A Tale of Two Evils – Infomercials and Insomnia

 

“It was the best of times; it was the worst of times”….  Sorry, wrong story!

I have had a love affair with insomnia often during my life.  With the coming of the infomercial, The Shark guy became one of my new best friends.  I recall fondly the days when Mark would taunt me with the steam cleaner, I even talked back to him, as if he could hear me.

I went through 4 of those in about 5 years.  Wasn’t a bad product really; just not as durable as I felt it should be for everyday use.  Not only did two of them end up with broken hoses, two of them completely stopped working after a few months….. Dead, died… buh bye shark.  170 bucks each time down the tubes…  Their customer service back pre 2006 was horrible.  I had an easier time getting my terrified of water black lab into the tub for his bath. (That’s another story completely and maybe I will write about it someday.)

Infomercials to me were now just as evil as insomnia!  I won’t go through all of the crap I bought on a sleep deprived whim; we would be here all year discussing that.

I had finally given up on infomercials; I thought I had recovered from my addiction of buying crap I didn’t need as seen on tv until…..

There it was… shiny, beautiful, and calling out my name like a piece of cake to a diabetic sugar addict.  The NuWave Oven…

 

It had awards, chef endorsements… and better yet… IT COOKED FROM FROZEN!!!!!  I often forgot to take stuff out of the freezer the night before work… OMG!! I NEED THIS!!!!

Before 10 minutes into the infomercial, I found myself dialing that flashing number on the screen like a mad woman, yelling out “HURRY I MUST HAVE THIS KITCHEN MIRACLE NOW!!!!!!!!!!!!”

I ordered it in white…

It took about a week to arrive on my door step, my children looking at me as if I had lost my mind.  I could hear in their little brains, “Mom was watching infomercials again; we really should stage an intervention”.

They watched me open the box, mockingly.  I washed it carefully and pulled out frozen picnic ribs for dinner.  I wanted to see how this worked… from frozen… Check… fatty meat… Check.

My frozen ribs cooked up perfectly in less than 15 minutes… my children were amazed… I measured the fat from the 8 ribs… 1 and ¾ cup of fat pulled out of them, poured from the drip pan right into my pyrex measuring cup… JUST LIKE THE COMMERCIAL SAID WOULD HAPPEN!!!!!!!!!!!!!! They ate their supper in shock and awe that night, as I smiled at them triumphantly… Yes, yes my little Nay Sayers… I WIN THIS TIME!

For 2 years, that Nuwave oven sat on my counter, daily.  I had a crack in the dome after two years of use, ordered another dome, quick response time from the company.

I love this infomercial gadget.  To date it is one of the two things I have purchased that was worth the money.  Almost 6 years later and that Nuwave is still cooking.  I love it so much; I ordered another one, this time in black.  Nuwave Ovens… a MUST HAVE kitchen appliance, infomercial or not…  (No I am not getting any kickbacks for writing about how much I love my nuwave oven.  But you really should try it out.)

The other good investments from an infomercial, and the other of my MUST HAVE kitchen appliances was shown to me by my buddy, Mark… the Ninja Mega Kitchen System…  I love this product, I use it daily, and often enough, more than once.

Now if only my Power Pressure Cooker would arrive.. I am still waiting for the company to actually ship it after 4 weeks or so since my order.  It’s on back order I have been told.  Not happy about this at all, and I have to say, it better not only be worth the wait, but as good as my Nuwaves…  I will let you all know either way.

Have you ever purchased items after watching an informercial in an insomnia induced stupor or otherwise? Were they good or bad investments? Tell us all about your Tale in the comments below!