3+2 Things: The +1

I haven't been blogging about my 3 quantitative and 2 qualitative goals for the year of being 32 very much, but I've been working on them behind the scenes. Remember the first qualitative goal?

+1. Be happier in my work
This is qualitative for now because I don't know what it's going to take for me to be happier. Just an attitude adjustment? Some internal changes at my current job? A different ad gig? A radical career shift? I've been pondering this for a while now, but I'm still "living my way into the answer."

Well, Rilke will be happy to know that I finally found the answer: As of Monday I'm starting a new job as a writer. I'm leaving ad agency life and software clients (and downtown SLC) behind and going to work in-house at a craft company. It's a big change, but I think it was time to shake things up--and I'm pretty excited about it. 

Friday Unrelated Information

1. Depressed Copywriter is pretty much perfect, especially if you know of or happen to be a depressed copywriter. Some examples: 

2. On a less cynical note, I hope all the moms out there have a Happy Mother's Day. If you need a card for your own badass mother, you can download a printable PDF of this one here. 

Just Once

Just once in my life, I'd like to be able to tell off a client and hold out for my idea the way Don Draper does in this clip that isn't allowing me to embed it. 

That is all.

Friday Unrelated Information

1. Here's a fiesty (and profane) piece about the benefits of working in advertising if you're creative. The writer makes some good points:
You can try to make it with your band or be a novelist in your free time. But during the day, you may as well learn about how to work creatively with other people, and how to accept rejection and outright failure, even if you still think that Verizon catalog copy you wrote was a masterpiece.

2. Being Easter weekend, it's time for my annual religious experience: listening to Bach's St Matthew Passion.

3. It's also this guy's first Easter (and nearly his first birthday)! I had to resist buying him the bunny ears costume I saw at Target.

Because obviously he doesn't need ANY clothes to be cute!

Friday Unrelated Information

1. Have you seen Animals Talking in All Caps yet? ALL CAPS MAKES THINGS FUNNY! (OK, no always, but this one makes me laugh so much. It's how I feel about IKEA, too.)

2. Recently, I noticed that Jack Daniels had changed its bottle shape and label a little. (Hey, I buy whiskey pretty frequently.) Here's a case study of the brand refresh by the agency that did it. Nice work--I especially love the new copy bits on the side panel (under "A Refined Identity).

3. And speaking of advertising, how about some Don Draper nihilism to kick off the weekend? You'll have to click through and wait through an ad (how meta!) but it's worth it to hear him say, "What you call love was invented by guys like me to sell nylons."

I Want To Write For The Ball Cookbook Company

Thanks to generous family and friends with fruit trees, I have both peaches and pears to can this week, which means I had to break out the canning cookbooks. Before this, I've skipped the chapter introductions in The Ball Blue Book Guide to Preserving, but now I know what I've been missing. From the chapter introduction to "High-Acid Foods":

As you gaze with pride on the colorful jars in your pantry packed with nature's best, the sense of accomplishment you feel is rivaled only by the sumptuous goodness you'll enjoy when you unseal them--for one delicious meal after another.

Or consider the lead to the "Soft Spreads" chapter:
Preserving is about more than food. When your home is filled with the fragrant aroma of sweet spreads simmering on the stove, you are preserving memories that last a lifetime.

Questionable use of "sumptuous" notwithstanding, well done, Ball Cookbook Writer. You are selling the hell out of the concept of home canning. Maybe I need to join your team, because I haven't been able to muster that sort of enthusiasm for technology, hotels, or insurance benefits in a long time.

Wouldn't That Make A Cheesy Mess?

Over the weekend I read the most head-scratching headline I've ever encountered:

In the words of Inigo Montoya, "You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means."

"Smite" of course has the Biblical/archaic usage of "defeat or conquer," but according to the dictionary it also means "to strike with a firm blow." But does that meaning make this headline make any more sense? NO.

I mean...how does this get approved and go into national circulation in the Sunday ads? I'd love to have heard the copywriter explain this.

