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.
I was watching, well, not so much watching as listening, well, not so much listening as tolerating the Today Show which was on while I was getting ready for work this morning.
By the way, getting ready for work consists of repeating, “I’ve got another 15 minutes before I have to get out of bed.” about four or five times after the alarm has gone off. And by alarm, I mean my German Shepherd or whatever the hell Lucy is barking at sunrise.
Anyway, apparently there’s a controversy I was totally unaware of, that was “shaking up the internet” and was important enough to merit time on a national television broadcast.
Today show co-anchor Savannah Guthrie was rattling on about a picture of Victoria Beckham kissing her young daughter on the lips, and the subsequent firestorm of controversy and discussion it started. I imagine the people discussing it are the same brain trust that leaves comments below every article about anything online.
Frankly I’d be more concerned if she was kissing someone else’s kid on the lips. Ah, who’re we kidding here. Actually, I wouldn’t. I have no opinion on the matter. I don’t care.
In the age of photos going viral, and people with too little brains and too much time on their hands having access to technology that transmits their stupidity around the world in a nanosecond, people feel they have to have an opinion about everything, merited or not.
Is Jennifer Aniston pregnant. Madonna’s road rage. Dolly Parton’s secrets. Honey Boo Boo growing up. Jaden Smith. Anything about a Kardashian. I was going to call this post Who Gives A Shit, but after all it is a family blog.
There are too many real issues in the world, especially this year, that people need to reflect on, apply some critical thinking against, get the facts and actually form a well-conisdered opinion about. None of them include watching alleged "journalists" embarrass themselves discussing the way Victoria Beckham innocently, like parents all over the world, like we have, kisses her kid on her birthday.
The worst part is producers of morning shows like Today want it both ways. In one breath, Savannah Guthrie shares our frustration about the insignificance of this story by telling us it's a topic we shouldn’t even be discussing. In the next breath, she's inviting the audience to go online to the Today website and give their opinion in a poll about parents kissing kids on the lips.
I never thought I'd be longing for the days of the Martha Stewart cooking segments, but after all, these are desperate times.
On the list of things I don’t like to do, somewhere between going to the gym, cleaning up after the dog and watching QVC, is shopping for clothes. Maybe if I was 60 lbs. thinner, could rip out a page from GQ, walk into the men’s department at Nordstrom, point at it and say, “I want that.” I’d like it a lot more.
But I’m not. I can’t. So I don’t.
Having said that, what I do love is shopping with my daughter.
She definitely doesn’t fall far from my side of the tree when it comes to sharing the same philosophy about hitting stores at the mall. Get in, get out and no one gets hurt.
We both appreciate the true fact that you can shop and shop all day long, but eventually you have to make a decision and buy something. For us, eventually comes sooner rather than later.
Neither of us has any desire to spend time in each section looking at every. single. item.. Instead we quickly find what we like, try it on, and if it fits it’s a thumbs up. If it doesn’t we move on.
Together we’re like Secret Service agents of department store shoppers – we don’t focus in on everything individually. Instead, we take in the big picture, scanning the floor looking for items that grab our interest, then we move in. We also don’t have those little wrist walkie-talkies, but I think they’d be cool.
We don’t see the point in making an entire day of looking for a shirt, a blouse or a pair of pants. There are things to do, people to see and only so many hours in a day to get it all done. Streamlining the process helps make it all possible.
There’s also another thing my daughter and I have in common when it comes to shopping.
There are some experiences in life you reflect back on fondly, through the flattering haze of nostalgia, wishing you could go back and re-live them. Then there are those other experiences, like my high school girlfriend, that you'd never go through again even if someone paid you a million dollars in 1962 money.
For me, the Palm Springs Aerial Tramway is one of the second ones.
I'd actually managed to forget I ever went on what I like to call the Tram O'Terror until this afternoon, when I was enjoying a brief respite and chocolate donut with my good friend Lori, who I'm working with at my current gig. I asked her if she had any big plans for the weekend, and she told me she was going to be in Palm Springs.
That's when it all came rushing back.
Years ago, in a galaxy far, far away before I even knew my wife, I used to go out with a girl named Anne Siegel (not my high school girlfriend). Her parents owned a condo in Palm Springs, and every few weekends we'd hop in her brown Camaro, head out there and enjoy the weather, the restaurants and the pool.
On one of our visits, we decided to ride the Tram O'Terror.
Here's something you should know about me: I'm not afraid of heights. I like flying, tall buildings and standing on top of hills looking down at the city. I took helicopter lessons for awhile, although I never flew enough hours to get my license. Altitude doesn't phase me.
What does phase me is riding in a little death cart hanging by a thread, while traveling 8500 feet up a ridiculously steep hill, swinging in the breeze all the way up.
I don't remember how long the ride actually was, but it seemed like an eternity. It was also thirty-five degrees cooler at the top than at the desert floor where we started (fortunately at the top there was a gift shop selling souvenir sweatshirts - what're the odds).
I know I took the tram back down, but I don't actually remember that either. I might've been passed out, hyperventilating too much or honing my spot on impression of a little girl screaming to really pay much attention.
At any rate I'm pretty sure that somehow, someway, that tram trip and the raw, crippling fear it sent coursing through me had something to do with the fact that now there are only two mountains I'm comfortable riding all the way to the top of.
In theory, Facebook is a good thing. I can find people I've lost touch with, catch up with celebrities and even talk to them if it’s really them posting on their page. I can follow my favorite brands for discounts and special offers, view endless vacation photos, baby pictures, inspirational sayings, favorite musician YouTube clips and German Shepherd pictures (which I personally can’t get enough of) that friends feel compelled to share with the world. It can be a fun, informative, time-killing app if used correctly.
