Change in the weather

It occurred to me that agencies have a lot in common with the weather. No matter how hard you try to predict it, you really can’t be sure what it’s going to be from one day to the next.

In fact, there are some weather terms that can just as easily be applied to the agency culture as well as the inhabitants. For example:

Jet Stream

You know when the creative director, account supervisor, planner, junior account executive (in charge of the carry-ons) and research director board a plane together to fly to yet another Adweek seminar on Digital Creativity Strategies and Better Banner Ads in the Caribbean? The one you told them about and wanted to go to, except there was no budget for you? That’s the Jet Stream.

The Mean Temperature

Agencies are notoriously angry places. It doesn't take much to set them off. Someone's work sold and yours didn't. You weren't invited to a meeting you should've been at (don't worry-meetings are like buses). No one brought in bagels. Someone looked at you the wrong way. People at agencies have thin skins and long memories. They're not exactly rays of sunshine to begin with, but when they feel they've been wronged they're meaner than a junkyard dog having his anal glands expressed. When you figure out exactly who's mad at who, and how mad they are, that's the Mean Temperature.

High Pressure System

These kind of systems can be created in a number of ways. An approaching deadline. A meeting with HR. Finding out what someone else makes. The creative director wants to "talk" about his/her "idea." These systems can be found daily in the ever changing environment of the agency world.

Unstable Air

This is usually found in meetings where planners are involved. They're almost always telling you their insight that just isn't quite insightful enough. Usually they know it, and as a result aren't making the point as confidently as they'd hoped. Hence, unstable air.

Wind Chill

What you get when that joke you made about the creative director gets back to them.

Warm Front

The new receptionist. That's all I'm sayin'.

Of course, there are many more terms that apply, but I'll leave them for another post. After all, many of you reading this still think of advertising as a fun, glamorous, star-studded business to be in.

And I wouldn't want to rain on your parade.

Welcome back cauter

Nice picture isn't it? It's sunrise over the Caribbean Sea.

The reason it's here is because it's considerably more pleasant to look at than the images I got when I Googled "nasal cauterization."

Take my word for it.

The reason I was looking that up is because I had to have it done last week. I was sitting on one of our newly reupholstered couches at home, and I sneezed. Hard. When I did, the wall of a weakened blood vessel very near the surface on the inside of my nose blew, and I started bleeding profusely.

It was like a scene out of Dexter.

Thank God I managed to get into the bathroom and over the sink so I could bleed there instead of the couch.

Now, the site of my nose gushing blood like the well in There Will Be Blood (no pun intended) would normally be enough to scare me into a panic. Fortunately, I knew what was happening because it's happened before.

The same thing occurred a couple years ago, and I had to have vessels in both sides of my nose cauterized. In case you're not familiar with cauterization - and why would you be - it's a minor procedure where they burn the vessel either electrically or, as they did in my case, chemically with silver nitrate to stop the bleeding and seal the blood vessel with scar tissue so it doesn't happen again. At least in that vessel.

It works in theory. But here's the thing: once you have it done, your body says, "Hey, what the heck! How am I gonna get blood to this guys schnoz?" So it regrows the vessel(s).

It's not necessarily the location that makes it happen. It's the fact the nose dries out and weakens them. Hence the small bottle of saline solution you'll see me spraying up there five times a day for the next month.

The other thing is that while it heals, I can't blow my nose or sniffle too hard. And I have to sneeze with my mouth wide open, which takes the pressure off the nose, not to mention scares the hell out of anyone within earshot cause it's so loud.

That part is fun.

Then there's the Neosporin that I have to apply very carefully each night with Q-Tips so my nose doesn't dry out during the night. I'd like to take a moment to thank the Santa Ana winds for their impeccable timing.

So, all in all, it looked a lot worse than it was. And at the end of the day, I realize it could've been symptomatic of something much worse. I have a lot to be thankful for.

Not the least of which is finding that picture of the Caribbean. Trust me.