Consult your doctor before reading this article. Side-effects could include drowsiness, loss of appetite, abdominal cramping, diarrhea, joint pain, nausea, blindness, athlete’s foot, loss of interest in Scrabble®, inability to floss, sudden urge to sing show tunes, barking, delusions of grandeur, desire to wear underwear on the outside of clothing ....

According to the TV, there’s a pill for everyone – for everything. Has anyone ever noticed that anti-depressants seem to be exclusively marketed to women? Damn right we’re depressed! But aside from women who have a legitimate chemical imbalance, how exactly can a pill pay the bills, help with the kids, make your boss a nicer person, help you zip those jeans and make your ex pay child support? Jesus Christ must’ve invented that pill because it would definitely qualify as a miracle.

Of course, one pill is marketed directly to men. That would be the one that fixes erectile dysfunction. Terrific. Is anyone really upset when that stops working? I seriously wonder if the erectile dysfunction people aren’t in collusion with the anti-depressant people. After all, it’s doubtful that a grabbier husband translates into a happier wife.

Just a quick note about ADHD: I think it’s really cruel to have a long list of side-effects for people who have trouble paying attention.

Cleaning products are another big seller for women. It’s great that we now have powerful stain removers, but come on. It’s by no means FUN to clean anything. And I don’t care how well the product works, no woman laughs when her child spills grape juice on the white shag. The only thing less likely to happen is that conversation mom and I are going to have about douching while sitting on a porch swing in the middle of a lazy summer evening.

When it comes to car ads, men seem to get the fast cars and the big trucks. If it’s an SUV, men get to tow a large boat or splash dirt around as they drive through the mountains. (Men in commercials only live near woods and mountains.) Women, on the other hand, get a minivan. Evidently, the only reason for a woman to get behind the wheel is to cart a soccer team around. Whether she has children or not, there always seems to be filthy children in sports uniforms that need a ride somewhere.

What’s with Hardees® these days? Apparently, they’re under the impression that the entire female population has been voted off the island. Someone at their ad agency has convinced them that cavemen would be the best customer base. Why bother cooking the burger and putting it on a bun at all? The men in these ads look like they’d be more at home simply tearing the meat directly from the carcass with their bare hands. As for the women in these commercials, it really doesn’t seem like a good idea to eat a sloppy burger while gyrating atop a mechanical bull. Intelligent women know this would cause gas.

Let’s not forget how drinking lots of beer makes everyone attractive. Give me a man with a 12-pack and the car keys and I go weak in the knees. If I consume enough alcohol, I’ll look absolutely stunning in my little, black dress, shaking it out on the dance floor. Yeah, right. I don’t need to shake anything that takes longer than 30 seconds to stop and the only interesting thing about a man who drinks large quantities of beer, is watching his waste band sink lower and lower because his gut hangs down to about mid-thigh.

Judging by all of the financial ads, no matter how little money you make, you’ll be able to retire a millionaire at age 45. Don’t worry if the best you can do is sling hash browns in a diner. Once you’ve made a couple of shrewd investments, a summer house in Martha’s Vineyard is only a plane trip away. You also shouldn’t fret about all of that credit card debt either. A simple conversation with a debt consolidator will have those monthly payments down to $10 and a couple of chickens.

Can we pass a law prohibiting washed up actors from pushing products? I appreciate the fact that Lindsay Wagner can finally sleep through the night on her sleep number bed. But I just saw Cheryl Ladd endorsing something and I can’t remember what it was because I was so disturbed by her facelift and lip implants. She looked like a fish with a REEEAALLY tight ponytail. If Jaclyn Smith starts doing ads for adult diapers, I hope I’m not alive to see it.

Now I’d like to discuss the period before my period, the period during my period and then comment about the period after my period. After that, I’d like to move onto the period in between my period. According to the makers of feminine hygiene products, we have about 25 minutes each month when we’re not bloated, cranky or unable to swim. Of course, don’t worry; there’s a pill to take care of everything. Hell, if you wear the right tampon, it’s quite possible you could actually even take flight.

Regardless of how they do it, commercials are designed to make you think you can’t live without a certain product. Sometimes this is true. Since I started using tartar control toothpaste, the dentist no longer needs a jackhammer to clean my teeth. More often than not, though, I’m a little disappointed. I have no one but myself to blame most of the time. If it wasn’t obvious to me that an Epilady™ would hurt, I deserve the pain. Just remember, it’s “Buyer Beware” with anything.

I hope this article has caused laughter, amusement, sudden urge to chuckle, inability to stop smiling and minimal loss of sexual function.

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© Beth Wiesemann. No portion of this article may be reproduced without the author's permission.