I recently got cable hooked up in my home office, which is both a huge productivity drain and completely awesome, as I can now watch unlimited Cops reruns and classic Family Feuds while I work — if by “can,” you mean “must.” The only drawback: I don’t have a DVR hooked up to the office TV. I’ll get around to moving the TiVo in here, eventually, but I haven’t done that yet, so instead of recording all the awesomeness and watching it later sans commercials, I watch it live. With commercials. And as other consumers of daytime digital cable can attest, the further up the dial you get channel-number-wise, the more deeply and depressingly pathetic the advertising. TNT is rocking the diapers and the Sunny D on Channel 3, and then up around Court TV (23) it starts to get a little wobbly with a lot of Mickey Rooney and contraptions you put on your banister so you don’t have to climb stairs, and by the time you get to the nexus of channels where I spend most of my time during the average afternoon — SoapNet and GSN in the low one-hundreds — it’s wall-to-wall Red Skelton and Ron Popeil.

And let me just say right now, I think Ron Popeil is a total genius, and I love gadgets, and if I lived like a normal grown-up in a big-girl-size house, I would have whole closetfuls of As Seen On TViana — a Rotato, Hair In A Can in every bathroom, a Ginsu knife with a Bedazzled handle. I cannot count how many times I ran into the kitchen during a Brady Bunch commercial break all, “Okay, Ma?” “No, I won’t order you a Ginsu knife.” “But Ma. It cuts. CANS. You could cut a can.” “What do I need to cut cans for? What, we’re goats now?” “Ma, but, but it could cut a can.” “But it wouldn’t, and it won’t.” “But –” “No.” “But if you threw a tomato in the air, you could –” “I said no.”

I still kind of want a Ginsu knife so I can hack open a Diet Coke can and sort of get closure on the whole thing, because back then I just could not understand how my mother didn’t see the brilliance of a knife so sharp that it could cut cans. Her resistance to the Salad Shooter: equally baffling. “Ma, okay –” “No.” “But it fires the cucumbers onto the –” “No.” I just did not get it. Why settle for boringly slicing the cucumber and then boringly sliding it onto the already-boring salad when you could shoot the cucumber onto the salad all Hong Kong-stylee — or, better yet, allow your pesty, spendy, easily-led child to do so? I could have Salad Shot all day, man. I could have killed a thousand carrots and never shed a tear. I could have made dinner into a Western. Never got the chance.

Of course, you get older and you realize why your mom would never buy you that shit. “But Ma. It’s COD, right? So I’ll just pay for it with my allowance, when the…when it’s the D? When it gets he–” “No.” It’s because you just don’t need most of it. You use it once, it’s kind of cool, but then it’s just easier, usually, to do it the old way — you can reach down into the back of the cabinet behind that waffle iron with the novelty shapes that your aunt regifted to you a few years ago, which nobody ever uses for the same reason, and dig out the Salad Shooter and fire off a few julienne rounds, and then take the thing apart and clean all the teeny parts, blah blah, or you can just grab a knife and do the same thing in less time with less clean-up. You also, in some cases, move to large cities where dwelling space is at a premium, and you can use one or two knives for everything, or you can build a shed on the roof to house all your kitchen gadgets — come on. God gave you a perfectly good Cheese Sandwicher in the form of your hands.

So, you know, I get it, and whenever I fantasize about getting my very own Citrus Express, I remember how heavy the average juicer is, how much space it took up, how seldom I used the old one…I’ll just have to squeeze the oranges with my hands and strain the seeds with my teeth until I live in a big old McMansion.