Where it comes undone for me is the preaching, guiltifying, lecturing and cage-match quality bickering some people feel compelled to administer in the course of my Facebook feed.
I stopped getting into Facebook fights a long time ago. In fact, the post I wrote here almost five years ago was the last time I remember really losing any semblance of control, and continuing an online argument for no reason other than to hammer my point home to someone who was never going to hear it.
Oh, wait a minute. There was another time in the recent past I got into it online with a writer/director/voice-over talent/creative director/agency-owner friend I've known over thirty years. I had no idea about his extreme right wing political beliefs, but all it took to find out about them was posting something favorable about Obama and not so flattering about the way he was being treated by the Republican congress. You know, something factual he didn't want to hear.
What can you do. Some people walk around loaded for bear.
Anyway, after a certain number of back and forth posts, there comes a point in any Facebook argument where it becomes less about the topic at hand and more about energy and endurance. It forces me to ask the tough questions, like how bad do you want it kid? Will it all be worth it in the end (if it ever ends)? Am I willing to go the distance?
What I've discovered about myself, when it comes to Facebook fights, is that I am not.
I put up a post today about the general blahs of being back at work after a holiday weekend. To my way of thinking, not very controversial. I’m pretty sure it’s a universal feeling that after a three-day weekend, no one—regardless of what industry they're in—wants to be back at work after enjoying time off. AmIright?
I got some comments agreeing, and a few likes, but I also got a comment that said, “You’re booked. You should be grateful.”
Let’s disassemble that comment, shall we?
First of all, my post was a little joke, based on a universal truth. And by the way, jokes are so much funnier when you have to explain them aren’t they?
Next, does the fact I made a joke about not wanting to be at work exclude me from being grateful to have the gig? I think not.
And while I’m on the subject, I actually don’t need people telling me what to feel and when to feel that way. I don’t accept that from strangers, I didn't accept it from my high school girlfriend and I’m certainly not going to take it from friends (well, Facebook friends, not real life friends).
I’m not saying people shouldn’t put up how they feel about things. It's a free country, free speech, your right and all that. And I recognize that by posting anything, and being a part of the Facebook community, I leave myself open to whatever comments anyone with a keyboard and access to my feed wants to make.
But, like in a nice restaurant, 90% of the game is presentation. It'd be better—and, even though it might not sway me, it'd probably make me more receptive to hear their point of view—if people commenting on my posts framed it in a way that expressed their opinion without condemning me for not sharing it.
And by the way, this idea I should or shouldn't do or feel a certain way just doesn't fly. Not a big fan of the word "should"—people "should" know better than to use it with that hand-on-hip, reprimanding, wagging-your-finger tone.
To me, it's just as frustrating and insulting as people who ask you to copy and repost what they’ve posted for one hour to prove to them you’re against cancer, bullying, parting your hair on the right or whatever. I’ve written here about how I feel about those people (“What do you mean ‘those people’” “What do you mean ‘Those people’?” - see below). How much validation does one individual need?
Besides, if you're looking for it from Facebook posts, you have bigger issues than whether or not people share your point of view.
I know you all won't agree with me, but if you do copy and paste this post on your page for one hour.
Ok, not exactly played. I've walked across the stage in front of an audience. My high school graduation was held at the Hollywood Bowl, and it might've been the most awesome part of high school except for the time I talked my Consumer Law and Economics teacher Mr. Blackman into thinking he'd lost my final term paper (if my kids are reading this, don't even think about it). He gave me an A, but I still feel bad about it.
Having grown up an L.A. kid, I've seen plenty of concerts at the Bowl, so many I can't remember them all.
I saw The Eagles take it easy. If you could read my mind you'd know I also saw Gordon Lightfoot. When school was out for summer I saw Alice Cooper.
I've seen Bruce Springsteen and Jackson Browne perform together (I know, I'm as shocked as you are) for Survival Sunday 4, an anti-nuke benefit concert.
It's getting to the point I remember Crosby Stills and Nash belting out Suite: Judy Blue Eyes. I can absolutely confirm the Go-Go's got the beat. I saw Laurie Andersen do whatever the hell it was she was doing. I've seen Steve Martin getting wild and crazy with Edie Brickell while fireworks were going off in the sky.
There have been many, many more, but you get my drift.
Not all my memories are happy ones. There was the night my pal David Weitz and I were driving in my 1965 Plymouth Fury. Highland Avenue was jammed because of the show at the Bowl, so we turned up into the surrounding hills to see if we could find a shortcut around it. Out of nowhere, a police car appeared behind us, lights flashing. The officers told us through the speakers to get out of the car slowly with our hands up. We were young, but we weren't stupid. We knew this was serious.
Once we were out of the car, hands up, they got out of their car with guns drawn and pointed right at us. They told me to open the trunk, which I did slowly and with my hands in sight at all times. They didn't find whatever they were looking for, and after checking our I.D.'s, they let us go. Apparently we fit the description of two guys who'd been robbing the hillside homes recently. I figured the description was brutally handsome and incredibly funny.
Anyway, the reason my mind's on the Bowl is because a week from tonight, I'll be there again, not on stage, but watching the first J.J. Abrams' Star Trek with the Los Angeles Philharmonic playing the score alongside the movie. It should be a great night.
If you've never been there, or it's been awhile, you owe it to yourself to go. It truly is one of the greatest venues, in one of the most beautiful settings, you'll ever see a show at.
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.
