Cold truth

There are a lot of things I’ve forgotten as I’ve gotten older, not to mention a few I’d like to forget.

Like that spontaneous date I went on with a very attractive temp receptionist I met at an agency I was working at that shall go unnamed. Wells Rich Greene.

Because I thought it’d be an impressive thing to do, we drove the ninety-five miles from L.A. to Santa Barbara for dinner and back. Had I put a little more thought into it, I would've realized just how long a drive that is after a hard day's work, not to mention a whole lot of conversation to fill with someone you don’t know. And the Chart House in Malibu would've worked just as well and had me home a lot earlier.

Live and learn.

I might be getting off topic here. We were on things I’ve forgotten.

One of them is how to be sick.

Last week, for the first time in over two years, I got sick. Really sick. It wasn’t covid, although at first I wasn’t sure. My symptoms — runny nose, sneezing, coughing, aching, mild difficulty catching my breath — were right in line with the dreaded 'rona virus. But come to find out the months and months of masking, keeping my distance from people, tons of hand sanitizer and washing my hands more obsessively than Howard Hughes paid off. After home testing every day for the last five days, I had what I like to call a case of novid.

It wasn’t that nasty flu going around either. Although some symptoms were similar, the telltale flu fever never arrived. It was some killer cold/respiratory/bronchial thing that saw me and decided since my immune system hadn’t had a real workout in a couple years I was an easy target.

Anyway, not being able to focus on much more than breathing and trying to score two-point shots lobbing used Kleenex from my bed to the trash can, I did something I haven’t done in years: I called in sick.

Calling in sick when you’re working a 100% remote is a different experience. In the before days when I had to commute to an office, calling in sick meant sweet relief from having to get ready, fight traffic and slog through the day.

Now it meant I didn’t have to walk from my bed to my desk.

Speaking of getting older, here’s another thing I noticed: I don’t bounce back as quick as I used to. Colds, even bad ones, were always a 24 or 48 hour ordeal tops. As I’m writing this, I’m on my seventh day of it, although it does seem to be easing up.

In between watching The Social Network twice a day on HBO and the third season of Dead To Me and Neal Brennan's comedy special Blocks on Netflix, besides what being sick is like I remembered another thing I'd forgotten.

Business goes on without me.

And it’ll all be there when I get back.

Encore post: My head hurts

A little over six years ago, I put up this post about overthinking. And I'm happy to say in that time, what with the thousands hundreds dozens nine industry power players who've read it, absolutley nothing has changed.

Even though the advertising world looks drastically different today what with working from home, hybrid home/office situations, the great resignation, Zoomers and reimbursed wi-fi, it's comforting to know one thing that will never change is the uncanny ability for (certain) agency people to make mountains out of molehills.

Whatever you do, don't overthink this little updated intro too much. It's clear I didn't.

Please to enjoy.

Ad agencies are overflowing with lots of things. Creative ideas. People with opinions. Knit caps. Tattoos. Bad coffee. One thing there's also no shortage of is The Overthinkers - people who overthink every little thing. Every single thing. Over. And over. And over.

Don't get me wrong: I'm all for the well thought out question. A dash of examination. A pinch of should we or shouldn't we. But I’ve often wondered what it is The Overthinkers actually bring to the table. Sure, they manage to turn every item on the brief (all fifteen pages of it) into an event in the Second Guessing Olympics, with all of them going for the gold. But beyond that, what does it all add up to?

Every time The Overthinkers reconsider a point they reconsidered a minute ago, the work has to change, because “this time they’ve got it.”

Until the next time.

It’s the reason work is constantly being revised, rewritten, revamped and regurgitated all way up to the last minute. It’s why meetings and more meetings are held to reveal the latest insight and observations.

Until the next ones.

And it’s the cause of enormous amounts of time and confusion being unnecessarily added into the process.

Planners, brand strategists, VP's of Cultural Trend Metrics - or whatever they hell they're calling themselves this week - have managed to turn what should be a single-focused insight into a Three-Card Monty game of strategy. If you can guess which card it’s under, you win the strategy to work against.

Spoiler alert: you never win.

The Overthinkers have to keep changing the rules, because if they don’t they’re out of a job. It's like the paid consultant who has to create a problem so he can solve it, and then create another one to keep the checks rolling in.

In the name of simplicity, efficiency and a better product, it might be a good thing for The Overthinkers to take one for the team and move on.

Then creatives could execute against a simple strategy, in a short, concise brief we’d only have to meet about once.

Of course, The Overthinkers might wonder why they ever left such a cush position. The good news is they’d have plenty of time to overthink about it.

With friends like these

Say what you will about advertising…no, really, say what you will. I’ll wait here. Okay, now that you’ve got it out of your system we’ll begin.

Advertising has lots of currencies depending on what time of day it is. Sometimes the currency is liquor. Occasionally it’s pizza. Once in awhile it’s the camaraderie that can only come from sitting in a dark, cold edit bay for 57 hours straight.

But the most valuable, most consistent currency in the biz is, always has been and always will be relationships.

There’s an old idiom (Who’re you calling an idiom? – BAM!) that tells you to be nice to people on the way up cause you’ll see the same ones on the way down.

Funny story. The other day I ran into someone where I’m working who I worked with at another agency. I haven’t seen this person in about three years, but he recognized me and greeted me like we were long lost war buddies, shaking my hand like it was an Arkansas water pump and asking how I was. He could not have been happier to see me.

I actually felt sorry for him, because - even though I'm not a doctor - I could tell immediately he was suffering from an serious case of amnesia. At that other agency, he was a creative director and I was a freelance copywriter. Many times I had occasion to present work to him, only to have it shot down in what I would consider an unnecessarily arrogant and rude manner.