But that, I would still buy. I would buy a Citrus Express, I would buy a Perfect Omelet — I don’t need those things, and in fact on some level I think they contribute to the decline of American civilization by not only making things too easy for us to do, but also by implying that any effort or difficulty at all, in doing anything, is too much. You sort of see it in the Bush administration, like, wah, it’s too hard to enforce environmental regulations — let’s not bother! It’s too hard to teach kids to read and figure out a cure for AIDS — let’s lay organizations do it! It’s too hard to get up on a chair and whack a spider with a rolled-up magazine, and then clean the spider juice off the wall with a sponge and pick that one clinging leg off the drywall — let’s buy a Spider Fighter or a Bug Wand and do it that way instead! So I kind of don’t approve of these gewgaws, and yet I definitely don’t approve of spiders or of any extended dealings with them that involve me in any way, so I probably would never buy one for myself, but I would totally accept a Bug Wand from someone else, as a gift, and if a friend of mine got one, I would totally covet it. I would not understand why we as a society need both a Bug Wand and a Spider Fighter — can’t you just wand the arachnids too? — but still.

Some of these gadgets, though, I would never buy and do not understand the need for, even when the announcer explains it to me in the tones usually reserved for the news of a healthy baby’s arrival, because, again, I understand lazy, and I understand clever, and I understand “ooh, shiny!” — nobody understands it better than I. But certain gadgets, it’s like, hey, this will save you time and make your life easier, which is such an American thing in terms of both instant gratification and a near-OCD-level need to do everything really quickly — but then, when you really think about the gadget in question, it doesn’t really save you time, it isn’t that much easier than the current mode of doing whatever kitchen or housework task, and a perfectly serviceable solution already exists. An example both egregious and nauseating: The Butter Dispenser. The Butter Dispenser purports to solve a number of butter-related problems, namely that 1) your butter is too hard, in both senses of that word, to spread; 2) your butter plate is messy and gross; 3) your children find the application of butter, peanut or otherwise, to toast quite boring.

Um. What? You just…take the butter out when you put the toast in the toaster, so it softens up. Then you cut it thin enough that it melts, wait ten seconds, and spread it. I’m not the most patient person in the world but even I never had that much of an issue with non-spreadable butter…and the thing is, we have spreadable butter. It’s called Parkay and it’s right there next to the stick butter in the dairy aisle. I also don’t recall ever looking at the butter plate and going, “Ew,” except maybe after the whole family rolled corn on the cob through the stick, in which case you just…chucked the stick and put a fresh stick on a fresh…plate? I mean, what do other people do with their butter, exactly, that the butter plate is so nasty? And the “kids will love spreading butter!” thing? If I had observed to my mother that I really needed more excitement in my toast-condimenting routine, she would have drowned me in the sink. Toast is its own reward, folks — parents don’t have enough to worry about with the cost of a college education, now they have to manage their child’s breakfast-food stimulation levels?

And furthermore, just how much butter do people use, anyway? That diagram is…well, it makes the butter look like poo in a couple of those graphics, but as a huge butter fan myself, even I am going to draw the line well before “more butter than bread.”

Y’all. You have a butter dispenser. It’s called “a knife,” and you’ll find several dozen of them in drawers around your home. Come on now.

But the madness has only just begun.

Product: The Centerpiece Gourmet
Problem “solved” by product: Inability of many consumers to craft realistic flower arrangements out of foodstuffs ranging from Asiago to zucchini
Pre-existing solution to “problem”: Knife (see: Butter Dispenser); actual flower arrangement; book club or other human contact.

This isn’t so much a “why would you need this” thing, since obviously nobody needs to make radish daisies. If you like to do kitschy stuff like that with your food, great, more power to you, but if you have to get so good at it that you’re going to bring in outside help? It’s the difference between having an ice sculpture at your wedding reception, which is kind of cool, and learning to sculpt ice from a DVD you bought online, which is kind of scary.

Product: Meatball Magic
Problem “solved” by product: Time-consuming aspect of home meatball manufacture; frustrating uniqueness of meatballs, leading to inexact cooking times
Pre-existing solution to “problem”: Ice-cream scoop; therapy

Here again we see the “but it’s food” principle at work. Yes, a radish rosette is attractive. But in the end, it’s going to get chewed up and digested and wind up as poo. Not to rain on the collective parade of people who care about food presentation — a well-laid-out plate is lovely, I always admire them in restaurants, it’s not insignificant. But there is a line between caring about how the food is presented and obsessing over whether every meatball is identical, the line is not fine, and you should not cross it.

