rings, and then you can’t get your hands out to answer the phone?
And even though no resident of Planet Earth has ever had this problem, even though no one in the history of the world has ever said (or thought), “Gee, blankets are all right but they can be so confining,” even though it’s clear that they make you look like cult members, even though farm animals are smart enough to realize that the Snuggie is just a robe you wear backward, even though, even though, even though … people still buy Snuggies by the millions.
I do realize that newspapers have made many mistakes as an industry and new times bring new challenges and I wish we were adjusting better.
However, I do think I need to type out a six-word thought that probably should be the new name of this blog:
Newspapers are dying. Snuggies are thriving.
The point is, anyone can give you a crappy, product that doesn’t actually solve a problem. Here’s the Guzzlenot, the device you attach to your car engine to give you an additional 20 miles to the gallon! Here’s the Garage Hand that sounds off a horrifying alarm whenever you are close to nicking the side of the garage while backing out! Here’s the ShoppoFinder, this little device that, using the same technology as GPS systems, helps you find that one grocery store item that you cannot find ANYWHERE! I have a million ripoff possibilities.
But finding that one product that doesn’t solve a non-existent problem, yes, that’s much trickier.
At first, I thought the Flowbee had an excellent chance to be the next Snuggie. The Flowbee, in case you are wondering, is the home haircutting system that allows you to give a professional hairstyle every time … even with your eyes closed! The reason I love the Flowbee so much is that it has an absolutely horrendous name that has nothing at all to do with the product. And also it’s stupid looking.
Yeah, that’s the Flowbee. It seemed a promising future Snuggie. Trouble is, there is a market for such a thing. There are people who DO wish they could give professional haircuts in the comfort of their own homes … and I say this as someone who, yes, had his mother cut his hair on numerous occasions. It’s really tragic. I started balding at 20, so I already had a limited time frame with a full head of hair. And I would say I spent roughly half that limited time frame with the mother-endorsed “Bowl on the head” haircut. If only she had a Flowbee I might have gotten a date before I was 17.
The BodySnake seemed like an excellent future Snuggie candidate. To explain the BodySnake, I can only refer you to the brilliant opening of the infoco:
“Has taking a shower become a pain? Are you bending and twisting yourself just to get clean? Are you tired of scrubbers and brushers that just don’t work?”
Let’s see here. Yes! Yes! Yes! It’s amazing how they were able to nail all of my biggest complaints in just one lead-in. I mean, they had me at showering being a pain, but then, for someone to finally come forward and speak out against the alarming number of malfunctioning shower scrubbers and brushers … well, the only thing that comes to mind is: Win, win.
What’s the solution to these two big problems (getting injured while trying to clean yourself in the shower AND defective bathing devices)? You got it: The BodySnake, which is a long mesh brush that you can bend into all sorts of fun Gumby shapes. You may wonder what possible use this could be … the infoco helpfully lists off the various body parts you can “safely” wash with the BodySnake. As it says on the screen:
Safely reach your …
1. Neck
2. Shoulders
3. Back
4. Bottom
5. Between your legs
I love that that the Snake allows you to safely reach your “between.”
The thing that takes the BodySnake to another notch though is the “But wait, there’s more” gift. I can honestly say this is the most horrifying secondary gift in the history of infocos … it is called the “foot scrubber.” This is a small thing that looks like a slipper, only it has suction cups on the bottom so that you can stick it to your shower floor. And here’s how it works: You stick your foot in there, and you bounce your foot up and down like you are working the piano pedals. Apparently you also put soap in there. And when you’re done, voila, clean feet at last.
That foot scrubber, I just want to say, looks like a wonderful resting place for any rats that were not driven out of your home by the digital pulse technology of the Riddex Plus. I wouldn’t stick my foot in there on a bet.
So, you get the BodySnake, which finally solves our long national nightmare of unsafe showers, and the foot scrubber, which promises to freak you out every time you use it … this definitely seems like the natural follow-up product to the Snuggie.
