I love this little lady…

Okay, so where am I?

On the heels of the Clio win, I’m in front of my television after having watched a hockey game for the third time gleaning inspiration for a “homework assignment” I am working on as a tryout to contribute to a popular website. Who knows where it will lead? Who cares though? It’s great as an old dog to try new tricks.

All of this triggered my anxieties from my old days as a copywriter. Those endless nights in front of Selectric Typewriters with the hum urging my fingers into action, and, later, word processors with their fancy white cursors doing the same on the green background.

Being a copywriter is an amazing, yet disturbing occupation. I mean, you get paid to put words to paper. It’s one part brilliance and one part perseverance. It’s the art of sculpting fog as I’ve covered before.

The brilliance is that a copywriter has the ability to generate sales and positive branding for your clients while the perseverance comes from grinding through the feedback that rocks you to your core. The wrong set of “constructive criticism can trigger a full-scale identity crisis and make you wonder if you’re in the wrong profession.

The biggest influence I ever had in the copywriter world (and the Ad Man/Media Guy world) is that I never want the emotional wave that swallows you whole when you think you’re a fraud or incompetent. Yes kids, this how you feel when your client asks, “ Who the hell wrote this copy?” Every day, I think back to those instances and it energizes me to not only knock out my daily tasks, but think of those big ideas as well.

For me being a copywriter spurred an entire career. For me, that’s 32 years and counting. If this is the trade you desire, I celebrate your courage, innovation, and idiocy. Each day is a fresh scuffle against stalling, that blinking cursor, and those voices in your mind that scream you don’t really know what you’re doing. Best career ever.

So without further procrastination, here’s a quick tick list of the things you need to do in order be a successful ad agency copywriter.

Consume caffeine.

Not a coffee person? I wasn’t either. But, hey, this is what we do. Before you lift open your Mac Book, head to the coffeemaker and brew yourself a K-cup. If you want people to think you’re cool, drink it black—like your heart. If you want to truly appreciate the taste, splash some cream in it. It’s the perfect remedy for a late night or the more than occasional doldrums that plague the work day.

Keep a daily to do list.

Talk to your boss. Make a list. Shape your day. If you do, you’ll be put on projects and business you crave and desire.

Battle writer’s block.

Blink….blink…blink…

There she is again: that blinking cursor. You swear up and down you killed it yesterday, but she’s back, like that cat from Pet Sematary. Don’t be scared. Kill the bear, or rather, the blank doc. Down that morning coffee and bring your special set of skills and wage battle. The blinking cursor is going down once again.

Base camps.

No one every climbed Everest in a day and you can’t do it with your mountain of work. Build some momentum If I have an email that just needs a subject line, I’m moving that bad boy to the top of my list.

Be a firefighter.

Quench all fires as soon as possible. The urgent projects and needy clients you’re your attention first. Keep them happy and you will have the mental real estate to be as creative you want later in the day.

Inspirational views for a potential third Clio.

Focus on billable work.

Don’t daydream all day and try to knock out work in a tiny window leaving only a handful of billable hours for your agency to bill. For you newbies, billable work is merely the labor your clients authorize payments for. More work means more revenue for the agency. Fill up that time sheet and you will mostly likely see your own paycheck rise at annual review time.

Take your constitutionals.

I’ve spent my days chained to my desk throughout my agency days. Don’t do that yourself. Take a break—not a long one, but enough of one to stretch your legs. Go for a quick walk and grab a Starbuck. You’ll get back to your desk revitalized and prepared for the blinking cursor.

Know when to call it a day.

If you say to yourself, “nobody told me there would be days like this…” remember that I just did! Some days are tougher than others. They won’t all be like this. Some days you won’t have it.

Go home, find your happy spot. For goodness sakes, get some good sleep in. The blinking cursor will be ready for you tomorrow morning.

—

So there you have it…now it’s time to channel my inner wordsmith and deliver a winner on this old dog, new trick homework assignment.

Click to enlarge.

The post Before Coffee Your Brain Doesn’t Work So Well appeared first on Media Guy Struggles.

Before I get to that, allow me to go back to my Café Squatters story for just a minute and talk about
this woman on the left. The New York style work area table at Starbucks meant to house 8-10 people was relatively full as I try feverishly to finish this column after retouching hundreds of photos for my Golden Globes assignment. There was an empty spot, so I asked her if that seat was taken. Her reply was that she was using the seat and spot…for a foot rest. It takes all kinds these days.

So know you know that I am (or was) at the Beverly Hilton on the red carpet basking in the wacky opulence known as the Golden Globes. Most of you already know that La La Land won Best Motion Picture and Brad Pitt made a surprise n stage appearance on stage to the delight of the crowd. But, as you know, all of the real fun happens off camera, including Justin Timberlake making sure the drinks were flowing and Kurt Russell and Jeff Bridges exchanging phone numbers.

