Those three little words

Nothing says Merry Christmas like the subject of poop.

Ever since my daughter was a little girl, we've had our own father/daughter jokes between us. They often send us into hysterics, while innocent bystanders wonder what time we'll be taking our medicine. Some of them are quite funny and tasteful, perfectly acceptable for telling at the Christmas dinner with family gathered all around.

Some not so much.

There's really no way to explain this gift she got me for Christmas without getting into way more detail than I'm sure any of you want or need to know. Suffice it to say I laughed harder than I have in months when I unwrapped this little gem.

It's an awesome gift, based on a particular joke - one of our less savory ones - that goes way back. Maybe right there is a good place to leave it (figuratively speaking). Except to say that the three little words referred to in the title aren't the ones on the mug.

They're "neat and clean." Enough said.

Deadlines and other fairy tales

Funny thing happened on the way to writing an assignment for a company I do work for.

We had a conference call last Friday afternoon - late afternoon - where several of their people went over the new products they wanted me to write about. Turns out it's going to be a lot more work than I expected (or wanted to do over the holidays), but of course by now you all know my motto: the checks clear.

I wasn't worried about it, because when we all got off the call, the understanding was that the work wasn't due until the first week of January.

At least that was my understanding.

So imagine my surprise when I got an email on Monday asking the status of the work and when I'd have it to them.

I wrote back, and decided truth was going to be my first tactic. I told them not only had I not started working on it, but the agreement was first week of January. Oh, and by the way, they hadn't approved my estimate.

About that estimate. Don't get me wrong - I'm nothing but grateful that this particular client keeps coming back to me with more work. But the holidays are the holidays. So when they asked for an estimate, I gave them one with my holiday rates.

The ones that make it worth my while to be working over the holidays instead of going to movies, spending time with my kids, eating like Oprah at the buffet for two weeks and sleeping off the egg nog and bourbon.

Just kidding. I haven't liked egg nog or bourbon since I got wrecked on several glasses of the mix in high school.

I'm still not sure the room has stopped spinning.

Anyway, the client came back to me just sorry as hell for the misunderstanding. They very politely asked if I could have a portion of the assignment done next week - if it didn't interfere too much in my holiday plans - and the remainder of it in January.

I said sure.

They also told me they'd approved my estimate, which frankly gave me just what I was looking for to start the job.

Christmas rap

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A Colbert Christmas: Another Christmas Song
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You should need a license to record a Christmas album.

Seriously, when David Hasselhoff and Jessica Simpson are allowed to go into the studio, you know someone's been really naughty and they're taking it out on all of us.

What is it about the holidays that makes celebrities - and alleged celebrities - decide they have to get into the studio and record a collection of sticky, cheesy, treacly, sentimental Christmas standards?

Not that they're all bad. The classic Christmas albums by artists like Barbara Streisand, Tony Bennett, Frank Sinatra or Johnny Mathis have a certain timeless holiday sound.

But when it comes to the newer crop of Christmas albums, I can only listen to so many lush arrangements (insert Hasselhoff joke here) without heaving my nog. I prefer something a little more upbeat, not to mention honest.

In that spirit, for kids from one to ninety-two, please to enjoy Another Christmas Song by Stephen Colbert.

May it jingle your bells, nip at your nose and roast your chestnuts many times and many ways throughout the season.

The Elvis factor

There's a phenomenon called The Elvis Factor. It's the fact that at any given time, 10% of the population believe Elvis is still alive. And of that 10%, 8% believe if you send him a letter he'll answer it.

I'm going to generalize here, but as a rule these people are very sensitive and don't respond well at all to being asked about their questionable beliefs. They don't like being cornered, and when they are usually lash out with personal insults or comments that have nothing to do with the issue at hand.

Imagine, a group of petty, thin-skinned, hard-headed people believing what they want despite verifiable facts to the contrary. Wonder who they're voting for?

When you ask them about it, why all the papers reported him dead, why there's a grave at Graceland, why he's laying in his casket in that famous National Enquirer photo, they all give the same, extremely predictable answer: conspiracy.

It'd be funny if it wasn't so sad.

Almost every major event that's happened in the last century has a conspiracy theory attached to it. And a group of people willing and ready to blindly support those theories with their ignorance. When you disagree with them, they act like Americans in Europe for the first time. They just keep talking louder and louder until you. get. it.