But, alas, there is a problem. And the problem is the commercial … you will recall the brilliance of the Snuggie commercial: The creepy Dad, the Mom who looked about as uncomfortable as any human in the world holding a baby, Friar Tuck working the remote control to find the one channel that ALWAYS plays Lawrence Welk, the poor college girl with the 1970s poster on her dorm wall, the family showing up at a sporting event in their Snuggies and so on. It was great moment after great moment.
This commercial, however, pretty much revolves around a naked fat guy taking a shower (and then falling over because he lacks the proper showering instruments). I am not in the physical shape necessary to fully make fun of a fat guy in the commercial. However, I don’t want to see him naked. I really don’t. The point of commercials as I understand them is to make people want to BUY the item you are selling. And the general reaction to this commercial, which I have conveniently placed after this paragraph, is to … run in horror.
So, no, a commercial that frightening cannot create the next Snuggie. Shame, too, because the BodySnake definitely has the other qualities. If only they would have gotten Amy Adams for the commercial.
Fortunately, there is another potential Snuggie out there. Thank you to Brilliant Reader Jimmy.
They are called Micro Smores.
First, you need to ask this key question: Do you love Smores but hate how long they take to make?
No. Of course not. Seriously, this is very much like hating blankets because they prevent you from answering the phone in precise time. Is there anyone, anywhere, who loves Smores but has been troubled by the preparation time? We’re not talking about preparing a 16-pound turkey here. In the oven, smores take roughly 90 seconds. Maybe. Over an open fire, even less. In a microwave, it’s more like 40 seconds. Smores may have their drawbacks,* but cooking time isn’t one of them.
*This is a side point, and I’ll say up front that I KNOW many people will not agree with me. But to me Smores are the ultimate example of a food item that should taste a lot better than it actually does taste. I mean, I know there are many Smore-a-holics out there, and this is sacrilegious** to you, but I just have to say my piece. We probably make Smores once every two years or something — and every time I see them I think, “Man, those are going to be AWESOME.” And, to me, they never are quite awesome. They’re OK. But I always find myself slightly disappointed. I always think: “Man, that should have been better.” I am certainly not down on Smores, and I’m sure next time I see them, like the guy from Memento, I’ll be every bit as excited as the last time and then I’ll be disappointed again (because I will not tattoo “Smores are disappointing” on my arm).
**I am entirely baffled about why religious is spelled e-l-i while sacrilegious goes i-l-e. I suspect that this is based on the word “sacrilege,” but still, it bothers me.
OK, so, here we have a classic non-dilemma … you want a Smore, but you don’t want to wait the 40 seconds it would take to make one. What to do? What to do? What to do? The outlook is decidedly blue. Until …
“Smores are gooey, melty, tasty fun,” the narrator in the commercial says. So true. Gooey. Melty. Tasty. What could possibly make them better?
“What could POSSIBLY make them better?” the narrator asks, even though I just asked the same question. Then, he gives an answer in the form of a question: “How about your favorite Smore in 10 seconds?”
Well, how about it? Is such a thing possible? Has mankind triumphed? Has American technology really created a device that can make Smores in 10 seconds rather than the 40 seconds it would normally take?
It is possible. How? Well, I cannot explain. Fortunately, the narrator gives us the technical answer: “The fusion technology of the patented Micro Smores cooker heats up quickly! And then smooshes everything together.”
Yes, it is comforting to know that there are scientists out there working with the various principles of fusion technology in order to create a cooker that can smoosh graham crackers, chocolate and marshmallows together. Of course, they patented it. We wouldn’t want that sort of technology to get into the wrong hands.
The Micro Smore is hysterically funny on about 12 different levels including this … the “patented Micro Smores cooker” doesn’t actually cook anything. You have to put the thing, um, INTO THE MICROWAVE. The Micro Smore Cooker appears to be some sort of glass top thingy that pushes down on the smore (to create the necessary smooshing fusion). The microwave merely does the “cooking.”
And this: The Micro Smore is quite small and can only make one Smore at a time. Who makes one Smore? Isn’t this like popping on kernel of popcorn? Roasting a single chestnut on an open fire?
But, of course, if the Micro Smore commercial ended here, it would only be inane … something along the lines of the Slap Chop*.