It's OK To Be A Cat Guy

I think people should just own their crazy cat lady (or man) tendencies, but apparently there's still some barriers to overcome. That's why I like this series of ads for a California animal rescue telling us, "It's OK to be a cat guy." No, they're not subtle. But there are cats. And guys.

My Job Is Great, Except When It's Not

Writing for a living sounds difficult and mysterious, but the truth of the matter is, it's pretty easy for me. Except when it isn't. My agency job is usually great, but there are times when writing for clients is like the most dreaded and tedious school paper you've ever been assigned--if that school paper went on for weeks and you had to make sure the paper made your professor money and you had to act really excited about the whole process and your ability to pay your mortgage depended on the grade you got.

Which is why I was so happy to see this last week: a graph of the levels of fun involved in the writing process. Let me tell you, it's 100% accurate--especially that last step.


(click for bigger--from the Not Exactly Rocket Science blog, found via BoingBoing).

In Which I Gave A Presentation And It Was OK

In maybe the most "professional" moment of my career to date, I went to a college marketing class last night and talked to them about brands. I had a PowerPoint prepared--with animations! I had speakers notes! I brought in a 1995 J. Peterman catalog as a prop! I answered grad students' questions!

I was afraid it would be like this, but it actually went pretty well.


There are four kinds of business. Tourism. Food service. Railroads. And sales.

Cat-vertising!

This commercial from Purina New Zealand would have been a fun account to work on. Kitties! Yarn! Oh my!

Minus The Scotch (For Now)

Today is the first day that I'll be working from my new office (!). Just like Peggy Olson, I'm moving up as a copywriter. Unlike her, I don't have booze and paper cups in my desk drawer. Yet.

I Have No Words

It's not health food...do they think...whose idea...that URL...I mean...just NO.

(This came in the mail yesterday with the grocery ads. It was so inexplicable I had to take a picture of it.)

Did We All Have A Merry Christmas?

Remember, the week after Christmas is the time to go shop for yourself, as this vintage ad reminds us:
(Click for big. I don't really advocate buying or giving handguns.)

Serves Me Right To Complain About Private Jets

Remember my last business trip? Yeah, I'll wear all the booties you want if you don't make me fly to Orlando and back and arrive both places after midnight. Oh, the humanity.
But I'm home now. And business trips=salary. So I really shouldn't complain about this one, either.

Jury Duty Looms

So work is slow this week, but next week a site needs to be written and there's the potential for a trip to Florida for a new client, plus all of the other things the only writer at an agency handles. And that's all going to be a problem because I've been called for jury duty.

I'm hoping that the court will find enough jurors before my number comes up. And failing that, I'm hoping the deadline on that site is flexible. In theory, a break from the routine with lots of downtime for knitting sounds OK, but I'd be happier if I had some freelance lined up. I guess that's today's project.

Are You Watching Mad Men Yet?

We just got Season 2 and are trying to not watch it all too fast. I like Don Draper even less and the costumes even more in this season. 1962 was a good time for fashion--and not the best time to be a woman in an office.

Oversleeping + Busyness = Picture Post

(From Married to the Sea. Click if you need it bigger.)

What I Do At Work (Besides Ride On Private Jets)

A couple of sites I worked on the last two months are finally live:

• A Novell partner site (I did this freelance, actually; then got a job. All the Microsoft wasn't for nothing!)
• The Franklin Covey Mission Statement Builder

(I've done more than this, of course. Have I mentioned the work that required a trip on a private jet?)

Friday Unrelated Information

1. Things I have done at work this week (unrelated projects): Researched the difference between a multi-level marketing scheme and a pyramid scheme; used more exclamation points writing one web site than I have in my entire professional career; and learned about the growing mainstream market for total-body cleanses. My job is awesome!

2. Speaking of advertising, let's watch some Precious Roy Home Shopping Network (from the most brilliant show ever to appear on MTV, Sifl & Olly):


3. And to end the week on a more highbrow note, I came across an Elizabeth Bishop quote that, for me, defines the reason literature exists: "Since we do float on an unknown sea I think we should examine the other floating things that come our way carefully; who knows what might depend on it."