Come on! That’s not real!
Posted: May 1st, 2009 | Filed under: Pop Culture | 54 Comments »
Here’s what I have started to wonder about the Snuggie people … what were their dreams? I mean, you always hear people say: “Oh this is beyond my wildest dreams!” But, more often than not, it’s hard to believe them. I mean, despite what he may say, I don’t think Phil Mickelson winning the Masters was beyond his wildest dreams. The guy grew up playing golf and he was awesome at it from the time he was like 7 years old. I’m sure he dreamed about winning the Masters. I don’t think Carl Edwards winning a race in Atlanta was beyond his wildest dreams. I don’t think that a young actor getting to play in a movie with Robert DeNiro or Meryl Streep is beyond their wildest dreams.
Think about those words: “Wildest dreams.” Most of us, I suspect, have some pretty wild dreams. I don’t expect any of my wildest dreams to come true but if I win a billion dollars tomorrow or get asked to play second base for the Cleveland Indians or win the Pulitzer Prize or have Jenna Fischer just call … to say … she loves me or have Morgan Freeman call to say he’s turning Soul of Baseball into a movie, well, I won’t be able to lie and say I never dreamed them.
So, what would be beyond my wildest dreams? I don’t know. If I could come up with something, by definition, it would not be beyond my wildest dreams.
But I have to say this … I suspect what has happened to the Snuggie is beyond these people’s wildest dreams. I mean …
A Snuggie pub crawl in Chicago.
And now, yes, Collegiate Snuggies.*
*
If ever a picture cried out for a thousand words, it is this one. How many things can be wrong with one photograph? You have a woman wearing an Auburn snuggie leaning back into a guy wearing an Alabama snuggie? Really? This doesn’t break any American laws?
So here’s what I have spent way too much time wondering: What are we supposed to get out of this photograph? That these two are dating? Married? An Alabama fan and an Auburn fan, each with snuggie fetishes? I don’t think so.
So, I have come up with the only scenario that makes sense to me: They are brother and sister. She’s named Diane, and she was, oh, Miss Perfect, you know, cheerleader at a Birmingham high school, voted most popular, was Homecoming Queen. Eventually, she went to Auburn because that’s where her boyfriend Jack was going. Jackie was gonna be a football star.
When she was a senior, her younger brother, Tom, was coming through school — he’s three years younger — and of course he was known in school only as Diane’s younger brother, and it drove him mad. Tom had his own dreams! He didn’t want to be known as Diane’s kid brother. He tried sports, but, well, look at him. So he became editor of the school newspaper, and to get attention he started putting a chart in the paper called “Who’s kissing who,” where he would sneak around the school and see, well, who was kissing who. That’s when everyone started calling him “Snoop,” and he hated that name, and his sister called him Snoop, and he promised to get revenge.
Then, one day, he was making his rounds and he saw that Diane was kissing someone, and it wasn’t Jack, no it was Luke the nerdy, smart kid (played by Corey Haim) who was going to be Valedictorian. Tom was not entirely sure what to do. One the one hand, he wanted to expose his sister and prove that she wasn’t this perfect thing like everyone said. But on the other hand, well, he loved his sister and did not want to hurt her and he kind of liked Luke, who was the only senior who didn’t treat him like a jerk.
Of course, he wrote the story. And Jack dumped her. Diane did not speak to her brother for two years. She went off to Auburn anyway, where she dealt with the difficulty of being around all the other Alabama high school cheerleaders who were Homecoming Queens. Tom went through a phase where he only wore black clothes and drew really weird pictures in his notebook of wizards and witches and stuff like that. And then, when Tom was a senior, he decided to spite his sister and go to Alabama.
And then, as the movie comes to an end, their relationship began to warm … for one thing, Jack turned out to be a loser. He went to Auburn for a semester and dropped out when he realized that he was like the fifth-string quarterback and had no chance at all to play. Jackie talked about transferring, but instead he went back home and dated this other high school girl and he got a job at the quickie oil change place because, oh yeah, life goes on.
