There's no hiding from the Marketing Junkies.

I'm sitting here, at half past eleven on a Saturday night, thinking of what drivel I'll write this week, and realising how cliché I'm sounding at the moment. I really don't know what to write about, and it's worrying me. Don't get me wrong though, it's not that I'm out of topics, it's that there's too much decision. I could write about Americans or the French (they both went down well last time, except with Ma'am Reyburn: she said I should stop saying that America is a useless waste of landmass that would be better off as a nuclear and medical waste dump and that the French are all arrogant... so I will), or I could write about that thing that everyone's going on about... global warming I think it's called, or I could write about how last week was very cold and wet (strange, that, what with all the global warming going on), or I could complain about how much work we've all got these days. I could also rant on until the cows come home about the endless stream of increasingly angry men who take lots of drugs and call themselves musicians when all they... um... sing about is how many hos they've acquired or how many times they've been shot. But no, today's topic may actually have some relevance to current affairs. Yes, this week I am writing about Valentine's Day (well, more specifically starting at Valentine's Day and branching off with whatever thoughts come my way...).

Does anyone else find it distressing how Valentine's day (and any other holiday your can think of) has turned into a marketing ploy. I was walking around the shops this afternoon and everywhere I looked there were signs advertising sales, specials and general cut-down prices which indicate that the mark-up was too high in the first place. There was even one store that was advertising a two for one special on 'Happy Valentines Day, my love" cards. I mean, what were they thinking? Maybe you'd give one to your spouse and one to your secretary? Anyway, the point is that I don't think there is anything left on this earth that hasn't somehow been turned into a plan to make more money. Think about fashion fads, for one thing. Items that are essential and everyday for certain jobs have been manipulated into becoming essential for looking 'hip and cool'. Examples of modern materialistic manipulation are Rayban aviators, bikers' leather jackets, and dogtags. How the hell can something designed to identify the remnants of a mangled, gory bomb explosion have become a fashionable item? But this isn't the worst part, oh no. The absolute worst thing about this whole money making system is the way all these things are advertised. Anywhere you go these days, you will be pummelled with advertisements. When I say anywhere I'm talking about if you go to one of Pluto’s far moons you may just have a slight chance of evading the marketing section of some or other small business, that type of anywhere. I don't mind people putting up posters around their local newsagengy to tell all the old people that they're selling small koala bears, because that's taking initiative (which is good), but ad's become a bit ridiculous when once you've walked into a store to buy a pencil you are suddenly greeted by an unending array of signs advising you to invest in housing developments in eastern Thailand. On any road in South Africa there is sure to be (and I will bet money on this) some sort of sign or billboard on the side telling you how Johnston's window repair is the best and cheapest window repair around, or something like that. It may seem like I am being pedantic, but I am just building up to something that I know bothers you. Something that affects the lives of South Africans so badly that some are driven to suicide. Something that proves that Man will never be perfect. This something is the current television ads...

I once was really into Scrubs and CSI, but other than that I've never really been much of a series fan. However, recently I have been tuning into SABC 2 on Fridays to watch an episode a week of NCIS (which by the way is brilliant) and every episode that is on is punctuated by several ad-breaks. This in itself is not a cadenza, but it is what is on during those breaks that utterly defy logic. There is one short 30-second ad about some other drama about Sipho breaking up with Jane who secretly loves Francis...etc, and for the rest of the five minute break they run these short and really annoying ad's urging me to SMS 'Love' to 31425 to receive a 'sexy poem or love tip' or 'Hit' to 34121 to receive 'the latest top of the charts music' NOW! for only 1 rand per tip/song (or something along the lines of that). Four things bother me about these ads. The first is the unbearable repetitiveness and frequency of the ad's (they're on ALL THE TIME). The second is how the broadcasting stations allow such utter drivel to be screened. The third is that there is so much fine line writing and terms-and-conditions that nobody notices that if they do send the SMS 'NOW!' they will be subscribing to a 'service' that charges something like R50 per subscribtion per day, which you then have to pay to unsubscribe from (This newfound knowledge of mine was acquired after much study of the ad's and very agonising attempts to read small print very quickly). But the fourth thing is the worst: the fourth thing that not only bothers but worries me is that anyone would comply with the advert and actually send an SMS. Doesn't anyone have the common sense to know that most if not all of these "SMSing" companies are absolute rubbish in the sense that they're as reliable and trustworthy as Krakatau (which, for those of you who didn't know, blew up quite spontaneously quite a while ago...). The really disturbing thing is that the numbers show that people don't realise this. All these SMS adverts must be working because the companies must be generating a huge income to pay for all those TV ad's. And that means that there are tens, if not, hundreds of thousands of people out there who will believe anything that is put on the TV. Think about it, ten or more thousand people in a country that's stricken with poverty, crime and political unrest, all doing what some small box with wires in it tells them to do. Now that's a scary thought.

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On another matter, I've been getting some complaints recently from no-one in particular (that no one being the English teachers, of course) that I write pieces that are too long. My argument is that if it's too long for you to read then sod off. Please get back to me on this, because if the majority of you actually appreciate art and enjoy my long stories then I shall continue writing a lot, and if the majority of you are Philistines and don't like my long passages then, well, I'll probably ignore you and continue writing a lot anyway. But feedback would be nice, to anyone who cares.