2021, Business, Games, Media, Mysteries, Technology, Uncategorized

They’re Coming to Take Me Away

46 Comments

I’ve been aware for some time that nothing I do online is really private.  If I look at some clothing website on Tuesday, by Wednesday, I’m getting sidebar ads for that same clothing company.  If I watch a Paws for Hope video on YouTube, suddenly lots of their videos pop to the top of my feed.  Same with Facebook.  Not too irritating although it makes me wonder if cyberspace is smart enough to know what I’m looking at, why isn’t it smart enough to know when I’ve made a purchase so they can stop showing me the ads for what I’ve bought?

I have a “color-by-number” app on my phone – it’s a mindless game that I often play if I have the tv on or am listening to a book on tape.  It only takes up about ¼ of my brain (if that).  It has a function that offers me “hints” if I watch the occasional ad.  Most of the time I ignore that function, but occasionally the puzzles have little bits that are almost impossible to see, so I like to have a couple of hints available.  About a month ago I noticed that the ads on this game were aligning with stuff that I was searching for online using my phone.  Not 100% but close enough.  So now my game is paying attention to what I’m up to when I’m not playing.   I wasn’t sure if I should worry about this or not.

Then yesterday I had the tv on while I was working in my studio.  One of the interminably long Cindy Crawford ads came on – the ones in which they talk about the special melons in the south of France.  I flipped on mute and waited it out.  While I was watching out of the corner of my eye for the commercial to end, I thought to myself “Well, at least they don’t run those Crepe Erase ads anymore.”  I’m not sure why I don’t like these ads, but I don’t even like to say the words “crepe” and “erase” together.  I have nothing against Jane Seymour, their spokeswoman, but I just don’t like the ads.  So imagine my shock when about 20 minutes later, there was Jane Seymour hawking Crepe Erase!  Honestly, I haven’t seen one of these ads for a couple of years at least.  It’s clear they’re reading my mind – this crosses the line!

Do you have a favorite hat?

46 thoughts on “They’re Coming to Take Me Away”

  1. Is that your cat you wrapped in foil? Just the other day I was imagining what it would be like if women started wearing hats again. You must have been reading my mind! I look goofy in hats. My head is shaped oddly.

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    1. Although YA is constantly messing with the cat and would be a likely culprit if I found the cat wrapped in foil, I actually found the photo online. But the fact that it looks so much like my cat is what drew me to it.

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  2. As a former advertising guy, I am always interested and amused by the sorts of ads that get attached to a given show. It reveals a lot about who the ad agency thinks is the audience for that show. You can decide for yourself whether you fit the preconception of the ad agency media department. With old reruns, they have viewership statistics to work with but for new shows they have to guess, and sometimes their guesses are puzzling. We were watching a newish show the other night and all the ads were for pharmaceuticals aimed at dire conditions and with alarming side effects. I suppose that represents a segment of the population but is it a worthy target?

    One thing that you have to remember with regard to the advertising placement choices that get made is how young, on average, people in the advertising business are. They seem to have difficulty distinguishing between somebody, say, 50 and somebody 80. I guess it’s similar to how I can’t judge how old young people are anymore. That age vagueness shows up not only in the kinds of advertising appeals they make to seniors but also in the programming where they place those ads.

    I wear hats when I need to for warmth or sun protection but I’m not a hat guy. More than any other article of clothing, hats feel like a statement and a costume to me.

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    1. I’ve had to come to terms with the fact that based on the channels that I like to watch, I am now in the “old” demographic. There are so many Medicare advantage commercials on these days I could probably do some of them by heart.

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  3. I’m not a big hat wearer. And this past winter I wasn’t even much of a coat wearer. I left the house so rarely and when I did it was just to go to the car (and then I sat in the car while target put stuff in the back for me or I went through the drive-in at Dunkin’ Donuts). Even during those cold cold days I didn’t always wear a coat. I did however wear the hat that I got in Peru in 2019, one of those beaded things with fringe. Extremely warm although I couldn’t call it fashionable by any means.

