Cats, pikey neighbours and gadgets

Regular readers will know how much I dislike my neighbours. It's bad enough that their growing tribe of inbred cats (just one generation away from finding them sitting on the porch, strumming banjos and brewing catshit moonshine) infest my garden.
Eskimos are said to have identified over a hundred different types of snow. By carefully traversing our lawn, I think I have achieved the same feat for cat turds. Previously indifferent to cats, I have since developed a deep prejudice against them.
This is because our neighbours are too sodding lazy to do anything about them. When I'm running the country, they'll be first off the benefits and down the yoghurt mines, doing something useful for the downtrodden middle classes.
You see, gentle reader, the neighbours are what I call the Plasma Poor. Neither of them have been observed going to work, and yet they miraculously appear to be materially better off than anyone else in the neighbourhood. Takeaway meals are delivered four times a week. Sky multichannel is available in all four bedrooms. Two of them are Chelsea season ticket holders. They have (at the last count) five multi-gened children clad in Nike trainers.
At the Future Foundation's State of the Nation conference last week, one of the speakers speculated as to why the middle classes haven't rioted over the apparent inequalities between themselves and the extremely affluent.
I'll tell you why: it's because the middle classes are in a state of permanent bewilderment over seeing their taxes being channelled to the Plasma Poor - Britain's secret underclass of workshy layabouts. By a counter-intuitive masterstroke from the god of improbability, the Plasma Poor are able to afford the sort of goods that the middle classes have to save for. They are the post-early adopters.
Think I'm wrong? Go to a Basildon Dixons on a Saturday afternoon and see who's in the queue.
Dammit, why can't these people be respectably poor, like my Northern grandparents, who were brought up on one lump of coal a day for breakfast, a piece of string for Christmas, and a deferential nod to the factory owner as he rode by on his white horse?
(Nostalgic sigh) It was therefore with mixed feelings that a fortnight ago, I observed the neighbours taking delivery of a 40-inch HD-ready plasma TV.
I'm not sure what to make of this technology. On the one hand, it's bloody amazing (having taken the decision to forego holidays for two years in order to buy our own Sony Bravia). A large flat screen somehow dominates a room in an understated way. Don't ask me how that works, but it does. And when you finally rig it up to High-Definition input, the results are staggering.
On the other hand, it's difficult to decide whether these things have the air of exclusivity that makes a new technology desirable. We've gone through the early adopter phase with flat-screen tellies without, say, the equivalent of the Apple iPod dominating the market. Sales volumes have hit that mass necessary to drive down prices, but which one do you buy? Which brand is going to give you that sanctimoniously smug buttock-tremble?
Sure, the Sony Bravia is probably the one brand name that sticks out because of the Balls ad (the Paint and Bunnies have been less memorable and I believe have somehow diverged from the brand; my own personal dinner-party research revealed that, at first, most people thought the Balls ad was for Hewlett-Packard).
Take this current crop of ads.

Philips' Aurea is an LCD TV with multi-coloured backlights. That's its USP. And its advertising suggests that backlights on a bloke's telly will dazzle foxy chicks into bed. It's a weird hybrid between Ikea-catalogue mood lighting and entertainment. You can achieve the same effect with a lava lamp. It's a lot cheaper too.
Now, I really do like this one from Toshiba. It's a boring picture, but the message is bang on for those wondering when to jump on the home technology bandwagon. The only problem is, the answer could just as easily be a telly from any other manufacturer. The ad might make me go to a TV shop where I'd end up buying a Sony instead.

OK, this is cheating a bit 'cos it's not a telly, even though it's a fine example of integrated technology i.e. all the bells and whistles and geegaws in the camera that are meant to help you make best use of your fancy new flat-screen TV. I can't be arsed to figure out what 3CCD is because, frankly, the image doesn't make me want to read the copy.
As Belinda Parmar (probably the most cheerful planner I've ever met) points out, it's not exactly feminine in its appeal, either. Do Panasonic only want men to buy this camcorder?
I spotted this ad in ES magazine, the Evening Standard supplement aimed at women, and it sticks out like a sore thumb.
Bored.
Rant over.

Mrs Morrey, you are harbouring a potential mass-murdering parasite

I hate cats. Or rather, I hate people whose affections are blinded by the little furry bastards. People who think it’s cute when their wee psycho furball deposits a dead bird on their doorstep. Aaaah, that’s just sooooo cute.
I’ve seen our garden visitors – sparrows, blackbirds, tits (the only non-salacious use of that word you’ll ever see in this blog) and doves (i.e. proper pigeons, not the dusty flying rats that populate London) – virtually disappear since our pikey neighbours decided to join the cat crowd. They have made their contribution to the growing population of 8 million domesticated cats in Britain that are responsible for killing 300 million wild birds and mammals each year.
I exempt the agency cat, Mister Ajax, who is a grumpy fat old bastard, because he is too lazy and overfed with chocolate by the monkeygirls to bother hunting. In fact, he is so full of contempt for exercise that he just waits for the nearest rat to stroll past and die laughing at his paws. Now that’s my sort of cat.
I haven’t got a bone to pick with this ad or the several others that push the latest in pet nutrition because they are simply taking up the trend for complicating something that used to be relatively straightforward. Buy pet. Feed pet. And after a few years, Bury pet. Aah the good old days.
Now, with complicated pet insurance plans, complex pet nutrition options including lifestyle foods aimed at particular pet demographics, the bewildered old ladies and sad old numpties who don’t have anyone else to talk to can spend an infinity of time and money pretending that their pet deserves as complex an upbringing as a real person. And when Miggins dies, you can have him buried in a cemetery.

