Psst!

I have a few things to say about this lady. I will call her, Aurelia. Why? Because it's one name that sticks out to me as being Mediterranean, meaning, when I studied Latin and a wee bit of Greek in school, Aurelia was a name that came up a lot in the teaching texts. So, she's Aurelia. I want to break this down for you, why I have her here on my blog.

1. This picture was taken at the Nashville Farmer's Market. Now, I have seen this image, of "Aurelia" many times in many different locales, so she gets around. She is always advertising that product with that look on her face. Usually in gyro shops, Greek, Lebanese, etc. They seem to feel that Aurelia does wonders to demonstrate how you are supposed to enjoy gyros.

2. Can you see how much makeup she has on? I mean, look closely. Granted, this is not a high res photo, so it may be difficult, but the lady has CAKED ON makeup. Like enough foundation to mortar bricks together. Seriously. What is up with the makeup? The lipstick - well - that is another thing altogether. (If you can't tell from the size of the photo, she has light lipstick on with a dark, dark outer ring of lip liner.) There is a David Cross piece on his first stand-up album that talks about women who paint their mouths like that. Let's just say that it looks like a certain body part, and I will not mention it here, because this is a family blog. But I'm sure you can locate the clip somewhere or perhaps you've already heard it. She is an example of this kind of makeup phenomenon faux pas.

3. Does she have eyebrows or are they just painted on?

4. Does this woman look Greek to you? Not that she has to be Greek to advertise a Greek product, but does she look Greek? I think of olive-skinned (naturally, not through tons of foundation or spray tan), dark-haired people. (Oh wait, perhaps she IS dark-haired, but she has washed it out with the fourteen bottles of peroxide it took to make her platinum-haired.)

5. Are we supposed to believe that in the second after the photo was snapped that she is going to take a big bite of that gyro sandwich? Do you see the size of the sandwich? It is made for Andre the Giant and there's no way Aurelia could fit her mouth around that meat monstrosity. It is an absurdly large sandwich. Which brings me to my next point...

6. Really? So this is supposed to look hyper sexual? I mean, I know advertisers use obliquely sexual themes whenever they sell items, but this just looks like pseudo-porn to me. Why? I don't know. Maybe it's all the makeup, the suggestive face, the huge amount of meat. I don't know. But whenever I see it, I feel sorry for Aurelia, and wonder if she also posed for car-pin-up magazines or if she only does food product advertising. Perhaps she's also on some taziki sauce ad or something for stuffed grape leaves.

7. My last point is that I, in no way, have anything against our sweet, dear, gyro-advertising Aurelia. I do want to nominate her for a makeover done by Oprah or Kelly Ripa or something, but I have no qualms with her, personally. I am a bit scared of this advertisement and whenever I see it, I kind of feel like my eyeballs are being assaulted with cosmetic products and a handful of lamb meat. But I wish Aurelia (or Jane, or Lynn, or whatever her real name is) the best in her modeling career. She has done one heck of a job getting my attention, so obviously she has attention-getting qualities, and dozens and dozens of gyro shops across the land want her to sell their lamb, so good for her. Just take off the makeup, Aurelia.