And this particular gadget does not appear to save the user any time in the second place. You have to flatten out your meat wad to fit the Meatball Magic, and then you do the cutouts, and then — then what? Because you’ve got the leftover meat, so you’ll have to hand-shape that anyway, right? And then you’ve got to clean the contraption? Seriously, just use an ice-cream scoop, or your hands. I don’t eat meatballs anymore, alas, but when I did, not once did I notice the size or the shape or the uniformity of the cooking. I noticed the quality of the chuck and what spices were used. Those aspects of meatballery, feel free to overthink. The size? Please. Get on with your day.

Product: The Buttoneer
Problem “solved” by product: Threading a needle is hard and takes too long and causes injuries
Pre-existing solution to “problem”: Needle and thread; bifocals; thimble

I can see buying this product if you suffer from arthritis, I guess, although The Buttoneer is operated by squeezing, so I don’t know how much better that is for avoiding that, versus just sewing. And again, in the time it takes to figure out how to use it, you could just thread a needle and have done with it. Sewing has, I think, a disproportionately intimidating reputation, but ninety percent of the sewing you do, or need done, is reattaching buttons and hemming. Neither of those things is hard — if I can do them? Not hard. A thimble is 99 cents. Hemming you can do with the Sewing Genie, which is legitimately rad.

Product: The Gopher
Problem “solved” by product: Stuff is hard to reach
Pre-existing solution to “problem”: Stepladders; sucking it up

Another one that’s probably for older folks, which is fine, but if you believe that it’s really “precise enough to pick up a paper clip,” please back away from the stupid. I sort of want to buy one of these for when the cats go under the bed and won’t come out, but mostly, I think the solution for reaching things on high shelves is probably to buy a sturdy stepladder, or to store things you use often lower down. Because I can see a lot of cans of chickpeas slipping out of the suction grips and bonking a lot of heads. It’s not all that dumb; it is kind of sad; mostly it just doesn’t look like it works very well.

Product: The Mouthwash Dispenser
Problem “solved” by product: Having to hide “that ugly, old mouthwash bottle”
Pre-existing solution to “problem”: Cabinetry; remembering that it’s a bathroom

There is, I am certain, a thesis in American consumer society’s frank fear of/refusal to acknowledge what really goes on in the bathroom. Toilet-paper cozies…scented plug-ins…bleach-soaked towelettes…it’s like those ads for the Clorox Toilet-Cleaning System or whatever where the lady is staring all horrified at her toilet brush, like, it’s a toilet brush. Unless you’re using it to stir pancake batter, who cares how germy it is? It’s used to clean the place where people pee, shit, and barf, okay? Find a way to live with it already, my God.

Anyway…I have a “Clorox toilet-cleaning system” of my own: dump Clorox in bowl; scrub with toilet brush; flush; wash hands. Nothing to it. Same deal with The Mouthwash Dispenser. It came with a dispenser. It’s called “the bottle.” It’s in the bathroom, not rubbing shoulders with the Ming vases in the parlor, for chrissake. If your guests get offended by a mouthwash bottle, either invite less uptight guests over or remind them that you could have left the Kaopectate out on the sink, because: bathroom.

I mean, truly. Porcelain cups? Who’s fighting bad breath at your house, the Queen of England?

Product: The Ove Glove
Problem “solved” by product: Burns suffered during flambé…? Not sure, actually
Pre-existing solution to “problem”: …Oven…mitts? Right?

The Ove Glove is a strange one, because the only reason you might need one is not really the reason they use to market it — the copy is focused on The OG’s ability to withstand temperature extremes during grilling, flambé, et cetera. It’s made with Kevlar, so, fine. But a standard-issue oven mitt or pot holder is all you need, really — what do they think people cook, iron ore?

But The OG is more flexible than most oven mitts; you can grip pot handles better, which is handy. They don’t really mention that, though, in the ad — just set the shit on fire with someone’s hand in it. Okay, but…so? Unless your hand model is frying up some rebar, I don’t see the point of this item.