*Yes, I must make one comment about Slap Chop pitchman Vince Shlomi getting arrested for allegedly beating up a hooker in Miami (and getting beaten up a bit himself). I would never pass judgment on anyone, but has any person in American history given newspaper headline writers more options than Vince did after he got arrested. I mean, this guy pitched the Slap Chop and the Sham Wow for crying out loud. There have to be 15 headline possibilities right there — Sham Pow, Slapped and Chopped, Slammer Wow and so on. He’s famous for saying “You’re going to love my nuts,” and “You’re going to be in a great mood all day because you’re going to be slapping your troubles away,” and so on. I mean, the guy writes the headlines for himself.
But the Micro Smore does what every great infoco does … it goes to another level. Because then the narrator talks about how they will include a Micro Smores recipe book. Really? A Smores recipe book. I mean: Marshmallow, chocolate, graham cracker. It doesn’t seem that hard. But, aha, the recipe book offers you countless other possibilities. For instance, you can use a Reese’s Peanut Butter Cup instead of chocolate. Or you can use M&Ms! Or you can use Hershey’s kisses! Or you can use Peppermint Patties! Or chocolate chips! Or you can use fudge-striped cookies!
Wow! That’s incredible. OK, OK, I’m not a Top Chef or anything but how about we put … a Snickers bar! Or a Pepperidge Farm Milano cookie! Or a Krackel! Or a Rolo! Or Goobers! Or, how about, anything chocolaty we can find in the checkout lane at the Supermarket?
The Micro Smores recipe book has to be one of the more fabulous info-commercial twists I’ve seen in a while. Then they take it to another level by including a “Holiday Smores” recipe book that will allow you to have Gooeylicious Smores year round — Fourth of July, Valentines Day, Halloween and many more*. I don’t know if it’s genius, but it’s gotta be pretty close.
*Smores for Shavuot! Martin Luther King Day! Good Friday! Labor Day! Vaisakhi! Twelfth Day of Ridvan!
Finally, to finish it off, the Micro Smores people also offer the lame “But that’s not all, call right now and we’ll send a second Micro Smores Cooker free!” As an infoco fan, I can tell you this, and there are no exceptions to the rule: You can tell that the item is especially crappy when they offer to send you two of them.
I am not saying that Micro Smores will sweep the nation the way Snuggies did. I can only repeat what the little boy who will someday win three Academy Awards says after eating one of those amazing 10 second Smores: “Perfection.”
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Smores are kind of like the McRib or Pizza Hut. Every two years or so you see an ad on TV, and it suddenly sounds like a good idea to try them because you’ve forgotten what they taste like. There’s always one nearby, so it’s not a big inconvenience, and you can usually get whatever ridiculous Pizza Hut creation is the newest one delivered with ease in, like, 20 minutes. Then you get it, take a bite, and realize that you made a huge mistake but that you must power through despite the pit of despair that will accompany the spot the food is about to take in your stomach.
And, yes, I’m going so far as to say Smores will actually make your feel like ass. Too many marshmallows make for a near-death experience.
“…make YOU feel like ass.”
Ninety seconds? But I want it now!
Thanks for the laughs and the information. It kills me to learn I’ve wasted so much time cooking my Smores. If only they could figure out how to make Pop-Tarts faster, I’d be set. In all seriousness though, if I had a Flowbee, I would use it. I usually wear a hat so the $10 haircut thing is getting old.
Every time the Micro Smores guy says “Gooeylicious,” I can hear his contempt for life growing by at least 140%.
Alright, since you asked, I’m going to nerd it up. I believe that the reason that religious and sacrilegious have different letter combos (-eli- versus -ile-) is because they actually come from two completely different latin roots. Religious simply comes from Latin “religiosus”, which just means revering god, pious, whatever. The etymology is debated, but it seems to be a combination of the prefix “re-”, which we have in English and seems to provide emphasis in this case, and the verb “ligo”, which basically means to bind (think ligament, ligature). Hence religion is something extremely binding, like an obLIGation.
