Friday, July 31, 2009

from the "advertising that makes you go ewww!" dept.

What do murder, pedophilia, suicide and a baby tiger have in common? They have all been used to sell stuff in these amazingly disturbing vintage ads!

These are real, untouched advertisements from the good old days. It doesn't matter if it's lovely ladies or adorable clowns, somehow these old-time ad wizards found ways to traumatize us while peddling everyday products.

Enjoy them now, call your therapist later!

15. White Bread Demon
"Bread is swell, but what I'm really excited about is eating jelly made from the blood of the innocent!"


14. French Suicide Sausage
It's enough to make you want to eat Kosher forever.


13. A Girl Around The House
It's nice to have a girl around the house... especially if you are a psychopath serial killer who makes women into rugs!


12. Chubby
Who needs self-esteem when you can have a free fashion book for chubbies? Also, proving that advertising weight representation has always been screwed up, the girl pictured is totally not chubby.


11. Christmas Weapons
The family that guns together, has funs together.


10. Eye patch. Shirt. Baby Tiger
Sexy?


9. Chase & Sandborn Spanking
She totally deserves it. Seriously, what kind of woman doesn't "store test" for fresher coffee?


8. Fry's Chocolate Nightmare
Nothing wants to make consumers buy chocolate more than 5 faces of a sickly kid looking 5 different shades of miserable.


7. Root Beer Baby!
Mama, please DO NOT give your baby another glass of Root Beer. It is clearly doing something horrible to him. He is terrifying.


6. Locked Out
You better wash out your privates with Lysol, or your husband will install cartoon locks on the door.


5. Pears Soap Disaster
"Pears Soap- now with such a soothing lather, you won't notice that your baby has gotten into a horrible accident!"


4. Postage Meter Murder
"Is it always illegal to kill a woman?" This is a truly important question and makes us want to buy a new postage meter.


3. Shave Yourself
The old man baby's gonna sing karaoke into a razor! Hooray!


2. Baby Soft
JonBenét Ramsey, eat your heart out. (Too soon?) This ad makes us want to scream, gouge out our eyes and then barf.


1. Chocolate Poulain
Drink that cocoa, or this clown will murder you in your sleep.



Originally posted on Retrocomedy.com, Weirdomatic, Livejournal & the fabulous Plan 59!
http://www.plan59.com/main.htm
And a tip of the hat to: Jason Hendeles

from the "Jeremy Clarkson's got beat" dept.

BBC's automotive programme Top Gear is, without a doubt, my favourite show. It features amazing cars and some of the funniest stunts imaginable -- like their epic specials that take the viewer to places like Viet Nam (by scooter) and the North Pole (by truck).

Jeremy Clarkson, the show's lead host, is one witty fellow. But he's also got rhythm, as shown in Swede Mason's mash-up called Jeremy Clarkson Beatbox.

Enjoy:

Tuesday, July 28, 2009

from the "Shatner does Palin" dept.

Sarah Palin quit. Her goodbye speech made no sense -- until William Shatner got a hold of it. He realized what we missed: It was poetry.



Cheers!

Monday, July 27, 2009

from the "milestone" dept.

Another milestone for Roadspill today -- this is the 2000th post. That's a lot of blather and ego-centrism over the past six years. Thanks for reading!

Meantime, here's a nice timelapse of "A Day in Vancouver." It was created using still images from the amazing katkam.ca webcam. The day in question was July 25, 2009 and ended with an amazing sunset, huge thunderstorm and the Celebration of Light fireworks competition.

Watch:



Way to make me miss home.

Cheers!

Sunday, July 26, 2009

from the "video on demand" dept.

A tip of the hat to MN for the following two amazing videos.

The first from what must have been the most fun wedding ever:



And the second... well... just watch:



Cheers!

Friday, July 24, 2009

from the "linkfest" dept.

Some interesting stuff from the world of the internets for July 24:

The crisis in Honduras continues: The de-facto government has imposed a curfew along its border with Nicaragua in response to threats from deposed President Manuel Zelaya to return to Honduras via a land crossing.