Diane realized that it was probably best that she did not get stuck with Jack, and she met someone new, and she was happy, and she realized that her younger brother, in addition to being a little twerp, was simply struggling to find his own identity. She told him that she was proud of him no matter what he was, even if it turned out he was gay, which was what she had basically come to believe.
And he broke down and cried — and apologized for writing that catty story and he insisted he was not gay but she did not believe him, and they became close again, close like they were when they were both young. And Diane said: “Remember how we used to love to have our own little slumber parties and stay up late and eat popcorn and listen to my Garth Brooks records.” And he said, “Yes, those are some of the fondest memories of my life.”
She said: “Let’s get our school snuggies and have another one of those parties, for old times sake.”
And the photo was snapped.
And it all makes sense. Until you see the second photo.
Wait, so now Tom’s wearing the Auburn Snuggie? And Diane’s got on an LSU snuggie? That is Diane, right? And who is that wearing the Oklahoma Snuggie? What’s her story? Is Tom dating her now? And what could they possibly be watching on TV? Now, I’m totally confused again.
The main point is that the Snuggie people surely wanted success, but I suspect they could never have imagined becoming a cultural phenomenon like this. And, of course, the Snuggie has set off an exciting new trend in American culture: Products that promise to solve non-existent problems. Having trouble answering the phone while covered in a blanket? Buy a Snuggie! Worried about getting injured while taking a shower? Buy the Body Snake! Frustrated by how long it takes to make smores? Buy the Micro Smore!
And now, there’s a product that is so incredibly pointless that, honestly, I find it hard to believe that it’s real. It looks like some sort of Internet joke. It might BE some sort of Internet joke. But, from everything I can gather it is real.
Ladies and gentlemen, are you tired of seat belts that pinch and bruise? Sure you are.
Enter: The Tiddy Bear.
Yes. The Tiddy Bear.
OK, a few thoughts. One, that’s not real. Two, you have to admire the way that the people call their product the Tiddy Bear but then, to make sure that you as a viewer are not confused, they spell it. “That’s T-I-D-D-Y Bear!” Hey, we’re running a clean show here, people.
Then, the commercial proceeds to show numerous attractive women wearing tank tops and pushing a plushy toy bear to their breasts. Remember, it’s T-I-D-D-Y people!
“My shoulder strap used to pull so tight, I could hardly breathe!” says our Tiddy Bear heroine. “Now, with the Tiddy Bear, I really enjoy traveling again!”
OK, come on. Seriously? I’m all for suspending logic when watching my favorite infocos — I’m willing to accept that we all want a little more salad in our diet and we all spend $20 a month on paper towels — but loosening a seat belt is this hard, really? And how exactly is a stuffed animal on your breasts supposed to help you breathe is the seat belt it that tight? Does it come with an oxygen mask?
Now, I’m sure that the Tiddy Bear people — by showing closeups of women’s chests and adding in the wholesome and adorable footage of a toddler in the backseat playing with his Tiddy Bear — are dreaming of Snuggie type success. They are hoping that the Tiddy Bear will inspire all kinds of parties, Tiddy Bear keggers, Tiddy Bear sleepovers, Tiddy Bear joy throughout the land. I’m sure they hope that someday they can use actual college and pro mascots so that you will have Tiddy Tigers and Tiddy Wildcats and Tiddy Pirates and so on.
It might happen. That’s the thing about Snuggies and the world we live in. Anything is possible.
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Can anyone confirm that the dude in the photo is the guy the most recent season of Real World?
baltimore had a crawl too:
http://www.snuggiepubcrawls.com/baltimore/
You’re completely insane, and I’m pretty sure I love you more than your wife does.
What I want to know is how the lady ended up with the remote control in the 2nd picture? Now we know who wears the snuggie in that family!
Wow, well done. Hilarious.
