SkyMall Monday: Night Sweat Alarm

by Mike Barish on

I love sleeping. After a long night of testing fabulous SkyMall products, I like to retire to the SkyMall Monday domestic headquarters, curl up with the catalog and fall asleep with my best buddy. I sleep like a log. But, not everyone is so lucky. Some people are startled awake every night by an awful sensation. It happens involuntarily. It’s embarrassing. It’s damp. They wet the bed…with their sweat. Night sweats are no laughing matter. Every year, zero people die of night sweats. Together, we can reduce that number.* In order to survive night sweats, the victim must be made aware of this dangerous situation before it’s too late. Now, thanks to one very special invention, people can be made aware the moment that night sweats strike. Now, we have the Night Sweat Alarm.

The Night Sweat Alarm detects persperation and wakes you up so that you can deal with your night sweats immediately instead of in the morning when you would be making the bed and perhaps doing laundry. This way, you’ll pay less attention to your night sweats as you focus, instead, on how tired you are. Your spouse or hooker will also be awakened by your movements and will be there to help you deal with your night sweats.** Now, rather than waking up naturally in the morning and throwing the damp sheets in the wash, you can discuss your problems with your mate at two o’clock in the morning. What great bonding time!
As always, we refer to the product description to hammer the point home:

If you’re bothered by night sweats, try this monitor. When it senses perspiration, it vibrates and sounds an alarm so that you can wake up and remove blankets or take other corrective action. Saves you time and trouble changing moist sheets and sleepwear.

Imagine the time you’ll save when you wake up in the middle of the night, remove the blanket from the bed and explain to your spouse why you’re up at some ungodly hour. You’ll be so glad that you’re awake when your lover turns to you, carresses your cheek and says, “Why is your sleepwear moist?” “It’s my night sweats,” you’ll respond. “I have to take corrective action.” Surely, your husband or wife will smile, assist you in changing the sheets and lovingly laugh at the misunderstanding. They will love this extra time that you spend together early in the morning, two-to-three hour before the alarm clock goes off. And they’ll enjoy doing activities that easily could be done during waking hours.

So, if you wet the bed through your pours and not your crotch, get yourself the Night Sweat Alarm. You and your partner will be glad that you did.***

* That’s statistically impossible.
** He will probably roll over, go back to sleep and mutter something unflattering under his breath.
*** Your partner will be perusing the Casual Encounters section of Craigslist while you wash your moist sheets.

Check out all of the previous SkyMall Monday posts HERE.

SkyMall Monday: Personalized Hot Buns Dish & Your Kickasserole Dish

by Mike Barish on

We’ve discussed in the past how much I love to cook in the SkyMall Monday kitchen. In fact, it’s starting to dominate the SkyMall Monday posts, what with the pizza, hot dog, pepper grinder and paper towel products that we’ve featured. I just can’t help it. I travel a lot, so when I’m home I like the comfort of good food and friends. In fact, my favorite activity in between travels is a good old-fashioned pot luck dinner. I get to catch up with friends, enjoy the tastes of home and share good stories. But at a pot luck, how can I be sure I’ll get credit for the food I made? I specialize in hot buns and casseroles, and I’m sick and tired of my friends stealing the credit for dishes. I’ll step away from the table for five minutes and suddenly my friend Matt will tell everyone that he made the hot buns. But I’ll show him. At my next pot luck, I’ll serve my hot buns in a Personalized Hot Buns Dish and my tuna noodle casserole in my Kickasserole Dish.

That’s right. No one will be able to steal my thunder with these dishes that announce to the world, “Hey, I made these hot buns and threw these random ingredients into the oven and called the result a casserole!” I wasn’t convinced that anything could solve my problem and prevent food identity theft, but the product description that these two items share convinced me beyond the shadow of a hot bun:

Serve up piping-hot buns, while giving the baker of the family his or her due…You know your tuna casserole kicks everyone else’s. But social conventions and that mild-mannered demeanor demand that you keep quiet about it. However, if your baking dish says what needs to be said, you can sit back and accept complements graciously.

It’s like they read my mind and stared straight into my soul. I’m just so mild-mannered and a slave to social conventions that I let people walk all over me. Usually, when Matt steals credit for my casserole, I bite my tongue, smile nervously and then go back into the kitchen to cry. But what will Matt do when I serve my new, improved Sausage Kickasserole in my personalized Kickasserole Dish? What will he do when I present my sweet, sticky hot buns in a dish that announces just who worked hard to make those buns so irresistible? He’ll enjoy those buns and that sausage-fest and he’ll know once and for all who’s on top. And he’ll like it.

Take bake the credit. Take back your life. Get the Personalized Hot Buns Dish and Kickasserole Dish and assert your dominance. You owe it to yourself and your buns.

