Billy Mays of infomercial fame.

Over the weekend, an impressive list of celebrities passed away.  First, there was Ed McMahon, famous sidekick of the King of Late Night Television, Johnny Carson.  Then, Farrah Fawcett of Charlie’s Angels fame died after a long battle with cancer.  On the same day we learned of Farrah’s death, word came of the sudden and unexpected death of entertainer Michael Jackson.

My son, Nathan, particularly noticed the attention paid to Michael Jackson, asking me at one point, “Who is he?”  He was not familiar with McMahon or Fawcett either.  But when I picked up yesterday’s newspaper and saw that the pitchman for Oxiclean, Orange Glo, and other As-Seen-On-TV products passed away (only 50-years-old), I had a feeling my infomercial baby would recognize him.

Just last week, I wrote about Nathan’s obsession with infomercials as a toddler and how we wound up with the Shark Professional Cordless Sweeper after he made an unauthorized purchase on eBay.  I can’t tell you how many times Nathan “pitched” products to me back then–everything from Ronco’s Rotisserie (“Set it and forget it!”) to Smartware (“the revolutionary silicone bakeware set”).

Out of curiosity, I showed Nathan the photo in the newspaper and asked him if the man looked familiar.  It’s been a while, after all, since infomercials dominated his television viewing.  “That’s the OxiClean guy,” he said without missing a beat.  He was disappointed to hear that Billy Mays had passed away.

So rest in peace, Billy Mays.  In our household, your stardom reached epic proportions!

Nathan with his Shark Professional Cordless Sweeper.

I got a phone call from my Aunt Dot last night.  She had read an interesting article in the Enquirer while she was at the beauty parlor and felt compelled to share it with me.

First, let me insert a little background information.  When Nathan was a toddler, he was obsessed with infomercials.  He watched infomercials, talked infomercials, and wanted me to buy everything sold on infomercials.  Almost every day I would explain, “No, baby, I don’t want a Magic Bullet,” or “I don’t want to spend that kind of money on the Sharper Image Ionic Breeze Quadra,” or “Urine Gone is for people who have indoor pets.”

One day, I was checking my eBay account and noticed that I had won an item and needed to pay for it.  This was puzzling to me because, although I had some things on my watch list, I hadn’t bid on anything.  Upon further investigation, I saw that the item I had won was the Shark Professional Cordless Sweeper!  There was only one person in the house who had been pestering me to buy that…Nathan!

Sure enough, Nathan had pecked out S-H-A-R-K into eBay’s search engine, and he scanned down until he found what he wanted.  He clicked “Buy It Now.”  If you’ve shopped on eBay, you know that backing out of a purchase can damage your feedback score, so I had to follow through.  Within the week, a big box arrived.  Nathan gleefully ran around my house for weeks vacuuming my floors.  A few days later, he got back on eBay (unbeknownst to me) and got into a bidding war for Thomas the Tank Engine tracks–but that’s another story.

Back to Aunt Dot.  She called to tell me that according to the Enquirer, a three-year-old child bought a BULLDOZER over the Internet!  I immediately burst into laughter, knowing exactly the message she was trying to convey:  Shark, shmark…it could have been worse!

[Related story:  My Infomercial Baby]

[Some of my favorite Nathan stories:  Nathan's Quilt, Nathan's Prayer, Before the Back Surgery, The Principle of Finders Keepers, What will a 5-year-old remember about heart surgery?]

One of Nathan’s claims to fame in our family is that he was once the King of Infomercials.  While other toddlers were obsessing over Elmo, the Wiggles, and Dora the Explorer; our boy was enthralled by the Magic Bullet, Showtime Knives, and Jack LaLanne’s Power Juicer.  His TV time was spent tuned in to the 24-hour infomercial channel where he learned to recite almost verbatim the pitches for Space Bags, the Ionic Bweeze Quadwa, and Smartware, the revolutionary silicone bakeware–just to name a few.

This little quirk of his created an embarrassing moment at church a few years ago.  One of our sweetheart nursery workers was a very large lady who would be the first to admit she could stand to lose weight.  Nathan decided to give her some advice.  He asked, “Are you dissatisfied wif you body?”  I’m sure I gasped.  He continued, “You should twy Body by Jake Ab Sissuhs and get the sexy six-pack abs you always wanted.”

Thankfully, our nursery worker friend had a great sense of humor!