Sacrilegious on the other hand comes from a combination of two different latin words: sacer (sacris) and lex (legis), meaning respectively “sacred” and “law”. Combining the two words made it necessary to drop the -s at the end of sacris, so it became “sacrilegi(um)”. Then it made its way directly into English and so on. Interestingly (or not?), while the two words together simply mean “sacred law”, both in Latin (sacrilegium) and in English (sacrilege) the combo refers directly and specifically to the violation of sacred law.
Yep, pretty exciting…
I knew a guy once who had purchased a Flowbee. Used it on himself and his teenage son. I’m not sure if the kid became a mass murderer or not, although it would seem he had cause.
You would think the Body Snake folks would have chosen an attractive young woman to feature in their spot. I realize the target audience is probably lazy dudes, but as a lazy dude I don’t want to see another lazy dude in the shower. Give me the babe.
Around Christmas I heard about a company that takes razors and cryogenically freezes them to harden the steel. So far, this is probably the closest thing to the Infinity Razor. The web site is called greatrazors.com (I think; I’m already spending the money I’ll be saving on razors.
Love your stuff, Joseph.
The Flowbee always pissed me off because it was nothing more than a ripoff of the Suck Cut from Wayne’s World.
It certainly does suck!
Thanks for putting in a plug for the somewhat obscure Jewish holiday of Shavuos. Getting mentioned on your blog is probably the best pop culture reference the holiday has received since Sandra Bernhrad mentioned it in “The King of Comedy”
Nate
It’s a Scientific Fact! Micro’Smores are Gooeylicious!
You guys can’t argue with Science!
Joe:
Have you seen the Peekaru yet? I think it’ll be right up your alley.
http://gizmodo.com/5191510/peekaru-is-a-baby-snuggie
It’s my s’more, and I need it NOW!
WesTley.
Sorry, couldn’t help myself.
I like Joe’s writing in general, but when you can get a Princess Bride reference in a blog, it takes it to a whole new level. Thanks Joe.
Notice that razors now come with 5 blades. And here we used 1 or 2 blade razors for the longest time. Did anyone see SNL when Will Ferrell used a 14 blade razor? I can’t believe we’re not there already.
As for the Smores thing, we went on an outing with our Scout group a while ago. We had regular chocolate and “leader” chocolate, rightly figuring that the Cubs and Scouts would be eating their Smores so quickly they wouldn’t even notice the taste. The ones with the more expensive chocolate were great! Maybe that’s the secret.
“am certainly not down on Smores, and I’m sure next time I see them, like the guy from Memento, I’ll be every bit as excited as the last time and then I’ll be disappointed again (because I will not tattoo “Smores are disappointing†on my arm).”
nothing really to add. i just wanted to read it again.
Smores are not worth the effort.
The Flowbee has been around since the late 80s. I can remember seeing commercials for it when I was a kid and I’m 29. The Snuggie should hope that it is the next Flowbee.
Flobee predates suck cut.
According to Wikipedia the Flowbee was invented in the late 80s. Wayne’s World came out in 1992. The Snuggie debuted as the Slanket in 1998.
My biggest problem with the Micro Smores is this damn blanket keeps me from eating them.
Body snake: if it gets morbidly obese people (the ones who wish that they looked as good as the guy in the commercial) to wash better, especially with summer coming, I’m all for it.
See:
http://www.vikprjonsdottir.com/products.html
if you need something that is not only stupider than the Snuggie, but much more expensive.
Oh. Oh, Joe. Why did you make me see that? I mean, I’m against ridiculing overweight people as much as anyone, but I didn’t know I was signing on to see one naked. Using “Goobers” only partly redeemed you.
I’ve linked to this one here before, but just in case it got lost in the comment haze, here – once again – is the Tiddy Bear…
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gw1g2yKxb0I
PS: I apologize for the gratuitous overuse of punctuation in the previous sentence. I lost my train of thought mid-sentence and am too lazy to go back and change it.
Bodysnake- “Has taking a shower become a pain?”
Hilarious. I’m like Kramer from Seinfeld- I’d live in the shower if I could.
Why even bother with a s’more when, in the winter months, we in the North can simply eat Mallowmars? Portable s’mores, already prepared, and much better tasting than actual smores because of the dark chocolate. It’s worth the extra money in time savings and taste.
