I hate the following ten TV commercials

1. The husband is a simple being who just wants TV and sports.  The wife is an intelligent task-master who is proud that Product X got him off his fat ass or tricked him into health.
2. The husband or boyfriend hates being in a relationship and wins some degree of freedom from the shackles that bind him.
3. The car in the ad is different than all others.  It will make you stand out.  It will make you special.  It is the best car…ever.
4. Company Y, despite its sins of the past, is now saving children, the environment, and the economy.
5. Baby talks.
6. Animal talks.
7. This product is about people.  In fact, it was made by people just like you.  The people on screen are not actors, sorta.
8. This medicine will save you from whatever ills you.  Its side affects just might kill you, or at least gross you out over the next 90 seconds.
9. Product Z is made in a very clean environment by funny people you can relate to.  You want to hang out with them as you consume Product Z.
10. The people on this evening news program are hysterical locals.  They are your friends who live down the street.

The Missing Piece, Plastic Cycles, and Goulash

Travel is something I have done since I had a means. When I was maybe 4 years old, after my father had given me a little plastic cycle, I took it for a ride through Anaheim’s busiest streets, cruising the left-turn lanes and terrifying local mothers. Things haven’t changed much – I moved to New York from California, I travel to Asia regularly, and I generally freak out if my Delta “Itineraries & Check-in” tab isn’t filled with at least one or two trips in the next 90 days.

All this travel, I realized a couple weeks ago, has been to places obscure in nature, at least in relation to my own world view. Japan, England, St. Kitts, Seattle – these places really have nothing to do with my episteme.

So in a fit of desperation for self discovery, I booked a trip to Budapest, Hungary. I will spend five days in my grandparents’ homeland, looking for some missing pieces, opening my senses to whatever I can relate. I’ll follow that up with a few days in Paris, because, well, I’ve never been there either, and I’m frankly tired of hearing people talk about it and need to see it for myself.

I’ll travel alone, I’ll write, I’ll drink coffee, I’ll probably pick up a couple bad habits and eat some things that I’ll regret, but I blame it on my father for giving me that plastic cycle a bit too early.