Hannah Jones/Winonan

If you watch half as much television as I do, (which is to say: “too much”) you’ve seen all of the major infomercials of our region.

I have actually paused in changing the channel in order to watch the rest of a few fine specimens of over-the-top, low-budget, smack-you-in-the-face, repeat-the-phone-number-five-billion-times-in-the-last-ten-seconds marketing.

Like a sommelier of crappy advertisement, I know all the nuances, undertones, and distinct groupings of infomercials.

One major phylum of the infomercial kingdom is Quick-Fix Beautification. This category boasts a menagerie of ten-second solutions to our hairiest little problems. And I do mean “hairy.”

I’ve seen at least two laser hair removal products, which translates to about twenty clips of women strobe-ing their “problem areas” with pocket-sized blacklights like some kind of an armpit rave.

Combine that with thirty plus clips of men sticking custom trimmers directly up their noses, and you have at least a half-hour of quality, disgusting television.

Feeling a bit too pudgy? Try five or six of the diet supplements that are guaranteed to melt away those pounds.

The number on the screen has the perfect girdle, corset, and helping-bra combo suit to squeeze you in all the right places.

Trust an infomercial to bring a simple, charming solution to every personal grooming issue: scrub for your acne, tonics for your bald spots, and whitener for those stained chompers of yours—usually in one convenient, grapefruit-scented bottle.

Once you’re done giving yourself a total infomercial makeover, you might find yourself a smidge peckish. Not a problem.

Infomercials boast easy ways to prepare every snack known to man, sometimes with the same device.

I could watch a single Vitamix commercial for hours, watching them turn a carrot and a handful of blueberries into smoothies, cakes, soup, burgers, baby food, and nail-polish remover.

If all those options seem overwhelming, no need to fret. While their multi-tasking machines are popular, the infomercial’s true forte is the single-use kitchen device.

In a single afternoon, you could purchase an apparatus designed exclusively to hard-boil eggs, a specialized tray for baking brownies, even a mold that makes nothing but tortilla bowls.

The cream of this comestible crop is, of course, the Big Top Cupcake Maker.

What, you ask, is the Big Top Cupcake Maker? Simple: it’s a set of silicone molds specially created to bake our most beloved confection, the cupcake… only ten times larger than average.

The result is a single-person pastry the size of a cantaloupe; a fun and festive way to give your party guests exactly what they never thought they’d need in their entire lives.

You may ask: if the cupcake is ten times bigger than a normal cupcake and is not baked in a cup, is it actually a cupcake at all? Ah, now you see the beauty of it.

What they lack in practicality, they make up for in pure, mesmerizing lunacy.

I couldn’t watch one without asking myself who on earth would actually purchase something so ridiculously humiliating, far-fetched, or useless.

…Until I put on a Snuggie.

You’ve seen the commercial A hideously unattractive smock made of fleece, the Snuggie is designed to accommodate a lifestyle of pure, slothful indulgence. It is essentially a blanket equipped with sleeves.

The Snuggie is an eyesore and a ludicrous concept altogether. Nobody, in their right minds, would want to live in a blanket like a second skin.

The very idea is nothing but THIS IS THE MOST COMFORTABLE THING I’VE EVER EXPERIENCED IN MY ENTIRE LIFE.

One day, after a long shift at the Home Depot, I sat down on the couch with a cup of coffee.

I noticed our novelty Vikings Snuggie, which pairs its unattractive shape with garish purple and gold helmets all across its surface. I was tired and chilly, and decided, on a lark, to put it on.

The device, which seemed so unassuming lying dormant on the floor, instantly molded to my body and raised my temperature to a cozy smolder with the grace and precision of a high-tech machine.

My legs felt snuggly. My arms, free to hold my coffee cup, also felt snuggly. My coffee tasted snuggly.

I’m a little ashamed to admit it, but I’m going to start taking these infomercials a little more seriously now.

Now, it’s just a slippery slope to showing up at the Home Depot in fleecy purple pride.

And that Big Top Cupcake might be fun to try, too.

Oh, and I might want to zap those pesky pit hairs while I’m at it.

…Oh, God, somebody stop me.

Contact Hannah Jones at [email protected]