See also:
Pointless critter products
Put a bell on it

Pointless critter products

I’ve seen surveys which claim that our free time is dwindling and that we have to cram more activities into the same 24-hour box.
This is a handy argument for marketers who have to push the latest convenient and time-saving product. Innovation in increasingly crowded markets succeeds if the consumer is fooled into buying the latest version of something that was perfectly adequate in its original form. Look at razors, dishwashing powders, even food.
Does the latest Gillette laser-powered 8-blade vibrating razor give a closer shave that a single-bladed disposable? Does the plastic-coated tablet with sealed conditioning liquid clean better than boxed dishwasher powders? Do chlorine-cleaned and repackaged lettuce leaves taste better than the loose raw vegetable?
I was therefore utterly astounded when this short ad crept onto my TV screen. It’s just another example of a pointless 21st century product.

Cats are my least favourite pet since I have engaged them in a daily battle to keep them from shitting on my lawn. Observing the general behaviour of the feline-owning neighbours, I have developed a theory that cat ownership may have a correlation with IQ. One cat per household has a zero effect – there’s no recognisable decline in intelligence of the occupants. Once you start to increase the cat per household quota, then mental faculties decline.
Without jobs but with satellite TV in every bedroom, and take-away food delivered at least four times a week, my pikey neighbours keep at least a dozen of the critters.
I wonder who has the inclination to buy this wretched product. Maybe its multiple-cat owners who have more money than sense. But I guess the cat food manufacturers have to try something, when the UK cat population is about 8 million-strong, and the market worth £900m. Rich pickings.

Speaking of cats, this is the greatest cat picture, ever.

New Year guff

Before I kick-start the year with the usual high-quality, ad-related stuff, I'm making public my New Year Resolutions.
In 2007, the Chimp Messiah shall:
1. Be more tolerant of people, except for religious maniacs.
2. Continue to avoid being sucked in by brain dead reality TV, except for Celebrity Big Brother.
3. Pick up the cat shit in my front garden before it decays and messes up my lawnmower.
4. Place the aforementioned feline defecation in a more strategic setting i.e. right on the neighbours' doorstep, because it is they who decided to increase their cat quota to double figures in 2006, the fucking pikeys.
5. Stop to smell the roses, which are complex hybrid vegetation that have evolved over milliennia, and are not the result of divine Intelligent Design.
6. Attempt to get other bloggers to refer to CMM News as The Worst Ad Blog In The World.
7. Delegate more.
8. Begin the God Is Great Diet aka the GIg Diet (I'll eat what I please - if anyone tells me I'm fat then I'll tell them they're wrong before killing them).
9. Cease referring to the prima donna captain of my son's football team as The Fat Fucker.
10. Ignore 1-9 if they are not in a client's interest.

And to put the Bagged and tagged post to rest, the lie was #4. I do happen to be extremely poor with numbers, but have never had to see a doctor about it.

Old ladies’ stuff part 7

Click to enlarge

This ad ran in most of last weekend's Sunday papers. What it isn't saying is:

• It's getting close to Christmas.
• Feeling guilty for not visiting your old ma?
• Milkman not talking to her any more 'cos she smells of weewee and cabbage?
  
• Want to assuage that guilt by enhancing her relationship with her moggie?
• Be safe in the knowledge you can now get away with two visits a year!
• She's not going anywhere anyway!
  

Mind you, while we're on the subject, there's a message I'd like to communicate to next door's cats: Stop shitting in my garden.

Click to enlarge

Put a bell on it

There’s a new reality TV show planned in the US, and the stars are going to be cats. It’s said that the Devil has the best tunes and it’s true that evil can be very entertaining, so I can see some of the reasoning behind the idea. But what if you hate the little pests? If I were to watch cats willingly, it would be in the hope of witnessing some anti-feline action, courtesy of Mother Nature. When I hear the screeching tones of a cat fight after midnight I always leap to the nearest window in hope of seeing one of them being consumed by a fox.
Why Advertising Sucks recently had a long anti-cat rant, which is understandable if these creatures blight your life. Here’s my turn.
For seven years my substantial private estate has been free of cats until my nearest neighbours, a lazy bunch of workshy misfits (the only characteristics they share with felines) acquired a female cat which must have divided like a bacterium because seemingly within weeks there were at least a half-dozen of them murdering the wildlife and shitting under my bushes.
The unofficial agency cat, Mister Ajax, senses my hostility and likes to pretend he’s my pal. I’ve even found him quietly astride Dave, kneading holes and purring like a demon motorbike, like I’d be happy at this abuse of my best mate.
I can’t be horrid to him, because the girls here love him. I mean… for heaven’s sake, can’t they see these animals are evil? No, of course they can’t, and so many people are seduced by their big-eyed fluffiness and alpha tendencies.
Just look at these ads:

“You’d better not get in his way”. When he’s lapping up his expensive dinner, just remember, it’s the food he loves and not you.

And then there’s this sorry bunch. You’d think this were people food, it’s so darned nutricious and delicious. Mind you, that Sheba looks quite tempting (which is weird when you think about it: you’re supposed to find this food mouthwatering, yet you’re going to give it to your cat. It would probably be cheaper to go to the deli and buy some offcuts).

Gourmet… check out the sprig of garnish!

Go Cat, a good cock joke

Here’s Purdy, a wicked-looking bastard. I love the inherent threat here: feed me or the birds get it.

Go to Flickr and enter “cat” and “bird” and one thing you’ll notice about the photos is the “aaah, look how cute” tone of them, with the moggies murdering indigenous wildlife under titles like “Lunch” and “Pride”. Ha bloody ha. And their owners probably call themselves animal lovers.
Put bells on their collars, you eejits!