Commercial Confusion

I think that we all have our own little bad habits. One of mine, one that I have had for as long as I can remember, is trying to do two things at one time. I know that the modern, current term for this is multitasking. Call it whatever you will; I have been doing it for a long time and will probably continue to do so. For many years now, I have been the mistress of reading a book or paying bills (I like to call it performing financial wizardry) while watching television, or baking cookies while watching a movie. Heck, Trent might even be sitting next to me watching the telly as I write a blog post.

Of course, one of the downfalls of doing this is that sometimes you miss things. But it just seems that I often have to have more than one thing to do at a time. Does it mean that I am scatterbrained, or unable to focus? Not necessarily. If I am doing something really absorbing, I focus on only one thing at a time. Often my other task, like the telly or some music, is just background noise that keeps things from getting way too quiet. For some of us, too much quiet is just as distracting as too much noise. Or maybe it's just me, and I am a complete weirdo.

I freely admit to shifting my focus from one task to another. If I didn't, I wouldn't be able to finish anything at all. But I go on, watching a movie and looking it up on  IMDB because I just know that I've seen the third serving wench on the left in something else before. Oh, wait, wasn't the Elf King in an episode of Law and Order: SVU? Yes, I'm one of those people whose brain remembers faces. It's a curse that causes me much less suffering now that I am able to look up movies or people and cross-reference online. 

Anyway, as I was saying a few moments ago, one of the dangers of trying to do two things at once is that sometimes you miss a little thing here or there. You're making a move in a variation on Candy-Crush-Your-Soul, a game that you swore to yourself you'd never play again because it makes you lose your flipping mind, and you sense from the background music on the telly that you have just missed Something Important. What did he say? Wait a minute, what happened? Thank goodness for the DVR and the let's rewind a few seconds feature. Oh, okay, you've caught up now.

Sometimes this can end up being a really funny moment, as it was for me the other night. I was watching a program that I was quite interested in but decided to do something online during the commercial break. I believe it was actually something important, like catching up on some financial wizardry. There was yet another commercial running for yet another fancy new drug. It followed the usual formula. Do you have moderate-to-severe whatsis? Have you been unhappy with your medication? Try new bizzdeeboo. And on and on. 

The next time you see one of these commercials, take a listen to the scary part toward the end. This is where they tell you that while bizzdeeboo is a wonderful new drug, it can cause various side effects. These can range from dry mouth to uncontrollable flatulence and all sorts of things in between. Then they get into the really serious things like bleeding of various body parts and even organ failure. It was one of these side-effect speeches that stopped me in my tracks the other night.

As I was looking at Very Important Things online I heard the announcer, who may have had a slightly unusual way of pronouncing things, start in on the product warnings. And then my brain really went down the garden path. When he said "if you experience pain when urinating," my brain heard something completely different. "If you experience peeing while urinating..." My head snapped up to look at the tv. What?! Peeing while urinating?! That happens to me all of the time! It's a good thing I don't take bizzdeeboo because I'd have to go to the doctor tomorrow. And he'll hate it if I try to read a book during my office visit...