Snake oil, anyone? Tearbosnike oil, anyone?

The child only gets to watch TV with commercials on weekends when she sees Cookie Jar TV for an hour because it has an animation of Richard Scarry's (insane and cool) books. The very first time she saw this sort of TV -- not long ago -- the kid came away from her hour of network viewing asking for Shoes Under ("we should get one of those," she sang, "You can store all of your stuff conveniently under the bed!"), a Pillowpet ("Makes a great gift under $20 Mom," she pitched, before lapsing into a rhapsody about the cuteness and the softness of the thing) , some gizmo that dispenses toothpaste onto a toothbrush ("Mom -- it makes less mess! And it uses the WHOLE tube!")
And then there was the Turbo Snake. Only you don't say it like that. You say it like this: tearbosnike. As in 'I'm yellowin' ma teef and spakin' lika Brit, gov'na'. The tearbosnike launched us into a different sort of TV category, and has led to an unlikely childhood fascination about both drain clearing and the British. And not necessarily in that order. "Mom! Dad!" she called. "You should get this! If you order now, they'll double the offer" she implores at 8:30 am on a Saturday. "You can get two large and two small tearbosnikes for just tan dollas."
It is now apparently a requirement that all gimmicky products be sold by Englishmen, probably because Americans think it gives the Sham Wow and Tearbosnike an air of sophistication or believability -- it's foreign, exotic!. The kid agrees with this philosophy completely.
Meanwhile, since we groggily ignore the TV in favor of half-sleep, we had no idea what the child was talking about, or why they would be showing an ad like that while cartoons were on TV (answer: when they can't sell ad space, they sell it for pennies on the dollar and companies buy in bulk regardless of when they'll be fit in. Hm. I guess it works too, when you mesmerize the post-toddler set). When she realized how amused we were, this quickly became a running gag. In the middle of dinner, out of nowhere: tearbosnike!
She's also begun listening more carefully to the British mom up the street, and she can imitate her perfectly. If she finds out that chocolate and cheese are part of high tea, we'll be forced to move to England immediately.
Labels: News of the offspring's world











