Phelps Confirms My Predjudices

Michael Phelps photographed getting his Jamaica on? Further proof to me at least that out of the pool all competitive swimmers are boring.

Phelps and his aqualung bong

Marketing Thought

In much the same vein as when retired senator Bob Dole endorsed Viagra, perhaps male urinary weak stream medication Flomax should ask retired NASCAR driver Dick Trickle to serve as pitchman.

Maybe the Name is Worse that the Side Effects...

a piece by Stephen Jon
A new pharmaceutical ad has hit the American airwaves, chums, this one for yet another compound designed to combat the excess of acidic bile that is a byproduct of our dyspeptic age.

Now that heart burn is a disease rather than a discomfort these products are to be expected. This one however has a most unfortunate name:

AcipHex

I'm sure it looked fine written down, but based on the way they pronounce it in the commercial I don't think I'll be rushing to guzzle handfuls of "ass effects" any time soon.

Their product sounds like either porn foley or a pair of lift-and-separate shorts for the terminally saggy. I'll have none of it.

Are Prescription Ads Bad Performance Art?

Yet another wonderfully vile advertisement for prescription medication is doing the rounds on American TV. It is standard in this field that the level of butterflies and flowers in the ad are in inverse proportion to the general squirm-inducing nature of the malady the drug is intended to treat. A classic of the genre, this one is for a prescription laxative.

Setting aside how horrendously egg-bound one must be to need a prescription strength laxative, what really grates are the contraindication warnings. Apparently, those afflicted with severe diarrhea should not take the prescription laxative. Presumably this is the scatalogical equivalent of matter and anti-matter. You have been warned. If you have the squirts, don't take the roto-rooter pill lest the universe implode or something.

What sort of maniac would do that? If you have the shits, is the first thought that crosses your mind really "Ooooh- a powerful laxative should help me feel better!"? Jesus.

Yuck. Sorry for sharing.

Medicine for MEN

Like many folks I take great amusement in the pharmaceutical ads on the telly*. I love the way many every day normal bodily quirks are medicalized, the way the ads indicate the desired demographic of the program maker ("I am way to young to watch the news honey, I don't have a need for osteoperosis drugs"), and most of all I love the legally required list of side effects (based on the frequency they pop up in the lists I imagine that even medicine for dry mouth and constipation may cause dry mouth and constipation).

My current favorite drug ad is for a prostate/boomer-needs-to-piss-a-lot potion called "Flomax". Roll that name around in your mouth a little- flomax. You can only force a trickle at the urinal and fear that more than two shakes is a wank? Then guzzle some flomax, piss like a race horse, then go kayaking with your buddies. May cause dry mouth and constipation.

Now, when I go kayaking I find it just as easy to piss in the boat- I'm normally wearing swim shorts, it will drown any leeches who have crept in, and if things get too disgusting I can always capsize. But then again, I'm a thirtysomething healthy urinator, not some dribble-wee baby boomer desperately trying to cling to past glories that weren't actually too glorious in the first place.

Even as obvious as the name Flomax is, I don't think the big pharma has gone far enough. With that in mind, I offer up my re-branding suggestion. Its just a name and a tag line, but if it gets picked up, consider this my poor man's patent app:

"Pisplosion!
You'll pee so hard, you'll need a second hole in your knoblet."
May cause dry mouth and constipation.

*British chums: as you may know, the pharmaceutical lobby convinced American broadcasting regulators to allow them to directly advertise medicines to consumers, in the hope that idiots will go to their doctors and ask for pills by name as if they were Mars Bars.