Cabin Fever and Camel Fervor: It Ain’t Pretty People!

I’m taking a brief respite from religion topics to regale you with something totally different. Do not fear, this departure from my usual atheistic and anti-theistic diatribe is temporary,. Here’s the situation….

New Hampshire thus far has had 112 inches of snow. The record is 122 inches that fell during the winter of 1873-74. The result is “cabin fever”, a condition brought about by isolation, too much TV and too little else to do besides listening to NPR, tending the fire, reading, and from time to time pretending I’m the Alpha dog … which prompts fits of laughter from my dogs since they don’t take me very seriously.

Things have gotten so bad I find myself looking forward to the twice weekly trip to the town dump (making deposits, not pick ups). To make matters worse, Mrs. Hump has laid down the law: no more walking around the house with an axe, wild eyed, hair all askew, yelling “Heeeere’s Humpy!!” ala Jack Nicholson in The Shining. She claims it’s upsetting to the dogs. [Note to self: find out who’s been scrawling “REDRUM” in lipstick on the bathroom mirror.].

Anyway, I’ve had a lot of time to mull over stuff that’s really gotten my hump in an uproar. Not the big stuff, like Creationists, war mongering Evangelicals, the Clintons, or the price of gasoline …. I’ve come to terms with those things. No, I’m talking about those little annoyances whose repetitive and cumulative obnoxiousness just irks the shit out of me. I made a list but it’s a long one so I’ll just share a few:

HUMP’S TOP FOUR HUMP BUSTING PEEVES:

1) Chipotle Sauce. Why have I never heard of chipotle sauce before 2007? Why is it now featured in every fast food outlet and “family restaurant” advertisement? Tacos, meat loaf, hero sandwiches, fish, chicken, salads …everything is slathered with chipotle sauce. WHY? Can this be a side product of 12 million illegal’s inflicting their third world tastes upon unsuspecting American palates?

I have never tasted chipotle sauce and vow I never will. I have lived a long time without it and figure I can make it a few more years in chipotle sauce deprivation with little or no ill effect. But, if I ever find the person responsible for the chipotle sauce hysteria I will inflict severe bodily harm on him.

2) Duplicate Mexican Food. Or what Americans think is Mexican food. Now I have nothing against our Hispanic I mean “Latino” brothers, as long as they are here legally, or are in their own country. But I get damn fed up with these fake foods that keep popping up. Taco and burrito, fine. But, Chimmichonga ?? Quesadilla?? Chalupa?? Gordita?? WTF!!!???
Who are they kidding!? Six names for the same rice, beans, and mystery meat, slathered with that fricken chipotle sauce and packed into a flour wrap or bent cracker. Thanks amigo, but, this Gringo will just say “no way Jose” to this undocumented marketing attempt.

3) Zoom, Zoom. A kid with no whites in his eyes, wearing a dark suit, stares into a camera and creepily whispers “Zoom, Zoom”. An unseen Caribbean accented guy excitedly chants “Zoom, Zoom” to a reggae beat. For the past ten years these Mazda commercials have caused me emotional distress. What does this kid, who looks like a reject from “Children of the Corn”, or this Rastafarian guy who’s likely high on ganja, have to do with a Japanese car? Just as troubling is the very word “zoom”. Its application to Ferrari, or Lamborghini would make perfect sense. Its use as a tag line for some unremarkable mid-priced Jap import is grounds for fraud and should be punishable by forced hara-kiri.

4) Furniture Store Commercials. These may be regional. Here in the North East we have “Bob’s”, “Bernie and Phyl”, and some other company owned by two aging, balding, hippy brothers wearing 1970’s style pony tails. Appealing to the lower economic scale of the consumer pool, they all insist on doing their own commercials, lending their insipid personal touch to shill their chipboard, pine, and plywood bedroom sets, and tacky recliners replete with cup holders, a hidden microwave and a built in urinal.

“Bob” calls every thing he sells by his name like “ Bob O’ Pedic” bedding; “Bob-A- Licious” dinette set, “Bob-O- Sational” faux leather sectional. Bob has a smile that measures 4” x 6 “ that he flashes continually through his clinched teeth and scraggly grey goatee. Bob says things like “the competition is BUSTED!!!”, “and “THAT’s the way it is!”, and “It’s Untouchable!!”, and the ever creative “C’mon Down!!”. Bob lives in mortal fear of his homosexuality being exposed, so he employs a terminally perky, highly annoying, blond woman as a pseudo-wife. She enthusiastically repeats his every word and makes crazy hand gestures. She should be burned alive. Bob deserves a nice crucifixion.

“Bernie and Phyl” are just pathetic. They are a septuagenarian husband and wife team. Poor Phyl evidently has some kind of palsy that makes her head shake uncontrollably like a dash board bobble head doll on a bumpy road. But never mind, Bernie drags her out in front of the camera anyway like Jerry Lewis used to drag out a kid in leg braces during the Muscular Dystrophy telethon. Bernie doesn’t appear to have actual lips.

Their vacuous theme song pervades their commercials. Their two glassy eyed, doughy, thirty-something, community college educated sons, being otherwise unemployable, have latched onto the family business. They stare blankly into the camera looking like perfect clones of their parents. They mumble through their lipless mouths in their heavy Boston accents something about their great deals, as I the viewer wonder why Bernie and Phyl never practiced safe sex.

Well, I feel better now. I could go on, but I have an appointment. The dump opens in an hour and I have to tunnel my way to the car.