Product: OWL Optical Wallet Light
Problem “solved” by product: Hard-to-read menus, phone keypads, and so on
Pre-existing solution to “problem”: Eyeglasses; proper lighting; reality

It’s a magnifying glass with one of those press-’em purse-flashlight things stuck on it. That’s it. When I can’t read a menu, I use a little doodad I call GED: Goddamn EYE DOCTOR.

Either that, or snag one of those drugstore pairs of bifocals at Walgreen’s. It’s cheaper than the OWL anyway.

Product: The Spountin
Problem “solved” by product: Faucets in home not enough like water fountains
Pre-existing solution to “problem”: Live in park, elementary school, or other public facility; get a life

Why? Why would you want this? You crank it on your faucets, and the water comes up in a water-fountain loop instead of streaming straight down. Fine. Someone invented that and patented it. It doesn’t mean anyone needs it.

“Well, what about when you have a really tall skinny vase and you can never quite get the water –” Okay, good point. But do you think that’s the primary selling point in the ad? No. The primary selling point is that it’s easier to take pills now that you don’t have to crane your fat head all the way down into the sink and drink out of the faucet anymore.

I’m not joking. Evidently, the practice of running an inch of water into a freakin’ glass is not as widespread as I’d thought. I mean…Jesus. What did people do before The Spountin, throw a couple Advil into their mouths and then lap up water from the bidet? OPEN. A. SODA. MY GAAHHHD.

And you know how you fill those vases? You put water in…a glass. And you pour the water from the glass into the vase. It takes thirty seconds. It takes a lot longer to fix the plumbing you fuck up when you try to attach the Spountin, which The Spountineers deny will happen, but it will. Nowhere is the potential for user error greater, it seems to me, than with an ASOTV product.

Product: Hairagami (see also: Part-Pizazz; Topsy Tail)
Problem “solved” by product: Difficulty in styling own hair beyond simple ponytail or bun
Pre-existing solution to “problem”: Practicing; buying a brush; pomade; a short bob (Tomato Nation approved!)

Aside from the misspelled word in the product’s name, the Part-Pizazz is the most egregiously “huh” in the ASOTV hairstyling family. Dudes: A comb is, like, fifteen cents. If you want to go nuts with the parts specifically, get a pick; it’s maybe two bucks.

Hairagami and Topsy Tail seem kind of like the same product; none of the hairstyles shown is anything I couldn’t do myself with a couple of teeny claw clips and enough gel. Long hair is a bigger pain in the ass, but that’s why I get to shoulder-length, give up, and chop it off. Life’s too short to call 800 numbers for help with your ‘do.

Product: Nipple Covers
Problem “solved” by product: Nipple-itis
Pre-existing solution to “problem”: A delightful widget known to the French as “le brassiere”

A bra is actually more expensive than the nipple covers, but has the added benefit of lifting, separating, supporting, and not being an eleven on the one-to-Federline trashy scale.

“But you can use them to prevent nipburn during topless sunbathing!” Please kill yourself. Thank you.

Product: Bow Lingual: The Dog Translator
Problem “solved” by product: Mysteries of canine communication
Pre-existing solution to “problem”: Guessing; feeding

Okay, seriously, how hard is it to figure out what your dog is barking about? She’s hungry, she’s happy to see you, she saw a cat or another dog, she thinks someone’s breaking into the house, or someone stepped on her tail. She’s not trying to tell you some shit about Fellini films, okay? You don’t need to spend a hundred bucks on a gadget that tells you she wants to eat cat poo.

And speaking of cats, you’ll notice that they don’t have an analogous product for the felines. I’ll let you draw your own conclusions.

Product: FM Radio Pen
Problem “solved” by product: Failure of writing implements to rock out
Pre-existing solution to “problem”: iPod; imagination; loss of virginity

Just because you CAN put a radio in a pen doesn’t mean you should, or need to.

April 18, 2005

Share!