Clearly, his amnesia has made him forget that when we worked together, he treated me like, oh, what’s the word…oh yes. Shit.

My guess, and I'm going out on a limb here, is that his newfound fondness for me is because he was unceremoniously fired from that other agency, and has been forced to take a sudden deep dive into the freelance pool. Waters which I've been swimming in for a long time.

But, and here's an example of how much I've grown and how mature I can be if I really try, I want to give him the same benefit of the doubt I hope anyone would give me. He may be a different person now than when we worked together. Perhaps he's grown as an individual and creative person. He might be more confident in his talents, and therefore has no reason to treat people the way he treated me in the past.

So I'm going to step up, put my big boy pants on, be the bigger man and let bygones be bygones.

I know you're waiting for the zinger put down at the end here. But not today. Today I'm about forgiveness and generosity to someone who treated me badly in the past.

Which is why I'm not telling him my day rate. It would only upset him.

Firing squad

I've said it before and I'll say it again. If you get fired in advertising, all it means is you showed up one day.

Jobs in the ad biz hinge on a number of factors, and often job performance is the least of them. How you get along with A) the creative director B) the client C) the clients' wife D) creative services or any number of other individuals can affect how long your shelf life is at an agency. Decisions that determine your fate at an agency are almost always entirely out of your hands, and can be made based on campaigns you've sold (or not sold), the shirt you're wearing (or not wearing) that day or the color of your eyes. The tag line for this blog says "We didn't invent random." Ad agencies did.

Like many people who make ads that make America buy, I've been laid off a few times in my career (pausing until giggling fit is over for using the word "career"). And I can tell you from experience, it takes a village. It's not as straightforward as it once was. No one says, "You're fired! Collect your things and get out!"

Well, they say the second part, but now they say it in accordance with state labor laws.

Here's an example. I'm not going to name the agency I was working for, Y&R, but I was let go after almost three years there. I'd originally been brought in as a freelancer, but the creative director and I hit it off and he decided he wanted me to stick around. So he offered me more work and less money, and I said, "Where do I sign?"

Fast forward a few years later. I'm in a meeting in Versailles, which was the agency's big conference room. For some reason, ad agencies love to name their conference rooms after cities. Or cars. Or explorers. Or movie characters. We take our creativity where we can find it. I worked at this one shop that just had numbers for their conference rooms. It was a nice change of pace.

Where was I? Oh yeah.

As I'm in this meeting, my creative director pokes his head in the door and says, "Hey Jeff, can I talk to you for a minute?" This is how it always begins.

I walk out of the room with him, and while we're walking he's making uncomfortable small talk about the meeting he pulled me out of. I notice we're going upstairs towards HR. When I ask what's up, he says to the office of the head of HR.

Alright, so I know what's coming, and I said, "Are you kidding me?" To which he said, "It's out of my hands. There was nothing I could do." To which I said, "Really? I thought you were the boss. How about you let me speak to the person in charge?"

I was pissed.

In the office, he sat uncomfortably to the side, not making eye contact - as they always do - while the head of HR told me I was being let go, gave me an end date, paperwork, blah blah blah. I learned shortly thereafter I was one of five people let go that day. I'm sure it was out of their boss' hands as well.

I came back the next day and spoke to both of them about getting more severance. My boss said nothing, and the head of HR said no. But this story does have a happy ending.

Some time later, that head of HR got let go - ironic ain't it? I was talking to a mutual friend, and come to find out the former head of HR had wanted her to ask me if I'd write some copy for a website she was setting up for her post-agency life.

I'm nothing if not a giver, so after a nanosecond of thought, I told my friend I'd like her to relay my two-word answer to the former HR head verbatim.

Since this is a family blog, I won't repeat them here. But they were exactly the two words you think they were.

The most wonderful time of the day

I think breakfast has been hogging the spotlight as "the most important meal of the day" for far too long. It's a new morning in America. And as the sun rises on this new morning, we skip breakfast and go straight to the rightful holder of the title: Lunch.

There are a couple things I look forward to everyday as I make my scenic, freeway-free commute to work. One is the end of the day, and the other is lunch.

Neither ever gets here fast enough.

There's a strange phenomenon in advertising agencies I've talked about before here and here. People take themselves way too seriously. They think they're contributing something—shall we say, more meaningful—to society than they really are.

One way that kind of thinking reveals itself is by not going to lunch.

Apparently some agency people have talked themselves into thinking the work they're doing is too important to stop for lunch (it isn't), if they take a lunch break they'll fall behind (you won't), and that they can't go to lunch because what if the client calls? (News flash—the client's out to lunch).

You see these people in the kitchen between 11:45a.m. and 1p.m., loitering in front of the bad coffee, next to the dirty microwave waiting for it to ding. Then they're back at their desks, typing that Powerpoint presentation with one hand and eating Stouffer's Lasagna, again, with the other.

From where I sit, at the restaurant down the street waiting for my food to be brought to my table, it's a sad existence.

A few agencies I've been at cater lunch in every day. It's positioned as a nice, money-saving perk for the employees. But don't be fooled. Their intentions aren't that altruistic. They knows people take shorter lunches if they don't go out, so they can get more work hours out of them. As if just being there actually equalled productivity.

Anyone who's ever worked with me can tell you that's not true.

Personally, I have to make a break from the compound everyday. I spend too much time there already, and if I don't get out, feel the air, the sun and walk around a bit, it just feels like I'm biding time until my parole hearing.

