#262 In which our hero somewhat reluctantly participates in a questionable company-mandated charity contest.

My agency is big on charity work. Not pro bono advertising work (which is a little odd) but general fund-raising and collections. We typically “adopt” several underprivileged families around Christmas and provide gifts, coats and assorted stuff, for example.

Recently, we had a food drive. The deal was that the charity organization would provide us with ten 55-gallon plastic barrels, and we were to fill them up with canned goods, paper products and other non-perishables. Which is all and good.

But, then an email went out explaining how we were going to turn this food drive into a FUN! activity for the entire agency! We were going to decorate the barrels! You would randomly be assigned to a team, and your team would get together to brainstorm how to decorate the shit out of your barrel! Oh, what fun would be had!

This reeks of mandated participation, which doesn’t thrill me. Years ago I worked for The Columbus Dispatch newspaper. The owner’s pet charity was United Way, and he liked to brag that 100% of his employees contributed. This was achieved by strong-arming anyone who didn’t want to participate. And, honestly, it was coercion, plain and simple. At the time I was working in the phone room, and not making a fortune by any stretch of the imagination. So I didn’t really want to give any money to charity, especially when I could better use that money to pay off my credit card debt. But when I didn’t immediately return my United Way form, my boss, then my boss’s boss came down on me. First it was a nice “ah, come on, donate a$1 a week, that’s not so much, is it?” Then it became, “Y’know, John F. [the owner of the paper] takes United Way contributions very seriously. You wouldn’t want to piss off the president, would you?” It was all really obnoxious.

So, I wasn’t excited by this apparently mandatory contest BS. But I went to the initial group meeting because… well, because I want to keep my job. And every little thing I can do to make myself seem like a team player/someone management wants to keep around, I’m going to jump at it.

And, it just so happened that one of the guys on my team is the same jackass who beat me out of the Halloween costume contest two years ago. And, as you may remember, I’m still bitter about that.

And this guy came to the meeting prepared. He had sketches of what he thought we should do to decorate the barrel. Which was to but a gigantic nutcracker head on to of it, with a working mouth to accept the canned goods. Now, I’ll admit this is an intriguing idea, but how the hell do you make that work? Was this guy going to craft a giant nutcracker head out of paper mache? When someone asked him how to do it, his answer was, “I dunno, we could carve it out of foam or something.”

Now, my original plan was to go to the meeting but not really help that much. I was busy with my real job, after all. But, I would be goddamned if I’d like this guy get his way. I had what I thought was a pretty damn clever idea, and I told the group about it. And, more importantly, it was 100% executable. I sketched it out on a piece of paper and passed it around.

After some debate (some dumbasses still wanted to make this unmakable nutcracker head) it was deceived to do my idea: Santa’s reindeer.

My idea was simple: do something that no other group would think of (it was a competition, after all): turn the barrel on its side, make sawhorse legs, and make a head with antlers. It came together easily in my head.

Then I made a mock-up, using foamcore and a Mountain Dew can as a proxy for the barrel. It looked great. So I told everyone I’d cut the real deal out over the weekend and bring it in on Monday.

That weekend it took me about four hours to cut the parts out of plywood. It went amazingly easily, especially considering that I’m not at all handy. Another 15 minutes of brown spray paint, and it was done.

I brought it in and started to assemble it. I told the rest of my group that all they needed to do was find a blanket or piece of cloth or something to cover the barrel, and a red nose. One $5 blanket from Walmart and a foam nose later, and it was done.

Behold!



I was really pleased with how well it all came together. Most of the other barrels were more traditional in design (there were a lot of chimneys with Santa coming down, an angel, Oscar the Grouch in his trashcan, things like that. None of the other entries put the barrel on its side.

I thought that gave us a good chance of winning but, honestly, what I really thought would put us over the top was the butt:

I made a plug for the open part of the barrel, with a trap door. The idea is you had to lift the deer’s tail to stick the canned goods in it. That’s right, you had to stuff the food up the deer’s butt.

Given the mental age of a large portion of the agency, I thought this was the perfect gimmick to give our entry the edge. And it was certainly more fun that some half-assed nutcracker head.

I should have known better.

The votes were tallied, and my reindeer lost. By two votes. TWO! I can’t win a damn thing at this agency.

However, the entry we lost to was very cool. It was a Starbucks’ holiday cup, complete with hot chocolate and whipped cream. It was beautiful. Not as innovative as my entry, but very cool. If I had to lose, I’m okay with losing to that entry.

Okay… but still bitter.

###

SOUR HOUR

Speaking of Halloween; you might wonder if I dressed up for my work's annual Halloween party. You might wonder this because you remember that my costume last year was fucking AWESOME (if I do say so myself).

Now, the prize for best costume last year was a pair of round-trip tickets to anywhere in the continental United States. Not a bad prize. I wanted to win them, bad.

I did not.

Instead, this jackass won by dressing up like a woman. Ugh. I was rather put out by the entire thing. I debated if I wanted to make an effort to dress up this year or not; I was still pissed about losing to the tranny (Still, after an entire year? Oh yes.) but I enjoy making and wearing costumes, and if there was a good prize I figured I'd go for it. But, then the prizes were announced and the grand prize for the costume contest (a $50 gift certificate) was less than inspiring.

But, since I'm a good sport, I dressed up anyway:


Yep, I was "Bitter." My costume was a big hit. There were a surprisingly large number people who still remember last year's costume and think I was robbed.

Which I was. Yep, still bitter.

###

#255 In which our hero discusses what was said to him by a coworker recently causing flames to shoot out of his eyes (our hero, not the coworker)

nIf you follow my Twitter account, you already know that a coworker called me an “asshole” last week. And I mean really called me an asshole, in anger, with malice. I have to make that distinction because when creative people in the advertising industry get together the conversation often quickly drops to the level of 8-year-olds on the playground.

I’m not going to get into the particulars of the project because a.) it wouldn’t be wise for me to discuss actual client work on my dumb blog and b.) it’s irrelevant to the story. What this really is about (other than the account executive (or AE) in question being an arrogant knob who’s pretty piss-poor at his job) is the constant and universal struggle between AEs and the creative staff.

I’ve worked at several agencies, and it’s always like this. The reality is that the system we all labor under is really set up to fail. It works like this: the client gives some sort of direction about what s/he wants in the latest print ad/radio spot/brochure/whatever. The AE in turn takes that information and relays it to the creative staff, usually in the form of a written document (generally called a “brief.”) The problem should already be obvious: the creative staff, ie., the people who will actually write and design the end result, are getting the information from the client second-hand. To make matters worse, we’re getting the information in a written document, usually well after the actual meeting between AE and client. So we don’t have the opportunity to ask question as the information is being relayed to us, then, if we do go back to the AE and ask questions, the information is no longer fresh in his/her mind.

So every project generally starts at a deficient.

But that’s just a little background, and not really important to what the AE called me (which, you’ll remember, is “asshole.”)

So we have a industrial parts manufacturer with a new product. They are very excited about this new product, so they’re pulling out all the stops to tell the world about it: brochures, trade show panels, email alerts, new mini-website and more. So we, the creative staff, get all this crap thrown at us and we start digging through it, producing the most important bits first. The website, which this tale hinges on, is pushed to the bottom of the pile, because it’s not a critical element and is quick and easy to turn around.

So early last week the AE suddenly sends out an email saying, “Hey, what’s up with the website? I want to show the client something on Friday.” He hadn’t indicated that there was any urgency with this part of the project up until this part. And honestly, it wasn’t a big deal, because the art director and I had been working on it, off and on, all along, and we had finished stuff to show.

Then it got interesting.