By the way, there was also a Snuggie bar crawl in Minneapolis recently!
Or, if you will, Impossible is Nothing.
Only you, Joe, would come up with such an in-depth backstory for an advertising photo. Obviously the Snuggie people didn’t put any thought into it.
Interesting that the Snuggies in the photos are football-specific, with helmets on them. I wonder if we’ll see basketball Snuggies for UNC, Duke, UConn, etc. this winter.
Off-topic, word on the street is that you’re the guy to go to for double play research. When was the last time a team hit into 6 double plays in a game AND had a game where they turned 6 double plays in the same season? Or more specifically, the same month?
I had to shut the door of my office I was laughing so hard. That was incredible. Thank you!
Speaking of wildest dreams…Imagine life as a Tiddy Bear. After years of duty, have the teats lost their allure? Does the bear long for more intimacy?
What about the poor bear that emerges from the box to see that his owner is Meatloaf sans manssiere? There are fates worse than death, my friend. I demand an SNL digital short.
Collin-
That is absolutely Scott from Real World: Brooklyn. Looks like his modeling career is really taking off. He’s made it!!
I absolutely love the story but have unfortunately come to hate the Snuggie…
A few weeks ago I thought it’d be a great idea to get a Snuggie as a sort of gag gift for a good friend of mine for her birthday. The Snuggie has been a running joke between us for a while so I thought it’d be funny to actually buy one. I went online to getsnuggie.com and began the process of ordering a Snuggie. This was my first mistake.
If you are going to get a Snuggie, do not order it from getsnuggie.com. It is a scam in more ways than one. In the first, you cannot order only one Snuggie. You HAVE to ‘buy one get one free*’. There is no way to avoid this.
*free= P&H only = $14
Second scam: there is no way to double check and confirm your order – once you click the button on the first page there is no turning back, your Snuggies are officially ordered.
Third scam: Since you are ordering two Snuggies you’d think they’d let you choose two colors for your two Snuggies. Wrong again. After clicking order on the first page you come to a page that asks you what you’d like the ‘color of your second set’ of Snuggie to be… key word here is “set”. They list the three colors and two choices: Yes or No. Unfortunately, if you click ‘yes’ – which I did, of course – congratulations you’ve just ordered yourself TWO MORE Snuggies!
So coming to the page where it tells me my bill you can imagine my surprise when my bill of $36 became a bill of $72. I won’t even go into detail about how hard it is to cancel your order once it’s been made. Let’s just say I’ve only gotten $20 back so far.
So if you want to order a Snuggie, please do your research first. I’ve now come to find that there ARE other, more reputable and cheaper places to order a Snuggie but getsnuggie.com is NOT one of them.
There was even a radio host hosting in a Snuggie (and nothing else) in our own metro a few months ago. Truta from JACK FM was at Le Peep on College/Metcalf* and spent the whole day in only a Snuggie (or so he claims)
*I was tempted to visit, since its right across the street from my job in the Darth Vader** building. But, the temptation was really not that great.
**Not growing up in KC myself, I don’t really understand calling it the Darth Vader building. Yeah, its big and black, but it doesn’t heavily breathe when it speaks or force choke anyone. But, most people here recognize it as such, so when I say that I work in the Darth Vader building, they all understand.
Collin, I had the same thought, and I’m pretty positive that is him.
Tom did his graduate work at Auburn, Diane used the Saban Connection to get a teaching gig at LSU, and…BarbaraAnnette (OU) is the school outcast who went north to go to school, but because of her stellar work as Tom’s kissing scout in his high school paper days, is still part of the gang. This gang of SECers have, of course, gathered to watch the 2010 NFL Draft to watch Tim Tebow squirm in the green room.
denver had one too! and i’m featured in picture #3 (i’m surfing with a snorkel on my head)
http://www.westword.com/slideshow/view/8108168/1#slide
I’m waiting for the inevitable Snuggie/Swine Flu connection. Either swine flu is being spread on Snuggies or whole offices are forced to close and everyone has to work from home in their Snuggies. Or something else, but I’m hopeful you can explain it.
