A way out

If you follow me on Facebook, you know what was once a snarky, funny, advertising-bashing feed has turned into one long, deservedly anti-Trump rant 24/7. In light of that, this post may surprise you with its sympathetic tone.

Here's what we all know: Mr. Trump never thought he was going to win the presidency, which was fine with him because he never really wanted the job. What he wanted was publicity and his name in the papers and broadcast news everyday. Then he was going to leverage his provable popularity into a favorable deal for a Trump Network, where one can only assume you'd be able to find reruns of man-crush Sean Hannity, and yet another reboot of the Odd Couple starring Ann Coulter and Rush Limbaugh (SPOILER ALERT: Limbaugh's the sloppy one).

I know the nation wants a way out, and doggone it, judging from how tired he looks and incoherent his thoughts seem to be, I bet Mr. Trump does too.

I'd like to suggest he write a resignation letter, a bold, unexpectedly honest letter to the Secretary of State—who is the person who accepts that letter—and the nation, and simply explain the situation.

And because I'm a giver at heart, I'd like to offer him this draft:

Dear Mr. Secretary of State,

Well, it's been a crazy few weeks. Certainly far more active in every sense than I would've expected. Executive orders, banning Muslims, repealing Obamacare, the protests. Frankly, I'm spent.

Here's the thing: I never wanted the job. I had the kind of life many people admired. Money, beautiful wife, children I like a great deal, my own building in mid-town Manhattan. Don't forget the jet—pretty nice rolling up to runway 25 Left and seeing that baby fueled and ready.

Anyway, the point is I'm tendering my resignation as President of the United States. I believe my biggest campaign promise of bringing the nation together has been done. Mission accomplished. Have you seen those protests? You tell me the last time people were united like that. You're welcome.

Effective immediately, Mike Pence will assume the office of President. Now, Pence is not the ideal man for the job, and let's face it—I'm a tough act to follow. But he knows how government works much better than I do, and he's less likely to launch the missiles over a disagreement. I can admit it, I've got a temper. I'm working on it.

Besides, I was never going to help my base anyway. Did they really think I cared if they had jobs or not? I mean, I could hire a few of them to pull weeds on the back nine at Mar-A-Lago, but that would still leave a lot of them needing jobs.

I know the mayhem I've caused. But it was a wild ride, no? And Pence will look like a hero just for not getting everyone killed. You're welcome Mike.

I also miss Melania. She never cared for D.C. very much, and I can't blame her. I want to be back at Trump Tower, tweeting without all these people telling me not to, and not causing havoc when I say what's on my mind. Which, as you know, is subject to change even within the same sentence.

Frankly, the longer I'm here the more I recognize two things. First, who needs the aggravation? And number two, Obama handled this much better than I can. He's smart, he's calm, he's well spoken. For a guy born in Kenya, you can't do better.

So that's it. United the people. Put America first. Got Alec Baldwin a steady gig. It's time to go back to private life. Johnny, fuel Trump One for take off. Moscow, then Manhattan.

It's been tremendous people, but we're done here. God bless me, and God bless the United States of America.

Although they won't need it nearly as much now that I'm gone.

Yours truly,
President the Donald

Limited menu

I'm married to an insanely great chef. She has a degree in Culinary Arts, she's cooked at the James Beard Foundation in New York and she was a pastry chef at an upscale, white tablecloth restaurant called Amis. She's one of those frustratingly creative chefs who can open a cabinet, see a box of rice, a bottle of syrup and some week-old crackers and whip up a spectacular meal from it. Including dessert.

Needless to say we eat pretty well around here.

You'd think with all the meals she's made for the family, and all the years we've been married, some of that culinary know-how would've rubbed off on me. You'd think that. But you'd be wrong. Cooking wise, I'm still pretty much at the same skill level as when I came into the marriage. One thing I know how to make, and make pretty damn well, is meat squares.

Hang on, I'll tell you.

First you go to the market and get some ground beef. A pound, two pounds, three pounds depending on how many people you're feeding. Then you mix it up with ketchup, onions and some salt and pepper. Mix it up good, and flatten it into a square Pyrex dish. Place in oven at 350 degrees for twenty minutes, then serve to a grateful, hungry public.

I know meat squares isn't the most appetizing name. It even sounds like a euphemism for something far less savory. But when you bring that hot meat square out of the oven—I prefer using the Hello Kitty oven mits—I guarantee mouths will be watering. They may be watering for something else, but still.

The other dish in my pre-marriage repertoire is a little item I like to call the open-face, reverse turkey melt. Here's how it goes.

Take two pieces of bread, I prefer sourdough. Then squirt the ketchup of your choice into a design of your choice on each of the slices. Sometimes I'll make a happy face, other times it'll be the sun with ketchup rays emanating from the sides. One time I tried to do the comedy and tragedy masks, one on each slice. Let's just say tragedy won out.