I understand not wanting to spend money eating out every day. By the time you've split the check with the person who had a three-course meal while you had a cup of soup, and add tax and tip, you feel like you need a co-signer just to pay the check. But I think the more important thing to ask is what's the psychological cost of not going out for lunch at least once in awhile?

I have no idea either, but I'll bet it's pretty high.

Round here

You may have noticed I haven't written a new post in a while (undisciplined).

And frankly, there have been a lot of reasons for that (laziness).

I've been unbelievably busy with work (couch potato). I've had family obligations (binge watching). I've been concentrating on other projects (lotto tickets).

But I did want to take a few minutes out of my busy schedule (napping) to do something I have never done before—offer a bit of advice to my fellow blogger and swing dance instructor Rich Siegel over at Round Seventeen.

Now, normally I don't make it my business to tell anyone else how to do theirs. I don't give other parents advice on how to raise their kids, although God knows with the devil spawn some of them have unleashed on the planet they could use it. I don't offer relationship advice, even though I know the secret to a long and trouble-free relationship most married men find out soon enough involves two words: Yes dear.

But since Rich is a friend of mine, I want the best for him and his blog because, and I think if you're followed me for any length of time and gotten past the crippling disappointment, you know I'm a giver.

So here's the advice: It's time to change the name of your blog. Not that Round Seventeen isn't a fine name, but based on my personal experience as of late, I don't think it's an accurate one anymore.

I can't remember the last time copy got routed less than seventeen times. For starters, once I've used up the entire three to four hours I get to craft a compelling brand story people will relate to, find humor in and want to know more about, it first has to get routed through several of what I like to euphemistically call layers.

The account team.

Strategy.

Account planner.

Product specialist.

Legal.

Associate creative director.

Group creative director.

Proofreading.

Executive creative director.

The cleaning lady on three.

And, if I'm lucky, then it finally makes its way to the client.

That's ten stops it has to make before it gets out the door. And if any of those people have a change, suggestion, idea, whim, opinion, thinks something's missing, thinks something else should be included, forwards a suggestion (mandatory) from the client or just. doesn't. get. it., then, as if I'd written it on a boomerang, it comes back to me for revisions.

After they're made, some well-meaning, highly intelligent, over-worked, underpaid and incredibly organized project manager gets to route it through all those people again. And again. And again.

Every time an "and" gets added. A "the" needs to be included. Disclaimers have to be changed (as if anyone reads them-thanks legal). Something gets underlined. A word gets bolded. An accolade gets deleted. Whatever the change, the copy suits up and does another lap.

By the time it gets back to me to sign off on, we're on round twenty eight. At least. Of course, as any writer in an agency will tell you, it'd be great if it stopped at twenty-eight. But sadly, predictably, it doesn't.

What people don't know about advertising is it's a lot like Groundhog's Day—the same assignments keep coming back over and over until the powers that be decide it's been watered down, legalesed and tamed enough to make it out the door to the client for their changes. I mean approval.

Now, I don't want you to get the wrong idea. And as I read this over, I see that would be easy to do. Great work, classic advertising, the kind you remember and talk about for years—I'm looking at you Apple 1984 spot—doesn't happen the first time out. I'm fairly certain anything good I've done and I'm proud of took plenty of victory laps around the agency before it saw the light of day. So I do realize in some cases, this painstaking and often frustrating process has its upside.

Anyway Rich, you don't have to do it today, but you probably want to think about a more realistic number for the old blog title. Of course I suppose it's possible a writer of your caliber may not have to go more than seventeen rounds.

And if that's the case, just forget I said anything.

Lesson learned

This isn't going to be a funny post tonight (I know, why is this post different from any other post?). But for some reason a particular incident has been on my mind and I can't stop thinking about it.

Years ago, I worked at an agency which shall go nameless. Y&R. There was an art director I worked with there who I never clicked with, nor she with me. Her creative sensibilities were completely different from mine, and it made for a lot of disagreement. Nonetheless, during the occasional times we worked together, we managed to forge ahead and get it done.

I'd never describe us as friends, even though she did ask me to write her wedding invitation because she thought I was talented and funny (some truths can't be denied). I wouldn't say I was glad to do it for her, but I was pleased she liked what I came up with.

It was a cool relationship at best, and only got cooler when I was assigned another art director—one of my favorites to work with and a great friend to this day—and she was going to supervise the project.

Here's where my memory gets a bit like an oil company executive at a senate hearing. I can't recall the exact circumstances, but for some reason she didn't like what my art director partner was doing and decided she wanted to get him fired.

I would have none of it.

After several attempts by her to get rid of my partner, I unloaded and read her the riot act. I did it loudly, in the middle of the department, and at length. It was not my finest hour, but in the heat of the moment, lines clearly drawn, loyalties clearly defined, I was unable to stop. I was a bully in the worst, most unprofessional way. To her credit, she kept her cool and listened to my angry ranting until I was done.

Needless to say we didn't work together after that, and my partner never got fired. Surprisingly, neither did I.

Years later, after I'd left the agency, I heard she was battling cancer. A few years ago, she lost her battle.

I was invited to her memorial service by several people, but I didn't go. It wouldn't have been right or honest given the nature of our relationship.

As I think back on it, she didn't deserve any of my angry antics. Not because she became ill, but because she was a human being.

I believe so much in the golden rule, and I'm embarrassed and shamed by my complete abandonment of it during that encounter. If I could go back and do it differently, I would in a heartbeat. If she were around, I'd tell her I'm sorry, and I had no right to treat her like I did.

But she's not.