The AE looks at our work, then sends out an email the next day. It’s a three page mini-site and he has commentary about each page. And this next part is the problem.

Account executives aren’t writers. They aren’t designers. The best of them have insights into what the client likes and dislikes, what hot buttons set them off or make them fall in love with projects, and can share this insight with you to make the project better. But this guy isn’t the best of the best. And in his commentary, he wasn’t providing any insight anyway, he was art directing the project. And more to the point, it wasn’t really about his comments, it was about the way he delivered them. He was arrogant and condescending, and gave himself a lot more credit then he was due. “This layout is too busy,” he wrote in his email, “and where are the bullets that were outlined on the brief?”

So, hackles up, I write an email in response, saying that the creative team doesn’t think the layout is too busy, and that all the information from the brief is in there, if he would look for it (I said this in a more polite way). The emails keep going back and forth, and get a little heated. His attitude is clearly: I TOLD you want to do, why aren’t you art monkeys following orders?

My attitude is “fuck that guy.” Because he’s trying to act as a creative director, and he has neither the experience or aptitude to do it. My email responses are getting shorter, but haven’t crossed the line to insulting yet.

Finally, the associate creative director and I end up in the art director’s office. The AE storms in all in a huff. The ACD says “Okay, what’s the problem with this layout?”

The AE says, as closely as I can remember it: “ALL I need to know is how this animation is going to work. THAT’S ALL. You just have to give me the information. There’s no need”--and here he looks directly at me--“to be an ASSHOLE in emails!”

Yeah, I know, a little anticlimactic. He didn’t say, “Hey, you’re an asshole!” but it was clear from his body language that he was saying exactly that.

Anyway, I am FURIOUS. And, I’ve been known to fly off the handle once or twice, especially when needlessly confronted by incompetents, so I immediately get up and square off with the guy and say, “Look! I’m not the one being an asshole here!”

The ACD intercedes and brings things back down to a reasonable level--which is nothing short of miraculous being that this ACD is an angry little man--and we hash things out reasonably. I think some of it was miscommunication, but more of it was this AE needed a dumb amount of hand-holding because he can’t properly do the job on his own. All the information he needed really was right there, if he took a moment to think about the project and look at the supporting materials.

So now the guy is all fakey nice-nice with me, as usual. Maybe he’s already moved past it. But I have been known to keep grudges FOREVER and can’t imagine I’m going to forget this any time soon.

But that’s just me being an asshole.

WORK SHIRK

When I eventually go into Lily or Macey's classroom for Career Day and some snotty-nosed kid asks me what it takes to be a good copywriter; I'm going to tell him this:

"Think of something you don't care about. I mean really, really don't care about. Something that never even entered into your consciousness before. Maybe it's the Snail Darter controversy; maybe it's hair replacement surgery. After you've got it, sit down and write a 16-page brochure about how amazingly awesome that thing is. If you can do that--you have the chops to be a legendary copywriter."

I, myself, will probably never be a legendary copywriter.

###

WORK JERK

I've been thinking about my job a lot lately; my career, actually. Nothing I'm dumb enough to post publicly, but it's been on my mind. Ugh. Big thoughts. Make my brain hurt.

Here's a video that you may or may not find amusing. I find it hilarious, because it's true. A hack. An egomaniac. That's me.

###

#237 In which our hero thinks big thoughts.

I’ve been thinking about my career quick a bit lately. Not surprising, being that next month is my two year anniversary at this agency. Assuming I manage to avoid being fired for the next 30 days, this will be the longest I’ve worked at any agency since moving to Cleveland.

I try not to be negative about it, but in my career, I have cause. In the six years I’ve been in Cleveland, I’ve worked at five agencies. That’s probably higher than the norm, but not terribly unusual in my field. Economy goes down, advertisers cut budgets, agencies go down, agencies cut people… it’s a vicious circle and I’ve been on the bent-over end of it several times.

Here’s the first time.

Here’s the second time (The Scientist was eight months pregnant for this one).

Here’s the third time (Macey was two months old for this one).

And being that the economy appears to be heading to another recession, this looms large in my mind. Except, I don’t really expect to get fired any time soon. I’ve probably just jinxed myself by typing that, but I feel like I’m in a really good place at this agency. In my two years here I’ve proven myself, stepped up to any challenge thrown my way. I’ve been rewarded with high profile assignments, and made the main writer on several big name clients. I even started a recycling program that has been so successful that the entire building participates in it, not just our agency.

But.

I can’t stop thinking about some insight I got from a co-worker years ago. The only way to get a substantial raise, he told me, is to go to another agency.

And in my decade of experience, I’ve found that to be absolutely true. If you get a regular raise (which in my experience has NOT happened more than it has happened) it’s always cost of living, never any more. Regardless of stellar job performance evaluations, it’s always the absolute minimal that an employer can get away with.

And I get this. It’s management’s job to keep costs low, and salary is the #1 cost to an ad agency. I don’t begrudge them, really. But I do want to be rewarded for doing good work. And most of my career, the reward for good work was not being fired. It’s really hard to shake that lingering fear that I could once again be called into Human Resources and told to close the door.

But, being respected (to my face, at least) and liked at this agency has given me the confidence to ask around, poke at some people and see what are my chances of actually making some more money.

And answer is slim to none.

I gently asked my boss today where she saw me going in the future; what promotions might exist. She said that while she didn’t know if a promotion to associate creative director (the next rung on the ladder in my department) would happen this year or over the next couple years (translated, that means it will NOT happen) she definitely saw me in the position of being the “lead” on more major clients and maybe even a “creative manager.” There are two roles which entail more responsibility and more work… but no more money.

This bums me out.

So the big question is: should I start looking around again? I have my resume up on Monster.com and all the appropriate job sites, of course, but I haven’t actively sent out resumes in two years. Not since I got this job.

The big problem is that I love this job, and this agency. The client list is good, my co-workers are nice and talented, management is hands-off for the most part. It’s a fun place to work.

But if I want a big bump in pay, I think I’m going to have to jump ship. But I kinda don’t want to. Even if I ended up at a place as enjoyable as this, there’s no guarantee that I wouldn’t be laid off the next month when the economy shits the bed. So I’m wrestling with the concept of how much money is enough money to roll the dice again.

The entire concept frightens me, and I’ve generally shied away from things that frighten me. But, I also think that the only way to gain great rewards is to take great chances.

I dunno.

###

SURVEY NO WAY

Helpful hint of the day: if a telemarketer calls you with a survey, and you want to get off the phone but don’t want to be rude, tell them you work in advertising. Call I got last night:

TELEMARKETER: Hello sir, I’m {didn’t catch it} with {didn't care} and I’d like to ask you a few brief questions.
ME: Okay.
TM: Is there anyone in the household between the ages of 30 and 34?*
ME: Actually, no.
TM: Is there a male between the ages of 34 and 42?
ME: Yes, I am.
TM: Great! First, do you or anyone in your household work in any of the following professions? Advertising or--
ME: Yes.
TM: Advertising?
ME: Yes.
TM: Um, what is it you do?
ME: I’m a writer.
TM: Oh, do you have anything to do with radio advertising?
ME: Sure. In fact, I wrote some radio scripts just today.
TM: Oh. Um, I think that might disqualify you from the survey.
ME: It usually does.
TM: Let me just check… {moment later} Yeah, I’m afraid that disqualifies you from the survey.
ME: No problem.

Now, unlike most people, I want to take these surveys, because I’m often using the info on the other side. I’m always curious about how the questions are phrased, if they are leading or misleading, and what order they are presented in. Phone surveys are notoriously unreliable, because there’s nothing stopping the recipient from lying outrageously.

