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February 16, 2005
Word to your Marketing Dept.!
I haven't been feeling in and of the world for the last day or so. When vexed, I sometimes feel detached from good people like yourselves. What's bugging me is not the issue for this forum. Instead, let's explore how I chose to dispel this semi-funk.
An hour at the gym on the elliptical machine left me feeling sore, yet active and vital. Blowing plaque out of my arteries almost always cheers me because I know it's healthy. Also, I get to feel smugly superior to anyone who didn't exercise today for the duration of the drive home.
I stopped by Safeway to pick up some croutons for the Big Salad I envisioned for dinner. Croutons begat beets, and beets begat blue cheese. If you've not had roasted beets and blue cheese in a salad, you're cheating yourself.
I walked past the beverage case and noticed a new addition near the syrupy alcoholic concoctions: B to the E, a new Anheuser-Busch product for "contemporary adults" like me who are "looking for the latest beverage to keep up with their highly social and fast-paced lifestyles."
Granted, I hadn't read the A-B press release when I was strolling down the aisle, a sweaty T-shirt plastered to my back. In fact, I was quite dehydrated, and was amused to find that the beer I held in my clammy palm was infused with caffeine, guarana and ginseng.
Understand, my parents raised me to be bulletproof to the whims of Madison Avenue. I was chiefly encouraged to read books, but I was also permitted to watch as much television as I wanted with one caveat:
My parents would not buy me anything that I saw advertised on television.
As a result, I was inured to each pitch for sugary cereals, lawn darts and the like. As an adult, each time I bring home something whose praises have been sung by one marketing genius or another, it's an act of rebellion. I'm hopelessly over-saturated with the popular culture, as the phrase "marketing genius" forever evokes Seinfeld, as in, "Which marketing genius came up with that one?"
So, I disobeyed my parents, and now, I'm sitting here with a 10-oz. can of something. Wait, L just came in. This could be interesting.
"Close your eyes. I want you to taste something."
"What is it?"
The can pssshht! open, and I placed it in her hand. She smelled it deeply, then took a moderate sip. Her shayna punim morphed instantly into a sourpuss, eyes still dutifully squinted shut.
"Gack! What the hell is that?"
"You can open your eyes," I said, taking the can back. "B to the E. Red Bull meets Budweiser."
L grimaced still. "Damn, man. By the aroma, I thought I was getting Hansen's raspberry soda. Bleck."
"Sorry, sweetie." I felt badly, but her reaction was most amusing. She saw me smirk and grabbed for the can.
"Gimme that. One more sip to see if it's really disgusting, or it was just my imagination, running away with me."
She sniffed the can again as if she was huffing hops and barley, then took another sip. She smacked her lips and looked at me skeptically.
"Still weird, but not terrifying. That was scary." She handed the can back and went back to the bedroom to repair a server that'd been hacked by some no-goodniks in a Spanish-speaking nation.
The empty can is now in the recycling bin, and I feel neither buzzed nor a buzz. I won't be buying this swill again soon. But spending $1.59 to satisfy my artificially inflated curiosity and to see L make that face seems like a very good value.
Posted by Your Protagonist at February 16, 2005 11:35 PM