Random Developments

This weekend I stayed up to watch the Japanese F1 Grand Prix, as I usually do (note to those outside Australia: F1 GPs are shown in Australia late at night on Sundays, regardless of when they actually happen, except for the Australian GP, which is shown live; that broadcast time is approximately the right one for the European GPs, but the Asian ones are severely delayed - the American ones are shown approximately live early on Monday mornings). The GP was exciting up to the point when Schumacher’s car broke down, but that’s not what I want to talk about.

There’s an ad for Mobil oil that, as far as I know, is only shown during the F1 transmissions, and it’s driving me crazy. It tells of a “drive around the world” expedition that used Mobil oil to protect the cars’ engines from the environment: dust, mud, water, smog etc. The ad ends with a member of the expedition standing knee-dep on mud, lifting his ruined shoe and saying, and I quote, “too bad everything wasn’t protected by Mobil oil”. NO! That’s wrong! If the expression “everything wasn’t protected” makes any sense — and I don’t think it does —, it means that not a single thing was protected, and what would be the point of making an ad then? What the guy should have said is “too bad not everything was protected by Mobil oil”.

There. I had to vent. Back to the regular programming, now.