WEEKEND HUM ( 4-22-06 )

GOOD CHIP OFF THE BLOCK
Literal and figurative hats off to Chip Spillane and Thrifty Car Rental. In ad running on the radio this weekend, Spillane says he's not going to talk business, he's gonna talk blood. Seems he heard from Monica at the Red Cross about a desperate need for blood and decided to use his radio time for that! If more radio hounds used half their time for biz and half for helping the common cause, we'd all be better off. Especially the car dealers. Have you watched the local six o'clock news stations lately. The amount of car ads is sickening. There used to be an unwritten rule that a station would never run two car ads back to back. Not any more, folks. It's sell, sell, sell.

THERE'S ALWAYS THE HOME SHOW
Home Show this weekend. I know what you're saying. Whatever. But if you need a place to let the kiddies unleash their energy, what better place than the fairgrounds. And kids under 17 are free.

THE GREAT BEN & JERRY'S BLACK AND TAN BOO-BOO
Uh-oh. The marketing wizards at Unilever and Jerry's probably didn't know that the Black and Tan militia were violent British thugs. They just thought that the name Black & Tan would be really cool for their new flavor, based on the lovely combo of ale and stout. A blogger got some ink from Reuters with this story. Check out junkfoodblog.com.