And, depending on how clever you are with the questions, you can really get just about any result you want. Typically, on the surveys where they allow me to participate, I have a really good idea by the end of who’s sponsoring the research and/or what product(s) they are gathering information for. It’s fun. Well, for me, maybe.

I guess I could lie myself, and tell them I’m a bricklayer or whatever. But then I’d just be giving some poor copywriter down the road bad info.


* WTF? This is the first time that I’ve been aged out of a survey. For a long time I’ve been in that golden zone, the male aged 18-35 that all marketers want to target. I’m going to be royally pissed if I get bumped up to the next age range, and find myself lumped with 40-65-year-olds.

###

OBEY DAY

We have name plates on our offices at work. They are actually CD cases... the idea being that instead of just having boring wall-mounted name tags, everyone in the agency could design their own album cover. Here's the new one I put together yesterday:

Sadly, to date, no-one has.

###

LOCKDOWN TOWN

Decided that I wanted something else for lunch rather than what I had brought. I headed out to the front doors, only to find them locked. The receptionist came around the front of her desk to confront me.

ME: Why are the doors locked?
RECEPTIONIST: Oh, sorry, Craig. There’s, um, a security issue in the building, which I can’t reveal.
ME: What?
RECEPTIONIST: If you want, I can let you out, then just call when you want to come back in. Or you can use your keycard to get out the back door.
ME: Um, okay. I’ll get my card, I guess.

So suddenly I was in the position of deciding if it was worth my life to go down to the deli on the first floor for a grilled cheese sandwich. I decided it was.

I poked my head out of the door and looked around. Coast seemed to be clear. Then I looked over the railing of the atrium, and it appeared to be business as usual. People where getting food from the deli, eating in the little food court area, wandering in and out of offices.

It soon became clear that whatever was happening, it was just in our agency. And, as I write this, it still is. No-one knows what’s going on. HR isn’t talking. We’re in lock-down, and no-one will say why.

Very odd.

If I had to guess, I’d say it was a threat against a specific employee. Maybe an angry boyfriend situation? At least, I hope that’s what it is. Because if someone called the president and said they were going to blow up the agency, well… I think I’d go home. Yeah, I’m pretty sure I’m not willing to risk my life for any of the clients I work with.

That’s all I know about the situation at this time. I’ll update later, if I survive.

EDIT: As of 1:45pm the front doors are now open. I happened to run into the relentlessly chipper HR Director in the hall and had this conversation:

ME: Hey, I don't suppose you could tell me why we were on lockdown?
HR: We had some security issues to deal with. And now they've been dealt with!
ME: Un-huh. In other words, no, you can't tell me.
HR: But I did! The issues have been resolved! We're all secure again! Doesn’t that answer your question?
ME: It would if I had asked you to tell me in the vaguest and most obscure way possible.
HR: Ha-ha!

So, apparently my life is no longer in danger. I hope.

###

#230 In which our hero does his part to save the planet, which avoiding any actual work on his part.

I don’t remember if I’ve written about this before, but I’m the recycling guy at my work. I never intended to become the recycling guy, but become him I did. It went down like this.

Couple of weeks after I started here, I noticed that the agency doesn’t recycle. I’d see aluminum cans in the trash, and it bugged me. Now, I’m not the super-dedicated save the earth type, but we recycle at home. Generally speaking, it’s not that hard to do, and it’s a good thing for the earth. Mother Earth, good karma, all that crap.

At work we have a suggestion box. You can drop in anonymous suggestions, or put your name to them. I bypassed that entire system and went right to the General Manager. Hey, I said. Noticed that we don’t recycle cans. We really should.

In my naivety, I assumed that this was a simple fix, and that no-one had thought of it before. I thought we could get in some recycle cans, and that would be the end of it.

Foolish me.

As it turns out, we didn’t recycle cans at the agency because the building doesn’t recycle aluminum. They do recycle white paper and cardboard, which is dutifully hauled out by the cleaning staff every night. But there was no provision for aluminum. Which struck me as silly, but there you go.

The GM’s suggestion was that I gather a group of like-minded people with curb-side recycling at home, and we all take turns taking the cans home at night. Which seemed rather unworkable, to me. I mean, I didn’t want to take a leaky bag full of soda cans home in the trunk of my car, and I suspected that neither would anyone else. So I told the GM I’d think about it, and get back to her.

First thing I did was call the city. They confirmed that even though Akron has curb-side pick-up, they wouldn’t pick up from commercial buildings. Then I called a couple recycling places; they wouldn’t pick up unless it was a large amount of aluminum, as in a ton or more. So that was out.

Finally I asked around if anyone in the agency was involved with scouting. This is where I hit the jackpot. The husband of one of our production people was the fundraising chair for their kid’s troop.

I made him a deal: have the scouts come pick up our cans every week or so, take them to a metals recycling place (one of which is conveniently located three miles away from the office) and they could keep all the money. Perfect.

Management was very supportive of recycling; they ordered special recycling cans to put in the kitchens, created space in the warehouse to store them, and allowed me to work with a designer to create some signs and flyers, etc. At which point I thought my work was done. It bugged me to see aluminum cans in the trash, and now people had somewhere else to put them. Mission accomplished!

Then, it was decided that we should recycle other things, too. We contracted with a waste hauling company to pick up our used magazines (you wouldn’t believe the sheer amount of magazines a typical ad agency goes through). And this same company would pick up newsprint and plastic, too (but not aluminum).

So then we had to order more recycling cans, and the cans turned into recycling stations and suddenly it takes me the better part of an hour to collect all the crap from three separate stations and co-ordinate with the waste company to schedule pick-ups. And it was decided that I needed a committee to deal with recycling; so now I chair a committee of 12 people (only about five of which ever do anything). But still, everything was working very smoothly.

Until two weeks ago.

That’s when the scouting fundraising chair guy came to me and said that since his kids had dropped out of scouts a year ago, and he was becoming too busy at work, he wasn’t going to be able to pick up the cans any longer. And, he continued, no-one else in the troop was willing to pick up the slack.

So now there are 20 bags of cans in the back, and I don’t know what to do with them. Well, that’s a lie, of course… a couple of the guys on the committee have pick-ups, so we’ll have to load up the cans and drive them over to the recycling place ourselves. Which defeats the entire purpose of getting an organization like the scouts involved: I didn’t want to actually do any of the work.

I have people on the committee looking into other solutions… but it’s starting to look like it’s going to be a pain in MY ass, and not someone else’s.

All this because I bugged me that people put cans in the trash.

###

#229 In which our hero considers his choice of footwear and what affect it may have upon his career, part II.

Couple of agencies ago, my Creative Director was a real jackass. To be fair, he was a good Art Director, but a suck-ass CD. Just a terrible manager. When I first spoke with him, he told that he hadn’t yet fired the guy I would be replacing. He wanted to make sure he had a new writer lined up (me) before he let the guy go. Which seemed a little underhanded to me, but it’s the way of the world, I guess. We met at a coffee shop for our first interview. Later, he brought me into the agency after hours, when everyone else was gone. He made me an offer, I accepted. Since I had been unemployed in advertising for more than a year, I was anxious for my first day to come.

Now, since I never saw anyone else at the agency, nor did my new boss mention anything about a dress code, I assumed I could wear my usual attire: jeans, t-shirt and sneakers. But when I arrived for my first day, he nearly crapped his pants when he saw me. “I’d hate for you to make a bad impression on your first day,” he explained. “Could you maybe go home and wear something more business casual?” Being my first day, what am I going to say?