As an LSU alum, there is nothing more offensive to me than having the same person model an LSU and Auburn snuggie. I hope Auburn is swallowed up back into the earth and returned to the hellfires they richly deserve.
I hate Auburn so much they make me root for Bama once a year.
Sorry. To bring it back to baseball, LSU had two players hit back-to-back home runs twice. In the same inning. Thought that was very cool, especially since it was against Tulane. Who would later invoke the Mercy Rule and go home after 7 innings. Good times.
There was a Snuggie crawl in NYC, too, starting at The Village Pour House (an NYC KU bar). Amazing. Wow, Pozers, I’m very surprised at the number of die-hard “Real-World” fans on this site!
I cannot possibly understand the appeal of these, and yet they are a great success story. They’ve obviously sold enough of these things to afford the rather sizable licensing fees from the NCAA schools. That’s impressive.
This infomercial is pretty bad as well.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E9_amg-Aos4&feature=related
As a Tulane alum, there is nothing more offensive to me than an LSU snuggie.
Roll Wave Roll.
Hard to believe, but the Tiddy Bear does appear to be a real product based on the website listed in the infomercial.
http://www.tiddybear.tv
This blog post was beyond my wildest dreams.
Mitcho – OU is Big 12 not SEC.
Your tale of Diane and Tom reminds me of an ESPN ad from a couple years ago. That one had a guy in a Ohio State sweatshirt making out with a girl in a Michigan sweatshirt, and the caption “Without sports, this wouldn’t be as disgusting.”
I was in tears. I forwarded this link to 20 of my friends, bragging about your creative genius. Thank you Joe, and keep it up!
ps–I’m off to find a COLLEGIATE SNUGGIE! :0)
Drat.
LMAO!! The college snuggie backstory is insain! The hysteria around the snuggie is beyond my worst nightmares. Who buys these things?
I can’t believe it either, but the Tiddy Bear seems to be a real product.
I’m crying I’m laughing so hard. Thank you for bringing a smile to so many of us on (yet another) gray, rainy day.
I finished “The Soul of Baseball” and was able to read this column today. Who says that the Internet sucks?
“The tiddy bear fits all makes and model.”
is that a car reference or breast reference?
And the American populace gets dumber by the day.
Next they should market Snuggie Gloves to cover up your hands, thus negating the original “reason” to have the Snuggie. Maybe after that they can go for Snuggie LegWarmers (fancy socks!) because the feet never quite get covered right.
There reallly is a sucker born every minute.
Have you noticed HOW TALL that grass is getting outside? And it’s not raining and the Royals ARE NOT playing right now.
Your story of Diane and Tom was the most hilarious post I have ever read on this site.
Bravo, Joe! Bravo!
What would happen if the T-Bear starting motorboating Karen Carpenter there?
I bet they were born in a small town and still live in a small town…
WHERE IS THE BANNY LOG??
The real story behind the Auburn/’Bama/LSU/Oklahoma Snuggies. There are these unemployed models in LA. They need something like bathrobes. They go to Goodwill. Being from California, they don’t know or care about those eastern colleges (from California’s perspective, almost everything is an eastern college) so they buy them. Then they decide to make an adult flick. The Snuggie people see the opening scenes and realize the marketing potential. And that’s the rest of the story.
Seriously, if you don’t have any significant loyalties, including a whole lot of folks who don’t care about SEC football, then you’re just buying a Snuggie to match your eyes and keep you warm. Why obsess over it?
And the real hidden message is: Snuggies are so wonderful that even arch enemies can wear them and feel good about it (before the rest of the adult entertainment starts). Put me down as somebody who will never willingly own a Snuggie. Not even a Dodgers Snuggie.
Joe… You’re on some roll, brother. It’s spilling over.
