So apparently it’s been Delurking Week this week, and I was supposed to put up the button on Monday and invite all my half-dozen lurkers to come out and leave a comment. Oops. Besides, right now I wouldn’t be able to put the button on my sidebar even if I wanted to, because although I love the colors and design of this theme, the coding is some kind of PHP that I just don’t understand. Even someone who has custom-designed tons of blog templates couldn’t understand it. I checked a book on PHP out of the library but I haven’t had a chance to look at it yet. Well, button or not, it’s not too late! Why not delurk and say Hi anyway?

I have to complain about advertising now. Have you seen the TV commercial for the “Kiafest January Sale” featuring car salespeople wearing white shirts, red ties and khaki pants dancing around and singing “So Long, Farewell” from The Sound of Music? The first time I saw it I turned to my husband and said “those actors need to call their agents and fire them NOW”. One of the actors is actually scowling, looking totally bored as he twirls around in step to the music. It doesn’t make me want to buy a Kia, that’s for damn sure.

Even worse, a new ad for Kleenex I found in the February issue of Parenting magazine. This one is so bad, and so disgusting, I just had to tell the whole Internet all about it. Hopefully Kleenex wasn’t getting ready to send me any free samples or anything. (P.S. ParentBloggers? If you let me join, I promise to review all products fairly-E.) If you have the magazine, turn to page 80. See how page 81 is a piece of heavy cardstock with four faces on it? Each of those faces has a flap in front of it. Don’t do like I did and try to lift the flaps UP, you will just tear them. The perforation is actually on the side. (P.S. Kleenex? The perforation was really hard to see and I tore the first two flaps clear off-E.) Under each flap are the words “let it out”, and a lovely graphic image representing what a big sneeze feels like. Nice. There’s a rushing waterfall (ewww), hurricane winds, fireworks, and a wineglass in the act of shattering, which if that’s what your sneezes are like, stay the heck away from me.

Turn the page, and this is a portion of the actual text written there:

“It’s time to LET IT OUT. Don’t hold back, Don’t keep it in. Don’t you dare put on a brave face. It’s time to LET IT OUT. Open the floodgates. Uncork the bottle. Unclog the pipes. Release the hounds. It’s time to LET IT OUT. Laugh until you cry! Scream until you spit! And when tons of stuff stuffs up your nose BLOW it LOUD & BLOW it PROUD! It’s time to LET IT OUT.”

Ahem. May I please make a suggestion? Please do NOT scream until you spit, because that is just gross, and if you need to blow your nose, could you not blow it “loud and proud”? There are just some things that other people don’t need to hear, and you honking into a Kleenex is one of them.

As if all of that wasn’t bad enough, there is a website. Oh yes. A website where you can create an account and then upload your photos and short videos of you or your loved ones “letting it out”. There is a BLOG. The Welcome post reads, in part, “We’ll be here blogging every week and giving you an opportunity to let out your tears, joy, excitement, frustration, laughter and even your snot.” Okay, Kleenex, ENOUGH. I know snot is your business and everything, but you are asking me to think about it WAY too much. On the right side of the home page are the three “Most Viewed” videos, and the bottom one is of a kid who has a STREAM OF SNOT coming out of his nose, and everyone is laughing about how funny it is that he is TRYING TO LICK IT. NO NO NO NO NO!

I can’t talk about this anymore or I am going to hurl. Why don’t you tell me what commercials are bugging you the most? OH, and it’s Future Milfs Friday! I lost three pounds and am down to 173 today. I’ll take what I can get.

Edited to add: The theme I refer to in the first paragraph is NOT the one you see here now. It was a different theme that I experimented with and then abandoned to come back to this AWESOME design. Just thought I’d clarify that.-E.