So I go home and change. Which is completely ridiculous, of course. This guy should have grown some balls and just said, oops, my bad. I should have told you about the dress code. Well, you’ll know what to wear tomorrow, huh? Instead I’m gone for an hour and a half, since this place wasn’t exactly close to my house.

Here’s the point to this story: when I got back, he pulled me aside and said this: “I’ll give you some advice. If you want to go anywhere in this agency, you should try to dress more like an account executive, and less like a creative.”

Again, being my first day, I nodded along. But inside I was thinking this: fuck THAT.

Now, I know I’m spoiled in this regard, but I’ve been lucky enough to work in an industry full of misfits and eccentrics. Generally speaking, no-one would bat an eye if you were to wear shorts and flip-flops year-round. Most agencies put a premium on creativity, and embrace the concept that you need to feel comfortable to be at your best, creatively speaking. Dress codes are generally only enforced when you’re meeting a client (and even then I tend to wear jeans, albeit nice jeans).

However, I have worked in agencies (two of them, to be exact) that have a dress code. Other than the above-mentioned business casual, I worked at an in-house shop where I had to wear a tie every day. That sucked.

I don’t know if being allowed to wear jeans and sneakers really makes me more creative, but I certainly resent it when told I can’t. I’ve been fiercely anti-dress code all my life. In fact, when I first moved up here to work at a (dress code-free) agency, I put all my ties in a box labeled “NEVER TO BE WORN AGAIN.” Which proved not to be true, but anyway.

So, maybe you can understand why I feel like a sell-out being that I haven’t worn my sneakers to work in a week.

Like I wrote yesterday, I’ve been giving my career a hard think. I’d like to stay at this agency (and make more money), progress my career (and make more money) and maybe even create a little job security for myself (and make more money). And while opportunities may be few and far in-between, they still exist. So when management is talking in their star chamber about how they want to create a new position in the creative department, I want my name to be the first that comes to mind.

So, I’ve been trying to act the part. I mean, this is part of my job, and it comes naturally to me to be vocal in brainstorm meeting, and present to the client well and to write good copy (the part that doesn’t necessarily come naturally is to be patient and kind with dull-witted account executives. But I’ve been working on that. Honestly, the AEs from my first agency up here wouldn’t know me now).

That said, I don’t think it’s a bad thing to try to look the part, too.

Not that I’m going to stop wearing jeans. I’m comfortable in jeans, so I don’t see them going away anytime soon. But I have been wearing dress shoes. But, “dress shoes” is maybe not the right term… these are Doc Martens, so they’re still cool. Right? I’m cool, right?


Yeah? No? Hello?

Anyway, what all this boils down to is that I’m trying to be more professional in all aspects of my job.

Professional.

In the not-so-far past, I might have equated being “professional” with being a jackass. Mostly because the word “professional” is often used by non-creatives as a codeword for wearing a tie, not rocking the boat and kissing the client’s ass. All of which I’ve done before, and will certainly do again--but I don’t make a habit out of it.

But I’ve started to become more thoughtful about my job… and, I dunno, maybe I’m not selling out as much as facing reality. Advertising is all about appearances, and the people who work in the field certainly aren’t exempt from that. Not only that, but dressing more professionally (ugh, I hate even typing that) puts my head in a different place. I’m not just going to an office and screwing around for eight hours, I’m working on my career. And if I do that every day, every month, every year, someone is bound to notice. And that, one hopes, will pay off in the end.

Because when management starts casting around for the next manager or whatever, I don’t want there to be any discussion about how I don’t fit the part, or how they’re unsure if I could successfully tackle a new role; I want them to say, “Craig’s the perfect candidate for this position. Hell, he’s already doing it in everything but title.”

And then they back up the dumptruck full of cash.

###

#228 In which our hero considers his choice of footwear and what affect it may have upon his career, part I.

I’ve been thinking a lot about my career lately. And my shoes. In truth, I’ve probably spent more time thinking about shoes than work, but that is still career-related. Maybe. Or maybe not.

Let me back up.

For several years now I’ve been telling people that I have “nearly 10 years experience” as a copywriter. This is, for the most part, a big fat lie. Once I hit the five year mark, give or take, I felt like I could make the 10-year claim. This is stretching the truth to nearly breaking, but if you consider the time I spent thinking about advertising in school, and my feeble attempts to free-lance early on and, um, watching TV commercials during the Super Bowl, it was close. Well, it wasn’t really, but no-one ever called me on it, and besides, this is advertising we’re talking about. Whenever someone starts asking if an ad is “true” or “factual,” my response is that I'm a marketer, not a journalist. Meaning that my requirement to hew strictly to the truth is someone more… relaxed… than in other communication fields.

But I can honestly make the 10-year claim now. More to the point, I can say that I’ve been a copywriting at honest-to-God advertising agencies for eight years (or, “nearly 10!”). This is an important distinction in my industry. Agency writers are generally legit, at least compared to freelancers or people running their own “agency” out of their bedroom who maybe aren’t really writing every day for a variety of clients, like I am.

And I’m currently at an agency that I really like, and I really feel like I fit in. I could see a future here (now that I’ve written that down, I’m sure I’ll be fired tomorrow). But what kind of future? Career progression at an advertising agency isn’t always cut and dry. I’m a Senior Copywriter, which has everything to do with my past experience, and nothing to do with my time at my current agency. The next step up the ladder is “Associate Creative Director,” of which we have two, currently. This title falls somewhere between copywriter/art director (which are parity positions, except that one writes and the other designs--don’t be confused by the “director” in there) and Creative Director, who’s top of the heap in creative. Usually. We have two creative directors, both of whom have been here forever. If one of them where to suddenly quit, they’d be replaced by one of the many people here with more experience at the agency than me, if the agency didn’t bring in someone entirely new from outside the agency. So my chances of ever seeing Creative Director at this agency are pretty slim.

But Associate Creative Director? Maybe. It seems like this title is given to people who are the lead writing/art person on one of the big accounts and/or someone who’s been here a long, long time. I don’t know if that would ever happen to me, either. At the very least, it would be politically unwise, since there are lots of people with years and years more experience at this agency than myself.

Sometimes it feels like I don’t have much in the way of upward mobility. Except, maybe I do. Every now and again the agency just invents a new position. With the last major restructuring of the creative department the title of “Concept Development Director” was unveiled. This is a wholly new title, and one I’ve never seen at any other place I’ve worked at. So, if the agency really wanted to do something for me, they could create a new position. For me. But they probably won’t.

Of course, this is all really about money.

The one thing I’ve learned is that you don’t get big bumps in pay by staying in the same position. You have to jump to a new position or, much more commonly, jump to a new agency. That’s really the only way to command a BIG pay increase.

And this is what has prompted my recent introspection. I like working here--a lot, and it’s been a long time since I’ve been able to say that--but the only practical way to start making more money is to leave.

But what’s this have to do with shoes? More than you might think. More tomorrow.

###

HARD CARD

It’s come to this… I’m only on day six of NoBloPoMo and I’ve already dipped into the “blog fodder” document I set up a couple weeks ago. Every so often, when something interesting hit me, instead of actually posting about it at the time, I wrote it down to be used in November. Of course, what I couldn’t capture on paper was the motivation to write about it. That, sadly, is fleeting.

So, one of the things (the first thing, actually) in the blog fodder folder was this:

Work thank you card

You know what I’m talking about… those thank you cards that are pinned up to the bulletin board in the break room. They’re usually of the thank you for your kindness regarding the passing of my grandmother sort of things.

I don’t get ‘em.

