My graphic design partner in crime Amy Wimmer sends one of the most compelling pieces of communication I've seen in awhile—an ad on Craig's List.
Tell me you don't want to see this bike after reading this ad:
What kind of bike? I don’t know, I’m not a bike scientist. What I am though is a manly guy looking to sell his bike. This bike is made out of metal and kick ass spokes. The back reflector was taken off, but if you think that deters me from riding at night, you’re way wrong. I practiced ninja training in Japan’s mount Fuji for 5 years and the first rule they teach about ninja biking is that back reflectors let the enemy know where you are. Not having a rear reflector is like saying “FUCK YOU CAR, JUST TRY AND FIND ME”.
The bike says Giant on the side because it’s referring to my junk, but rest assured even if you have tiny junk that Giant advertisement is going to remain right where it is. I bought this bike for 300 dollars from a retired mercenary that fought in both World War 1 and World War 2 and had his right arm bitten off by a shark in the Phillipines while stationed there as a shark handler. When he sold it to me I had to arm wrestle him for the honor to buy it. I broke his arm in 7 places when I did. He was so impressed with me he offered me to be his son but I thought that was sissy shit so I said no way.
The bike has some rusted screws, but that just shows how much of a bad ass you are. Everyone knows rusted screws on a bike means that you probably drove it underwater and that’s bad ass in itself. Those screws can be replaced with shiny new ones, but if you’re going to go to that trouble why not just punch yourself in the balls since you’re probably a dickless lizard who doesn’t like to look intimidating.
The bike is for men because the seat is flat or some shit and not shaped like a dildo. If you like flat seated bikes you’re going to love this thing because it doesn’t try to penetrate your ass or anything.
I’ve topped out at 75 miles per hour on this uphill but if you’re just a regular man you’ll probably top it out at 10 miles per hour. This thing is listed as a street bike which is man-code for bike tank. The bike has 7 speeds in total:
Gear 1 – Sissy Gear
Gear 2 – Less Sissy Gear
Gear 3 – Least Sissy Gear
Gear 4 – Boy Gear
Gear 5 – Pre-teen Boy Gear
Gear 6 – Manly Gear
Gear 7 – Big Muscles Gear
I only like gear 6 and 7 to be honest.
Additionally, this tool of all immense men comes with a gigantic lock to keep it secure. The lock is the size of a bull’s testicles and tells people you don’t fuck around with locking up your bike tank. It tells would-be-thieves “Hey asshole, touch this bike and I’ll appear from the bushes ready to club you with a two-by-four”.
Bike is for 150 OBO (and don’t give me no panzy prices)
Not me. This kind of self-conscious “cleverness” wears on me. Tries too hard and then doesn’t work. But good luck to him.
I’m with you Dian – the first two paras were mildly amusing, but the next six are over the top, and despite his protestations, what the entirety of this says to me:
“My “junk” is actually pretty tiny, so I’m compensating, and hoping nobody notices”
Newsflash: We noticed!
You’re assuming the seller really is a guy. But imagine if the seller is actually a woman – that would make this funnier. And maybe the bike is her ex-boyfriend’s and he is the kind of guy who really is this insecure about the size of his junk and whether or not the seat will penetrate him.
I bet the person who buys this bike is actually some loser manly man just like that. There are those who will read this and be at least mildly amused. But, sadly, there are also more than a few guys out there who will read it and think “Right on, dude – that is my kind of bike!” They are the same guys who think life can and should be like it appears in Budweiser commercials. Odds are they can’t afford a new and really cool bike, but offers on $150 may just be possible – you know, if Mom and Dad give them a break on the rent this month.
Reuben, I am willing to bet MONEY that a woman did NOT write this ad.
Even when we are being tongue-in-cheek and teasing men who DO think like the writer of that ad, women just don’t think about or communicate things in this way.
Don’t get me wrong – we women have our own issues (lots of them) but this homo-phobic, “I’m incredibly insecure about my manhood, and need to compensate by talking like Conan the barberian on speed” thing, it’s just a man-thing. It just IS.
Oh, I agree with you, Kristen. I was just imagining. But don’t even get me started on how much I agree with you. Boys will be boys, and men will be men. Unfortunately far too many boys live their whole lives and never figure out what it means to really be a man. Hint: it can’t be found in a can of Red Bull or in any program that airs on Spike TV.
Well, I’m not hiring the guy to write copy for me either, mates. But I think he is writing tongue in cheek, don’t you? And STILL I want to see a photo of the bike that inspires this ad.
Be honest, David, this is your bike for sale, isn’t it? And of course you were being tongue in cheek when you wrote your ad. No doubt it will sell quickly – but don’t take no panzy price for it.
Oh yeah, my bike totally kicks that guy’s bike all the way to hell and back! I have FOUR GIANT stickers on mine.
Can we analyze this any more? LOL! Wait, please do! These comments are funnier than the ad itself!
Note to staff at Murray’s Freelance Writing: Please DO create a hoax like the one Rueben describes sometime within FY 2008/2009.
Oh, I wasn’t analzying. Just not impressed.
I wasn’t analyzing, just commenting that I don’t find it compelling. I didn’t even think about the manly aspects, just the I’m trying too hard to be clever ones.
And I assure you, Jason, all my comments were written in the same tongue-in-cheek spirit as the ad itself.
Four stickers, eh? Wow.
