advert mysteries

Sometimes I'm mystified by advertising graphics, like this one.

A girl in a skimpy bikini stands in front of incoming surf on a hot day. This is Seattle? Looks more like Acapulco or Nassau.

Maybe today, one of maybe three or four days out of the year when it's as hot here as in the picture, it fits. But forget the surf. Puget Sound is a sheltered inland sea, and the only time we get waves even approaching what you see in the picture is when a sou'wester blows in off the mouth of the Columbia and bypasses the Olympic range. And when that happens, the sky is dark as a tar barrel.

A better Seattle picture would show a middle-aged lady in an L.L. Bean waterproof parka with the hood up, wearing rubber boots and walking along a pebbly beach in front of what looks like a gray-green lake, but is actually "our" salt water. She might be shown trudging along under a cloudy sky carrying a bucket and a rake, for gathering butter clams. The ad copy might read, "Beat the heat: Seattle in late August -- One Day Special."