JR, I’ll see your nerdishness and raise you one. The adjective sacer in Latin, in addition to simply meaning ‘sacred’, can also mean accursed (specifically in a religious context) – that’s why the ancient ‘sacrilegium’, from which we get sacrilege (as you quite correctly pointed out), refers to something that is accursed according to (religious) law.
Gotta agree with Ray C. The BodySnake is clearly a washing implement for people who are too fat to wash themselves normally. I could see promoting it as a way to clean your back, but who the hell can’t clean their neck, shoulders, bottom and between their legs without help?
I’m with Joe on the Smores dislike, though. I like Graham crackers, love chocolate and enjoy the odd toasted marshmallow, but the three together are somehow less than the sum of their parts. It’s the anti-peanut butter cup.
I never understood why Krackel has not fully competed with Nestle Crunch. I have never seen a candy machine size bar of this.
The whole fun of a cookout smore is that the marshmellow is never burned the same way twice. As a kid, essentially, they are letting you play with fire.
I used to blame maternal haircuts for my lack of action in high school, too, it was about fourth on the list after shortness, acne, and glasses, but hell, it was really just my personality all along.
Thanks to JR and Preston for nerding out. I just eat that kind of useless information up.
And man, those other products people linked to in comments section are incredible. The Peekaru was possibly the most ridiculous thing I’ve seen in ’09 until I checked out those items on the Vik Prjonsdottir site.
The Sealpelt is a bizarro Snuggie, in that it seems to be a garment designed specifically to make you unable to do anything because your hands are stuck in this ungainly Grimace-like costume. And the story that accompanies it is pretty odd…are we to believe that the farmer had seven kids with a friggin’ seal?
The Twosome Blanket, same thing. It’s just a blanket, except that your head’s, and your partner’s head, and kinda stuck in holes, so you could pretty easily get up quickly and wind up yanking both necks suddenly (if you happen to forget you’re wearing a ridiculous two-person blanket with head openings).
The Beard Cap…okay, it’s just stupid enough that I might buy one if I saw it in a flea market.
The Sea Blanket is…what? Just a blanket? Why does the woman look like she’s struggling in the photo? Do Icelanders take candid snapshots for their catalogues? The story about how countless people have drowned in the sea don’t make me want to rush out and buy this blanket.
The Regional Blanket is a total mystery. Are you SUPPOSED to just leave your feet sticking out? I’m officially lost. Not as lost, however, as the guy writing the blurbs for these products. He just got to the huge papier mache horse and obviously said “oh, what the bloody hell?” and gave up.
As for the Tiddy Bear, I had a similar idea when I was a kid, though mine was for a foam cushion that would cover a long stretch of seat belt, not a ridiculous-looking plush bear whose name is a not-even-thinly-veiled double entendre.
One last thing about the Snuggie: I bought one for a friend for his birthday a couple of months back (it was a gag gift) and he wore it in the pub that night. It actually got the attention of a few girls, who clearly understood that it was a joke. It is with great surprise that I’m able to say this, but the Snuggie is a chick magnet.
Where’s this thing fit in?
http://jumpsnap.com/
It burns more calories … in less time! Somehow.
I nominate this:
http://jumpsnap.com/
Solving or not solving the non-problem of jumping rope being too hard. If nothing else the infomercial at the page has lots of people looking really silly using the jumpsnap.
great minds thinking alike
Another problem with the BodySnake commercial is that, as with any life-changing product, things go from black and white to color after your life has been changed. Fat naked guys should never be seen in color.
After seeing the BodySnake I was reminded of that episode of “The Simpsons” when Homer decided to become morbidly obese so he could work from home. Bart was so inspired, he imagined his future as a sideshow-sized fat guy, telling the people gathered around him, “I was myself with a rag on a stick.”
And another candidate for infoco legend…
That should be “I WASH myself with a rag on a stick.”
Robert – ah, a classic. “Bad news, Dad. We’re out of food. We’re even out of the elements of food. You drank all the soy sauce and ate all the tarragon!”
Speaking of which – what do you do if you’re a lefty like Ned Flanders? Are there left-handed versions of these products for sale in the Leftorium? He should have branched out into infomercials after his store got ransacked. “Want to open a can? Well, okely-dokely! This handy little gizmo has the switch on the other side.”