What I can do now is pray her two children grow up healthy, with their loving father and nothing but beautiful memories of their mother who was taken too soon.

Sadly, I'm in a position now where I do get to have the last word. So here it is. I'm sorry I treated you that way. You didn't deserve it. And if it's any small consolation, I'm a better person as a result of it and it's a lesson I'll always carry with me.

Rest in peace.

Headline story

Every copywriter has one. A headline they want to use, wish they'd used or are waiting to use. Usually these headlines, often never presented or sold, do nothing more than amuse the writer to no end. But here's the deal. If you work in an agency owned by a holding company (almost all are), with knit-capped, British-accented account planners droning on about consumer insights ("they want to 'engage' with the product - is social here?"), where every third word in kick-off meetings is disruption, then sometimes a good laugh is all you can hope for.

At one of the many agencies I work at fairly frequently that has a Japanese car account and is near a mall (no, not that one- the other one), I went out to lunch with a couple of my fellow copywriters. We went to this sushi place I can never remember the name of. It's one of two sushi places we lunch at. There's gas station sushi, the restaurant in the strip mall behind the Arco station with no parking, then there's the expensive sushi place in the industrial park with lots of parking. Who needs names? The expensive sushi place is where we were when this exchange took place.

The three of us wound up in a discussion of headlines we've always wanted to use. We all tossed out ones we'd thought of, and then my copywriter friend Victoria had one that still makes me laugh just thinking about it.

"What's wrong with you?" I almost did a spit-take.

I know, onscreen it probably doesn't come off that funny, and you did have to be there because ninety-percent of it was the way she delivered it. Without missing a beat, and with that annoyed I'm-asking-you-honestly-because-I-can't-figure-out-what-the-hell-you're doing-or-saying tone of voice. Plus the fact it just struck me as a perfect line for any client or product.

I don't usually invite my readers (pauses to laugh for imagining this blog has readers) to chime in, but I'd love to know some headlines you've always wanted to use. Post them here in the comments, or on my Facebook page where you probably linked from.

Just to make it interesting, when I get a good number of lines - assuming I get any - I'll put 'em to a vote. The writer whose headline gets the most votes wins a free lunch at the expensive sushi place with the good parking.

It's not like you were going to be using them anyway. So dust 'em off and send 'em in. If you don't, it means Victoria's going to be enjoying another sushi lunch.

And I'll be sitting here waiting to ask you one question.

Stop me if you've read this one before

I have a bad habit. Well, I have more than one. But I’m not talking about my addiction to virtually any kind of bread, how I leave near-empty food containers in the fridge or my compulsion to binge Breaking Bad whenever I have a free minute.

No, the one I’m talking about is repeating myself.

The one I’m talking about is repeating myself.

See what I did there?

Case in point. I just put up a post called Drive Time about the agency I’m at, the fact it’s at the beach and how nice the commute is. Come to find out the problem is I’ve put up nearly the exact same post two other times – Tsunami Adjacent and Mourning The Commute. In fact, I've even used the exact same photo a couple of times.

Granted, it’s a good story, but let's be honest for minute—although I've never figured out the upside of doing that—it's not that good. And I’m just a little embarrassed I’ve told it here three times.

I worry that I repeat subjects. Being who I am, I think it may be symptomatic, an early form of dementia setting in and I'll be the last one to know. But then it occurs to me I’ve been cranking out this blog for years, and the truth of the matter is occasionally I run out of topics I think are worth ranting and raving about. Apparently when that happens, I unintentionally go back to the same well and write about something I've already written about. Not that it's always a bad thing. After all, some things are worth repeating.

Although I'm pretty sure this isn't one of them.

I know the nine people who read this on their iPads while they’re sitting on the toilet probably aren’t paying that much attention, and had I not pointed it out, wouldn’t have even known I was telling the same story again and again.

But you’re all paying good money for this, and I didn’t want you to…wait a minute, you’re not paying any money for this. Suddenly I don’t feel so bad.

Anyway, I'll try not to repeat myself as often. And if I do, I’ll try to keep it to the most interesting and popular subjects only.

By the way, don’t miss tomorrow’s post on how I sometimes repeat myself. It’ll be a good one.

Drive time

A good commute can be the difference between happy Jeff, and his evil twin – pissed off, short-fused, grudge-holding, horn-honking, lane-changing, one finger saluting, swearing like a drunk longshoreman Jeff.

So what makes a good commute? Well, for starters—and this should come as no surprise—distance.

For a long time, in what I believe was a very strange coincidence—or was it?—my commute to the agencies I was working at was exactly 26 miles each way. It seemed to be my travel threshold.

Even though 26 miles doesn’t sound like a lot, you can do the math - and if you can't then I believe it's a damning indictment of our public education system. Don't get me started. Where was I? Oh, right. It's 52 miles round trip. But at 8:30 a.m. or 6 p.m. going against traffic on the 405, they feel like dog miles. It may as well be a 1000.

All this to say my commute now is spectacular. The agency I’m currently at is right at the beach (or as I called it the last time I wrote about it, tsunami adjacent). I don’t have to get on a freeway to get there, I just cruise down Pacific Coast Highway from my house. There’s never any traffic on that stretch of PCH at that time of day, and it takes me about 20 to 25 minutes to arrive unstressed and un-pissed off at work.

Which brings me to the second component in a good commute: the destination.

I’ve worked for a few agencies in San Francisco over the years. They all have the same politics, personalities and British-accented, insight spouting, knit-cap wearing planners every other agency has. Here’s the difference: at the end of the day, I’d open the door to leave, and I’d be in San Francisco. It made up for a lot of ills. Flight and all, my commute to the San Francisco shops from my house was often faster than my commute to Orange County.