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  4. I was all set with a snide little “I occasionally wear MY tinfoil hat” comment before I saw the heading picture of your cat wearing his/hers. 😦 Curses! Outsmarted by a cat once again.

    I only wear hats when necessary–stocking caps in cold weather, golf hats when the sun threatens to sunburn the top of my head (not bald, just thin hair up there). Hats make my head itch and some golf hats don’t stay on well and they can heat up my head on a hot sunny day and I sweat enough as it is.

    I do wish I was confident enough to pull off an Indiana Jones look with a wide-brimmed fedora or cowboy or adventurers style hat. But they always make me look goofy (in my eyes). I figure it’s because of my big head. Oh well.

    Chris in Owatonna

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  5. I used to be annoyed by the way the slavering ad agencies watched my every mouse click, always assuming I might want to buy the stuff I was looking at. I’m way beyond that now. I can pull on an invisibility cloak by moving to the incognito version of my browser, but it is more fun to spoof the admen by going to sites I don’t care about, like a rescue site for lightly used Saint Bernards or maybe a business in Ireland that makes custom guitars selling for $8K or castles on the Inner Hebrides islands. I think of this as a way of decorating my computer screen, filling it with pretty objects I wouldn’t buy even if I had money. I like to hear ’em pant.

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    2. Steve, I was going to tell you, as a guitar man. Jane and I drove to Javea two days ago, and as usual we pointed out landmarks so I’d remember the way when I go there alone next week. Jane knows the way better, I went there twice two years ago. As we approached one roundabout(yes, roundabouts, know you all know this isn’t Kansas), I suddenly said “there’s a guitar factory here”. Jane thought, but didn’t say, “Yeah yeah, that fool doesn’t even know what planet he’s on”. Just carried on giving me, now pointless, directions. I said, “we don’t see it, it’s off to the left of the roundabout”. She ignored me. We got round a curve, and there was a sign, “Fabrica guitarras”, or similar, with an arrow pointing left. My point here being that I was right. But she just carried on pointing out landmarks. Maybe she thought it was a lucky coincidence.

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  6. I know, VS! I made a comment about The Ladies’ #1… the other day, and now Alexander McCall Smith’s newest book shows up on my screen…

    I like hats as buffer against the weather, though for cold and wind I mostly use hooded coats. I LOVE hats as costumes, or special occasions like my book club’s garden tour one year – there’s a great picture of us all wearing our summer (straw) hats.

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    1. A few years ago my work team got together and made hats for the Kentucky Derby opening. Lots of hot glue, felt, silk flowers. I bet I have a photo somewhere of all of us in our hats. Gotta love corporate morale building!

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  8. I recently learned about ‘bump hats’ – it’s a plastic liner that fits inside any of my seed corn caps. I bought four! I have one in my farm hat and one inside my everyday hat so far. It’s not an official, OSHA certified ‘Hard Hat’, but when I’m up in the lighting catwalks and I have to stoop because of the beam overhead, it will help when I accidentally bump my head. Or working on machinery, it helps prevent knockin’ my noggin.

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  9. I must present a confusing set of demographics. I sometimes get lots of ads on my phone for erectile dysfunction treatment. Lately it has been lots of ads for adult diapers.

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    1. So far.
      German uniform back hats. Smart.
      Italian uniform white hats. Smart.
      Turbans.
      One hat with a vail gets admission to the gambling.

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  17. Ferrari was introduced with a white fedora. He second scene shows a fez with Rick, at last, wearing a fedora. Love seeing Ingrid with a white lamp shade hat!

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  27. Hats on everyone in the final scene. “We’ll always have Paris (or hats)”
    “Welcome back to the fight. This time I know our hats will win. “

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  31. sorry i missed hat day

    i watched casablanca when i got home last night and commented on the hats wes
    in my favorites list too
    ricks gray fedora and the white panama with the 3” brim as the get in the plane

    my favorite is the one i’m wearing
    i sell my favorites and find my new favorites everyday gray stetson 1950’s this week

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  32. In the wintertime hats annoy me – the collar of my jacket inevitably pushes the back of the hat upward, and I’m constantly pushing the front up to keep it out of my eyes.

    I like a straw hat in warm weather.

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