The idea for this came while I was ruminating about how nice it would be if I woke up each morning to a clown handing me a yellow smiley face balloon. Yep, I used the word “ruminate” in the same sentence as “clown” and “smiley face balloon.” I think hard about these things. I also have a t-shirt that says– “FACT: Clowns Eat People.”

The commercial opens with Ronald McDonald and the BK King standing at the foot of your bed holding their respective breakfast sandwiches. Watching you sleep (because there’s nothing weird about that). Waiting for you to wake up and settle their bet on which sandwich you’ll choose for breakfast.

You wake up to the radio alarm. “Another one bites the dust” is playing.

(Side note that has nothing to do with the commercial: “Another one bites the dust” was the song I woke up to once a week during my junior year of college.  I don’t know if they had a mixed tape or Queen’s greatest hits, but I do know that the garbage truck’s route was always timed to play THAT song at 5:30 am when driving through my neighborhood.  I liked to imagine the garbage men jumping in their truck, popping in their “tunes” before hitting the trashcan filled streets, blaring their anthem to the sleeping, unsuspecting world that was my college town. Some weeks I thought they hated me personally. Other weeks, I figured they thought they were being helpful by waking up the guy who was passed out on the lawn of the fraternity that was across the street from my house.)

Anyway, you hit the alarm, stretch and open your eyes to the find yourself staring into the anxious faces of a painted face clown and king bobble head. They both offer their sandwiches. You walk past, ignoring them, and head downstairs where the Quaker Oats guy is sitting at your kitchen table, bowl of oatmeal waiting. No words are exchanged. You simply eat your oatmeal while he watches. Because it turns out the Quaker Oats guy is a sociopath who is holding your family, friends, dog, fish, [fill in the blank with whatever you hold dear] hostage if you don’t.

The narrator would close the commercial with: “Would it kill you to eat more oatmeal? Probably not, but it might get the ones you love killed if you don’t.”  The camera would close in on the murderous face of the Quaker Oats guy.