Another item that makes for a good commute is the scenery. You can have a short commute where you get to work in no time, but if it takes you through the senseless murder district coming and going, it’s still not very pleasant.

Since my commute du jour runs down PCH, I get to see the ocean, surfers, joggers and beach rats while I drive there and back. If I’m working a little later (stops to laugh at the thought of working later), I can even manage to catch a summer sunset. Like the old saying goes, getting there is half the fun.

Of course, depending which agency you're commuting to, it just may be all the fun.

Travelin' man

Depending how much you enjoy packing five days worth of clothes into a carry-on, TSA pat downs, crying babies (on the plane, not at the agency), and off brand hotels your per diem more than covers (always a bad sign), travel can be one of the better perks of working at an advertising agency.

In the early stages of my career (pauses to consider fraudulent use of the word "career"), it seemed everyone was looking for a reason to walk the jetway as often as possible. It usually boiled down to one of three: an out-of-town client meeting, shooting on location (“We open on the Eiffel Tower...”) and the occasional new business pitch (“Every agency needs a casino…”).

A fourth reason that comes up a few times a year is award shows (Cannes) and seminars (wherever Adweek’s having one this week), but those are usually reserved for agency brass. After all they're the ones who've been working on their acceptance speech for your work for a couple weeks, so they should at least get to go.

Traveling for work on someone else’s dime is an easy inconvenience to get used to. Right up until you come home and realize the baby you left a week ago grew two inches while you were away.

Or you missed the piano recital your middle-schooler has been practicing for two months.

And that thing you wanted to do around the house didn’t get done by itself.

Travel happens to be on my mind because I’m currently on an out-of-town gig in San Francisco. A city I love, working with people I enjoy a great deal. If I wasn’t being put up in a hotel that's like the Hotel Earle in Barton Fink - without the warmth - the trip would be perfect.

Since the advent of digital, email and FaceTime, the need to travel doesn’t rear its head very often. I’ve worked for agencies in cities all across the country right from the pampered poodle comfort of my own living room. And let’s just say when I did I was always dressed for the office. Mine, not theirs.

For whatever reason, this San Francisco agency, who I’ve worked with from home for a year and a half, decided for this particular project they wanted me in the office live and in person this week. Happy to oblige.

So here’s the bottom line: Yes I miss the dog (when he’s behaving). Yes I miss the family (when they're behaving). I do miss having my own car (when it's behaving), although I’m getting to be the Lyft king of San Francisco and now know more about Lyft drivers than I ever wanted to.

On the flip side, at the end of the day, I get to walk out the door, be smacked in the face by the breeze coming in off the bay, and I'm in San Francisco. I like to file this under "things could be worse."

To sum it up then, travel is good this time. Missing home is tolerable (I'll be back tonight). I'm in a great city, with lots of chowder and sourdough. And, most importantly, the checks clear.

Now if you’ll excuse me, I have to go present a storyboard to the creative director.

In the first frame, we open on the Eiffel Tower.

You never forget your first

I think it's pretty clear that, judging from the very first ad I ever wrote which you see here, I was destined to become a world-class, award-winning, creative-championing, sushi-loving, lunch-taking copywriter. Destiny was calling. Or maybe it was laughing. Sometimes it's hard to tell.

I've covered my illustrious career path before here, so there's no reason to repeat myself. Other than I get to talk about myself again, and being an only child I think you know how happy that makes me.

But I'll spare you. If you don't know the world revolves around me by now, remind me to remind you again tomorrow.

I remember being so excited when this ad actually appeared in Reader's Digest I told everyone I knew about it. My friends, my parents, my girlfriend. It was a much bigger deal at the time. I'd be in supermarket checkout lines, and casually pick up a copy and flip to the ad, talking loudly about how I'd written it.

This tactic always seemed to work better when I wasn't shopping by myself.

Of course, as you can plainly see, despite my illusions of grandeur and for almost every reason, it sucked. Plus the junior art director I worked on it with was a notorious asshole known all over town. He eventually went on to own his own successful asshole agency, until he was thrown out when it was acquired by another agency that didn't want assholes. He was an extremely unpleasant part of my first copywriting experience. It wouldn't be the only unpleasant experience I'd have with this asshole, but that's for another post (guess what the title will be).

Anyway, since the subject of the ad was how the "bite-sized pillows" were designed, his breakthrough idea was to make it look like a schematic and put it on graph paper. I was new to this ad writing thing, but even then I still knew how to roll my eyes.

I shouldn't be too critical - after all, this is the ad that launched me into a career path I never expected, and one that's been very rewarding both personally and professionally. In hindsight, I now realize it taught me a couple of extremely valuable life lessons that I think apply not just to advertising, but to virtually every industry. To this very day, I carry these learned philosophies with me to every job I do.

First, whether it's an insurance policy, a work of literature or an ad, if you're going to put a product out in the world make it as creative, entertaining, informative, thought-provoking and relevant as possible.

And second, don't work with assholes if you can avoid it.

You must be joking

You've got to be so careful these days.

Political correctness is the new normal, and the easily and unjustifiably offended have more recourse, retaliation and restitution available to their fragile sensibilities than ever before. Which makes it especially hard to tell an off color joke at work.

I recently worked at an agency that, thankfully, has a short memory and keeps calling me back in. Repeat business is good for business.™

Anyway, one of my friends, we'll call her Ashley, likes to binge Breaking Bad, loves Better Call Saul and has a wicked sense of humor. So hard to tell why we get along.

