F*@k Fest

The English language is all fucked up, and I don't mean metaphorically. Sometimes it seems like the f-word is fast closing in on "the" as the most commonly used word in the American vernacular. (Can't speak for the Brits - they fuck but they also shag, which makes me suspect that British English is a bit less, uh, frisky).

It's been decades since the late George Carlin's seminal routine about the seven dirty words. We used to find them shocking – now we just don't give a fuck.The Entertainment Industry blithely uses obscenities to signify grit and relevance. Thanks to hip hop and rap, motherf*@king is now the high school adjective of choice, as in "That motherf*@ker has a motherf*@king third period pass." Just look at all the foul mouths among your friends and family. Now, multiply that by legions of families, nationwide.

In my case, the desensitization began when I started working in advertising. Other than high school and the military, I can't think of a more expletive-friendly environment than the average creative department. I learned this my first week on the job, when I had lunch with my new colleagues. The humor was definitely ribald - I remember the hard-boiled female producer was making smegma jokes over her pizza. Everybody swore – a lot – with fuck a frequent root word. I was shocked, but it didn't take long for me to shed my propriety. After a few months, I made sex jokes without blushing and used fuck reflexively. I still do – In fact, I joined a face book page entitled "Intelligent, classy, well-educated women who say fuck a lot." I say fuck a lot. And I am a woman. Two out of five ain't bad.

When used literally, the word retains its graphic shock appeal. To this day, I would never use it in the dictionary sense, as in "I think she's f*@king him". It would make me feel like an entitled Manhattan artiste from a third rate Woody Allen movie. I prefer to default to something genteel, like "sleeping with", or goofy, like "boink" or" schtup," or maybe tongue-in-cheek technical, like "exchanging bodily fluids". I'll jokingly say fuck you to all my dearest friends, but I'd never say it to anyone if I really meant it. Foul language makes for ineffective rage. You appear out of control. The swearing is a distraction and an invitation to dismiss you as a hysteric. Far better to contain yourself and keep it cold, direct, polite and lacerating.

Still, there's no getting around it. Used with finesse and a sense of timing, an f- bomb can be f-ing funny. But there's a fine line between funny and lazy, as in this recap of 2010 from the website Jezebel. You heard the expression "phone it in'? The writer fucked it in. She wrote a lame piece and used the f-word to try and liven it up, but bad meat, even if you drown it in hot sauce, is still bad meat. Another example of uninspired writing, this anti-prop 8 video has been making the rounds online. Now I H8 prop 8. I find it appalling that we could pass a law that actually takes people's rights away. Still, expressing a critical civil rights issue as an angry fuckathon is a tad reductive. I get that the spot is preaching to the converted, not trying to sway the opposition, but a foul-mouthed 6 year old makes a lousy poster child for gay parenting. If Annette Benning and Julianne Moore were that child's moms, they'd send him to his room without dessert.

So this is the part where I'm supposed to tell you about the empty water jug in my kitchen. The one folks throw a quarter in every time they swear, until the day when the whole family is 100% fuck-free – like the Shakers, only metaphorically. But there is no such coin receptacle in my kitchen. Why? Because I'd rather give up chocolate than profanity. No doubt chocolate is in better taste. But profanity's less fattening - and you can't beat the mouthfeel. I need fuck and its derivatives to express another f-word, frustration. I'm not just tired: I'm fucking exhausted. I'm not just angry: I'm fucking furious. And after three rounds of running around the house looking for my keys, it's only natural to wonder where the fuck they are.

Quickies

Get your etymology on!
Cole Porter, where art thou?
Shagadelic

The Many Faces of Julian Assange

While Interpol was casting its net to capture Julian Assange, my daughter and I have been casting the inevitable biopic. Her idea. She's a first year law student, I've been jamming on a multi-media ad campaign for a hospital in Palm Springs, and we both needed a break.

The leakage to date has been embarrassing and, in terms of American foreign policy's ability to get with the times, disheartening, but I confess that what I find most fascinating about this entire affair is the Wiki-Leaker-In-Chief. A rumpled and slightly sleazy international man of mystery whose motives remain debatable, despite his passionate claim that all he wants to do is get the truth out.

Is he a whistle blower fueled by righteous indignation? An anti-American trouble maker? A pioneer of 21st century journalism? An overgrown preschooler looking to see just how many of his classmate's block towers he can knock down before the teacher puts him in time out? A bonafide anarchist in the Emma Goldman mode? An egomaniac who never had enough attention as a child and has been overcompensating ever since? An internationalist looking to clear the air so we can bypass the bullshit and get cracking on our global problems? A sexual deviant who forced himself on two Swedish women? The victim of a CIA smear campaign to brand him as some kind of perv? (Re: the sexual deviant stuff, there is a lot of chatter on non-mainstream news sites about the actual "assault" being much ado about a broken condom, aka Quicky Leaks. I researched the broken condom thing and all the references I could find are alternative, which, depending on your perspective, makes them either more suspect or more believable).