Next, put a couple slices of turkey on each slice of bread, and sprinkle some shredded pepperjack cheese over each slice. Then put them your toaster oven for four and half minutes at 275 degrees.

When the little bell dings, out comes a hot, cheesy, delicious, almost real tasting meal.

Of course, the good news is I don't have to make a meal for myself very often. It's intimidating being married to someone who can cook anything when I'm only limited to a couple dishes of my own. Don't get me wrong, I can do a few other things. Eggs scrambled or over easy. Put pasta in boiling water. If I'm feeling particularly healthy, even steam some broccoli. But those things aren't my creations. I just know how to do them.

As a gift the wife gave me two cooking classes at Sur La Table not too long ago. I took the first one, which was called The Ten Things Every Chef Should Know.

In my cookbook, number eleven is meat squares.

Eating healthier

If you work in an agency, you already know you're surrounded by many things.

Foam core. Account planners. Knit beanies. T-shirts with ironic sayings. Storyboards. Conference rooms. Ideas both great and wretched. Millennials. Broken printers. And, most importantly, food.

Agencies can come up short on the big idea, results, deadlines and insights. But one thing they're never wanting for is food.

It comes in all forms: leftovers from client and vendor meetings, food brought in for late night work (allegedly) sessions, donuts because someone felt breakfast is the most important meal. And when you work in an agency that has it's own café and barista, there are always snacks.

Snacks come in two forms: unhealthy, and the illusion of healthy. I prefer the illusion of healthy. For example today I had these. They're made with real fruit. They have 100% of my daily vitamin C requirement. Fat free. And gluten free, which means you can eat them in Los Angeles.

Right under the banner that reads Mixed Fruit is the disclaimer Natural and Artificial Fruit.

Well sure, but there's nothing artificial about the way these little gummy fruits taste.

I suppose if I was under oath I'd have to admit there are apples, bananas and those little Cutie tangerines on the counter next to the cookies, chips, candy and these "fruit mix" packs.

But then again, no one's under oath here.

Hearing it differently

I've always been a big fan of Ben E. King's Stand By Me (if you recall, and I believe you should have perfect recall of every post I write, I posted an article with several versions of the song here). To me, it's not just one of the great vocals of all time, but also one of the great songs of all time in its purity and simplicity.

Like everything else in life, what it means and who it's being sung to are open to interpretation. Over the years when I've heard it, I've often thought it was a song about lovers and loyalty, staying with each other no matter what.

But today, I have a different take on it.

Here's my truth: it's getting harder and harder to maintain a sense of humor when our country is being dismantled by a mentally unstable, billionaire (?) dictator and the neo-Nazi pulling his strings behind the curtain. I wake up with a sick sense of dread every day, convinced it can't be happening, yet slapped in the face by the reality of the situation with every newscast and social media post about politics.

I know I'm not the only one. There are at least seventy million in this boat with me.

Not to sound preachy (although it may be too late for that), smug or sanctimonious, but in this stark, stripped-down version of Stand By Me sung by Tracy Chapman—which I left out of my original post about the song—I hear something different. In this version, in this time, in this country, it feels like the voices of democracy, decency, morality, kindness, humanity and all things good crying out for us not to abandon them. Is hearing verses about the sky falling and mountains crumbling so far fetched in a time when an egotistical, ignorant, morally and intellectually bankrupt liar has control of the nuclear arsenal? Is it?

This particular version, to me, is everything good about America crying out, asking us to save her and be there for her.

I plan on doing that every second this narcissistic sociopath manages to stay in office.

Again, I know I'm not the only one.

Back to bed

I am many things. Funny. Good looking. Talented. Creative. Compassionate. Encouraging. Well read. Kind to children. Nice to the waitstaff. A catch as a husband. Someone who loves doing laundry. And loading a dishwasher. A good friend. A trusted confidante. An excellent driver. A great kisser. And definitely humble.

However one thing I am not now, nor have I ever been, is a morning person.

Mornings are just a cruel tease. Being a late night person, I rarely get to sleep before midnight or one in the morning. I say sleep in the loosest sense of the word. It's been years, literally, since I've slept eight hours straight through. I get up to pee. Or I startle awake from a dream. Sometimes I'm just restless and watch some TV at three in the morning to take the edge off (because nothing takes the edge off like skin care and exercise equipment infomercials). Occasionally my eighty-five pound German Shepherd launches himself up on the bed in the middle of the night.

That gets the old ticker going.

Oddly enough, one thing that never, and I do mean never, keeps me awake is work. I think it comes from so many years as a freelancer. But the second both feet are out of the office, I don't think about anything related to work until I have to be back the next morning.