SkyMall Monday: Towel-Matic

by Mike Barish on

I love to cook. Whether it’s pizza, hot dogs or well-seasoned steaks, I kick up quite a storm in the SkyMall Monday kitchen. But you can’t even begin to imagine the mess that I make. Most of my kitchen adventures result in me being covered in mayonnaise and bleeding profusely. With my hands full of salamis and Rocky Mountain oysters, I have a hard time tearing off sheets of paper towel. The roll ends up coming undone and that breaks my heart. There is nothing more devastating than a paper towel roll unfurled. That’s why SkyMall Monday is so pleased to add the Towel-Matic to the kitchen arsenal!

Thank heavens there is now a device that automatically dispenses paper towels for you! With just a wave of your hand in front of the sensor, the Towel-Matic will present you with one or two sheets. In fact, it can even dispense a half-sheet if you’re one of those people that buys rolls with half-sheet perforations because you’re that anal-retentive about paper towel comsumption.

Why would you need to spend $60 on a device that dispenses paper towel for you? I’m offended by your question but my editors require that I answer it. So, I’ll lean on my dear friends at the SkyMall catalog to explain it:

It never unravels. Built-in optical sensor automatically identifies the perforations on the towel and stops right at the line every time. One-handed operation guarantees perfect tearing and helps prevent the spread of germs.

It identifies perforations! Now you won’t waste valuable nanoseconds of your life finding the perforations on the paper towel with your own eyes.

Think how much easier your life will be now that you don’t have to worry about your paper towel roll looking mildly unsightly. Today is the first day of the rest of your life and you can be certain that you can wipe all that mayonnaise off your forehead.

SkyMall Monday: Pizza Pro

by Mike Barish on

Here at SkyMall Monday, we are always looking to make life simpler. The world is such a difficult and challenging place. But thankfully our favorite catalog tells us what our problems are and then solves them. This week, we tackle the impossible feat of serving pizza. Too often we make our own pizzas at home and then can’t slice them. Who has a pizza cutter? Or knives? And how do they expect you to pick up the slice once it’s cut? All the while, your family is dying of malnutrition. Can you live with that on your conscience? Is that tomato sauce or blood on your hands? Put all these questions to rest by inviting the Pizza Pro into you life.

Let’s face it, slicing pizza is next to impossible. Time after time, I have thrown my hands up into the air in exasperation while trying to serve that circular Rubik’s cube of a meal. I mean, what is a man to do? And lifting the slice? Don’t even get me started! Am I supposed to use a spatula? A cake spatula? It’s all just too damn confusing. So you can imagine how much of a relief it is to find a device that is made specifically for pizza. Finally, our long national nightmare is over.

I wasn’t fully convinced until I read the product description:

Slice and serve pizza easily with this new invention. It combines kitchen shears with a wedge-shaped spatula so you can slice and serve with one hand without ever losing toppings…Works for both left- and right-handed people.

Left- and right-handed people can finally cut their pizza like it’s a child’s craft project and serve it to their friends and families while looking like a true professional. Assuming, of course, that professional pizza makers use this device. Which they don’t. But if you make your kids pay you for the dinner, that would make you a professional. And, really, they should pay for their meals. You work hard all day. What do they do? Pick their noses and watch Dora the Explorer? Free-loading bastards!

So, if you want to look like a totally competent adult human being, get the Pizza Pro. I really don’t see any viable alternative.

SkyMall Monday: Full Color Photo Throw

by Mike Barish on

You love your family. You love to visit them, speak to them on the phone and keep photos of them around your home. That’s what you do when you love people and want to keep them close. But what if you really need to keep them close? What if you really need to express your love and devotion to them? You only have so many kidneys to give. Well, thankfully, SkyMall Monday is back to help you help yourselves. This week we learn what love is. This week, we discuss the Full Color Photo Throw.

Sure, you could display photos of your family in ornate frames or waste your hard-earned money on one of the asinine digital picture frames. But your love is better than that. Your love for your family cannot be contained within the confines of a 4×6, 5×7 or even 8×10 photo. No, you need something bigger. Something better. Something that also keeps you warm and makes your houseguests mildly to moderately uncomfortable. You need the Full Color Photo Throw.

It’s a blanket with a photo of your family (or friends, pets, sister-in-law, neighbor, yourself or some unsuspecting stranger) on it. Nothing will put your mind at ease more than laying down on the couch with some Irish coffee, your mortgage and credit card bills and a blanket with a larger-than-life photo of your loved ones on it. How relaxing!

Don’t believe me? You never do. It hurts my feelings. But, since you’re going to be that way, you might as well read the product description:

Turn your parent’s wedding photo into a cherished heirloom, honor a military hero, make a keepsake of the last family reunion photo or memorialize a beloved pet!

Who wouldn’t want to get busy with someone on the couch under a blanket festooned with a photo of their parents on it? And no one will be concerned about your emotional well-being when you take a nap under a blanket decorated with a picture of your dog who died 12 years ago. Nope, nothing to see here.

So, show everyone how much you love them in a totally healthy and well-adjusted way with the Full Color Photo Throw. It’s the natural way to love. Unlike the way your creepy uncle likes to love you.