Assange is obviously the role of a lifetime, with major Oscar potential given the right director. (Oliver Stone, this does not mean you). Anyway, without further ado and in no particular order, I give you our shortlist:



Kevin Spacey. He has the chops, and the round, doughy face. He's also 51 to Julian's 39, which I think makes him too old. Daughter disagrees.



Peter Sarsgaard. Good physical resemblance, proven acting talent, inde-film street cred, which means he may have too much taste to take the part if it's directed by, say, Ron Howard.



Christian Bale. Daughter thinks he's too good looking, despite his obvious nose job. (We have very different taste in men). I thought he was remarkable in The Machinist and believe his acting ability trumps the total lack of physical resemblance.



Edward Norton. Not an Assange lookalike, but bottle of bleach would help. Norton knows how to disappear into a role. Assange knows how to disappear, period. At least until now.



Cillian Murphy. Sorry, dear daughter. Too young, too creepy and too feminine. Not that he wasn't terrific in Red Eye.



Sam Rockwell. Can't say. My daughter likes him but I haven't seen enough of his work. Didn't go to The Green Mile because I am allergic to movies about magical black people who help clueless white protagonists find their authentic selves.



Leonardo DeCaprio. Yes, I know, he's too good looking, but it's amazing what you can do with a little nose putty. He's only three years younger than Assange and he's played morally ambiguous before – he rocked in Catch Me If You Can. I could see him getting the part if Spielberg directs.



Kevin McKidd. Blondeness, check. Pock marks, check. Hotness, check. Hotness is probably secondary here, but he made one smoldering centurion in the miniseries Rome, which, by the way, makes a great holiday gift for the amateur historian in your life.



Michael C. Hall. Creative suggestion on daughter's part, and if you look at Stephen in Six Feet Under vs. Dexter, you can see how Hall could pull off the duality of the Assange character.



Paul Bettany. This was actually my husband's idea. You may remember Mr. Jennifer Connelly from A Beautiful Mind. He is also a Beautiful Man in an aging British school boy kind of way. He was decent in the Darwin biopic Creation though the film itself was a bit dull.



Eric Bana. Boring as a romantic lead, but as an inter-galactic villain, he was the best thing about the otherwise totally lame Star Trek 11 (Yes, that's an eleven, not a roman numeral two - no wonder it was totally lame).

Well, that's the short list for you. Next step is finding a director. Is it better to go with a foreign candidate who won't take the whole affair too personally? Or would a foreigner have too much of an anti-American perspective? I'm ambivalent – pretty much how I feel about Assange in general. Our phantom production company is open to suggestions.

Copy Comments

I have a husband and two kids who never listen to me and a dog who won't come when I call. I can't tell any of them anything without being accused of lecturing. (The husband gets surly, the kids talk over me, the dog farts). So when I went on Linked In and saw that a budding copywriter was seeking writing advice, I couldn't resist the opportunity to pontificate. In fact, this post started as a wall comment, but I got so carried away, I figured I'd paste it in to the old blog.

Cadence:
As anyone who's ever experienced a frisson of delight reading Shakespeare knows, good writing is auditory. Even if your middle English is rusty, even putting aside all that timeless insight into the human condition, even sans access to the Cliff notes, the bard's words sound beautiful. Granted, a product website isn't exactly Hamlet, but cadence and rhythm still count. Lets say we were listing the ingredients for a minimalistic picnic. Should it be...
Wine, bread and cheese.
Bread, cheese and wine.
Cheese, wine and bread.
Wine, cheese and bread.
I won't list all the possible permutations, but you get the idea. There is no objectively right answer or wrong answer, unless you are a writer. Maybe you think cheese is an ugly word on which to end a sentence (unless you're on the Laughing Cow account and want to end on cheese for emphasis). Perhaps you prefer to end the sentence with wine, for its promise of intoxication and romance. You might want to start the list with bread because that's the most basic element of the meal. Not that you need to overthink it: a natural writer will just go on instinct and pick what sounds good – to her. If you can't hear the rhythm in your head, read it out loud. When you start to trip over your tongue, you need to do some more fine tuning.

Repetition
Try to avoid repeating the same word in one paragraph. Lets say you're writing copy for a hotel. You could just dash off something like this:

Our rooms are spacious and elegantly decorated. Each room has room for a roll-out cot, and every room has its own ocean view.

I'd say there's room for improvement. Take five minutes to craft that copy and see if you can make it sing without saying room four times. There are exceptions to this:
•The word you are using has no synonyms, or using one wouldn't feel conversational.
• You are using repetition for effect. Inspirational speeches may use a word or phrase as a mantra or rallying cry.
• You are writing SEO copy, otherwise known as "content", which means you will have to shove a key word or phrase into a small copy block three times.
•You are toiling on a heavily regulated pharma account (akin to donning a straight jacket and writing with a pencil in your teeth). If that is the case, the regulatory team will make you repeat not just the same word, but the exact same phrase, until you develop psychosomatic symptoms for the disease you are writing about. (By the way - it's now officially OK to end a sentence with a preposition.)