I mean if, God forbid, you lose a loved one, and someone at work gets you flowers, shouldn’t you thank that person? In person? I guess these cards are used more if you get a card from the entire department or agency… but still. It just strikes me as odd that you’d buy a card, write out a nice thank you message in it, then anonymously pin it up on a corkboard. Seems a little impersonal for such a personal thing.

And when I read those things, I’m generally at a loss. Unless they say specifically what happened, I read them and think, “oh crap… what’s going on with Mary? Who died?” Then I’m tip-toeing around her because I don’t want to say something that would conjure up bad memories. And then I feel bad if I didn’t chip in for flowers or whatever. I mean, I don’t deserve your thanks, since I didn’t do anything to help you through the difficult passing of your gerbil or whatnot.

Maybe it’s a female thing and I don’t get it. Or maybe I’m just a prick.

###

#226 In which our hero discusses a costume contest and his co-workers and the affects giant boobs have upon both.

I didn’t win.

I put some real effort into my Halloween costume, the least of which was shaving my head. I mean, that was easy. And free.

So I arrived to work that morning, and I was nervous that people won’t appreciate my costume and would just point and laugh. But, the reaction I got is pretty much what I was shooting for: unease. People looked at me askance, mostly because they didn’t know who I was. I don’t think a single person recognized me in costume, and probably wouldn’t have if I hadn’t sat down in my office. One account coordinator in particular was really freaked out, and as I walked by I heard her whisper, “Who is that?” Later she told her co-workers that she thought I didn’t really worked here, and that I was a trespasser. Which amused me to no end, of course.

But once people started to figure out who I was, the were very complementary to my costuming efforts. Most comments revolved around, “Holy shit, you really shaved your head?!” People took pictures. A couple co-workers said “You’re going to win. No doubt about it.”

Now, I have some insight into costume contests. I once attended the Drexel 24-hour Sci-Fi Movie Marathon in Columbus. This was back when it actually was at the Drexel Theater, when there was still a Drexel Theater. That was actually Drexel Theater North, if memory serves. It closed down and was turned into a CVS while I was still living there. Probably the origins of my hatred of CVS. Anyway, it was just what it sounds like: 24 hours of sci-fi movies ranging from great to really, really bad. In-between the movies they ran shorts, cartoons and other odds and ends. One of the shorts they did was a 1950s-era atomic bomb readiness propaganda film (I thought it was the famous Duck and Cover, but after seeing it again, I realize it was not.) In this film there’s a portly man in the shower who either slips or is knocked down by the atomic blast. Some things, like people falling down, are always funny; so it generated a big laugh with the audience.

They also had a costume contest at the marathon. The girl I was dating at the time put a lot of time and effort into her costume, a replica of a Star Trek:TNG’s uniform (commander’s red, first season, for you hardcore geeks). She sewed it herself and bought little commander’s pips; it was a really great costume. She might even have drawn on a Bajorian nose ridge, but I don’t remember. So she went up on stage with the other hopefuls, and it was clear that her outfit was head and shoulders above anyone else in the theater. But who won the contest? A heavy-set guy who got up on stage, took off his shirt, then fell down like the guy from the atomic bomb short.

My girlfriend put in hours to sew a costume so it was perfect. A fat guy got up on a whim and fell down on stage. Who was more deserving?

So, going into the costume contest at work I knew that people are fickle, and it may not matter in the least how cool my costume was. In fact, that morning I told a group of co-workers that I would probably not win, and that it would go to some guy in a dress. Because what’s funnier than a man dressed up as a lady? Ho-ho-ho!

But, as the day wore on, I made the mistake of letting myself get excited about the contest. Everyone I talked to said they were going to vote for me. The Scientist and I could use those tickets to travel to California to visit her family or, well, we could go anywhere. We haven’t flown anywhere for a real vacation since we were married. How cool would that be?

The contest was popular vote. All the participants (and there were a lot of us, probably 20 or so) paraded in front of the assembled agency, each of whom could cast one vote. After the votes were counted, they called up the top three vote-getters. Who ended up winning? A guy in a dress, of course. In fact, it was this guy:


Much as I would like to, I can’t be pissed at the guy who won. I mean, yeah, he basically bought a costume at Wal-Mart and put on some make-up, but it was the agency at large who voted for him. I can hear it now: Tee-hee! Did you see Joe? He’s a slim fellow, but today he looks like a fat lady! With giant boobs! In a see-though dress! That is a laugh-RIOT!

So yeah, I’m bitter as hell. I won’t even try to claim that it’s not sour grapes, because it totally is. I wanted to win. I thought my costume was better--and I still do. I think the majority of my co-workers are idiots for not voting for me. As a friend of mine said after seeing the winning costume, “that’s typical, lowest common denominator crap.”

The best part? The day after the contest I had several people come up to me and said, “Wow, you really did shave your head!” Apparently a bunch of people thought it was a bald wig. Personally, I’ve never seen a bald wig that didn’t look awful, but they apparently think I am some sort of Hollywood special effects master. “I bet more people would have voted for you if they knew you really shaved your head.”

That makes me feel great.

The final tally? I lost the contest by six votes. Maybe if I would have walked around and shouted Hey! I’m really bald over here! I would have won.

Or maybe, I never had a chance against giant fake boobs.

###

#224 In which our hero discusses a recent Halloween costume, and his attempts to not frighten children.

Every year my agency has a Halloween party. They award great prizes for best costume. Last year, the prize was two airline tickets to anywhere in the continental United States, a hotel room and $200 spending cash. This year the prize was more modest, just the airline tickets. But still, a prize worth winning.

Now, last year, they had two costume categories: most humorous, and most scary. There were probably 20 entries for the humorous category, but only four for the scary category. My costume last year wasn’t especially humorous, and it wasn’t scary at all, so I didn’t expect to win anything. And I didn’t. But it got me thinking.

If so few people try to be scary, that’s the category to enter! I could easily win free trip!

I kicked around a few different ideas, but when my wife again pestered me to shave my head, I decided to work that into the costume. So… something scary, something with a bald head… I decided on Nosferatu. Scary, creepy, bald and, most importantly, something I thought I could actually pull off.

I love playing dress-up. Now, I’m not some weird cosplay goon, but it’s a lot of fun to dress up as someone/something else for the evening. When a friend of mine announced a Steampunk-themed costume party, I immediately went to work building my own raygun. So for the Halloween party I started looking around on the Internet for ideas.

One thing I really wanted was to have red eyes. There is no shortage of websites selling “theatrical contact lenses.” Here’s one example. Scroll down to see the dozens of choices. I should mention that most real optometrist sites warn against buying colored contact lenses over the Internet. And they’re right… you don’t really know what you’re getting. I did a little research, found what appeared to be a legitimate brand name, and then hunted for a site selling that brand name for less. That’s one thing I did learn… you can get the exact same lenses for wildly different costs. I ended up with a pair for $90, which was pretty average, cost-wise. This was by far the most expensive part of my costume.

Then I went to one of those fly-by-night Halloween shops (Halloween USA, if it matters to you) to look for teeth, ears and makeup. I was really disappointed in their selection of ears… all I could find that was remotely close to what I wanted was a pair of fat rubber pointed ears. But I did find a nice pair of vampire teeth. And some black and white “cream makeup.” I opted against fake blood because… well, doesn’t every Halloween vampire have a little dribble of fake blood in its mouth? And I didn't want to be like everyone else.

Everything else for my costume I already had. I figured I'd wear my black suit pants, black dress shoes, black shirt and a black vest I bought years ago (I was big into vests for awhile). I looked up how to tie a cravat, and made one out of some scrap fabric (black, 'natch) we had in the basement. A tie tack to hold it down and I was set.

