Lower Self Esteem? I’ve Got a Coupon For That

I like a bargain just as much as the next person. I’m not an extreme coupon kinda gal like my friend Jodi who can go to the market, buy $200 worth of stuff and walk out with the store owing her money. She also tends to leave in her wake a bitterly pissed off line of Jacksonville housewives who have had to spend 15 minutes extra in line waiting to buy the jugs of vodka that get them through their day while the clerk sorts through Jodi’s coupon collection. Jodi’s a pro. She has a notebook and plans her assaults on the Piggly Wiggly like she’s in a militia. I promise you that if you pick up the last pound of bacon that she has a coupon for, she’ll cut-a-bitch just to get it. Me? Not so much. I forget my coupons in my car more often than I remember them, and once I’m in the store I’m too damn lazy to go back for them.

I’ve signed up for a couple of those discount sites like LivingSocial and Groupon, and I’ve even bought a few items from them. Dave got golf lessons for Christmas from a Groupon offer. However, of late, I’ve noticed a disturbing trend in the offers that they are sending me. First they kept sending me offers for bootcamp and pilates classes. Fair enough. Call me fat. I’m good with that. They aren’t the first to go that route. However is it absolutely necessary to send me email offers with the subject line: Colon Hydrotherapy Session? It’s bad enough that Jamie Lee Curtis is always talking about my regularity, do I need this? Do I need to sign up to go and have someone jam a tube up my backside, fill my guts with Evian, and then talk to me about what they see when they hit the suction button? No. Thank you. No. I don’t remember checking this as one of my interests when I signed up for any of these sites.

But they are not only concerned with the state of my bowel movements. No. They don’t stop there. In the last month I have been offered laser treatments for my wrinkles – which I DO NOT HAVE thank you very much. They have also offered to laser off my fat, which I do have but do not relish having someone liquefy during my lunch hour. I’ve taken Xenical. I know what liquefied fat gets me. They’ve also offered me discounts on having plastic surgery. I dunno about you, but I draw the line at getting discounts on anything that involves a scalpel and my face. LivingSocial has also decided that my smile needs more than brightening and that cute little tooth that’s been crooked my whole life would be better suited in a set of clear braces. Really? I’m 45, not 14. I’ve learned to live with my dental flaws. And I’m long since passed digging for my retainer in the trash after I forgot it on my McDonald’s tray and threw it out.

It’s not that I don’t appreciate the offers, really, I do, but where on the form that I filled out did I check a box that said “I’m insecure, constipated, and ageing, please help.”? Lowering my self-esteem isn’t what I look to coupon sites for, I have a mirror and a bottle of Rogaine for that.