Back Off
Are you writing a brochure or a complex website? Take a step or two back, like when you're hanging art. Look at your paragraph order. (Paragraph. Now there's a perfect example of a word that's hard to avoid repeating. "Sentence collection" just doesn't cut it as a synonym). Make sure everything flows logically. Do your best not to start two back-to back paragraphs with the same word or phrase. Let's say you have two sequential paragraphs that start with the words "Collingsworth Finials." There's a school of thought that says great, you're beating the reader over the head with the client's name. I say do it more subtly. Why remind people that they're reading marketing copy? You can insert the client's name into the text just as many times and make it seem perfectly natural. Even starting two sequential paragraphs with the innocuous "We are" can make your copy look stilted and uninspired.

Kill all your darlings.
I love this. It's Faulkner's advice to writers, and if Spike Lee followed it, he'd be a much better film maker. Many of his films have entire scenes that feel like they belong in a different movie. They work on their own but not in context. To paraphrase the late Johnny Cochran, if it doesn't fit, you must edit. (No, that doesn't work. Why? The rhythm of the word "edit" is off. Instead, try "If it doesn't fit, you must omit.") Translation, if it's clever but it's not working tonally or contextually or even word count-wise, kill it. You can keep it in your bag of tricks for later. The point is to sell product, not demonstrate how clever you are.

De-clause your sentences
Try not to write sentences with more than two clauses. Three clause sentences are OK for a really high end target, say, people reading up on a hedge fund, but it's generally a good idea to pare down your sentence structure. Stay as conversational as you can. Remember that the public is, alas, getting dumber every day (OK, less educated). 8th grade reading level is about right on many accounts. You want your copy to sink in. Dish it out in digestible morsels. Avoid honking long paragraphs.

You talking to me?
Never forget who your audience is. If you are a 20-something writing for boomers, give us a little more content. We don't mind reading. If you are a boomer writing for 20 somethings, run your copy by your kid. 20 somethings are a jaded bunch. They think everything is "cheesy" - romance, sentiment, alliteration, word play of any sort. Fine tune your nose for cheese, even if it means smiting a darling or three. And don't be the dork who panders to a young audience with dated slang. If you're over forty, rest assured that slang will be passe by the time you first hear it. Of course, if you're sure of your colloquialisms, use 'em!

Write for actual people
Stop viewing focus groups as drudgery, or creativity killers. They are a goldmine. This is where you learn how to talk to people in their own language. I know it's entertaining to make fun of the people on the other side of the mirror, but you can learn a lot from them. Besides, if you pay attention, you'll eat less focus group junk food.

Ins and Outs
Watch your first and last sentences. You need to get people hooked immediately, and not leave them hanging at the end. A really good first sentence is like the cork in the champagne bottle. Get it out of the way and your copy starts to flow.

Seek reality checks
If you "get it" but two other smart people in the creative department don't, throttle that darling, bury it and continue to concept. Even Colbert comes out with a bad joke now and then - a self-indulgent gem that no one gets but him. Sooner or later you will come up with an idea that appeals only to your quirky sensibility. Give quiet thanks for your capacity for self-amusement and move on.

Strategy
Stay focused on the strategy. If you don't get one, go back and ask for one. If you still don't get one, come up with your own, based on the research. Yes, read the research. And do your own - go on line and visit chat groups, look at what the competition's doing, know the product/service in-depth. Make sure you check your brilliant concept against the strategy.

Jargon
Cranking out collateral or webwork for a jargon-happy industry can be painful. Finance, tech and education are just some of the categories that have their own lingo. Your natural impulse will be to simplify and humanize their language. For a first draft, it's the right thing to do. Maybe the client will say "Wow! This copy sounds like it was written by an actual human being. It's so clear, so friendly, so concise. Don't you dare change a thing." And maybe, to quote Wayne's World, monkeys will fly out of my butt. Here's what usually happens: you get slapped on the back for writing something simple and direct, and then, change by annoying change, the jargon seeps back in. It's easier to accept if you understand why:
• Using industry lingo helps position the client as an industry insider, especially in the B-to-B arena. You're simply more credible if you can talk the talk. Of course, if the end user is a consumer, simplifying language is usually a good call, and worth a little push back on your part.
• Political correctness may be an issue. In the non-profit world, for instance, there is no longer any such thing as a disadvantaged community. It's an underserved community. If your copy gets scrubbed for un-pc terminology, just smile and make the corrections.

When funny isn't
Most advertising people are funny. Most clients are humorless, at least when it comes to their brand. If you're going to use humor, make sure it is in the service of selling more product. Find a left-brained way to sell your idea. Your client isn't going to buy into something just because it's hysterical. And remember who you are talking to - don't go all Jimmy Fallon on a Leno crowd.