But, as the day of the party drew closer, I still wasn’t happy with the fake ears. I figured I'd just not wear them. If you do a Google Images search for Nosferatu, you’ll notice that the ears are a pretty major element of the costume. I was dissappointed, but I thought I could just be a generic vampire.

I didn’t like the teeth I got, either. They were individual fangs that attached with putty. They worked okay, but the plastic was kinda yellow, and didn’t match the color of my real teeth at all.

So, a week before Halloween I went to another Halloween USA to see what they had. And what they had was a kick-ass pair of ears that were really close to my natural skin tone. They also had a nice set of werewolf dentures, which I thought would work pretty well.

My original plan was to slather that white makeup all over my bald head; something I really wasn’t looking forward to. But, when I saw the color of the new ears, I started thinking that maybe I could still get a decent look without the makeup. After I got home and put them on, I abandoned the idea of using makeup altogether (except to darken my eyes).

I should mention that throughout the entire process I was attempting to acclimate my children to how I was going to look. I wanted to avoid them being afraid of me in my costume, because I was going to look very different. They’ve never seen me clean-shaven (hell, my wife has never seen me clean-shaven) and I’ve never shaved my head before. So, as I got each element of my costume, I showed it to my kids. When the contact lenses came, I put them in and said, “Hey! Look at daddy’s creepy eyes! What color are my eyes? Red! That’s right!” After I got the teeth I chased them around the house; “I’m going to bite you with my monster teeth!” And so on. And the day before the party, I came home and we had a big head-shaving party. “Come on! We’re going to shave daddy’s head! Won’t that be fun?”

The morning when I put it all together, the girls weren’t phased in the least. They laughed at my bald head (again) and didn’t even register the weird ears or teeth.

So, after all that fuss, was the final result worth it? I’ll let you judge.




I think it looked awesome. But scary enough to win the big prize? Find out tomorrow.

###

BUSY HIZZY

Seems like I’ll have days and weeks where I don’t have much to post… then I’ll suddenly get creamed with a bunch of blog-worthy stuff. That’s what’s been happening lately; starting two weekends ago stuff started to happen--not all of it good--and I thought I needed to get to it and post something to my loyal fans (and or the people who accidentally came here looking for naked pictures of the Satterfield Triplets naked--here’s a hint, guys… use Google images with the keywords “Satterfield Triplets.” It took me all of two minutes to find some photos of them naked. PS: Eh, I’m not impressed).

Also, I’ve been busy at work, my preferred place to write blog entries. In fact, since I stopped to write this entry, six things have come into my in-box. I need to read these new briefs over, then get to the other stuff that I left hanging from last week--including stuff for a big new business pitch happening tomorrow.

So, I have stuff to write about, honest. Hang in there. Until then, here’s the most recent keyword searches that brought people to my site, annotated.

satterfield triplets picture
No surprises here.

satterfield triplets
Again, I wasn’t that impressed.

steampunk costume ideas
Oh yeah! That Steampunk costume party was last Saturday. It was a lot of fun. Something else to write about…

need to know about hurpis
Need to know about a dictionary.

meshuggna
oy gevalt!

super head
Huh?

does pfaltzgraff scratch easily
In my experience, no. We’ve been really happy with ours.

shark shit
Again, huh?

horse-widower
Hope they found this.

satterfield triplets nude
Honestly, guys, they aren’t that sexy.

vicki Satterfield
Wait, they have individual names?

He groped mother’s boobs
Good Lord… I don’t even know what to say about this. What entry did this even turn up when they searched? Ugh!

###

#220 In which our hero is part of a well-received presentation, the accolades of which swell his head considerably.

I had a rather unique experience last week.

At the advertising agency for which I work, we have monthly agency meetings. These are generally an opportunity for the President to stand up and say inspirational things to us, detail what new business we’re pitching, introduce new employees, celebrate anniversaries and the like. We often have a case study, too; something cool or interesting that the agency did for a client recently that bares sharing.

I was tapped to present a case study at last week’s meeting.

This isn’t a big deal for me, I’ve spoken in front of crowds before. And even though I still get a little nervous beforehand, I’m a pretty decent public speaker. Besides, it wouldn’t just be me, it would be the entire team who worked on the project. My part would only cover the actual creative stuff, and I’d present that along with the art director I worked with.

Now, in the past, I’ve been very careful about talking about clients and client work on this blog, because I don’t want it to come back and bite me in the ass. But it’s going to be hard for this story to make any sense unless I reveal some details. So… promise not to tell anyone else, okay?

The client in question is a major manufacturer of rubber products. Headquartered in Akron, OH. (Figure it out yet? Famous for its tires? Rhymes with “hood deer”?) Anyway, we don’t actually work for their major division (ie., tires), we do work for one of their affiliated smaller companies. This one in particular produces consumer and industrial belts and hoses (as in hoses for your car or for steam cleaning machines, stuff like that. Not just garden hoses, even though they do make those, too). The project was to stage a big event at a major industry trade show for hose.

What’s that? A trade show just for hoses? You bet your ass. I had no idea before working on this account just how big a business industrial hose really is. And there’s plenty of distributors out there trafficking in hoses and accessories--so much so, that there’s a trade organization that only deals in hoses and they have this big conference every year and on and on…

So this trade show is a big deal. And while there’s the typical big convention center room with booths displaying new products, the real draw is the after-hours parties. This is where our client (and the other manufacturers) rent out a room in the convention center and throw a big ‘ole party. Of course it’s a big smooze-fest so the client can wine and dine their customers without having to take them out one at a time.

The client puts a lot of stock into this event, so we need to blow it out, make it impressive. So every year there’s a theme, and the entire party/event revolves around the theme.

The theme we choose for this year’s event was “magic.” We paid this off by transforming the suite into an old-tyme magic hall circa 1900. Think Harry Houdini or the movie “The Prestige.”

We got to work creating a bunch of elements to create this mysterious feel. We sent out a pre-event “save the date” mailer which included instructions on how to do a simple card trick; we sent out another mailer right before the show reminding the client’s customers of the big party; we created in-room gifts for the attendees which included a magic wand, a customized Magic 8-Ball, “tickets” to a performance by the magician (“One night and one night only!”), a “magic” pen, and a few other odds and ends, all collected inside a black top hat. Pretty cool.

But once you got into the room itself is when you got to see the really cool stuff. One of our major tasks is to set up exciting and engaging displays of the actual products. This is no small feat, considering that the products are hoses. I’m sure they work really well… but they’re not that interesting to look at. So, what we did was create displays that were meant to look like magician’s props or tricks. We had a water-filled display that looked his Houdini’s famous Chinese Water Torture Cell with a hose (a hydraulic hose, get it?) suspended in it; another display featured a hose that was spiraling out of a wicker basket so that it looks like a snake charmer’s trick; another high-temp hose was suspected above “fire,” and so on. Beside each display was a big poster in the style of the posters of the time, full of hyperbole and carnival barker-esque patter. These were a whole lot of fun to write.

Anyway, at the agency meeting we went through the process we used to come up with the concept, mentioned all the elements, and showed a bunch of photos of all the stuff. The presentation was well received… people laughed at all the right places.

But here’s the crazy part.

When we were showing the displays and their accompanying posters, I read the copy to one of the posters out loud (since it was in a PowerPoint slide you couldn’t really read past the headline from the audience). Now, the copy on the posters were a fun combination of attributes the client wanted to get across and the crazy claims I came up with. MARVEL as this hose withstands temperatures up to 350 degrees F and QUAKE IN FEAR at its working pressure of up to 450 psi… and so on.

So I read this poster in my best sideshow barker voice and when I’m done, the audience actually applauds. I actually have to stop talking because people are applauding so loudly that they can’t hear me.

