I have a weird fascination with all sorts of packaging, from breakfast cereal boxes to ketchup bottles, to contact lens solution, shampoo, and household cleaning products. Given an idle moment, in the middle of a meal, a shower, or even while waiting it out at the supermarket checkout lane, I end up reading a lot of product literature: nutrition labels, application instructions, lists of ingredients, foreign language translations, and of course, warning labels.
So when I found a copy of Wearing of This Garment Does Not Enable You to Fly by Jeff Koon and Andy Powell (illustrated by Tim Carroll) in a bookstore bargain bin, I just knew I had to get it for my humor book collection.
Wearing of This Garment Does Not Enable You to Fly: 101 Real Dumb Warning Labels is a handy book that compiles cautionary statements found on sundry items. The authors, Koon and Powell are self-proclaimed “teenage stalkers of stupidity” who became famous for their first book, You May Not Tie an Alligator to a Fire Hydrant, a collection of dumb laws.
The collection features the best entries sent in by hundreds of fans on the website Dumb Warnings (yup, you can mosey over there to see some more!). I actually thought it would be a collection of Engrish labels but surprisingly, the book features real-life product warnings in plain and simple English.
While most of the warnings pertain to the use of the product — toys, appliances, garments, cosmetics, food and drinks, electronics, medicine, household items, and many more — the type of “dumbness” varies. Some state the blatantly obvious (invoking an emphatic “Duh!”), some propose paradoxical implications, while others seem to assume the users of the product have strange ideas in mind for its consumption. Comical illustrations accompany the warning labels.
Here’s a look inside the book:
It’s nothing particularly groundbreaking, but this book will keep you amused for one sitting.
***
Wearing of This Garment Does Not Enable You To Fly, hardcover with dustjacket, 3/5 stars
Book #154 for 2010
[amazonify]::omakase::300:250[/amazonify]
Great blog! I love books like this for those times I have nothing better to do. Some of those labels were pretty ridiculous!
Me too, Cyndi. I like them because they’re easy to read and entertaining. They work as great “palate cleansers” in between books, too.