Spelling and grammar
Spelling matters. Grammar is relative. Hopefully, you get to work with a proofreader. Make those pesky little grammatical changes. When it comes to informal elements such as sentence fragments or sentences that start with "and" or "but", put your foot down and tell the proofreader to take a hike. Of course, your client may be the grammarian, in which case, you will be viewed as a hack until you comply. And if your target is affluent and/or over 65, they may be more inclined to follow the rules of proper English.

Punctuation
Ellipsis marks are cheesy. Unlike puns and wordplay, which were once common tools of the copywriting trade, they were already considered tacky twenty years ago. The only excuse for using the dreaded dot dot dot is when you have edited out part of a quote. Exclamation points are usually redundant and should be used extremely sparingly. Deploy commas, colons and semi colons as you see fit and hope you have a good proof reader.

Bite the bullets
Yes, they are ugly from a graphic standpoint. No, you do not want bullets in a print campaign you plan on putting in your portfolio. However, bullets are useful in crafting long copy. Anything that breaks copy down into scannable, easily digestible chunks enhances readability. Bullets, sidebars and callouts help make collateral more reader-friendly. Remember, nobody has an attention span any more.

Sublimate your ego.
Here's a painful truth: the best idea may not always be yours. Sometimes, the art director comes up with the headline. If you're worth your salt, sometimes you think of the visual. There will be occasions when the creative director, in his infinite dickishness, decides to reward you and your partner for your hard work on an account by opening up the TV job to the entire department. (The sad truth is, by the time TV comes along, the client may have beaten you into a creative rut, and your CD may know that.) You have to muscle through this, and you may not win - whether you have the best idea or not. Get used to the taste of bile.

Transcend style
Every brand should have its own voice. Not YOUR voice. The product, the target and the strategy all factor in to finding the appropriate tone for marketing communications. Your job is to find and maintain that tone.

Help me. I just can't get over myself.

My husband and I were watching Bill Maher. We're fans. We usually agree with him unless he's ranting about the evils of things like lamb chops or the polio vaccine. But when it comes to politics and world events, the guy is spot on, and he knows it. He positively radiates self-satisfaction. Which is why I made the comment that Bill Maher was quite possibly the smuggest man on the planet.


Hubby did not agree. In fact, he took it as a personal challenge to come up with somebody, er, smugger. He only had to wait long enough for Bill's next guest to come on stage.



Salman Rushdie. Fatwa target and erudite author of convoluted novels for academics. I tried to read The Moor's Last Sigh, but I got tired of looking up obscure historical references just so I could follow the plot. If I have to consult Wikipedia more than once per chapter, there better be a test at the end. (In all fairness, Rushdie's cat-that-ate-the-canary demeanor could be a relic from the days when he was married to Padma Lakshmi, a most gloat-worthy companion).



As someone who, to paraphrase Mick Jagger, can't get no self-satisfaction, I decided to take the smug challenge and see if I could come up with some folks who could beat, or at least meet, the level of smuggery set by Messrs. Maher and Rushdie.

The dictionary defines smug as follows:
Smug. [smuhg] - adjective. Contentedly confident of one's ability, superiority or correctness; complacent. Somehow, that made me think of political pundits. Being unabashedly partisan, I had to work from right to left.



I know, it's too easy, but surely Rush Limbaugh is the fattest, most fatuous fathead in the smug-opolis of professional punditry.



Now here's a righteous mug just begging for an "S" in front of it. Bill Kristol, one of the original architects of the Iraq war.



Smug with a bow on it. Sorry for the old picture, but George Will appears to have given up his trademark bowtie. Even without the eunuchoid neckwear, he still maintains a high level of proper preppy smug-itude.




It would take a lot more than a flag pin to burst Sarah Palin's smug bubble. She's earned it by proving that ignorance truly can be bliss. The kind of bliss that comes with millions of dollars, closets crammed with glad rags and adoring throngs of admirers. She has subverted the old American belief that if you work hard you can succeed. The new paradigm is read nothing, learn nothing, know nothing and keep telling us how much you love America. The woman actually makes George W Bush look smart.




Bla Bla O'Reilly. There's no denying Bill's smug factor.

I know what you're thinking: Where's Glenn Beck? Well, as of this writing, he's on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial. The unfair and unbalanced one did not make this list because he is insane and I don't think it's right to make fun of the mentally challenged. But, like Fox News, I like to maintain the illusion that I am fair and balanced, so, I must point out the undeniable smug-osity of...



Keith Olbermann. Unlike his right wing counterparts, the man does deal in facts. And he can write a good rant, though he apparently finds it impossible to edit himself. Keith's heart is in the right place, and his frequent indignation is genuine but Lordy Lordy, does that man like to hear himself talk. He's also not half as funny as he thinks he is - "The worst person in the WOOOOOOORLD," just might be the lamest bit on the, uh, planet.



Rachel Maddow, Queen of snark. I like that she's on, and I like that she's out, but her commentary tends toward the obvious. Like Keith Olbermann, she's way too enamored with her own humour. And her mother should have warned her that smirking is like crossing your eyes: if you do it often enough, your face freezes that way.

So much for politics, on to religion. Mother Theresa notwithstanding, faith and humility aren't necessarily a package deal.