I’ve found that the best way to get great smores is to make sure the marshmallow is thoroughly melted, so it’s basically liquid held together by whatever the outside is. It is easy to do if you toast the marshmallow over a fire and keep turning it. You can tell by how much it droops when turned when the middle is done. I once had to make large number of smores and figured this out.
The Flowbee people missed out on an obvious opportunity for the “Order now and we’ll include” gift. How about a Mini-Flowbee for your 80′s cop moustaches?
Joe M.,
Fat naked guys should never be seen in color, black & white, or naked. (I’ll forgive them for being fat. It’s easier to do something about naked.)
I also enjoyed the infomercial “I Can’t Believe They Invented It!” on “The Simpsons.”
Troy: I’m here to tell you about “Spiffy!”, the twenty-first-century stain remover. Let’s meet the inventor, Dr. Nick Riviera.
Nick: Thank you, Troy! Hi, everybody!
All: Hi, Dr. Nick!
Nick: Troy, I brought with me the gravestone of author and troubled soul Edgar Allen Poe! [exhibits a grimy tombstone]
Troy: One of our best writers.
Nick: Yes, but unfortunately, a century of neglect has turn this tombstone into a depressing eyesore.
Troy: So what? I guess we’re going to have to throw it away.
Nick: Not so fast, Troy! With one application of Spiffy, you’ll think the body’s still warm! [applies some Spiffy, removes all the grime]
All: Ooooooh! Ahhhhhhhh! [The name "POE" twinkles]
Troy: Quoth the raven, “What a shine!”
Nick: I’m offering three bottles, enough to clean one thousand tombstones, for only $39.95!
All: Booo! [a chair is heaved on stage]
Troy: I’m afraid you’re going to have to do better, doctor.
Nick: Okay, I’ll throw in a fourth bottle, the applicator glove, and a state of Kansas jell-o mold. $29.95!
Poor Rutbag wrote “great minds thinking alike” and posted it .017 seconds before he remembered I was the guy who needed 200 comments and two JoPosts* to get the Monty Hall thing.
And poor Joe. The Beatles REALLY don’t want him to make any money at all. First Rock Band on 09/09/09, and now this:
http://www.avclub.com/articles/meet-the-beatles-cds-again,26292/
* I mean, JoPost, that’s gotta be a JoeWord, right?
I shudder to think of the atrocities inflicted by a man that might result in his reincarnation as a BodySnake.
Hi Joe,
Completely unrelated to this post, but I learned here several months ago the interesting trivial fact that “lollipop” is the longest word you can type with only one hand using the traditional typing hand positioning. But just now I discovered that “addressed” can also be typed with one hand and is one letter longer. Feel free to file that little nugget of trivia away for your next party. And yes, I actually stopped writing the dissertation chapter I was working when I discovered this in order to pass along this piece of information to you and your readers…
Graham crackers. Okay. Marshmallows? Okay, but lost my taste for them after my tonsillectomy, when a well meaning idiot doctor told my mom to feed us marshmallows afterwards so she’d have something to do (there is no therapeutic value to marshmallows; there *might* be some to ice cream, which at least would cool and reduce inflammation) and my mom took him way to seriously. Chocolate? Well, now you’re talking. But the only reason to dilute the chocolate with graham crackers and marshmallows is it’s 115 degrees and the chocolate will melt all over your hand and you’re camping so washing is difficult and your hands are dirty. Net result: s’mores are more hygienic than chocolate bars. And putting them in the flames probably kills some germs, too. Thus, they are not a food for civilized people. Give me Hershey’s Special Dark (or Sees Dark Chocoolate with Walnuts) instead.
As for my showering implements, I use a stiff loofah for my face (cleanse those pores), arms, upper body, and legs; a wash cloth for the ears and other areas the loofah does not go easily; and a long handled brush for everywhere else. My perfect shower, of course, is chez spouse, so both of us can use the loofah on each other’s back, giving us that really clean feeling afterwards. So the snake *might* be useful to me, since I’m working 600 miles away from my wife most of the time. But probably not. If I had Amy Adams, she could use the loofah so we wouldn’t need the snake, and my wife would not approve anyway.