Needless to say, this has never happened to me before. I mean, I’ve had people tell me, hey, that’s a cool ad or great job on that radio or whatever; but I’ve never had 200 people applaud my copy before. Crazy.

Anyway, the kudos just kept rolling in after the presentation. People said that it was the best presentation at an agency meeting EVER. It all totally went to my head.

But, that was last week, and the realities and deadlines of this week are already bringing me back to earth. There’s not a lot of room between “Hey, you’re the guy who gave that great presentation” to “Hey! You’re the dick that missed my deadline!”

But, for one brief shining moment, I was the star of the show.

Now, back to work.

###

#215 In which our hero discusses, in rather sappy terms, his first visit to the city that never sleeps.

To catch everyone up, here's what I've been doing the past seven days or so:

• I found out a week ago last Friday that I'd be going to New York to meet a client. So, hey, free trip to NYC, pretty cool.
• We left Wednesday AM, came back Thursday PM.
• Friday I had about 20 relatives up for a party at my house.
• Then Saturday my drill sergeant father-in-law helped us dig a ditch in the backyard and do some landscaping--all in hopes of elevating the flooding problem.
• Then on Sunday we all drove down to my hometown for a surprise birthday party for my Mom's 75th birthday.

So yeah, it's been a busy week. Especially for someone like me, who gets cranky if I don't get my afternoon nap on the weekends.

More details? Okay, in order:

New York City

I’ve never been to NYC. But, the trip was for business, and we were only going to be there for a day and a half, so I didn’t expect to see much of the city. And I wasn’t disappointed.

And here’s the hard part, Internet friends, what can I safely tell you about my trip? I mean, I don’t think any of my co-workers read my blog, but you can’t really be sure, can you? And I can’t afford to be fired, again.

So, some rather generic details:

The working part of the trip was really good… for me, at least. I’m new to this particular account, so it was great to hear the company’s big vision for the future, right from the horse’s mouth.

I noticed an odd phenomena, and I can only think it’s a woman thing: most of the agency team on this account have been working with their NY counterparts for more than a year… but they’ve never met them in person. So, during lunch, there was a solid 20 minutes of this conversation:

ACCOUNT EXEC #1: Y’know, I really thought you’d have blond hair!
CLIENT #1: Really? I thought you’d have dark hair!
AE1: But I don’t!
C1: I know!
AE1: But why’d you think I did?
C1: I’m not sure. Why did you think I had dark hair?
AE1: I don’t know!
C1: Well, I though Susan* would be taller!
AE1: Really?
C1: Oh yeah! I never got that she was the same height as me!
AE1: That’s so weird!

… and so on.

* Not a real name. Still don’t want to get fired.

I just can’t imagine having that conversation, as a man. I might think to myself, huh, she’s taller than I expected, but would leave it at that.

At the hotel, I stayed in the smallest room I’ve ever been in at a hotel. There was just enough room to walk around the bed. Not that I really cared. That is, until we met in the lobby for dinner that evening.

CO-WORKER#1: You’ve got to see my room.
ME: Oh, I know. Mine is tiny, too.
CW1: Oh no. My room has a separate sitting room, a huge walk-out balcony, a full-size bar, giant bathroom…
ME: What? How’d you get that room?
CW1: I just asked to upgrade to a king size bed, and they put me in the ambassador’s suite, no extra charge.

Pffft.

Dinner that evening was amazing. I’m a whore for a free lunch, but when you’re taking out the client you know it going to be more than pizza. And it was. We walked over to a Mediterranean place where six of the 12 entrées were lamb dishes. I’m generally not a huge fan of lamb, but it seemed to be the thing to eat. And it was delicious. And so was the lamb tartar we had for an appetizer. And the wine flowed like water.

The next day was less useful, in my opinion. I didn’t really learn anything new about the account. We could have left in the morning and I would have been perfectly happy.

So, my first trip to NYC was maybe a little underwhelming. I didn’t see much of the city at all. But still…

Maybe it’s all in my head, but I did feel like there was something different about the city. Certainly different from Cleveland… but it was more than the big buildings and the crowds of people. There was a feeling of motion, of activity that I don’t feel in my home city. It felt like an international city (which, of course, it is). No doubt the wonderfully diverse people I saw on the street helped give me that feeling. But there was more. A feeling of age, of history. That great (and terrible) things happened on these streets. The overwhelming hustle and bustle of NY was inspiring to this dumb corn-fed boy.

And at night… when the city slowed down, and the purposeful strides of businessmen in suites were replaced by the leisurely strolls of couples out for the evening… the city seemed more relaxed. Like I could put down my guard for a moment--even though I knew full well that that would be a stupid thing to do. As the merchants piled up the day’s trash on the curb and the honking of cabs was replaced by the laughter of lovers I felt like I was seeing the city from behind the scenes; it changed as it wound down for the night while simultaneously gearing up for the evening’s rivalry.

I long to go back and experience it again, as a tourist, and see all the touristy things. And to walk the streets in the early evening with my wife (with my wallet safely tucked into my front pants pocket to deter pickpockets, of course) and see a show, go out to diner, and just enjoy each other’s company.

Thanks for the brief introduction, New York. I hope we have time to get to know each other a little bit better next time.

NEXT: Family! Booze! Cake!

###

MONDAY FUNDAY

Monday morning.

I should be working (I have several job jackets on my desk giving me the hairy eyeball) but nothing is due immediately, and sometimes on Monday I have a hard time getting back into the groove. This is especially true this morning. I blame The Scientist.

See, Macey started to fuss at 5am, so The Scientist got up and brought her into bed with us. Which is fine, she settled down immediately and went back to sleep, as did I. But there was something about having one of our children in bed with us that made it feel like a lazy Sunday morning to me, and my wife finally poked me and said, “It’s six-thirty. Get up!” my brain was all, “What the fuck? You tellin’ me it isn’t Sunday? Shiiiit!”

So here’s a bunch of unorganized things of note that have happened lately:

We had a garage sale.

Actually, our entire street did. Or rather, the non-stick in the mud families did. This was organized by our garage sale veteran neighbor, who had the 4-1-1 on everything you needed for a successful garage sale in our town. Like, a permit.

I was a little horrified that our city requires you to pay five bucks to get a neon green piece of paper with your address on it to confirm that your garage sale is “legal.” Along with the permit came four sheets outlining what you can and cannot do at your garage sale, heavily weighted to the “can’t” side of the equation.

I humped a bunch of crap out of the basement and lined it up neatly in our driveway and let the invisible hand do its magic. And it was very successful! We got rid of all the big crap we no longer wanted (and only moderately wanted in the first place) and made a few bucks in the process.

It helped a great deal that everything was Priced! To! Move! The gigantic bulky end tables? $8 for the set! The dirty snow blower that desperately needs serviced? $10 (but I actually took $5)! The 1980s-era stereo with speakers? $5! The tiny black-and-white TV? Fifty cents!

The basement has never looked better.

We took a vacation.

A little one. We just ran up to the cabin (I’ve mentioned my family’s cabin before, right? Ah, yes I have) for Saturday and Sunday morning. We brought up some friends, and Mom met us up there and it was a good time. The girls are getting old enough to appreciate it, and I always enjoy my time up there. The Scientist’s severe allergies to mold and mildew make it… challenging… at times, but we’ve figured it out, for the most part. There was hiking and drinking and over-eating and poker and it was all-in-all a very fun weekend.

That is, until the trip back home.