Does it take a mega-ego to lead a mega-church? Just ask the purpose-driven Reverend Rick Warren. Whether God is pleased with him, only God knows, but Rev. Rick sure looks pleased with himself.


The hair. The arched eyebrow. The smirk. The Reverend Al Sharpton. The smug bug is colorblind. Just like ... Steven J. Colbert.



Really smug, or faux smug? I'm not sure even he knows anymore. And it's OK, because his fearless roast of George Bush at the 2006 White House Correspondent's dinner proved that he has the biggest cojones in comedy.


Yes, Alec Baldwin is smug, and he plays smug on TV. Plus, he can be really pompous about his politics. But damn, the man was hot back in the day. At least he doesn't wax his chest like some metrosexual little bitch.



Oprah Winfrey. So successful, so smart, so self-satisfied that rather than name her magazine after herself, she simply called it "O". Because when you're Oprah, you get to brand things like vowels. And in case anyone might think the O stood for Olive or Ophelia, Ms. Winfrey makes sure her face beams at us from the cover of every issue.



Donald Trump's ruddy skin tone may clash with the pink background, but his smugness remains undimmed. The famous hair construction that would look idiotic on your dad is an emblem of his smuguousness. Don's not balding and that's not a combover. Why? Because he says so and his reality trumps yours. Besides, after everyone's stopped chuckling at your lame hair joke, he'll still be filthy rich, and you'll still be struggling.


Get over yourself, Scarlett Johannson. You are not the first large breasted blonde to hit Hollywood, and you won't be the last. No matter how hard she acts, Scarlett always seems to be watching herself approvingly. And we always feel like we're watching her watching herself.



Why do I get the feeling Alice Waters grew her own Halloween costume? Why am I so sure that, when the party is over, she will make that necklace into a slow-cooked, Tuscan-style vegetable soup? Why would I bet money that tucked away in that berry crown, she's harboring a quail, to be impaled and roasted on a spit once its egg-laying days are over? Why is Alice so ditz-ily, deliciously smug?

Chevy Chase, a former Saturday Night Live comedian whose very mention dates me, said it best. He used to open his comedic news segments with the catch phrase, "I'm Chevy Chase and you're not." And that, my friends, is the essence of smug. If you don't believe me, just substitute a name – Sean Penn, Barbara Walters, Ann Colter, John Mayer, Nancy Grace – and see if it fits.

Think Ink

Meet your new creative team. I dare you to tell these guys they'll have to work without a brief.


I just participated in a linked in discussion about tattoos in the workplace. Everyone was weighing in about the significance of body art as a marker of creativity, which I frankly think is a load of crap. Can you be tattooed and incredibly creative? Absolutely. But I've also worked with my share of illustrated slackers. Creativity is not, and never will be, skin deep. So I amused myself by posting the following:


I used to be a hack. My headlines were corny, my copy was constipated and I hadn't had an original thought in years. Then, I realized what the problem was. No tattoos. Heck, I don't even have pierced ears. So I went down to my neighborhood tattoo parlor, stripped down to my skivvies and handed the guy my credit card. I started with a tramp stamp on my lower back. Being a minimalist at heart, I dispensed with the curlicues and simply had him etch the words "tramp" and "stamp" in Helvetica bold, right above my back dimples. Next, I wanted to do something celebrating my French and Jewish heritage, so we etched a mezuzah and an eiffel tower on my left bicep. Since I am also part Armenian, I honored that by having the artist do a stuffed grape leaf on my other bicep. (Sadly, it looks more like a dog dropping, as dolma, while delicious, don't translate well to epidermis.) Then, it occurred to me that in the winter, I might have to wear long sleeves to keep warm, thus concealing, or worse, stifling my creativity, so I made sure I inked my hands - we wrote CHOCOLATE in script on the left hand and NUTELLA on the right, in bubble graffiti to up my street cred. Finally, I opted for an argyle pattern on my calves that allows me to dispense with socks. The resulting ink-rease in my creativity has been nothing short of phenomenal.


I don't have to prove. That I am creative. I don't have to prove. That I am creative. - David Byrne

No words.

I'm sorry, I can't talk now. It's August. I have been working like a dog for the past three months, including weekends. I have been writing non stop about things like hip replacements, multiple sclerosis and gynecological surgery. I'm about to devote my entire weekend to a website for a PR firm. Am I grateful for the income? Very. Am I having interesting, potentially blog-worthy experiences? Nope. That would require leaving the house.

Now, my daughter is here visiting for a month before she starts law school. Or doesn't start law school. She is getting cold feet because she's having such a great time as a freelance writer and would rather become a journalist. I alternate between the you-will-never-make-a-living-in-that-dying-industry speech and the follow-your-heart-and-do-what-you-love speech. Truth is, I know she will have regrets no matter what she chooses. She is a glass half-empty kind of gal. That is not my daughter in the photo, by the way. I was looking for gag visuals to illustrate the concept of "no words." I picked that girl because she wasn't trussed and leather clad. Don't do a visual google on "gag" or you just might.

