I watch a lot of television so I see many commercials, and lately it seems as if much more time is taken up by them. I think pretty soon there will be 25 minutes of commercials for a half-hour sitcom with only 5 minutes of sitcom. I try to use commercial time to go to the bathroom, but I can go only so many times in an hour. The other evening a commercial came on for some prescription medication – those are always killers as they drone on and on about the side effects. This one started like, “Possible side effects could include muscle aches, headaches, backaches, earaches, sinus problems, faulty vision, acid reflux” . . . at this time I decided to go to the bathroom, take some clothes out of the dryer, fold them and put them all away in their proper places. Upon my return to watch the rest of my program, it was still continuing with . . . “erectile dysfunction, Prune belly syndrome, nausea, diarrhea, stroke, heart attack, narcolepsy, acne, bad breath” . . . it never ended. I gave up and turned to another program where I saw my favorite commercial.

As I said, I watch a lot of commercials and some are quite good. I love the one with the little girl – about 5 years old – being placed in her car seat by her dad. She is talking non-stop and swinging her legs. Even when he shuts her door to go around to the driver’s side, you can still hear her little voice from inside the car. I don’t know what she’s talking about, but I love it! I also don’t know what the ad is selling . . . probably some sort of car. I don’t look at the purpose for the ads—I look at the ad to see if it’s funny. If everyone were like me, there would be no money in commercials, would there? However, I do have my favorite one. It stars Dennis Haysbert who is a very good actor – he was once our president on “24” and has starred in many films and television programs. He’s also extremely good looking which certainly helps. He’s speaking for Allstate Insurance and he talks about how good it is . . . blah, blah, blah . . . but at the end is the part that really gets me. He always ends by saying, “That’s Allstate, Stan.” Isn’t that something? It’s as if he’s actually talking to Stan. But I feel like Stan could be me and he’s talking directly to me. So that’s one commercial I don’t mind watching.

I don’t have Allstate – I have State Farm and don’t plan to change. But I love the fact that I am being spoken to personally in this ad. I feel like Stan and I are one.