We always dope up the girls with Dramamine, just to be safe, since the roads are a little twisty-turny. Well, we didn’t on the way home. About an hour into the trip, Macey let out a big burp that sounded more than a little on the wet side. The Scientist and I exchanged terrified glances and looked back. Macey was still just watching the portable DVD player, seemingly happy. Whew, we both thought. Glad she didn’t--

And that’s when the puke flood gates opened up.

The Scientist was driving, and I was still looking back at Macey when the dam burst. It’s always funny to watch little kids puke… unlike adults who look around in desperation for something to yak into, little kids just let it come. All down the front of her, all over her car seat.

We pulled off into the nearest gas station. She had started to cry, and The Scientist took her into the bathroom to comfort her and clean her up, leaving me to deal with the puke-splattered car seat. Which actually cleaned-up fairly easily. Lily took the opportunity to remind me several times that she didn’t get car sick, for which we were happier than she could ever know.

We dosed both kids, waited about a half hour, then got back on the road. Fortunately, there were no further incidents. But the car did smell like puke for the rest of the trip.

I parked cars and took a leap of faith.

Right across the street from our church is a catholic church. Every year in July this church has a little festival on their property with rides, games of chance, fried dough, that sort of thing--I’m guessing here, I’ve actually never been to it.

Anyway, this church pays our church some amount of money to allow fair-goers to park in our parking lot. And here’s the thing: there’s nothing tricky about the parking lot, you don’t need a pass-card to get in or anything like that. It’s asphalt, flat, marked by lines. So you might think that the church would say, “Fantastic! Give us that check, and have at!”

But it doesn’t go down like that. Rather, the parking is this amazingly over-orchestrated affair with signs, roadblocks, 2-way radios, flashlights, parking cones and a bunch of volunteers.

All of this is run by one little old lady at the church, whom we will call Sue. The parking lot deal is Sue’s baby. It’s her territory, and you are wise to tread softly when entering her territory.

I got a frantic call from Sue on Tuesday night. One of the guys scheduled to work the parking lot had been hit by a tram (apparently he was time-traveling in the 18th century) and had sprained his ankle. Could I fill in? Sure, I figured… I hadn’t been the best parishioner of late, so I figured I’d better jump on any opportunity to get good with God. My shift was the final one of Thursday night, 8-11pm. “I’ll mail you the instructions,” Sue informed me. I reminded her that I had actually volunteered for this parking lot duty before a couple years ago, and wasn’t sure if she needed to waste a stamp. She assured me she did, and that was that.

Two days later my instructions arrived (the morning of the duty--Sue must have been sweating bullets worrying that I’d get them in time) and, honestly, I never opened them. It wasn’t until after my shift that I opened the envelope to review the five pages of instructions. To say that these instructions were thorough is to bad-mouth the gods of thoroughness. Everything was covered… how to hang the signs, where to place the signs, where to block off certain parking spots, and with what, and for how long… and so on. When to close the lot. How to operate the radios--because you needed a “front lot” person and “back lot” person, and it was critical that they be in constant communication. I mean, what if you didn’t block off the lot when it was full and someone had to--I shutter to even imagine it--drive through and not find a spot and have to drive out again?

But in all fairness, I suppose all the rigmarole isn't completely superfluous. I mean, if there’s actually people from the church there, I suppose any troublemakers would be less likely to, I dunno, key cars or try to break in to the church or whatnot. But is this event of such a scale that it requires five pages to properly explain? I guess Sue wasn’t willing to leave anything to chance.

And just to reinforce this, Sue was there herself to review the policies with me again when I got there. In the course of discuss the night’s clean-up, she noticed that whoever had put the FREE PARKING sign over the usual Church Parking sign had neglected to first cover it with the protective plastic sheeting--which is clearly outlined in the SET UP section of the instructions. “Oh boy,” I thought. “Somebody fucked up. Sue isn’t going to like this.” Sue seemed to take it in stride, although the look on her face was clearly a long-suffering “Why do I even bother?” I suggested I could go put up the protective sheet now, but Sue told me that “it’s too late, now.”

Luckily there were no parking shenanigans on my watch, and I spent most of the time texting stupid things to my wife.

But one thing did happen at the end of the night that’s worth noting.

Around 11:45pm we started to tear down all the parking materials (because if they stayed up all night--well, that just would NOT do) and I had to remove some signs from the rear lot. As the lot is designed, it does downhill a bit before it exits to the street. And it winds around a corner. So it happened that I ended up on the top of an eight foot tall wall, in the dark, looking over the edge. I would have taken about a minute and half to walk around. Or! my brain suggested for some unknown reason, You could just jump down! I shined by flashlight (Please make sure flashlights are OFF!!! and return to the box labeled “Flashlights And Batteries” at the end of your shift”) on the ground, didn’t see any rocks or glass and jumped.

Now, I’m a 200lb. guy, and don’t make a habit of leaping off walls or, well, anything. I think my brain had the imgine of me lightly springing to the ground like a cat (or a ninja!), but the reality was somewhat different. I landed hard on my feet, which immediately slid out in front and deposited me rudely on my ass.

Of course, it was at that moment that my brain spoke up and said, “Jesus, dude, that was stupid.” Damn you, brain!

Anyway, my ankles hurt for the rest of the evening, but I didn’t manage to do any lasting damage. Which is nothing short of miraculous.

And on that note, I must now return to work before someone notices I'm blogging and not working and I again land hard on my ass.

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#213 In which our hero pines for an adventure, of sorts.

I’ve found myself being rather envious of other people lately.

And not in the typical ways, either (i.e., why am I not rich like [insert name of sports figure/rock star/actor/musician here]?) People around me have been having adventures, and I want in.

First, about a month ago, a co-worker suddenly announced that she was quitting her job and moving to South Korea to teach English. She had no teaching experience (or qualifications, as far as I can tell; however, she was rather articulate) and speaks no Korean. This drastic change in scenery appears to come out of the blue. However, one assumes that this had been planned for months, if not years. To make the entire experience tilt farther to the surreal side of things, she has stark white hair and is crazy tall (she may be as tall as I am, which is 6’2”) Anyway, I’ve been following her progress on her myspace page (which makes my skin crawl a little, but that’s where the updates are) and I was amused to read that she’s teaching children. I assumed she was teaching adults. She would tower over most adults in South Korea, I imagine; but she must seem absolutely Everest-esque to children.

But what an adventure, huh? To chuck it all and just dive into a foreign culture; one in which you don’t even speak the language! She’s in her early twenties, and apparently has nothing (besides friends and family, I guess) to keep her in the states--so why not? I’ve briefly traveled outside of the country, but never lived abroad. It must be fascinating, terrifying and exhilarating all at once.

Then, last week, another co-worker quit to realize her dream of opening her own portrait studio. She works in oils, and rented a gallery/work space in which she will, presumably, spend her days painting and showing her artwork. This co-worker is not so young, and had been saving for years to make this happen. While I’m no artist, I really admire her for leaving the certainty of a regular paycheck to do what she loves to do. It’s perhaps not as radical as flying to the opposite side of the globe, but leaving corporate America to live the Bohemian lifestyle has to be at least as frightening and exciting.

Finally, I find myself envious of my buddy’s two teenage boys. See, they’re in a band. I’ve never seen them play, so I can’t really say if they’re good or not… but it kinda doesn’t matter. They’re getting gigs, they’re out there rockin’ it! It’s got to be a thrill to be up on stage and have everyone looking at you, everyone boppin’ their heads along to your beat. I’ve never going to be a rock star (the fact that I don’t play an instrument is probably the first hurdle) and I’ll never know what it’s like to have people clapping and screaming along to music I wrote. It’s got to be such a rush.

So, yeah, these people are having adventures, both big and small, and I wish I could go along.

If only as a roadie.

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