Have you seen these, or is it just my Puerto Rican neighborhood that attracts such ads?   The first is the original ad in Spanish, and the second is the new English version, which I was excited to see, being a fan of the original (I spend a lot of time watching Univision at my local bodegas and laundromats).

Spanish version

English version

Am I wrong or are these commercials the shit?  It’s weird, because I grew up in Tucson, where Mexicans make up a large percentage of the population, but now that I live in a neighborhood with mostly families from DR and PR, I have become very familiar with the sound of Reggaeton.   It’s died down a little in the past year or so, but it used to be the soundtrack to the neighborhood, along with that diabolical Mister Softee jingle.  I didn’t really think of it as a Caribbean thing until I went back home for Christmas and casually mentioned my newfound appreciation of this crazy new style of music, which I assumed had taken the country by storm.  But as I looked into blank stare after blank stare, I realized that Reggaeton was apparently not a Mexican thing, at least not a Sonoran thing.  So that makes me wonder if they could be playing these commercials across the country — would anyone know what the hell was going on?

These are the thoughts that keep me from getting any work done.  Maybe it’s time to stop working in front of the TV.