On the carpet, Justin Timberlake holds wife Jessica Biel’s hand while she chats with with Amy Adams’ husband, Darren Le Gallo. Designer Tom Ford hugs Timberlake who tells him: “The only reason I ever look nice is I learned to dress from you.” Meanwhile Timberland tries to make an exit inside. “Find us!” Biel tells Le Gallo as they depart

The Golden Ticket.

Laurence Fishburne tries to get past security and then notices he doesn’t have his ticket. He calls someone on his phone, in a mock (?) panic “I have no idea where my ticket is or is supposed to be.”

One half of Hollywood’s most beautiful couple, Blake Lively, cheers for the other half, Ryan Reynolds as he stands from the table to present the night’s first award. He accidentally knocks into her updo, but it doesn’t moved. She’s a goddess, that’s why.

Justin Timberlake pours a glass of vino for everyone at his table then offers the bottle to Felicity Jones. Meanwhile, as his wife and best actress nominee Annette Bening stands from the table, Warren Beatty kisses her cheek and says, “You look beautiful!” Seeing Denzel Washington’s wife and her pal, Pauletta, Bening goes over and gives her a hug and kiss.

Kerry Washington with a young fan.

In the press room, Billy Bob Thornton gestures toward the microphone manager and quips, “That’s quite a pole you got there!” That’s something coming from the polemaster. Thornton is super humble, looking cool and mellow wearing his shades inside. After taking home one of the fist-sized trophies, he thanked the Hollywood Foreign Press for choosing him over Better Call Saul’s Bob Odenkirk.

The feeling never gets old! After nabbing the award for her role in The People v. O.J. Simpson: American Crime Story, Sarah Paulson steps off stage and admits, “I’m shaking!” She takes a photo but is distracted when she hears more cheering. “Did the show just win?” she asks. Indeed, the hit earns a Best Limited Series and Paulson heads right back on stage.

Yours truly.

Oooooops? While posing for a picture off stage with Amy Schumer and Ryan Gosling, Goldie Hawn jokingly falls onto the hunky La La Land actor, “She fell into his nook and giggled!”

Back in the press room, Viola Davis says the night will wrap too late for her to squeeze in jacuzzi time. She report that she’ll celebrate her Fences best supporting actress win with hubby and a glass of Prosecco at home.

In the press room, Nocturnal Animals best supporting actor winner Aaron Taylor-Johnson is cut off as the audio feed switches over to Ryan Gosling’s acceptance speech. Taylor-Johnson stood there awkwardly holding his award then left, but no hard feelings: “Gosling amazing!” he says.

Someone accidentally steps on Anna Kendrick’s Vionnet dress, which prompts the actress to question her decision: “Why do I wear a dress with a train? Every year I ask myself this.” After she loses, Rachel Wood heads straight for the bar outside the ballroom. Bottoms up!

HBO Invite

There were some good zingers last night. Here’s some of the highlights:

“The film Florence Foster Jenkins is nominated. The character has been dubbed the world’s worst opera singer and even she turned down performing at Donald Trump’s inauguration.”
-Jimmy Fallon in his opening monologue

“Thank you, first of all, to the Hollywood Foreign Press Association for this amazing honour. I suppose it’s made more amazing by the fact that I’ll be able to say that I won this at the last ever Golden Globes. I don’t mean to be gloomy. It’s just that it has the words ‘Hollywood,’ ‘foreign,’ and ‘press’ in the title.”
-Hugh Laurie wins best supporting actor in a TV drama

“You make me proud to be an artist. You make me feel that what I have in me – my body, my face, my age – is enough.”
Viola Davis introduces Meryl Streep

“Hollywood is crawling with outsiders and foreigners, and if you kick us all out, you’ll have nothing to watch except for football and mixed martial arts, which are not arts.”
-Meryl Streep picks up the Cecil B DeMille lifetime achievement award

“This is for all the women, women of color, and colorful people, whose stories, ideas and thoughts are not always considered worthy and valid and important. But I want you to know that I see you. We see you.”
-Tracee Ellis Ross wins best comedy actress

“It’s not a problem. A dead bird never leaves its nest.”
-John Lithgow channels Winston Churchill when he realizes his zipper is undone

“While I was singing and dancing and playing piano and having one of the best experiences I ever had on a film, my lady was raising our daughter, pregnant with our second, and trying to help her brother fight his battle with cancer. If she hadn’t taken all that on so that I could have this experience, there would surely be someone else up here other than me today. So sweetheart, thank you.”
-Ryan Gosling thanks Eva Mendes in his best actor speech

“Take your broken heart, make it into art.”
-Meryl Streep quotes late friend Carrie Fisher

“I’ve been to the Globes six times, and I’ve worn a dress every time. And I love dresses. I’m not trying to protest dresses. But I wanted to make sure that young girls and women know that they aren’t a requirement. And you don’t have to wear one if you don’t want to. And to just be yourself because your worth is more than that. So, I said, this year I’m going homage to Marlene Dietrich and Victor/Victoria and David Bowie, because it’s his birthday.”
-Evan Rachel Wood on the red carpet.