What about degreaser?
I’m reminded of a couple of things on this post.
First is the Flowbee is just like the Suck Kut from Wayne’s World (although someone else beat me to it)
The forgetting about smores reminds me of a bit Lewis Black did about Candy Corn. “Halloween returns, and I, like an Alzheimer’s patient, find myself in a room, and there’s a table, and on that table is a bowl filled with Candy Corn for no apparent reason. And I look at it, even though I’ve seen it over and over and over again, it is as if I’m seeing it for the first time. Candy Corn I say…corn that tastes like candy. God I can’t wait!”
“I don’t work, I don’t get in a car, I don’t ride in a car, I don’t pick up the phone, I don’t turn on the oven, and I sure as s#*t don’t eat Smores for Shavuot!”
Time for a new JoeWord?
What do you call it when the whole is worse than the sum of the parts, i.e. the opposite of synergy?
antergy?
crestfallergy?
unwarranted optimism?
Help out wordsmiths.
There was a kid in high school unlucky enough to have a mom who purchased the Flowbee and cut his hair with it–once. Needless to say, for the next 2 years he was known as “Flowbee.”
@Justin, #30… I was going to make some comments on the truly astonishing Vik Prjonsdottir site, but you beat me to it, and had me laughing out loud at the counseling center where I work. Hopefully I won’t be dragged off.
And the Peekaru? Uh, my mom had one of those 30 years ago that looked nowhere near as insane, and it’s still around today. It’s called a snugli. I don’t have clear memories of it myself, but it sure looks comfortable.
Re:44
What about stewardesses? That’s 12 letters all with one hand.
“What do you call it when the whole is worse than the sum of the parts, i.e. the opposite of synergy?”
A Smorass?
“Smorass” sounds like an affliction. A horrible, horrible affliction.
or a heckavua way to spend the day. Getting s’mor’ass.
Hans Christian Andersen’s “The Emperor’s New Jump Rope.”
I want to remind everyone I reminded JoPo about the Flowbee after it was left off of the infomercial poll.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h05ZQ7WHw8Y
Snuggie…basically it’s a robe you wear backwards…
I wish I could say this is completely useless but, man, would this come in handy during nights out on the town…
The Uroclub:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ncjYnLgxyCI
“What do you call it when the whole is worse than the sum of the parts, i.e. the opposite of synergy?”
A: Sinergy
Preston and jr take a stab at guessing the derivation of the word ‘sacrilege.’ Wouldn’t it be better to just look it up? From the OED:
[a. OF. sacrilege (12th c. in Hatz.-Darm.; mod.F. sacrilège) = Sp., Pg., It. sacrilegio, ad. L. sacrilegium, f. sacrileg-us one who steals sacred things or commits sacrilege, f. sacri-, sacer sacred + -leg-, legere to gather, after the phrase sacrum or sacra legere to purloin sacred objects, to commit sacrilege.]
And for comparison here’s the one for ‘religion’:
[a. AF. religiun (11th c.), F. religion, or ad. L. religion-em, of doubtful etymology, by Cicero connected with relegere to read over again, but by later authors with religare to bind, RELIGATE (see Lewis and Short, s.v.); the latter view has usually been favoured by modern writers in explaining the force of the word by its supposed etymological meaning.]
I’m going to at least second the shout out to Shavuot.
Tied for third most important holiday in Judaism and nobody cares.
If it happened in December everybody would know about it, man is Hannukah lucky.
I have to say I love the word ‘infoco’ combining infomercial and commercial together, since infomercial is already a combination of ‘information’ and ‘commercial’. Good work, Joe.
Well, isn’t “infoco” just a combination of information and commercial?
[...] post a few snippets but it’s fairly lengthy so I’ll let you read on your own time. His premise: I have spent the last couple of months trying to find the next Snuggie [...]
Snuggie Worldwide!!!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WChDhSncSVE
[...] do. It really is a phenomenon. But now, you can enjoy your s’mores with them! (hat tip, JoePos) When the kids get that excited about the microwave, I don’t know how I can say anything [...]