You’ve Got Questions, #ThrowbackThursday’s Got Answers

Hey, gotta pick up Radio Shack’s slack somewhere!

Almost two weeks ago, I set up my dubbing station to copy two different tapes. One tape was from the early summer (June) of 2001, the other from November/December 2002, and January 2003.  From what I’ve gathered any of the times I’ve converted these tapes to digital, early 2000s commercials are easily as nostalgic as late 1990s commercials.  Sure, you can definitely tell the difference in the advertising, but the early 2000s still have a nice nostalgic feeling.  It was the reason I decided last year to change the “cut off” for my archives to 2003.

I try to keep the late 1990s and early 2000s stuff circulating in my archives, but I have so much 1980s and early 1990s stuff that just screams “use me!” that it tends to shove the later stuff away.

When I decide to go all “early 2000s” with my archives, I tend to do them in blocks, since it is sometimes hard to choose just one.

Oh, that’s it, the early 2000s are like potato chips.

Wonderful, now I’ll be checking to see if there is a potato chip commercial somewhere in today’s (or tomorrow’s) block.

So, all of that said…

Today’s commercial block comes from November 2002, taped during a rerun of Freaks and Geeks (the episode was “Dead Dogs and Gym Teachers,” in case you are familiar with the sisters). Back in late 2002, I found out ABC Family was airing some reruns (which proved to be even more short-lived than the actual series), so I set my VCR timer to tape the three episodes that actually aired.

Side note about Freaks and Geeks – I had never gotten the opportunity to watch the series in its original run, since it aired on Monday nights, which was when I had my Ballet and Jazz classes back-to-back.  For years, I’ve said that I missed television shows alot of my classmates liked because of dance school (absolute truth).  I also wasn’t interested in about 99% of what my classmates liked.

I do remember being interested in watching Freaks in Geeks, even though I wasn’t huge on nostalgia in 1999, or I was just trying to hide that budding future interest from the other eleventh graders.  But, it was cancelled so quickly, I never got to see it.  I was holding out for summer reruns, which never happened.  It did go to Fox Family to air the remaining episodes, but I didn’t know that at the time.

In 2004, I found out through the the wonders of the internet (the dial-up kind with the 56K modem – yes I still had that in 2004) that there would be a DVD boxed set coming out.  After having seen 3 episodes in 2002, I really did need to have this boxed set.  It was pricey (I remember buying it through the video store I worked for at a whopping $45.99, which was the norm for DVD boxed sets at the time), but totally worth it.

I really have to do something about this show at some point, it’s that good!

Anyway, today’s commercials come from one of the episodes reaired for that brief time in November 2002. The episodes aired at the end of ABC Family’s programming day (I think 11 pm EDT/EST), so this block actually has a few minutes of an infomercial at the end.

Included in this block of commercials…

The toilet paper version of the Fruit of the Loom Underwear Testers

SnapShot(1)

Reality television you wouldn’t expect on ABC Family!

SnapShot(2)

Coffee!

SnapShot(3)

New programming blocks!

SnapShot(4)

Illegal crimes…featuring the counting sheep!

SnapShot(5)

SPAM recipes!

SnapShot(6)

…is it though?

And network after hours programming, the way it used to be!

SnapShot(7)

You see, kids, television networks used to go off the air at night and air these things called infomercials.  These full-length commercials either sold a product or pushed on the socially conscious heartstrings of people who are awake for some reason at 4 am, be it insomnia, work, or vampirism.  Now, they have their own channels, dedicated to airing these programs all day, every day!

We have promos for ABC Family programming, products, vacations, and other goodies.  So why wait any longer?  Click play!

That Sony commercial with the camera memory stick, and the Radio Shack commercial featuring Shaq and a computer with speakers attached TO THE MONITOR…holy technology!

Flashback Friday will be along tomorrow with more commercials from the early 2000s (digitally transferred from the other tape I was working on two weeks ago).

Have a great Throwback Thursday!

4 comments

  1. I actually remember “Freaks and Geeks” pretty well. I may have seen an episode or two of this show whenever it was first shown on NBC.

    Infomercials also air on some stations on weekend afternoons whenever they are not airing sporting events.

    Liked by 1 person

    1. I have seen infomercials on Fox on some Sundays during football season – usually happens if the Eagles aren’t on (my home market is Philadelphia) and the Giants are either on CBS playing an AFC team, not on until that evening, or the game is regional and only on Fox New York (WNYW).

      Liked by 1 person

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