I have two jokes I love and will tell anyone who's willing to listen and won't sue or fire me. I knew Ashley would appreciate them, but the trick was finding a place to tell them to her. It had to be someplace we wouldn't be overheard, and somebody wouldn't be offended and decide to break a land-speed record running to HR to report me.

Although frankly I'm not sure what's so offensive about a joke that starts with, "So this bus full of Catholic schoolgirls goes over a cliff..." I know, right?

That's actually not the one I wanted to tell Ashley. That one starts with, "So this guy walks into a bar, and in the corner he sees a huge gorilla in a cage..." Even just writing the opening line it's taking everything I have to resist typing the rest of the joke.

If you see me ask me to tell it to you.

I decided we had to be on neutral turf outside the agency in order to tell it to her. Fortunately, one day we went out to a group lunch with about fifteen people. In what can only be considered a bold move, or maybe a stupid one, I decided to use all the chatter and side conversation at the table as camouflage. Then I leaned over to Ashley and told her my joke.

It got exactly the reaction I was hoping for, and she couldn't wait to tell it to her boyfriend.

Even if you're not telling off color jokes, working in agencies means using your Jedi instincts to figure out who your real friends are. Note: they're usually the ones who won't get you fired for telling a joke.

I don't have time now, but in a future post I'll tell you about the time I tried stand-up comedy ("I'll be here all week..."). Not going to say how the story ends, but you might've noticed I don't do it for a living.

Which reminds me: a rabbi, a priest and a hooker are at the Pearly Gates.

I better not. You never know who's reading this.

Ad hair day

Creative directors often have an over-inflated sense of their contribution to the process.

Their value to the agency.

Their rapport with the creative department.

Their indispensability.

And, if you read the Revolving Door section of AgencySpy.com, apparently quite a few of them also have an over-inflated sense of hair styles.

It seems there's no middle ground. In the pictures that accompany the articles, they either look like a nice guy, or a douche who's trying way too hard. Which is a shame, because they might actually be the first one coming off as the second.

Part of the problem is too many creative directors want to make sure their clients, their department, their bosses and the viewing public know exactly how creative they are at first sight. And what better place to start than from the top down.

From perms to pigtails, curls to comb overs, I believe none of it makes the impression they think they're making.

Some of these people have worn their hair the same way for years. Ironic for an industry that waves the banners of change and disruption every chance it gets.

There is a great benefit to the readers of AgencySpy.com every time one of these pictures pops up: we get to read the comments. AS is kind of a lawsuit free zone, where readers can anonymously post any kind of disparaging, libelous, childish, defaming and derogatory comments they want. They're always a great read.

I think the lesson we can take away from all this is to dial down the judgment, and try as hard as we can not to judge a book by its cover.

After all, some of these salon-challenged people might be hair apparent to running the agency. All the more reason not to wig out at something as superficial as a hairdo.

Or hair don't.

The first idea

When it’s not a business about fiscal quarters, increasing shareholder value, holding-company leadership bonuses, revenue increasing, maximizing efficiencies (euphemism for cleaning house), and cutting freelancer day rates (cause that’s where the real expense is), advertising is occasionally a business of ideas.

Ideas come at a variety of speeds, and the first one always gets there the fastest. That’s why it’s first, hello?

There are two schools of thought about the first idea. One is that it’s never the right one. The other is that it’s always the right one.

I can’t answer definitively. What I will say is more often than not in my career (pauses to laugh hysterically for using the word "career"), the first idea has been the right one. And if not the right one, then the best one.

The problem is, in advertising the first idea gets a bad rap. People say things like “It’s too obvious.” “You didn’t put any time against it.” “It doesn’t address all 350 bullet points on the brief.” All true at one time or another. Still doesn’t mean it’s not right.

Almost universally in ad agency culture, management likes to put on a show. Or at least watch one.

They like you to work late into the night, fueled on nothing but bad pizza and micro-brewed beer that almost tastes as good as cat pee and smells twice as bad, to show how dedicated and loyal you are to the agency, the client and, most importantly, the creative director.

Hallways are lined with dozens of 4’x8’ foam core boards plastered (just like the creatives) with hundreds of ideas and drawings, none of them as good as the first idea.

Meetings are called to kick around even more ideas. Mostly they're ideas for more meetings.

Even though people are burned out, every angle has been covered, the ideas are all starting to sound the same, and they’ll never present more than three to the client, and none of them are as good as the first one, the show goes on.

Way past the point of exhaustion, when the pizza is gone and the sun's about to come up, eventually someone musters enough awake to say something like “Remember that first idea we had at the beginning, what about that?” Then everyone in the room nods like a shelf of Peyton Manning bobbleheads on the San Andreas fault, and the creative director claims he/she always loved that idea from the beginning.

It’s a riddle wrapped in an enigma wrapped in bullshit.

I suppose thinking it will change anytime soon is futile. And besides, I get paid to come up with all those ideas. As long as the checks continue to clear, I'll keep doing it.

Anyway, my point as you've probably guessed by now is never throw away the first idea.

And always buy stock in foam core.

T'was the night before Christmas - Revision 6

If this post looks familiar, you have a fine memory. I posted it exactly one year ago today. I guess the fact I'm reposting it again here would be considered re-gifting. You're welcome.

Anyway, many people have asked me to post it again this year. Okay, not many but a few. And by a few I mean my wife. Alright, none. C'mon, it's Christmas Eve. I've got things to do, and coming up with a brand new post just wasn't on the list. Does that make me naughty? Guess I'll find out tomorrow morning.

In the meantime, please to enjoy. And the very merriest Christmas to you and yours.