I heard it on the radio last week–a couple local DJ’s do “Craig’s List Price Is Right” and guess the asking price for weird things on Craigslist. And I thought it was funny. And I still think it’s funny. After a week (two weeks? what’s it been now?) of Sarahpalooza, it’s fun to have a mindless manly humorous distraction.
Not that I’m trying to hijack David’s blog or anything, but Joan: Since you’re here, and, as a proud Alaskan, any chance you’d give us YOUR perspective on this politics-not-as-usual situation you’ve termed “Sarahpalooza”??
As one on-the-ground, so to speak, your opinions of the whole darn thing would most interesting.
Kristen, thanks for asking before I had to!
I have really mixed feelings about it all, to be honest. When she was running for governor, she seemed like a fresh alternative to a bunch of known politicos. She had taken on the Republican Party and won–and they’re a stubborn lot up here, and didn’t want her rocking their party boat.
I’m from Wasilla, her home town, but I was living in Juneau during the years she was mayor, so I don’t have firsthand stories to tell. What my friends told me, though, was that unless you toed her fundamentalist Christian line as a city employee, you were out the door. On the other hand, she got a lot done as mayor–new facilities, improved roads, and such.
Understand that Wasilla is a small town that was an even smaller town until the massive growth that came with the pipeline. At that point, it developed into an endless mass of strip malls and subdivisions. The Matanuska-Susitna Borough has steadfastly refused to institute zoning laws, so this has led to a muddle of housing next to big box stores next to little family businesses. Because Mat-Su has much lower housing costs than Anchorage, we are home to a lot of commuters who drive to work in Anchorage (I’ve just joined that crowd, having left my previous job about five weeks ago). That’s caused a lot of congestion and confusion–more crime, more drugs (we’re known for our meth labs out here), and being pegged by Senator Ted Stevens’s political son, Ben, as “Valley Trash.”
Sarah’s rise to governor instilled a big rush of pride in the Valley Trash; but she still played a lot of politics. You’ve heard about her attempts to punish her Trooper ex-brother-in-law. There were more subtle things as well. I was on the board of directors for our local recycling center, which was lobbying for several million dollars in state and federal grants to expand the facility. We had strong support from our local state senator, who got the money in the state budget. Sarah promptly vetoed it. I surmised at the time that her veto had nothing to do with the worthiness of our project, but instead was all about her very testy relationship with that local senator–the two despise each other and have been pretty catty toward each other at times.
On the other hand, when our gasoline prices were up to nearly $5 per gallon earlier this summer, Governor Palin proposed a credit to all Alaskans of around $1200 to help us pay for fuel this winter. There was a lot of resistance and criticism, but she succeeded. I like her willingness to trust people to handle needs like that directly rather than to set up another layer of bureaucracy to determine whether you’re worthy of assistance. This helps everybody. She also suspended the state gas tax of about 8 cents per gallon–that just went into effect last week. By reducing those transportation costs, it’ll have a direct positive effect on the economy of the Mat-Su Borough, where people have been finding their home values declining as it’s becoming too expensive for that long commute to Anchorage.
So she does good things and she does small-minded things.
Gossip all along has been that she has some wild kids, but then so do a lot of preachers; at least the preachers’ kids that I’ve known. I don’t know her except in the most cursory way–in Alaska, we pretty much all know each other somehow, so of course we’ve met–but I have friends who are or have been close to her. I have friends who’ve had to work with her.
Maybe the most telling story for me was when her mother-in-law, Todd’s stepmother, was running for Wasilla mayor. Sarah stepped into the race and endorsed her mom-in-law’s opposition. That, in my opinion, turned the election–Sarah’s very popular in her hometown. She didn’t have to do that; if you really wanted a harmonious family, it probably isn’t the sort of thing you’d do, eh? But she did, because it’s what SHE wanted, because she’d retain a lot of influence with her friend, and I think she liked that position of power.
So back to Sarah as a vice-presidential nominee, here’s what I think. Her fresh-faced appeal is hard to resist when you are first exposed to it. She seems genuine and honest, full of conviction and energy. She makes a great first impression.
I worry what will happen if she’s successful. If she and McCain together change the Supreme Court enough that my daughter no longer has the choice of whether to take a pregnancy to term or not, then we have lost a great deal, and I don’t think that’s too far-fetched. That’s the one issue that worries me most; but it isn’t the only one. I should make clear that I’m not a D nor an R; I steadfastly remain a nonpartisan, identifying with the great Moderate Middle that I think most of us are. But this worries me.
So what are your thoughts? Mine are too close to home, I think, to be worth too much.
Well, Joan, your analysis is worth five of mine. I just got finished listening to her speech, which was as alternately marvelous and nasty as the woman you describe here.
Left me with an ominous feeling about the next two months.
Joan – I think your opinion is even MORE valuable BECAUSE you are close to this AND because you are so *apparently* conflicted.
The way that you have addressed the two sides of Sarah Palin actually presents quite a reasoned, fair and, to my way of thinking, objective portrayal of her strengths and her weaknesses.
I also found it quite interesting to hear more about the workings of Alaska from a local, because I suspect the situation in your state is going to become more and more important to a number of people on a number of levels as the “to drill or not to drill” debate heats up.
While I cannot support the overall approach, or the majority of the individual aspects of the Republican agenda, and am particularly opposed to the insertion of religion into the governing of any country (the fundamentalist strain most especially), I found your examination of Palin to be very informative.
Thanks for taking the time to offer it!