May I propose the Snuggie-Tiddy-Wow.
It’s a blanket with sleeves that comes with a velcro tiddy bear and has untold absorptive powers. You will never need to buy clothes or paper towels ($20/mo!) again.
This blog is off the chain. I havent laughed this hard in a couple hours. The three screw ups were the best. You have a new reader.
So where exactly in Kansas is Kansas City? I can never find it on a map.
Jack & Diane?? What happened to John Cougar when he became John Mellencamp? He get married?? Seriously, there were many Springsteen knockoffs in the 80’s. He was the worst.
I plan on marketing my ideas with infomercials. I made a portable iron that you can use to make your shirt presentable after the seatbelt and the bear bleep it up. And the Love Grips – which are two stainless steel (No rust) hand grips that can be installed on ANY headboard using these four things called screws. Anybody steals that and I will go to Kansas to find you.
My wildest dream is now to make love to Diane on some romantic beach somewhere with the Love Grips installed into two palm trees. In my wildest dream she doesnt talk much and cooks.
Elon
I saw another great Snuggie parody on youtube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6yvnK9y44Xo
The product that solved a problem that didn’t exist just got an unnecessary addition.
Hey I sell the snuggie and the tiddy bear. Sales have been beyond my wildest dreams! People ask me how I can sleep at night, I tell them on a new mattress. I wish I were a tiddy bear though. MMMMM Tiddys!
When the Snuggie appeared as a key element on “30 Rock” this week, I realized that it had officially arrived. Sure it was being mocked, but Tina Fey being smocked in a Snuggie will send sales through the roof. Soon every household in America will have one. We are doomed.
Now if there was a tiddy bear with its own little snuggie, I’d get that. I’d even use it.
Maybe it’ll be a Royals giveaway.
And hey – let’s go easy on Tulane. Is any school more pathetic in sports? A little love for the Greenies, please.
Greg (Tulane ‘73)
Sorry, got carried away towards Tulane. It was hate week and I was still on the high after LSU mercy-ruled the Green Wave. Honestly, I sorta root for the Greenies. I remember when y’all had the Gumby-like mascot.
And I will defend John Mellencamp. He didn’t get married, the record company forced the name “Cougar” on him and as he got more successful, he was able to take control of his career and dump the name he hated. Also, I think his songs are terrific and tell a story while also being the kind of viral song you can’t get out of your head for weeks. Hell, Jakc and Diane is one of my mom’s favorite songs. Mellencamp was one of the few artists we could both listen to.
He also put his money where his mouth is, not only working hard for a lot causes, but putting together the Farm Aid concerts. He didn’t just sing about poor farmers, he raised money for them. which is pretty cool. And while I was more of a punk rock kid, I have to say, I enjoyed Farm Aid with him and Willie.
Cool! These are really coming! I thought maybe this was some sort of joke. I found this site: http://www.collegiatesnuggies.com College Snuggies MUST BE REAL! What do you all think?
Joe – You should be declared a national treasure. I’m just sorry I didn’t listen to Rob Neyer sooner, so I wouldn’t have missed some of your earlier work. You could write about grass growing, and we’d love it.
@Owen – brilliant idea!
Somewhere someone is wearing a Snuggie and Ugg Boots at the same time….
What about a Snuggie for your Tiddy Bear? Or better yet an alumni one.
That’s so sad. Collegiate-logo Snuggies. What is even sadder — my dear, sweet 80-year-old mother kindly bought me and my sister a Snuggie. (The generic, non-collegiate-logo version.) I just smiled when she proudly brought out the bag, and tried it on, and said fine, and left it at her house (because it’s warm here now). I’m hoping she’ll forget it is stashed away.
As long as we are on the topic of cool inventions, everyone needs to check this one out! SO COOL!
http://www.collegehumor.com/video:1911276
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There is a story (fake, but funny) about cats protesting the Snuggie for dogs on SnuggieHumor.com