Swine flu is getting scary again.

Business interests in Russia want the government to clamp down on Skype.

In New Zealand, a pissed off bank customer withdraws $190,000 in $20s. But the money ends up back at the same bank.

And finally,
do-gooders deny a five-legged dog a career in entertainment. Bastards!

Happy Weekend!

Tuesday, July 21, 2009

from the "leaving the scene" dept.

This NASA image shows a large impact near Jupiter's southern pole.
Ka-blam!


CNN is reporting (July 21/09) that a mysterious impact has left an Earth-sized mark on Jupiter.


"Jupiter is sporting a new scar after an unseen object hit the gaseous planet this week, NASA scientists say.

An amateur astronomer in Australia noticed the new mark -- seen through telescopes as a dark spot -- on the planet early Monday and tipped off scientists at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) in Pasadena, California, who then confirmed it was the result of a new impact, NASA said."

The rest of the story is here.

Thursday, July 16, 2009

Workin' Man


Workin' Man
Originally uploaded by borderfilms (Doug).

More pictures from last year's visit to Ukraine are now on Flickr. Click the farmer or, the Flickr link to the right.

Cheers!

Friday, July 10, 2009

from the "earache my eye" dept.


The little bastards!

Sometimes, when the extraneous noise is loud enough, I use a pair of in-the-ear headphones with my radio, computer and/or television. They're comfortable and really isolate the outside world.

My pair has little rubber ends on each bud. These are removable and interchangeable with other little rubber ends to ensure the perfect fit.

The other night I was isolating myself from the outside world and didn't realize that when I pulled the headphones out, one of the rubber ends remained in my ear. I didn't feel anything in there until I went to bed. I usually wear earplugs at night and when I jammed in the right one, I noticed that it a) didn't go in as far as the left and b) hurt like bleedin' hell.

I went to sleep.

The next morning I noticed that my ear still hurt and that one of the tips was missing from the headphones. Oh oh.

I poked around with my finger. Nothing. I poked around with a Q-tip. Nothing. I poked around with some tweezers (BAD idea). Nothing.

Maybe the tip fell to the floor?

Later that day I was at the pool and had someone, armed with a flashlight, look in my ear canal. They couldn't find anything -- not even my brain.

About a week later the ear felt weird. When I swam, the water would take longer to drain. And there was still occasional pain.

This morning I went to the local clinic and had a Spanish speaking doctor have a look. This wasn't as easy as it sounds.

ME: Mi espanol poco.

DR.: (Something in Spanish)

ME: Headphono in my ear-o.

DR.: (More in Spanish)

ME: Del oido... auditivo... auricular...

I then pulled out my headphones and did a pantomime to try and explain my predicament. Being an educated man, the doctor soon realized what I was going on about. He took his little ear flashlight thingie and peered deep into my head.

DR.: Tsk, tsk, tsk.

Now, I may not understand much Spanish, but I certainly could translate what he was saying: "What in the hell does this idiot have jammed in his ear? What is he? Four?"

At least it wasn't a gerbil.

Then he had me lie down and roll over. I waited for the snap of a rubber glove. And with little warning he inserted some sort of spreading device into my head, followed by a disconcertingly large pair of tweezery things.

He dug around for a while and I pretended it didn't hurt -- which was easy, because it didn't

After a few minutes of poking around and tsk-tsk-tsking, he pulled a small circle of rubber out. So it WAS in there.

I shrugged and thanked the good doctor. He charged me 150 Guatemalan Quetzals ($21) and sent me on my way with a prescription for ear drops -- to ward off any infection.

And I learned a lesson: Ear canal headphones suck and any removable tips should be Superglued in place. I also learned that San Pedro has a great clinic.

Just another day in paradise...

Cheers!

Saturday, July 04, 2009

New Photos!


Pose
Originally uploaded by borderfilms (Doug).

I've posted some new photos of Guatemala over on flickr. Click the link to the right. Or the image.

Cheers!