Wrinkly Finger Freakout

The guy who invented the bath probably celebrated by running a nice hot bath and sitting back to contemplate how fricken clever he was. I am guessing becasue it was the first bath anyone on the planet had ever taken that the inventor stayed in there a while and that would have lead to wrinkly finger. Bet he freaked out. Bet he thought that his bath invention also doulbled a some kind of super fast ageing device. Bet he jumped right out, probably forgetting to wrap a towel round him and ran to his wife crying like a baby. 10 minutes later the wrinkles would have faded away and thing would have been back to normal leaving our bath boy feeling like a right wally.
But those 10 minutes would have been the longest of his life.

The faulty jumping penis and other plastic tales.

I saw these day glow giant shrimp salad servers the other day in one of those gift shops rich husbands let their wives start up to give them something to do. The salad servers were made in China. It got me thinking about the guy who makes them. What does he tell people he does for a job. He wouldn’t say, “I make day glow salad servers shaped like giant shrimps.” He would sound like a dick. He probably says, “I’m in the plastics industry”, or “Manufacturing” or “The food service industry”.
But I bet the guy that makes the Manchester United salad servers tells everyone he is making Manchester United salad servers. They love football in Chine. He would be a star. He’d be the popular guy at the party. People would want to try and be friends with him in the hope he would give them a set. Maybe the two salad server guys work in the same factory and in keeping with the old communist tradition of rewarding the hardest workers, the hardest workers get to work on the coolest stuff.
Dressing the spice girl reunion tour dolls would be a popular gig. So would working on the Bratz doll production line. Or the My Little Pony Lunch Box with built in water bottle production line. The most unpopular job would be taking the sharp bits of plastic off the Chinese communist party headquarters Lunchroom chopsticks.
No one wants to see a pair of those in their Xmas stocking. “Hey kids look what I bought you home from the plastic factory. Chopsticks”. In Chinese plastic factory worker lingo this kind of job is called ‘Sucky sucky’.
How about the x rated plastic products. What if you worked on the production line that turns out those little wind up jumping penises? How would you explain that to your mum?
I guess you would say you work in the novelty section of the factory. Would there be a tester for a product like that. A person who winds up jumping cocks all day? What kind of parameter would they have for pass and fail? Would the penis have to hop a certain distance to qualify for a pass? What if it doesn’t? Does it go in the jumping penis reject box? Does the box go in the lunchroom with a sign that says ‘Reject jumping penises. Help yourself’. Maybe the guy from the chopstick production line grabs a couple and inserts chopsticks in them and tells friends they are mobile chopstick holders. Might not be as warmly received as a set of Man U salad servers but it would get a few laughs.

Do you know how to test-drive a bar?

I took a bar for a test drive last night. The Level Lounge. It is opening on the roof of the hotel she works for here in Abu Dhabi. It has no roof so I suggested they use the line ‘Abu Dhabi’s first topless bar,’ but no one thought that was a good idea.
Being in advertising I get to trial new products all the time. Once I did a photo shoot with a brand new Jag. It wasn’t really a trial of the product I was just supposed to drive it to the shoot in the morning but I took it to Hamilton and back just to see what it could do… over 145 kmh as it turns out. Test-driving a bar is more fun because essentially you are just out drinking, but it is free. But it’s not all free booze and bulshit… well it is mostly, but there are some tests you have put the bar through. For instance, I put my beer bottle down directly on the bar top and not on the coaster. But this infringement was spotted within the international standard of 8 sec and the offending bottle was placed back on the coaster by a staff member.
International bar rules dictate that after ordering the same drink from the same bar tender or waitress 4 times they should know it without being told. The staff at the level lounge had me figured within 2 drinks, but just to make sure I had to order more than 4 drinks from every staff member and there were a lot of staff. Happy to say they all passed with flying colors. Last night was what my wife called ‘the soft launch’ when she told me that I was worried that they would only be serving soft drinks but they didn’t. Tonight is what my wife calls the ‘VIP Launch’. If my wife thinks I am going to put up with another night sitting on the roof of a hotel on shiny new beanbags drinking free booze and listening to good beats then she is spot on. Not because of the free booze but because I support her 100%, and if that means testing things out for her then I am up for it. Anything but her cooking.

The 2-minute noodle conspiracy

I remember when 2-minute noodles hit the streets in New Zealand in the 80’s. Literally. Maggi put them in letterboxes in my neighborhood. That was one of the perks of living in a middle class ghetto like Pakuranga. People were always sticking stuff in your letterbox for your mum or dad to try. Mostly mum. We got a lot of fabric softener. Although they’re completely lacking in nutritional value, 2-minute noodles tick 2 of the more important food group boxes. They’re cheap and fast. But have you ever wondered why they are still 2-minute noodles? Are you telling me that over the last 25 years they haven’t developed the technology to shave a few seconds off the preparation time? Look at the 100 meters record since the 80’s? Now I’m not saying they should put steroids in the noodles but I cant believe in this modern, time poor age, that the two-minute noodle industries resources haven’t been focused on reducing the time factor. Or have they?
Rumor has it that a backyard inventor came up with a simple way of turning 2 minute noodles into 1 minute noodles. What happened to this new noodle? It was bought by one of the big 2-minute noodle manufacturers and hidden away. Why? Because the 2-minute noodle magnates want to keep you dependant on their product and avoid the costly expense of changing all the packaging from 2-minute noodles to 1-minute noodles. And they are banking on the fact that most of the people that reach for their product are drunk and don’t stop to think that they could be getting their noodles faster. But can we afford not to? We are all conscious of global warming these days. Think how much warming the pot on the stove with the water for the noodles is responsible for. Now imagine if we halved that? That’s right, 1 minute noodles could halve global warming instantly. When you realise that you understand we cant afford not to have 1-minute noodles in the kitchen.