When I was a child, especially a teenager, I dreaded those words. It signaled my mother was going to talk about something truly, excruciatingly, embarrassing.
So, let's talk! About ED!
No, not the biology of erectile dysfunction or the psychological toll on its sufferers or the affects on marriages and extracurricular affairs. Let's talk about the ads. Especially the campaign for Cialis.
I don't get it. (I'm making a blogging habit of "not getting it," like some kind of weird Andy Rooney of the internet. Last week, I didn't get why men find Sarah Palin attractive. But case solved: $22,000 makeup artists can turn any pit bull into a show poodle.) So on to ED!
The Cialis pitch always ends with a shot of the happy middle-aged couple sitting side-by-side in matching Victorian-style tubs. Outside. On a bluff overlooking the ocean.
I live on the Monterey Peninsula, the geographical "jumping off point" for the romantic Big Sur coast. I've been down to Big Sur countless times. I've hiked its forests, ridden its trail rides, discovered hidden beaches and stayed at the "big two" -- Ventana and Post Ranch, 5-star hideaways that sometimes offer specials for locals (usually during the rainy season).
But never, not once, have I ever seen claw foot bathtubs casually arrayed on the coastline. Hot tubs, yes. Infinity pools, sure. But no sparkling white ceramic tubs. Nope. Never.
So it's obviously symbolic. But even this is head-scratching. The happy couple is never in the same tub. The tubs are demure, separate, like some 1950s era sit-com where mom and dad always retired to twin beds. Is that what the hidden persuasion is meant to be -- that boomers, now the ED target demographic, were schooled in an era in which the Beav's parents called "good night" over the lamp table separating their beddy-bye's?
The Eisenhower generation is all grown up and beginning to flag. Forget the sixties -- "Make Love Not War;" "If you can't be with the one you love, love the one you're with!" -- that was just a stage. Back to the fifties with you, sitting in separate tubs, watching the waves crash on the distant shore.