And we know how I feel about mornings.

The point of all this, and there is one, is that right around the time the faintest sliver of sunlight starts to hit the pitch black night sky is the exact moment I actually manage to get myself back to the deep, still sleep I've been craving all night. It finally arrives just in time for sunrise. Ironically when I'm finally completely out, it's time to wake up.

There's no gradual, gentle, coming-up-from-the-bottom-of-the-pool kind of awakening for me. Because I know how deep asleep I am in the morning, the alarm has to be more than a light bell, chirping birds or a digital alarm. No, my iPhone alarm is Uptown Funk. It comes on loud, and it's a straight up jolt out of bed. In fact, I have to kiss myself I'm so pretty (see what I did there?).

So if you see me at work in the morning around nine, dragging myself around, looking somewhat foggy and I don't return your smile or your hello, don't ask how you're doing or what you're working on, please don't take it personally. I promise I will.

Sometime around eleven.

Goodbye John Hurt

British actor John Hurt died today of pancreatic cancer. In everything from Alien to The Elephant Man to three of the Harry Potter, his exceptional talent was on display in all its range and colors.

A few years ago I wrote this post—under the title of We Have Contact—about a lesser seen role of his that's always been one of my favorites. I hope you enjoy the clip of it.

The year isn't even a month old, and it's already claimed yet another one of the greats.

I'll miss John Hurt. He was one of those rare talents I always thought would be around forever. Fortunately all of his performances will.

The image many people have of John Hurt is of him thrashing around on the dining table of the space ship Nostromo with an alien bursting out of his chest.

Or maybe it's his grotesquely disfigured form in The Elephant Man, as he proclaims to Anthony Hopkins he is not an animal, he's a human being.

Younger moviegoers might know him as Mr. Olivander from the Harry Potter movies - including the next two of them.

But his one performance I think I enjoy most is one most people didn't see. His role as eccentric, reclusive, terminally ill billionaire industrialist S.R. Hadden in the Robert Zemeckis film Contact.

With a keen interest in space and extra-terrestrials, his character is compelling, creepy and brilliant all at the same time (not unlike a few creative directors I know).

I quote the line at the end of this scene all the time. Scares the hell out of my kids.

The plane truth

Hey pal, can you spare $371 million? I'll pay you back.

You're probably wondering what I want with that kind of green. I'm not gonna lie: I want my own plane, specifically a new Boeing 777.

Now I know what you're saying. Jeff you say, think of how many people we could feed with that kind of money. How many homes we could build. All the college tuitions it could pay for. Yeah yeah, sure sure. In case you haven't read a White House approved news source lately, this is the age of Trump (sorry, I just threw up a little when I typed that). And the new way we're making decisions is "What's in it for me?"

For $371 million, what's in it for me is my own plane.

I've flown commercially for too many years, and frankly, I'm tired of the massive inconvenience of it all. Getting to the airport early. Going through security, even with the TSA express line. Mechanical delays. Crew delays. And two words that should strike terror into the heart of anyone who travels by air: middle seat.

I didn't always want my own plane. However over the past couple years, I've been watching our dipshit president take-off and (unfortunately) land in his own badly painted, ugly jet. Also, the idea of a jumbo jet like Air Force One being fueled and ready to go anytime has always been appealing. But an aircraft doesn't have to be on that scale to trigger my desire for one. Drive to McCarren Airport from the Vegas strip, and you'll go past their private jet tarmac. As Springsteen sings in Cadillac Ranch, there they sit buddy just-a-gleamin' in the sun.

Private jets ready to go on a moment's notice. Or a whim.

I'm all too aware I could avoid the maintenance, cost and headaches of my own jet if I just took NetJet or other private jet sharing services. But I don't for the same reason I've never leased a car. If I'm going to be making a monthly payment on something, at the end I want to own it. (Note to self: check monthly payments on $371 million.)

I suppose there are lots of smaller, starter jets I could have for my first plane. But that would be settling. After all, they don't have a range of 8,700 nautical miles. They can't carry between 350-375 passengers. They don't have larger windows. Or twin-aisles.

You're probably wondering when I'd need to carry 375 people. Well, if you've seen my Facebook page, you know I have more than that many followers. With my brand new 777 they could follow me from the comfort of the coach section.

Buying the jet is the easy decision. There are plenty more to be made. What will the color palette be? Which designer will create the crew uniforms? Who will be the lucky chef who gets to prepare the five-star meals? I'll definitely need to take a few days and think these things through.

I'm not going to give myself a deadline for making the purchase. After all I know it'll take a little time to raise the money. But the second I have it, you'll be able to find me sitting in my favorite position.

Upright and locked.