TheMommyBlog

Saturday, November 18, 2006 Family

When I posted about the hilarious TUL ad featuring Graphology analysis by Dr. Ackerman a while back, the response was very funny. Everyone wrote with their “results” and we laaaaughed at their theretofore unrecognized neuroses as identified by the insightful Dr. Ackerman. That was pure fun.

And then, a very nice person from Office Max wrote and said that she loved the thread:

Dear Mindy,

I’m so please that you enjoyed the TUL website from OfficeMax and DDB.  Not only do we appreciate your eye for our mainline campaigns and products, our sources tell us that you are quite the critic of children’s products.  In the In the spirit of an early holiday season, I’d like to send you a sample of a new children’s product special to OfficeMax for the holidays.

I said sure, if we like it I’ll mention it and let them know that you’ve offered a discount to The Mommy Blog readers through the holidays.

Ooh! Update! 50% off!

That is fantastic!  I am so happy they’re getting great mileage out of it.  And I love the photo!  As far as a special discount, please see the attached.  Any customer who has this coupon or even just mentions where (your blog) they saw the discount qualifies for it any of the OfficeMax stores countrywide.

Oh. My. God.

This absolutely huge package arrived the other day while I was on the phone—the mail man had to help me bump it up and over the threshold. The kids fluttered around it, but I said that we couldn’t open it until they came back from Dad’s on Friday because otherwise they’d never get ready for school. So yesterday, I unpacked it, flipped it open, put it in the living room and didn’t say a word.

I couldn’t peel the kids off it all night. They ate dinner next to it. They cooperated. They complimented the construction, saying that it was great that two kids could draw on it at the same time without bothering each other. If there was one at the chalkboarad, the other two would hunker down with dry erase makers at the white board. And may I say, these markers have changed one of our major house rules; that is, that the kids may not ever touch a dry erase marker.

These have an eraser built into the cap. Duh. All those years of insisting they not use mine because they always lose the erasers and won’t learn to use a paper towel—a chimp could figure this out: use markers anywhere but on the funiture, clean up afterward and there won’t be a beating. Jeez.

Anyway, I had to snap this photo before they wake up and erase what they did last night. Details in the Flickr notes.