‘Twas the night before Christmas in the agency halls
Not a planner was stirring, there were no client calls
The glasses were hung by the conference room with care
In hopes the Christmas party would soon begin there

Creative directors nestled with campaigns that were dead
While visions of One Show Awards danced in their head
They’d talk of production and work they had done
It was true this year’s party would be nothing but fun

When out in the lobby there rose such a clatter
I sprang from the status meeting to see what was the matter
Was it the new intern wearing an Urban Outfitters jacket
What could possibly be making all of that racket

With a little old driver, so lively and quick
I knew in a moment it must be St. Nick
More rapid than eagles his coursers they came
And he whistled and shouted and called them by name

Now Dasher! Now Dancer! Now Prancer and Vixen!
Let’s go in the kitchen and see what they’re fixen!
To the corner office and just down the hall
They found trays of hors de oeuvres and ate them all!

The staff would look forward to the holiday bonus
Saying "as hard as we’ve worked of course they would owe us"
The general manager spoke, it was quite a summit
He told us all how profits had started to plummet

Cutbacks, downsizing, raise-freezes, client losses
He would if he could, but not so the bosses
He charted the bonus with marker not chalk
He wrote on the white board “That’s just crazy talk.”

They showed the work that’d been done all through the year
But with no bonuses the staff was not of good cheer
Sure there was music and dancing for those who were able
Even some shenanigans on the conference room table

Soon it was over, soon it was gone
All the carrying they’d planned had been carried on
The party was finished, the tinsel unhung
The songs they were singing had all been sung

After bad luck like this, what else could they add
It was Christmas, and really, things weren’t that bad
Until he exclaimed as his limo drove out of sight
Happy pink slip to all, and to all a good night!

Pregnant pause

As a freelance copywriter, you go through different seasons.

The unemployed season. The four-agencies-want-you-at-the-same-time season. The let's-have-lunch season. The I-think-I've-used-too-many-hypens season.

One season I went through for a while was the copywriter-on-maternity-leave season.

It seemed every gig I booked was for exactly three months, filling in for someone who was out on maternity leave. It always made me happy. Ask anyone who knows me, they'll tell you I'm a romantic at heart.

When love is in the air, money is in the bank.

Anyway, my point is it's never too early to start planning ahead. I'd like to suggest to all the female copywriters thinking about bringing a bouncing bundle of joy into your lives that now is the time. There are so many benefits - for you I mean.

Your parents will stop asking when you're going to have a baby. You and your significant other can start planning the gender-neutral color scheme if you live west of Lincoln, or whether the room is going to be blue or pink if you live east of Lincoln. Your friends can start thinking about how much they're going to spend on your gift at the baby shower (insider tip: don't give the Diaper Genie, they already have one. It's called a trash can).

And you'll have a tax deduction you didn't have before.

In case you were wondering, suggesting you get started now has nothing to do with the fact my son's 2016/17 tuition is due end of August, beginning of September, coincidentally right about the time you'll be having your baby.

Take it from me, nothing in life is more rewarding than you having a baby.

That goes for both of us.

You're gonna need a bigger box

It never stops.

If you work in an ad agency, you know there's one thing people working there love to do more than anything. SPOILER ALERT: It's not creating ads.

It's complain.

Two disclaimers right off the top: first, there are plenty of valid things to complain about. Second, I've definitely contributed to the culture. I have a reserved seat on the complain bandwagon. Ok seat, could be closer. Armrests don't work as well as they should. More padding wouldn't hurt. SWIDT?

Ad agencies, while sometimes a hotbed of creativity, can also be an unrelenting cacophony (waited 780 posts to use that word) of privileged, overpaid people who have it good whining about how bad they have it. Cue the violins.

They work too hard. Nobody understands them. People just don't get it. The traffic sucks (well, that one's true). There are too many meetings (also true). They should be promoted. That guy should be fired. The food guy always has the same sandwiches. This isn't as fun as it used to be. This coffee is awful. They hated my ideas. They only had an hour forty five for lunch. They had to work the weekend. The client is an idiot.

I used to work with this art director who liked to quote an old boss of his. He used to say, "You get paid four-times what the average person makes. I expect you to work at least twice as hard."

It's like the kid who cried wolf, and keeps crying. At first it's deafening, then after awhile you don't even hear it anymore. Somebody call a waaaaaaaaambulance.

I know what you're thinking: who the hell are you and what've you done with Jeff? I get it. And I'll be the first to admit, for the second time, I'm as guilty as anyone else - it doesn't take much of a push to get me started. When the complaint wave hits, I want to hang ten just as much as anyone. But when I complain about work, at least somewhere far below the surface - in a quiet little voice only I hear - I'm at least grateful I have work to complain about.

As I crawl at a snail's pace into the office every day on the world's largest parking lot, the 405, I look around at the coffee grinders, rust buckets, rattletraps and jalopies slogging it out in the lanes next to me, and that same little voice tells me to be glad I have a really nice car to wait it out in.

In my experience, complaining about people is a useless exercise. I've found they're not changing on my account anytime soon, so I try not to let them get to me. I make an effort, often unsuccessful but at least I'm trying, to use a little grace in dealing with people I disagree with. And by disagree, I mean they're wrong. At the very least, even when that's true I go out of my way to try and treat them as I'd want to be treated.

Since every agency I work at has open floorplans, maybe the complaining just seems louder because it echoes off the polished concrete floors.

Don't get me started.

But it's become a runaway train. Everyone wonders why it's gotten so, so bad. It's like the person who crosses the middle of the street, gets mowed down by traffic (when it's moving), then denies their contribution to the accident.