Anyway, since I have had no life recently, I have nothing to say. I need a break, and I need to spend some time with my kids and my husband. So I am officially going on hiatus for the rest of the Summer. See ya' in September.

Moe' Hotter

OK, Ga Ga. I get the whole post modern throw-all-the-visual-influences-up-in-the-air-and-see-where-they-land mashup thing. But since when is it considered hot to for a man to have hair like Moe from the Three Stooges?

Meet my other blog.

Like Snideties? Check out my other blog, Eucalyptus Way. Generally more personal and meditative.
http://eucalyptusway.blogspot.com/

My Semi-Jewish Identity

I am the wrong half Jewish. My Jewishness doesn't come from matriarchal, and therefore undeniable, lineage. The Russian/Polish Jewish genes are my father's. Not that he is in any way religious. My father is an avowed free thinker, all the while keeping encyclopedic tabs on all successful Jews, half-Jews and quarter-Jews. I think it alleviates some of his guilt over eating pig's feet and marrying a shiksa. I didn't go to a Seder until I was fifteen. It was at the home of my father's uncle Jack, who was married to my aunt Elinor, sister of Martin Landau. (Yes, the one from Crimes and Misdemeanors. No, I've never met him.) I was self-conscious because I had no idea what to expect and no understanding of the ritual's symbolic significance. I suspect my great aunt and uncle felt a little sorry for my sister and me for being such clueless goyettes.

While hardly the most kosher of Jews, I have been mistaken for a full fledged member of the tribe. I have blue eyes and olive skin, courtesy of my grandmother, Momma Paula. Thick curly hair, probably a legacy from my grandfather Poppa Irving though he was bald by the time I came along. A decidedly Jewish tinge to my humor, via my acerbic Aunt Bunny. And a thankfully more feminine version of my father's considerable nose. I think civilization would lose a portion of its depth, flavor and sophistication without Jews like Sigmund Freud, Lou Reed, Einstein, David Mamet, Barbra Streisand, Daniel Day-Lewis, Maurice Sendak, Dylan, Jon Stewart, JD Salinger, Elie Wiesel, Paul Newman, Sarah Silverman – I could go on and on. I love the work ethic, values and achievements of the Jewish culture. I am proud to be half Jewish, even if it's the wrong half.

All this to say that I take it personally when Bat Puchanan decides his big issue with the nomination of Elena Kagan is that there are enough Jews on the Supreme Court. Gee, on the one hand, conservatives decry affirmative action to help Blacks, and then they turn around and want a quota against Jews. I guess the idea is to support whatever will keep the most minorities down. Isn't "a level playing field" what the Republicans said they wanted? To try to evaluate someone's judicial decisions based on their presumed faith is dangerous and unreliable. I don't know if Kagan is a good or bad choice – I lack the expertise to judge. I just want her vetted on criteria more relevant than the fact that she was bat-mitzva'd.

As if that were not enough, Ann Coulter has been foaming at the mouth again, this time in an interview with Donny Deutsch. Deutsch asked her outright if it would be better if we were all Christians. It was a locked and loaded question and Coulter put her mouth around the rifle. She agreed that America would be a better place if we were all Christian and invited Donny to church. ( How can a grown man go by Donny? On the other hand, let's think about this. Donald is awful, associated with ducks and rich boors with combovers. Don, well, Don Draper is redeeming that one, but that's recent. Before Mad Men, Don was the suburban dork next door. So yeah, I get the Donny thing.) But back to Ann. Beef jerky blonde Coulter explained to the dumbstruck Donny that Jews needed to be perfected and become Christians. Donny was rightfully shocked.

I'm shocked too, and not just at the implication that Ann Coulter is somehow "perfect". Please tell me anti-semitism is not going through some retro-chic revival. I want to believe our society has evolved beyond the days of A Gentleman's Agreement. I know there are klansmen and skinheads and other creeps out there with leather-bound editions of The Protocols of the Elders of Zion, but I'd like to believe they are a lunatic fringe. I don't begrudge Ann Coulter her religion. But faith is faith, and it's personal. It can't trump the collective reality of a diverse society. Ann needs to balance her faith with the understanding that it's still a subjective belief system and not try to impose her perspective on everyone. Believers and doubters like me can coexist and even be great friends, but not if we strive to remake each other. You can pray to Jesus, Allah or Yahweh. You can chant, or meditate, or not pray at all. Ultimately, what matters is your menschitude.

Scrod.

So what is Scrod, exactly? Haddock? Whitefish? Pollock? Cod? All of the above? Some sources define it simply as "immature" fish - the veal of the sea. In Cape Cod, where my parents used to have a summer cottage, scrod is simply the catch of the day - white, breaded and hopefully, fresh. But to my sister and I, scrod was a state of being. This used to be our lame joke as kids, when we'd be lobbying for pizza and our parents would pick a seafood restaurant and make us eat fish. We'd groan, look at each other and mutter "We're scrod."

