Bad Commercial Hall of Fame

This commercial must have been written by a man. It's like one of those horrible persona poems where someone writes from the perspective of someone he or she couldn't possibly REALLY identify with. Once, one of my classmates in grad school--a big guy from the hills of West Virginia who was otherwise a wonderful poet, wrote such a beast about a twelve-year-old Indian girl sold into sexual slavery. Trust me when I say the poem was about as authentic as Priscilla Presley's face.

I wish I'd seen the guy pitch this: We'll have a woman read aloud from the journal entry she's just finished writing and then talk about what she just read aloud. Man, I've nailed this character, and she's someone women can relate to: she's an artist who eats Kashi, does scrapbooking, and is a member of two book clubs. She wears Naturalizers and tries to walk at least three times a week. She loves Emily Dickenson, the African djembe, and expression dancing. She leads a workshop called "Creating Sacred Spaces" at the local prison and checks her breasts monthly.

If any of my former students had anything to do with this, you'd better make sure I never find out. Howard?