You can tell I'm not much of a conspiracy theorist. I have my suspicions about the JFK assassination, I think something may have landed at Roswell and it does seem interesting to me there was one news story about the discovery of over two hundred years' worth of oil in the Gulf of Mexico, and then nothing. But that's about it.

I believe we landed on the moon. I believe Challenger exploded because of a faulty "O" ring.

A healthy dose of skepticism and questioning authority is a good thing. But the reality is, for the most part, things are exactly what they appear to be. And the big events, the catastrophic disasters, the "I'll always remember where I was when I heard it" tragedies happen because they happen.

There isn't any giant conspiracy. There's nothing hiding under the bed.

Although I keep telling my kids there is. It never gets old.

The London Telegraph has a great article on the 30 Greatest Conspiracy Theories. Definitely worth reading, if only for comic relief.

For the most part, these theories are harmless rantings. But one more than the others has a deep cruelty to it. The one about 9/11. The victims families have enough pain for the rest of their lives without these "theorists" continually trying to explain what REALLY happened.

By the way, good luck trying to figure out who put me up to writing this.

Late edition

This won't come as a surprise to anyone who's freelanced more than ten minutes in an agency.

Years ago I was freelancing at McCann and wrote a spot for the McDonnell Douglas C-17 aircraft. Ginormous, window-rattling cargo plane. The idea of the spot was to show how the plane could be used for civilian missions, and showed it bringing supplies to an area that'd been hard hit by an unnamed natural disaster (the best kind). Since the spot required a skill with real people and emotions, I thought Elma Garcia would be a great choice to direct it. So I suggested her to my partner and the creative director: they agreed and we - including me - began talking to her.

Here's the punchline.

Early on in the conversations, when everyone started realizing the spot's potential and how much fun it would be shooting on a base in North Carolina, the creative director suddenly decided my services were no longer needed and cut my gig short. He then went on to shoot the spot with Garcia. Despite the fact he liked to rewrite everything I ever showed him, he wound up shooting this one word-for-word as I'd written it. But just for good measure, he put his name ahead of mine on the copywriting credit (and ahead of the art director's on his credit) on every awards show the spot was entered in. I found this out when I picked up the New York Ad Awards show annual where the spot had won.

At least my name was on it. On a web page I looked at for this post, and I won't say who's page, it's just his name.

I know, so what else is new? Well, that was then and this is now. The ironic part is in the intervening years, I've had many reasons to consider (and still do) that creative director a good friend of mine despite his dickish ways at the time.

Over it. Really.

The reason I even bring it up here, instead of in therapy, is that during those early conversations with Elma, somehow the fact that my Dad worked at Al's Newstand for years came up. Elma couldn't believe it, because she'd shot a print ad using my Dad at the newsstand. The picture you see here.

Needless to say I was beside myself when she sent me the picture. My dad was from Brooklyn, and to me it looked like a classic New York newsstand, instead of one at the corner of Fairfax and Oakwood in L.A.

My Dad used to go to open the newsstand at 4:30 in the morning when all the papers and magazines were delivered. I hated that the heavy metal doors covering the stand weren't on sliders, and he'd have to lift them off one by one and set them to the side. To me it seemed so unfair that Al (who was great to my father for many years) would ask a man my Dad's age to do that.

But my Dad never complained even when he should've. Yet another difference between us.

I'm at a crossroad here, because my instinct is to get sloppy in my beer and go on and on about my Dad. I don't think I will.

Instead what I'll do is just look at the picture, this picture that came to me by grace and chance, and smile while I remember how much he must have enjoyed having his moment.

And how much I enjoyed having my Dad.

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.

The waiting is the hardest part

This is a book my therapist wrote a few years ago. I know what you're thinking: Jeff seems so well-adjusted I can't understand why he sees a therapist.

You have no idea.

Anyway, you can probably tell from the title it deals with why we can't always do what we want when we want to do it.

Or when other people want us to.

The gist of it is, no matter how good your intentions, nothing happens until you're ready.

If you've ever tried to quit smoking, lose weight, write a screenplay, ask someone out, clean the garage or whatever, despite the necessity of the task, you won't be able to complete or even start it until you're ready.

The Supremes said it best. You can't hurry love, you just have to wait.

The good news is when you least expect it, suddenly you'll find yourself doing the thing you've been meaning to do. Or well intentioned friends have been wanting you to do.

And you'll succeed because you're ready.

This shouldn't be confused for an excuse not to do anything. After all people, show a little initiative.

When you're ready.