Guns and roses

There are a lot of advantages to working in an advertising agency, as opposed to, say, having a real job. Especially if you work in the creative department.

Every day is casual Friday.

You don't have to be in at the stroke of 9 (actually if you make it by the stroke of 10 you're doing good).

You get to spend a lot of time making up fun stuff.

And you get a LOT of free magazines.

I've always loved magazines. Whenever I fly, one of the things that's an integral part of the experience for me is the newsstand at the airport. I browse the racks, then stock up with the latest issues of my favorite ones for the flight (insert your own "I knew he had issues" joke here).

Right now I'm working in a very large agency. It has a computer account, two car accounts, a soft drink account, a pet food account and a sports drink account - all accounts that buy a lot of print ads. Because of that, publishers give comp subscriptions to almost anyone who has anything to do with those accounts.

Every day, the mail room lays out all the extra comped magazines on a table for anyone who wants them. If you've been by a newsstand, you've seen the literally hundreds of titles for virtually every interest. That's what the table in the mail room looks like.

But yesterday, this was the one caught my eye. Alliterative, no?

Leave it to the south to combine the genteel charm, beauty and relaxation of gardening with a .357 magnum.

In it there are lots of ads for gardening tools, as well as rifle scopes. And why not? They've got to advertise somewhere. My guess is the gun makers are targeting (see what I did there?) women with these ads. Why pull a weed when you can blow it away. Little sucker's not coming back after that.

I actually don't object to gun ads. I don't even object to guns - more kids die every year from drowning in the bathtub than gunshots. I don't object to bathtubs either.

This may be a subject for another post.

Anyway, tomorrow I'll be back in the mailroom, looking around for another magazine. And if I can find the time, maybe I'll even write one of the ads that goes in them.