Uncle John’s Supremely Satisfying Bathroom Reader® (61 page)

Answers:

1) b; 2) c; 3) o; 4) g; 5) k; 6) n; 7) d; 8) m; 9) i; 10) h; 11) j; 12) f; 13) l; 14) e; 15) p; 16) a

For more info about the answers, see
page 511
.

Ladybugs are named after the Virgin Mary; they used to be called “beetles of Our Lady.”

We know
—
with a title like this one, you can’t help yourself…you have to read them. They really are disgusting, but, well, now you have something to share as dinner conversation.

• The average human foot has about 20,000 sweat glands and can produce as much as half a cup of sweat each day.

• Cockroaches can flatten themselves almost to the thinness of a piece of paper in order to slide into tiny cracks, can be frozen for weeks and then thawed with no ill effect, and can also withstand 126 g’s of pressure with no problem (people get squished at 18 g’s).

• Most of the dust in your house is made up of dead human skin cells—every day, millions of them float off your body and settle on furniture and floors.

• The average municipal water treatment plant processes enough human waste every day to fill 72 Olympic-sized swimming pools.

• According to a recent survey, over 10% of Americans have picked someone else’s nose.

• Tears are made up of almost the exact same ingredients as urine.

• Most people generally fart between 10 and 20 times a day, expelling enough gas to inflate a small balloon.

• Your mouth slows production of bacteria-fighting saliva when you sleep, which allows the 10 billion bacteria in your mouth to reproduce all night; “morning breath” is actually bacterial B.O.

• Leeches have mouths with three sets of jaws and between 60 to 100 teeth.

• A tapeworm can grow to a length of 30 feet inside human intestines.

• The crusty goop you find in your eyes when you wake up is the exact same mucus you find in your nose—boogers.

• Spiders don’t eat their prey; they paralyze the victim with venom, vomit a wad of acidic liquid onto them, and then drink the dissolved body.

• The average person will produce 25,000 quarts of saliva in a lifetime—enough to fill up two swimming pools.

Three out of every 4 creatures living on Earth are insects.

The 30-second TV spot ain’t what it used to be. So sneaky TV executives are doing whatever they can to make sure we get the advertising message. This piece by Terry Lefton first appeared in the
Industry Standard
on March 26, 2001.

It was a bad night for Ogakor. In the fifth episode of the CBS TV phenomenon
Survivor: The Australian Outback,
the remaining members of the hapless “tribe” competed to win a crate full of luxuries like toilet paper, blankets, spices, shampoo, and toothpaste, but lost out to rival tribe Kucha. “I am getting very frustrated,” said Ogakor member Colby Donaldson. “If we don’t turn up the heat and turn this runaway train around, there may be a meltdown for the Colbster.”

So, while the metaphor-happy Colbster was off under a eucalyptus tree bumming, Kucha was celebrating. Its members descended on the box of goodies. Painted on the crate was a huge red bull’s-eye, the unmistakable logo of one of the show’s main sponsors, Target.

Welcome to the future of television advertising, where old-fashioned commercial breaks are giving way to experiments in “product integration”—advertisers paying to place their goods into the plots of TV shows. Target’s campaign on
Survivor
is just one example. AT&T shows up on
Who Wants to Be a Millionaire,
Campbell’s Soup made a high-profile appearance on daytime chat-fest
The View
(co-hosts Meredith Vieira, Star Jones, Joy Behar, and Lisa Ling sang the product’s theme song). Corona beer appears on
Blind Date.
And later this month,
The Drew Carey Show
will devote a two-minute interlude to the video game SimCity. (The gang will be transported to a virtual metropolis. Cue laugh track.)

Advertisers and TV networks are pushing their marketing messages right into the heart of the programming for one simple reason: Technology is making traditional commercials obsolete. With hundreds of cable and satellite channels, viewers have more reason than ever to surf during commercial breaks. Recording technologies
like TiVo and ReplayTV enable couch potatoes to zap commercial breaks altogether. And before long, viewers will be able to order their favorite programs on demand. It will be the death blow to traditional commercial breaks. “If the audience isn’t watching your messages, marketers will put them in places where they will,” says Brett Shevack, president of Wolf Group New York, an ad agency whose clients include
Space.com
and Häagen-Dazs.

Lobsters and jellyfish never stop growing.

If all this seems vaguely familiar, it should. In the early days of television, advertisers sponsored whole programs, and their products got plugs throughout each show.
The Camel Cavalcade of News
doesn’t seem so far-off anymore. “TV partnerships are changing,” says Mark Owens, senior VP at entertainment marketing agency Davie-Brown. “We’re going back to more of a 1950s model as marketers look to find places for messages viewers can’t zap.”

Survivor
is the poster child for this trend. Every advertiser that buys airtime in the top-rated show’s commercial breaks also gets prime placement in the program.
Survivor
contestants munch Doritos, guzzle Mountain Dew, wear Reebok sneakers, and win prizes from Budweiser, Dr. Scholl’s, Pontiac, and Visa.

The strategy works especially well for targeting the ultimate jaded consumers: teenagers. “Some contestants were really admiring our apparel and footwear on camera,” says John Wardley, Reebok’s VP of global advertising. “That’s the kind of exposure you just can’t buy.”