Lately, it's occurred to me that we could use more scrod in the vernacular. And not because it's more genteel than "screwed,". When Katrina hit, and New Orleans was left to sink or swim, you might say they were screwed by FEMA and "heckuva job" Brownie. (You could also find some weird reason to blame the Almighty but we have Pat Robertson for that.) 1,836 people died in the hurricane but the survivors kept on keeping on, making gumbo, playing music, and selling real estate to Brangelina. But what about now that the Big Easy is getting coated in petroleum goo? What about the barrier wetlands that were in the process of being rehabilitated and are once again ruined? The three species of endangered sea turtles that may no longer be endangered because they're probably all dead? The lines forming for ten dollar an hour jobs cleaning up beach tar for BP, aka Big Polluter, because the fishing, shrimp and oyster industries have been destroyed?

This time, there's no picking themselves up and pluckily persevering. New Orleans hasn't just been screwed. It's been gutted, scraped, battered and totally fried. New Orleans, and the entire Gulf Coast, is scrod.

Eye on the Tiger

I hate golf. The snail's pace, the early morning tee times, the business-shmooze aspect, the historically all-white-male club culture, the lumpy terrain and buzz-cut grass. I'm the freak who actually drove down 17 Mile Drive bitching about how the golf courses had ruined the landscape. If Jack Bauer were to torture me, I could probably name five golfers: Arnold Palmer, Lee Trevino, Nancy Lopez and Tiger Woods. Ooops, that's four. No, Jack, please, not the electrodes! But as much as golf to me is the television equivalent of Ambien, I admit I've been following the saga of Tiger's wood. It's been a welcome diversion from the Healthcare Bill. Besides, my husband is in control of the remote at all times, so it's not like I can avoid the Tiger tales.

So now, right during Augusta, Nike has put out an instantly infamous spot (No, I will not provide a link. If you are that out of it, you probably don't care). The video is a single shot of Tiger, looking sheepish. The audio is an old clip of his father lecturing him, seemingly from beyond the grave, and asking if "he learned anything."

Well, let's see. What could Tiger have learned?

Don't send incriminating text messages?
Never piss off a female Viking?
Keep it in your pants unless it's time to shower, pee, or have sex with your beautiful, blonde wife?

How about keep it in your pants long enough and you will start hallucinating that your dead father is talking to you? Tiger is almost 34 years old. A grown man with two children of his own who is way past getting lectured by Daddy, even if the old man is yelling at him from a cloud. The spot attempts to strike a "boys will be boys" chord and it works, if that's what you already believe. The wink-wink-nudge-nudge-way-to-go-stud crowd doesn't need to be convinced to keep backing Tiger. The how-dare-you-break-your-marriage-vows-and-publicly-humiliate-your-wife set isn't budging either. Nor is my subset, the people who can't stand phonies and hypocrites. The folks who didn't give a fig about Tiger's private life before, during or after the scandal still don't care. About the only people who could possibly change their opinion are those who believe Tiger is a "sex addict" who can be cured through therapy. And in fact, if he were to carry around a recording of his dead father's voice and play it every time his, uh, club wanted to swing, it would probably be a pretty effective "cure". Nice implants, Brandy, hold on while I switch on this tape of my Dad...

We had a long and spirited online discussion about this spot in one of my linked in writer's groups. People thought it was brilliant, stupid, creepy, clever, tacky, classy – it was a concerto of opinions. Some speculated that the spot was written by a 22 year old, an age bracket that can still wilt before a disapproving Dad. Others suggested that people who speculate about the copywriter's age are embittered old has-beens. One old school (as in strategic) copywriter posted the following questions:

what does that spot sell?
who's its target audience?
what's the expected take-away?
what benefit might it have for the brand?
why should people care?

I couldn't answer any of them.

I posted the spot on facebook, in a message addressed to my advertising friends. To my surprise, it's the non-advertising people who started commenting. The thread went on and on, and a lot of strangers chimed in. All the comments were about Woods' character, or lack thereof. Tiger was a slimeball. A great athlete with a right to a private life. A sick man in need of therapy. A vulnerable human being exposed to constant temptation. The spot was long-forgotten, it was all about Tiger.

And that's the thinking behind that Nike commercial: it keeps people talking about Tiger. Once Nike decided not to drop him, they couldn't pass up a buy like the Augusta telecast. To do a heroic great golfer spot would have been goofy – we all know what he's been up to the past few months. All that rehab, groveling, meeting with attorneys and cold showers three times daily. There was no ignoring the proverbial elephant in the room, not to mention his wayward trunk.

Nike has a stellar advertising history, but any spot featuring Tiger the athlete would inevitably be about Tiger the womanizer. So they made a brilliantly simple spot that could be instantly deconstructed and spoofed on You Tube, with the parodies spreading like H1N1, all across the social media universe. Within the first 24 hours, somebody had already done a version with new audio featuring Tiger's infamous voicemail to...whatever her name was (sorry, I left my Enquirer in the bathroom).