My suggestion is we all - including myself - try to dial it down a bit, and focus on the more positive things about agencies (yes there are some) for awhile. Like the fact we don't work in the insurance business. What we do isn't exactly breaking rocks or digging ditches (although I've occasionally watched someone dig their own grave). And that paycheck, at almost every level, is at least twice the national average.

Maybe November will be the No-complaining month. Let's see how that works.

Of course, if you don't like that idea, by all means feel free to complain about it.

Fire drill

At the building where I work – like all office buildings - the management company is required by the city to have annual fire drills. When you least expect it - provided you don't see the firetruck and guys in orange vests outside - building management breaks into your work day and makes an announcement over their static-y public address system. Lights start flashing, it's panic at the disco and everyone's instructed to evacuate the building using the stairs, not the elevator.

Slowly and orderly, everyone saunters out to the parking lot, wondering if there’s enough time for a Starbucks run. Then they check in with their company's point person to prove they weren’t left behind in the faux towering inferno.

It’s an inconvenience that interrupts work for a bit, but the intentions are good and this kind of fire drill can actually make a difference in a genuine emergency. Which is exactly the opposite of the fire drills you usually find in an advertising agency.

Sadly, people working in agencies are well acquainted with the other kind. The pain-inducing, frustration-increasing, time-wasting, resources-draining, brain-numbing, soul-crushing kind.

Agency fire drills are notorious shape-shifters. They can come in the form of an account person yelling in the hall for everyone to “Look busy!” as a new client prospect tours the agency.

They can be an all-hands-on-deck, cancel-your-weekend-plans mandate to try to save an account that’s been going out the door since they got it.

They can even be the creative director’s kids graduation, engagement, wedding or circumcision announcement that has to get done first, before the actual paying work. Don't even get me started on headlines for the circumcision announcements.

"Take a tip from a mohel who does!"

"Is your mohel good enough to make the cut?"

"It's time to put some foreskin in the game!"

The common characteristic of agency fire drills is they’re all, without exception, monumental wastes of time. They’re the original model for the hamster wheel. And the unlucky ones who are "volunteered" to participate are rats in a maze, who manage to find their way out the other side without reward for their effort.

Agency fire drills happen because people high enough in the food chain to call them have placed a misguided sense of importance on whatever the drill is. They’ve entered a state of denial regarding exactly what the results of everyone dropping what they’re doing to do something else will accomplish.

None of this should come as a surprise. Despite how lean, nimble, agile and responsive the agency website says they are, I have yet to work in a shop that runs as efficiently and effectively as they do in their fantasy life. The one that lives in their manifesto on their website.

Anyway, once the real-world fire drill is over, everyone shuffles back into the building, takes a crowded elevator back to their floor, and picks up where they left off.

And if they're really lucky, maybe they get a venti cappuccino out of the deal.

Don't ask: Working the weekend

I know what you're thinking: why haven't I posted a new installment of my ever popular Don't Ask series - the one that brought you such widely read and revered gems like Don't Ask: Moving, Don't Ask: Picking Up At The Airport, Don't Ask: Loaning You Money, Don't Ask: Sharing A Hotel Room, Don't Ask: Writing A Letter For You and the perennial Don't Ask: Sharing My Food.

Well, tonight's your lucky night. I'm posting my latest in the series, and it's about a particular nuisance that effects every creative person in the business: working the weekend.

Jay Chiat of Chiat/Day fame had a quote that's been misquoted and bounced around ad agencies ever since he said it. If you're in advertising, you're already saying it to yourself: "If you're not here on Saturday, don't bother coming in on Sunday."

Looks like I won't be seeing you Sunday.

Agencies are notorious for their outsized and aggressive disregard for both working smart and your life. If they did the first one, working weekends wouldn't happen nearly as often as it does. Which would mean you'd get some of your life back.

Since I believe agencies will start working smart and utilizing their time more efficiently about the same time I ride my unicorn to Xanadu while drinking from the Holy Grail, I've chosen not to wait. I'm taking it back. Weekends are personal time. They're days of rest by definition. They are non-work days. Here's what I do on weekends. I spend time with my kids. I go out with the wife. I get things done around the house. I veg and binge Breaking Bad again.

Know what I don't do? Work.

Maybe if there were fewer 12-person meetings to kick-off the latest banner ad, not as many mandatory attendance pep talks to rally the troops, and less presentations to the staff from the Executive Group Specialist In Experimental Branding Strategy & Innovative Demographic Search Engine Optimization Solutions, there'd be enough time during the week to get the actual, bill-paying, income producing work done.

Not to brag, but because I have this policy of no weekends, I get my work done during the week. When I pack up Friday night, everything that needed to be done is done. Monday will bring a whole new set of challenges, and I'll get those done during the next five days too.

I know this is a radical position for a freelancer with a kid in college to take. Especially since weekends are usually double time. At a nice day rate, that can add up pretty quick. I know freelancers that hope for weekend work - something about gettin' while the gettin's good. Whatever. When your relationship with your kids turns into a Harry Chapin song, don't come crying to me.

Don't get me wrong. This is not to say I haven't worked weekends and won't again on those very few occasions it's necessary. But it usually isn't, despite the desperation, authoritative tone, insinuations about reputations and false logic that since they have to be there you have to be there. Almost as weak an argument as "If I do it for you, I have to do it for everyone else."

So go ahead, talk about how I'm too good to come in on Saturday. How I don't want to be a team player. How pissed everyone's going to be that they're at work and I'm not.

And if you want to tell me to my face, fine.

Call me. I'll be at home.