We Covet | Better Living Through Consumerism

Pennant We Covet

Show your love of crunchy fried meat items with this fabulous BACON pennant.

Team Bacon all the way, baby!

Suitable for dorm rooms, kitchens, and barns. Or wherever bacon is cherished.

Bacon pennant, $4.95 @ Toy Lounge

Writing Instruments We Covet

Tired of people stealing your pens? Dude, have I got an answer to that problem for you.

These "Borrow My Pen?" pens are each emblazoned with the names of "reputation ruining" businesses ("Springfield Sexual Addiction Center", "Verdant Fields Nudist Camp", etc.), making your stockpile of pens the least desirable in the office! Keep em' handy (but hidden!) to thwart would-be pen borrowers.

Borrow My Pen?, $6.75 @ Pop Deluxe

We Covet Comic Ice Cubes

Shock and amaze your friends at your next soiree with the most unexpected drink-coolers God and nature never intended: Denture-shaped Ice Cubes. Yeah, you heard me.

Don't say we never gave you some practical consumer advice, man.

Crafted from 100% genuine rubber, these trays will make you the talk of the nursing home hipster set. Because we all know hipsters love nothing more than drinking booze from a glass that looks as though it might in fact be filled with Efferdent. Enjoy!

Frozen Smiles, $8.00 each @ Urban Outfitters

Nether Region Hair Care Products That We, Um, Don't So Much Covet

Okay, so, am I the only woman in the world that didn't know that her nether regions should be referred to as 'Betty" (and, can I ask, does that make 'Veronica' the asshole?) And, also, am I the only woman in the world to whom it has never occurred to color the hair of her nether regions? Because, this product I just do not get. Who cares if the carpet doesn't match the drapes? Who even notices? And why on earth would anyone ever want their coochie to boast a 'novelty color'?

Here, I suppose, is where I show my age and general fustiness.  In my day, a Brazilian wax was adventurous. Keeping the fuzz and coloring it rainbow brite? YOU CRAZY KIDS.

Betty Beauty Hair Color For The Hair Down There, $19.99 @ BettyBeauty.com

Weird Ass-Enhancing Thingies That We Don't So Much Covet

Are there really men out there who would buy these, seriously?

And if there are, could you point them out to me, please, so that I can laugh at them?

Thank you.

(Don't even get me started on the 'Pouch Pads.' DON'T EVEN GET ME STARTED. Just know that they are out there, and be afraid for the fate of Western Civilization.)

'Bottoms Up' (I SHIT YOU NOT) Bum Enhancers For Men, $40.00 @ BottomsUp.ca

(Sourced through Truemors)

Food Accessories That We Would Totally Covet If We knew What They Were For

These are adorable, but I just can't figure out what they're for. I mean, sure, why shouldn't an apple have a sweater, but then again, why should it? Not that I'm anti-apple or anything - if apples want to wear clothes, then more power to them - but it just seems to me that the sweater yarn might get caught in your teeth when you bite into them.

Of course, if you're the type to put sweaters on your apples, you're probably naming them and organizing them into little families, so you're maybe not eating them. So maybe I'm missing the point entirely.

Apple Jackets, $20.00 @ The Curiosity Shoppe. One size, apparently, fits most medium apples. So if you have extra large or extra small apples, you might want to have them sized by a tailor or something. Because, you know, dressing well is all about fit. Stacey and Clinton taught me that.

Frankenstein Mutant Freak Thing We Don't So Much Covet

BEHOLD THE HORROR SCIENCE HATH WROUGHT!

Okay, so it's just a stupid apple... well, sort of.

Actually, it's a Grapple -- an apple that is artificially flavored to taste like a grape, thus producing the most redundant and superfluous food item ever mass-produced by man. Congratulations, Grapple people, you win at being pointless! Woot!

Dude, what I want to know is when are they going to make a carrot that tastes like broccoli? Because THAT would be totally useful. Durr?

Get yourself a whole box of freakish grapey appleness if you dare, $39.95 @ Premium Fruit

Bizarre Stuff We Covet: Spazzstick Caffeinated Lip Balm

This product was, apparently, invented by an Alaskan police officer who was worried about staying awake during long shifts, and also about chapped lips. Which, I don't know, seems a bit too metrosexual for men who patrol the snowy tundra of the continental north. Alaskan cops should have chapped lips, to go with their wind-burned cheeks and polar bear pelt coats. I can't really visualize an Alaskan cop with a perfectly moisturized smile, which, when you think about it, is really only a few tiny steps away from the slippery slope to waxed man-brows.

The coffee thing, though, I get. There's only so much coffee you can drink before your bladder starts bursting, and I imagine that in Alaska the outhouses are pretty cold and uncomfortable. For me personally, though, the advantage of replacing coffee with lip balm has less to do with the temperature of the outhouses in my 'hood than it does with my inability, as a pregnant woman, to hold my bladder long enough to waddle quickly enough, after a few coffees, to said outhouses. So, sure, alternate means of caffeine-intake? Always good.

Spazzstick Lip Balm, $2.99 @ ThinkGeek

Weird Stuff We Covet: DIY Drinking Strawz

I gave up drinking straws when I was, oh, about eight years old (that is, if you don't count the relapse during the Long Island Iced Tea years of my early twenties.) Once I gave up apple juice, there was really no further use for the straws. But I gotta say: the idea of a kind of TinkerToy liquid-transportation device could lure me back to the apple juice pretty quickly (and, yes, Long Island Iced Teas, but I don't need so much of a push with that one.)

The problem here, I suppose, is that if you have small children you're going to have some difficulty convincing them that this toy? Is Mommy's. I mean, choking hazard, for sure, but also, they don't need convincing to drink apple juice, so this cool thing would really just be wasted on them. So maybe just save these for those drinking binges after the kiddies have gone to sleep.

DIY Drinking Strawz, $7.99 - 14.99 @ ThinkGeek

Sorta Disturbing Stuff That We Don't So Much Covet

I used to smoke, casually, a long time ago. I have nothing against smokers, so long as they don't blow smoke in my toddler's face (they can blow it in mine; I kinda like the smell.) But I do have something against creepy design, and this particularly item qualifies. Smoking mittens? Each with one tiny little hole in which to insert a cigarette? Maybe it's just me, but something about that creepy little eyelet hole puncturing that smooth poofy glove reminds me of a tracheotomy. Which, you know, is generally not the kind of vibe one is going for when one is trying to relax with one's smoke.

I get that smokers these days have to indulge their habit out of doors, and that sometimes out of doors is an inhospitable place, but guess what? There's already something that you can put on your hands to keep them warm while you suck desperately on your preshus cigarette. They're called gloves.

Smoking Mittens, @ SuckUK

Bizarre Product Of The Week: The Mansy

First of all, what self-respecting person of the male sex would don a garment that compounds the word 'man' with the word 'pansy'? Second of all, what self-respecting person with any excess baggage in the nether regions (which is to say, again, any person of the male sex) don a garment that effectively binds his sensitive parts and requires that he get a bikini wax?

I don't care how in tune you are with your higher chakras or whether yoga has enabled you to bend your legs back over your shoulders, there is no excuse for a manotard. None.

The 'Mansy,' by Lululemon. Ad premieres April 1st (which, yes, I KNOW - April Fool's. We can only hope.)