Recently, I was at the mall and couldnít help but notice all the Halloween stuff on displays in stores. I, for one, love Halloween so for me it is never too early to get your creep on.
But seeing all the goblin goodness got me thinking about fears and how mine is a little strange.
I like to think of myself as a brave, tough woman. Iím not a superhero or anything, but I can handle stuff.
Take for example my extreme fear of birds due to a lifelong victim-nemesis relationship with the feathered fiends in the attacking role.
I still donít like the beady-eyed creatures but since coming to Rocky View Publishing, Iíve gotten up close and personal with owls, hawks and eagles for photos. I faced my fear and came out intact with two eyes and no flesh wounds.
But one thing that continues to make me fidget in discomfort is when food products are depicted as having human characteristics.
Itís not so much of an issue when an animal is anthropomorphized but when, say, an M& M is given human characteristics I get really uncomfortable.
Donít get me wrong, I love me some M& Ms but after I see a human-M& M commercial that gets my grossed-out senses tingling, I have to avoid them for a while.
Itís not that I donít like that a food is walking and talking, itís the idea of then eating this walking and talking bit of food.
To me, it is almost the same as taking a bite out of person I just met on the street. Itís icky and wrong.
Case-in-point: I recently saw a commercial for M& Ms where the brown one purposely introduced the red one to a woman who couldnít control herself around chocolate.
The red M& M left with the choco-holic huntress only to be locked in her car with her where, we can only assume, she devoured him. It just seems like it should be taboo.
Itís even worse when the food-creature eats itís own, that just makes my skin crawl.
Thatís full on cartoon cannibalism.
And it gets worse, I remember one commercial for cookies where the cookies were singing and smiling as they were being microwaved.
What is with that? Being microwaved is no singing matter.
That would hurt something fierce.
Then after having suffered through the flash-cooking of the microwave, the cookies are all too happy to be eaten by the waiting children. Again I say, what is with that?
It turns out I am not alone.
Actress Kyra Sedgwick is also said to have this fear, which in my mind makes me much cooler because Iím a big fan of her show The Closer.
Now, I know this is odd and I am sounding like a bit of a weirdo but Iím okay with that because I am a little weird but what I like to think of as a delightful way.
So next time you see one of these creepy commercials, think of me not being able to eat that yummy food for at least a few days.
