The Super Bowl revisited

I had two thoughts about a blogpost on Super Bowl Sunday.

First was sit down and create an entirely new post that would have humor, pathos, and speak to sportsmanship and the game as a metaphor for life.

Second, I thought I could just recycle a post I'd already written and crack open a cold one.

Guess which one I chose?

I've written a few times about the Super Bowl, here and here for example. But there's another post I had about it, one that expresses a universality we can all relate to. That speaks to an experience we've all had and continue to have on a daily basis.

And most importantly, again, means I don't have to come up with a new one.

So have a seat and take a read. You'll laugh, you'll cry, you'll wonder where I came up with the phrase "toilet envy."

Please to enjoy.

Own a home, and you'll find yourself shopping for things you never shopped for before.

Like a new toilet.

Now, I've never been a toilet connoisseur. More of a journeyman really, just using whichever one happened to be available at the moment. You know, "the moment."

But my house has three bathrooms and four people, so the law of averages had to catch up eventually. Since the toilet in our master bathroom has decided to take a leak of it's own all over the floor every time it's flushed, it was time to aquaint myself with the plumbing section at Lowe's.

After some serious research, including what I'll call "faux test drives", this is the one that bowled me over. Yeah, I said it.

It's the Kohler Memoirs Comfort Height Toilet with Stately Design.

And why shouldn't a toilet be stately?

Now that I'm forced to actually give thought to it, turns out there are some things I don't like about the toilet I have, and some features I want in a new one.

For starters, I want one that feels like a La-Z-Boy recliner. Something comfortable. Something I can spend a lot of time on. After all, it's not just a toilet. It's also a reading chair.

One of the many reviews I've read said, "Looks good and flushes well." If only we could all say that about ourselves.

I also like the comfort height. I'm not potty training anymore, I've got it down pretty good. So I don't want to feel like I'm sitting on a trainer. And sometimes, those few seconds you save not having to situate yourself so far down make the difference between, well, they make the difference.

The only thing I don't like about this big, tall, comfortable crapper is the price. It's anywhere between $750. and $1000. depending where I buy it. Not including what it'll cost me to have it installed.

I feel a bit embarrassed about being so excited about this purchase. However that embarrassment is trumped by the cases of toilet envy I know I'll be creating once everyone who visits our house spends a little quality time with the new Kohler.

Toilet envy. Yeah, I said it.

What game?

I hear there's a game on today. Nah, I'm just messing with ya. I know today is the Super Bowl. Here's the thing: I don't care.

In fact, on of my list of five things I couldn't care less about, four of them are the Super Bowl.

It won't come as a surprise to anyone who knows me, despite my rigorous workout routine of Double-Double's and Neapolitan shakes, that I'm not the sports guy. I'm the movie guy. The theatre guy. The concert guy. The comedy club guy. The TV bingeing guy. The horse racing guy. The car racing guy. The "let's drop everything and go to Vegas" guy.

The football guy? Not so much.

My feeling is every year, Super Bowl Sunday is the best day to do anything else. Between 3:30pm and 7pm, you'll never have a better day to go shopping at the mall. See a movie. Go to Disneyland. Try that restaurant you can never get reservations at. Traffic is non-existent. Crowds disappear. And parking is plentiful.

Of course, because I'm in advertising, there's pressure and a certain amount of obligation to watch the Super Bowl commercials. Every year, ever since the brilliant, industry-changing, Ridley Scott directed Apple 1984 spot, clients blow a shit-ton (technical term) of cash on their Super Bowl spots.

There's a lot of creativity on display. But that's also a lot of cash that could've been better spent much more effectively in any number of different ways. Or maybe not as effectively. As one of my creative colleagues at the agency told me, "Do you have any idea how many banner ads no one looks at that kind of money could buy?"

As I write this, it's about an hour and a half into the game. Here's my take so far:

The Doritos/Mountain Dew spot with Peter Dinklage and Morgan Freeman in a lip-synced rap battle is pretty fun.

The Tide series of spots, with Stranger Things David Harbour show a surprising amount of creativity for a brand not known for it with the premise every ad is a Tide ad.

The Pringles spot with Bill Hader tries way too hard to recreate the success of "Wasssupp!" from a few years ago, only now the word is "Wow!" I think the word is "Yawn."

The Australian Tourism spot with Danny McBride and Chris Hemsworth was going along nicely, until the shot of original Crockadile Dundee star Paul Hogan, who's 78-years old and looks every second of it 'mate.

I'm not offended easily, but in what I believe will be a monumental backfire I'm fairly certain Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. never intended his voice and words to be used selling Dodge RAM trucks.

Obviously I haven't seen them all yet, but I can already tell you my favorite, whether I like it or not, will be the one my agency did (Team player, hello?)

Super Bowl is also where the studios break out trailer premieres for their most anxiously awaited films. It's a testimony to the enormously talented Ron Howard—who was brought in after original directors Phil Lord and Chris Miller were fired with only weeks to go in production—that the Stars Wars movie Solo looks unbelievably awesome.

Who couldn't use a movie where dinosaurs are running amok—again. Thankfully, Juraissic World Fallen Kingdom looks like it's going to fill that vacuum just swell.

Towering Inferno pedigreed Skyscraper with Dwayne Johnson looks like a few hours of mindless fun (just like my high school girlfriend).

That's all I have for now. I'm going to get back to not watching the game and thinking of unencumbered places I can go for the next two hours while it's on.

Right after I don't watch the Justin Timberlake halftime show.

Watered down

Like the lawn in a torrential downpour, or cocktails at the craps table in Las Vegas, ideas for Super Bowl spots from advertising agencies—like the people who create them—are often not what they start out to be.

For a lot of creatives, the Super Bowl spot is the Holy Grail, the pinnacle, the showcase where you can either make your mark and launch into a career arc filled with money, location shoots, media girls (another time) and a title too long to fit on the puny business cards you'll never carry.

Or it can be a spectacular flop seen by a billion people and sink you faster than the Quizno's Spongmonkeys—which by the way I think is awesome and one of my favorite commercials ever. Call me crazy, but I admire the bravery of it all. Just try not singing the tune after you've seen it.

I know, right?

Anyway, there are a few rules about the annual Super Bowl assignment that seem fairly universal no matter what agency you're at. First is the freelancer's spot never gets chosen, even if it does. No agency hands the biggest boondoggle and budget of the year to the freelancers to produce. And if their spot is picked, it's—take your pick: refined, evolved, massaged—just enough for them not to be able to claim it as their own.

Next, you would think that since the date of the Super Bowl is known over a year in advance, agencies would give themselves enough lead time to concept, sell and produce the spot they really want to make. Not so much. Virtually every agency starts working on their Super Bowl spot late in the game. Then it's a mad rush to meet the goal, with everyone hoping they don't fumble.

Ok, I'm done now.

Finally, just to prove God does have a sense of humor, it's almost always the team who couldn't care less about sports who has the winning spot. Then they have to go through the entire ordeal, pretending they're interested in the game and that they have a favorite team.

Sometimes, even though it's a score (sorry) to get your Super Bowl spot sold, it takes almost more than you can muster to get motivated to see it through.

But to quote Don Draper, "That's what the money's for."