As an old school strategic type myself, I too tried to understand the messaging, the goal, the benefit to the brand. It's all beside the point. The spot is a clean slate - you can stick on a new voiceover, slap on some color supers, guaranteed to pop against that black and white film, add some porno chickaboom boom background music – the possibilities are endless. As will be the stream of parodies. And the one constant throughout will be the swoosh on Tiger's shirt.

Guidelines for Taglines

Well, I did it again – blathered online to a perfect stranger and ended up with a blog post.

A lady in Women in Consulting, a networking group I belong to, emailed the following question to the WIC community at large:
I am looking for guidelines or best practices in designing a "tag line" or phrase that describes a company at the highest level. If you have suggestions or sources for such guidelines, please send them along.

I wanted to help her, but more than that, I wanted to help the unfortunate copywriter who might have to toil under someone who believes there are rules to this sort of thing. So I wrote up this nifty guide to writing taglines:

While there are no specific rules to writing taglines, there is a process. The actual tag line writing just requires a talented writer with an agile mind. The important work is strategic, and that happens before you ever think of a tag line. You have to consider:

• The size and focus of your company. If you have a very focused, b-to-b type business with a limited array of products and services, you might want to have a really hard working, granular tag line that says exactly what you do. You're small. You're not going to have to fold a huge array of products under one tag. Your advertising budget is limited and your tagline needs to work extra hard. Lets say you make latex surgical gloves and that's it. So you end up with something like The hospital glove people or Your patients are in good hands. (Tell your inner critic to stuff it. Not writing actual tag lines here, just giving examples, OK?) But what if you are making the leap into other surgical accessories? Then, you might want a more general line about your surgical expertise. Nothing else can cut it. Perhaps your business plan is to expand into other latex products, in which case your strategy might be about all things latex. You are Experts in Latex. No, that sounds too much like Perverts in Leather– but you get the idea.

• What if your company is enormous? At that scale, your tagline has to be more of a topline statement. Perhaps it's a positive spin on what you do – Disneyland. The happiest place on earth. GE. We bring good things to life. Another way to go might be a call to action – Just do it. Obey your thirst. Or a promise. You're in good hands with Allstate. We try harder. Note how you can stick the NIKE and GE lines on just about anything those companies make and they'll work. The important thing is to have an umbrella line that evokes some kind of emotion and still manages to mean something. Just do it is motivational. It tells you to get off your butt, but it also believes you can succeed. Perfect for sports stuff. We bring good things to life is comforting, almost cozy. Note the use of "good" and "life" in one sentence. It subconsciously evokes the phrases "Life is good," or "the good life." Just right for appliances.

• Product benefits Are your latex gloves so sensitive surgeons feel like they're operating with their bare hands? The healing touch. Or Because nothing should come between you and your patients. (Again, just illustrating a point, not saying these are great. Great, I charge for). The benefit is one way to go, but another one is a pain point. Are your hospital gloves less likely to break? Strong hands for Surgery. On the other hand, don't try to shoehorn more than one or two benefits into a tag line. Strong, yet delicate is fine for your gloves - two benefits, but it kind of works because there is some tension in the fact that strong and delicate are opposites. Strong, delicate, and available in six yummy pastel shades, on the other hand, is no longer a tagline. It's a cut line for a catalog photo.

• Your competition. Do you have an indisputable advantage - are you better, stronger, smaller, more portable,easier to fix, less breakable, more cost effective etc.? (Make sure the advantage you choose to lead with isn't some small technical thing that is meaningless to the end-user. Nobody cares if your surgical gloves come with an extra finger). If you have an edge over your competition, use it. Is your advantage temporary because the other guy is coming out with the same thing next year? Then, you might want to proactively own that benefit, so that your competitor is a me-too by the time they roll out their product. If you choose this route, you need to be able to spend, spend, spend before your competitor's launch. Also, don't just look at your competition from a product standpoint - look at what they are doing creatively. Make sure your line doesn't take the same position as, or sound too similar to, theirs.

• Your target. Whether you're targeting consumers or other businesses, shell out for some focus groups. You just might be surprised at what you learn. What are the perceptions of your product? Your competition's product? What are the top pain points? It's conceivable you might hear your future tag line come out of someone's mouth! If possible, invite your writer to the focus group and pay her for her time. If she's any good, she's strategic, and she'll want to attend. If she's REALLY good, she won't even mind suggesting a tag line that emerged fully formed from the ramblings of a focus group participant.

• Your budget. The less money you have, the harder your line needs to work. Fluff is not for the faint-of-budget.

• Tone. Attitude can be great or completely wrong for the product, target or category. Nobody wants a catheter with attitude, but a snack food? Why not? Humor can be endearing or a huge mistake. Just remember, it has a short shelf life. Bragging about the fabulosity of your product or company is a no-no unless you bring it back to the consumer. GE's We bring good things to life may seem like bragging if you look at it just using your left brain, but switch on your right brain and you'll discover that line is actually about the end user. We all have a life, we can all use toasters or cell phones.