Commercial Curmudgeon

Forgive me, but I’m a commercial curmudgeon. I see great commercials like this one for Skoda motors in England, and in my own country, it’s all fart jokes and shock value.

Don’t get me wrong, I love the Superbowl.commercials. And if you're like me, and want to see the commercials, not the game, Mahalo is the best place for Superbowl commercials live coverage. You can find out what is airing when, and see the commercials online mere minutes after they have aired.

But when every company puts out a press release or a teaser to let you, the coveted viewer, know that you can see their product shilled on February 1, you expect more than what is generally given.

I'm fine with knowing what commercials will be aired before they air. It builds buzz, excitement and anticipation. But, frankly, the commercials for the past few years have not been up to par. This is the best that creative marketing minds can come up with? Admittedly, I like that Doritos uses audience participation in creating and choosing the ads, but the ads themselves are hit and miss.

Give me some real creativity, something innovative and exciting, and, oh, I don’t know, risky? Remember those Intel commercials from the 1990's with the dancing astronauts in the psychedelic lame spacesuits? Whether it's a good commercial is debatable, but it sure was memorable. And it was certainly something out of the ordinary.

The big fad this year is purported to be 3-D ads. Dreamworks and Sobe are both going to run ads in 3-D. Seems creative, but it seems more like ploy to get you out to check out the products and locales that offer the 3-D glasses. A bad commercial in 3-D is still a bad commercial.

Even so, If you are interested in getting those 3-D glasses, or making your own, check this out.


I’m watching the commercials at a friend’s house this year, a friend who has TiVo, so we can pause, replay and capture some of the better commercials this year. I just hope they’re worth it. But, I’m an optimist, and I an hopeful that we’ll get more than a few good commercials this year. Besides, any excuse to hang with friends, eat and drink is worth it.

If you'd like to skip Superbowl 43 and don't have Tivo, Mahalo is the place to go. They are super-exhaustive about this sort of thing. Here's a list of the commercials that will air on Superbowl Sunday.

Amy Borkowsky
Angels and Demons Super Bowl Ad
Budweiser Clydesdale Super Bowl Ad
Carreer Builder Super Bowl Ad
Cars.com Super Bowl Ad
Cheetos Super Bowl Ad
Chuck Super Bowl Ad
Denny's Super Bowl Ad
Doritos "Free Doritos" Super Bowl Ad
Doritos New Flavor Pitch Super Bowl Ad
Doritos Power of the Crunch Super Bowl Ad
Doritos Super Bowl Ad
Doritos The Chase Super Bowl Ad
Doritos Too Delicious Super Bowl Ad
Fast and the Furious Super Bowl Ad
Frosted Flakes Super Bowl Ad
GI Joe Super Bowl Ad
Go Daddy Danica Patrick Super Bowl Ad
Go Daddy Super Bowl Ad
H and R Block Super Bowl Ad
Heineken Super Bowl Ad
Heroes Super Bowl Ad
Hyundai Genesis Super Bowl Ad
Hyundai Super Bowl Ad
Jay Leno Super Bowl Ad
Kings Super Bowl Ad
LMAO NBC Super Bowl Ad
Land of the Lost Super Bowl Ad
Medium Super Bowl Ad
Miller One Second Super Bowl Ad
Monsters vs. Aliens Super Bowl Ad
NFL Network Super Bowl Ad
Pedigree Super Bowl Ad
Pepsi Super Bowl Ad
Sobe Lizard Lake Super Bowl Ad
Sobe Super Bowl Ad
Star Trek Super Bowl Ad
Super Bowl Ads 2009
Super Bowl Commercials 2009
Super Bowl Commercials Live Coverage
Teleflora Super Bowl Ad
Transformers Super Bowl Ad

Coming out: My spiritual orientation

I've decided that I'm a theistic agnostic.

Let me 'splain. No, there is too much. Let me sum up. I believe that there is a God, but I don't believe that I or anyone can ever *prove* that.

I know that the deck is stacked against there being a God. When I was a kid, about 7 years old, I was scared to death of dying. Now, if I were a good Catholic, like I was raised to be, I shouldn't have been scared.

Clown: Good madonna, why mournest thou?
OLIVIA: Good fool, for my brother's death.
Clown: I think his soul is in hell, madonna.
OLIVIA: I know his soul is in heaven, fool.
Clown: The more fool, madonna, to mourn for your brother's
soul being in heaven.
--William Shakespeare, "Twelfth Night"

In plain English:

Skinner: Ah yes, Renata. How is she?
Linguini: She's good…well, not g…she's been better. I-I mean, uh…
Horst: She died.
Skinner: [awkwardly] Oh. I'm…sorry.
Linguini: Oh, no, don't be. She believed in heaven, so she's covered…you know, afterlife-wise.
"Ratatouille"

But I'm not sure about that. The whole possibility of non-existence after death has scared the shit out of me for years. And the only way I can deal with that is to believe that there is an afterlife, and, by extension, that there is a God. I can't not believe. (I'm not believing in God because of Pascal's wager, either. Hell is much less scary than non-existence to me.)

It's irrational, but faith is irrational. You can't prove faith, and those who try are seriously misguided. That's one of the main reasons that I think Intelligent Design and Creationism are so silly. Additionally, the debates over the Shroud of Turin or the James Ossuary should be meaningless for people who really have faith. Faith is believing something that can't be proven and doesn't make a whole lot of sense. It's very counter-intuitive. But we all do it to a certain extent. For some, religion is their faith, for others, it's secular things, like democracy.

The argument runs something like this. "I refuse to prove that I exist", says God, "for proof denies faith and without faith I am nothing." "But", says Man, "the Babel Fish is a dead giveaway isn't it? It proves you exist, and so therefore you don't. QED." "Oh dear", says God, "I hadn't thought of that", and promptly vanishes in a puff of logic.
--Douglas Adams "The Hitchikker's Guide to the Galaxy"

I'll live my life on this world doing my best to improve myself, be nice to others, and leave things in better shape than when I got here. Maybe leave an heir if I'm lucky. And I will do it for the benefit of that heir, and everyone who comes after. And, because it's the right thing to do. Not for some fear of divine punishment.

I'm also still going to pray sometimes, go to church sporadically, and search through religious texts to find meaning. I'm not going to consider those texts inerrant and infallible, and I won't just keep to religious texts, or texts older than 500 years old. There's wisdom everywhere. Even in Oprah magazine. Sometimes.

I'm coming out as a theistic agnostic for several reasons: For one, writing it down helps clarify my thoughts, to figure out exactly what I believe. Second, it's a confession of sorts. There's my Catholic roots showing again. Many times, I present myself as far more religious in the company of my devout friends and acquaintances, but I present myself as more atheistic in the company of skeptics and rationalists. I do this mostly so as not to get into huge debates, and not to hurt feelings. But that practice is intellectually dishonest.

That doesn't mean I'm going to randomly blurt out to my mother "I'm not a Christian," or post “I believe in God” in the comments of the Geologic Podcast, but I need to say the words out loud, write them down, get them in order, so I can learn to be true to what I believe, and not change how I present myself because I'm worried about what other people will think or how they will feel.