Well, actually, you can. Like the other
Survivor
sponsors, Reebok negotiated its product placement in the show along with its commitment to buy a certain number of commercials. And the phenomenon is spreading, Wardley says. He gets proposals offering to feature Reeboks in programs at least once a week. “There are a lot of producers trying to figure out how they can build this kind of marketing into existing shows,” he adds.

The technique goes way beyond “product placement.” On television, product placement might involve a show staffer slipping a product into a scene as an informal thank-you for buying an ad. These arrangements are generally finalized after scripts are written
and advertising deals are struck. “Product integration,” on the other hand, is built into television programs early on. In some cases, like
Survivor,
it’s part of the creation of the show itself. In others, like
The View
or
Drew Carey,
it shapes individual episodes or segments. And the products aren’t just props like a bottle of Snapple or a box of Special K on
Seinfeld;
they are built into the action of the shows.

Words most frequently used in U.S. TV ads: “new” and “improved.”

Product integration took root and thrived on another kind of reality programming—sports. There, sponsor “enhancements”—from electronically superimposed logos on the playing field to sponsored highlights—are routine. For the last two seasons, ESPN has used video insertion technology to create the illusion of a billboard behind home plate during Major League Baseball telecasts. They’ve also inserted a sponsor’s logo inside the goalposts during field-goal attempts in college football broadcasts. “We all have to get more inventive about creating ways to get the advertising message across without insulting the viewer,” says Ed Erhardt, president of customer marketing for ESPN/ABC Sports.

And therein lies an obvious danger. If networks and advertisers shoehorn too many commercial messages into programming, viewers are likely to tune out. Here again, sports may lead the way. In its most recent TV contract signed with four networks, the National Football League barred sponsored highlights and other enhancements—the Bud Light play of the game, the Nike starting lineup—from its telecasts.

Over at CBS, network executives are limiting product integration to
Survivor.
It’s a way to milk its hit show without cluttering the rest of the lineup—for now. Marketers are also leery of making too much of a good thing. “It’s a new phenomenon for entertainment programming,” says Owens, the entertainment marketer. “And we are all trying to be careful and not make it as crowded as sports has become.”

Still, he admits, “When digital cable gives us the capacity, it’s entirely possible we’d recommend a dedicated cable network for a client with a really strong brand.” Bring on the Dr. Scholl’s Channel.

According to
Bride’s
magazine, an “average” wedding costs nearly $19,000.

Uncle John was at the circus earlier this summer, when it occurred to him that circus performers probably have their own language. Well, it turns out they do. Here’s a list of his favorite terms.

Clown Alley:
The dressing area for the clowns.

Blow Off:
Immediately following the end of a performance, when the crowd mills out of the tent and onto the midway.

Butcher:
A concessionaire who sells food—hot dogs, sodas, ice cream, etc.—to the audience.

Dry Butcher:
A butcher who sells toys and souvenirs.

Groundhog:
A slow butcher.

Greyhound:
A fast butcher.

Razorbacks:
The workers who set up the big tents.

Roustabout:
A laborer for the circus.

Deemer:
A dime; 10 cents.

Mud Show:
A small circus or carnival.

Cloud Swing:
Aerial act performed on a loop of rope suspended from the top of the tent.

Kinker:
Any circus performer.

Grease Joint:
A food stand.

Grubers:
Peanuts.

Spool Truck:
Truck that carries the tent canvas.

Joey:
Any clown, after Joseph Grimaldi’s character, Joey.

Fine Ways:
Twenty-five cents.

The Disaster March:
“Stars and Stripes Forever” (see “Circus Superstitions,”
page 172
).

Fancy Pants:
The master of ceremonies (often incorrectly referred to as the
ringmaster).

First of May:
A rookie on the circus.

John Robinson:
A shortened performance.

Pie Car:
Place where circus people eat. Also
cookhouse.

Risley:
An acrobatic act in which one person juggles another on their feet.

Cherry Pie:
Extra work for extra pay.

Home Sweet Home:
Last show of the season.

Straw House:
A sold-out performance.

Windjammer:
Circus musician.

Twenty-Four-Hour Man:
The scout who plans the route to the next town and determines where the circus will be set up.

How many hair follicles on an average adult? 5 million.

Critics called
Three’s Company
“mindless” and “smarmy.” But it was one of the longest running and highest rated shows in TV history. We’re not sure why, either, but here’s the story.

You might not know it, but two popular American TV shows were actually rip-offs of British sitcoms:
All in the Family
is an Americanized version of
Till Death Do Us Part,
and
Sanford and Son
is a copy of
Steptoe & Son.

Donald Taffner, U.S. representative for Thames Television, wanted to export other shows for American audiences so he hooked up with American TV executive Ted Bergmann. In 1975 Bergmann took a Thames hit, Man
About the House,
to the networks. ABC’s programming chief, Fred Silverman, ordered a pilot.

He advised Bergmann to get an experienced television writer, and he found one in Larry Gelbart, developer of the TV show M*A*S*H. Gelbart declined at first, but an unprecedented offer of $50,000 convinced him. Gelbart devised characters in their late 20s who were intelligent and witty: David Bell, an aspiring filmmaker; Jenny, a witty brunette who worked at the DMV; and Samantha—Sam for short—a cute blonde model aspiring to be an actress. And of course there was a landlord, George Roper, and his sex-starved wife, Mildred.