Pop-Culture

You know you are growing old when, you really don't care about the current pop-culture trends that everybody in New York and Hollywood are talking about. When you hear that a rap star has been shot and killed and upon hearing their stage name you say "Who?" Or you hear some teen-agers talking about a hot new music group, and it sounds like noise to you.

I often feel unattached to the current pop-culture. Especially when it comes to TV commercials. What the heck are they trying to advertise? What is the point of a commercial that you don't know what its is supposed to be for? Once you do figure out what they are selling you think "What does a dog peeing on the carpet have to do with Sony Televisions?" or something similarly silly. I saw a commercial that at first I didn't know what it was but then when the end graphic showed I realized the idea they were trying to get across, sort of. The commercial shows a beach with the tide going out, nothing is there, the tide comes in the tide goes back out and then you see what appears to be some footprints in the sand, the tide comes back in and then goes out again and the footprints are gone. Then a graphic comes up for the U.S. Navy Seals, so it was a recruiting ad. Huh?

No wonder people have no idea what is going on. Commercials don't make sense or they don't show what they are trying to advertise. Even during election years political campaign PSAs (Public Service Announcements) spend all their efforts in bashing the opposing candidate without mentioning why you should vote for the candidate the ad is supporting.

Another thing that really bugs me, and this is especially the practices of my local cable system not necessarily the individual television stations, is while watching one Network, you see the upcoming programing schedule ad for another Network. It doesn't make sense to the viewer, but it's all about selling ad time for the networks, and I suspect it is mostly the cable provider doing whatever they feel like doing.

If it weren't for the news and the fact that I am still interested in a few new TV shows, I'd abandon new television viewing for good and stick with my VHS tapes and DVDs.