Justin Timberland and Jessica Biel – the drinking couple.

Radiant in yellow: Emily Ratajkowski

Gosling: A good year to be a Ryan in Hollywood.

Ryan (Reynolds) and Blake Lively: The most beautiful couple in Hollywood.

She’s a goddess.

There was a lot of free Fiji water. Kristen Bell is no dummy.

Monica Bellucci is 52 which makes me look 70!

Sofia Vergara – always the best part of the red carpet.

Mel Gibson hits the red carpet with pregnant girlfriend Rosalind Ross.

Lovely Drew Barrymore

Why oh why do you wear the dress train every year, Anna?

Who doesn’t have a crush on Amy Adams?

Adams with Arrival co-star Jeremy Renner.

Benning and Beatty – still looking good.

Only they could make us roots for the Russians (serious watch the Amerikans!).

Jonah Hill lives THE LIFE! Hanging with Ryan G. and nominated for Oscars. #Dreams

Sansa is all grown up now!

Travolta and Paulsen: It’s all fun and games until someone gets hurt.

Priyanka Chopra and Jeffrey Dean Morgan: Dirty Jokes Backstage.

Viola Davis: No time for wine…

The post Eavesdropping at the 2017 Golden Globes appeared first on Media Guy Struggles.

Madrid called me around the holidays (actually Spanish Television called to do a table read in the never-ending journal to get the Media Guy Struggles pilot made into something real – in any language) and I was all in.

As is the case back home near Hollywood, I didn’t sleep much. Because of that I got up close and personal with Spanish coffees looking to keep that edge and get my show made.

If I had to guess I would say that America became obsessed with Starbucks (west coast) Dunkin’ Donuts (east coast) coffee not for the taste, but for the simplicity – it was much easier to simply order “a cup of coffee.” Not to mention the to-go factor. As a culture, we’ve developed a global stereotype (particularly acknowledged by Europeans and Middle Easterners) that our coffee is watered down, dull and hardly enjoyed, sipped or swigged in huge cups at the speed of a 7-Eleven Big Gulp®. It wasn’t until the introduction of Starbucks that we thought we got a little more class, that our coffee consumption skyrocketed to include fancy-pants sizes and milk variations with shiny flamboyant Italian nicknames.

Then around 2005 something called the Gibraltar happened in San Francisco to a once-little company named Blue Bottle Coffee – which if you know anything about being hip has helped spawn a catalyst within the Northern California coffee movement, as well as along the West Coast, over to New York and popping up in London (although they have a lot of influence from the Aussies, whom also make excellent coffee). But did that really happen? Was that really an invention? Or a renaming of the existing Spanish cortado? All finger pointing aside, coffee and espresso drinks are some of the most widely consumed beverages in the world, and the manner in which they are ordered and prepared differs according to countries, backgrounds or the baristas’ habits.

The Spanish people have developed quite a taste, or perhaps dependency on coffee since its arrival from Turkish immigrants in the 17th century. The general consensus is that the coffee here is good, although it may be argued that the coffee tastes better in Italy and Portugal, and certainly worse in France.

What do you need to know to order an espresso drink or coffee in Spain?

Spaniards aren’t known to eat a hefty breakfast, in fact for a true experience during your stay in the country, steer clear of restaurants or cafes offering an American or British breakfast. On a given day, the local eateries will be filled with common citizens, or even hotshot politicians (if they dare show their faces), munching a pastry, or toasts with tomato pulp with their café con leche, 1:1 ration of strong coffee or espresso with steamed milk, or what we might register as a caffé latte.

That said, coffee in Spain is consumed at all hours of the day, particular after larger meals or in the late afternoon at the merienda hour (5-7p roughly) served alongside a slice of olive oil or egg yolk cakes. Besides this fact — you’ll soon see for yourself during your time in Spain a culture of tomando un café (or tomar un café — to have a coffee) via patios, terraces, cafes, bars, gas stations, and restaurants offering all sorts of food stuff but also always coffee, and this practice is not only a time for caffeine, but an opportunity to catch up and meet with friends, family, colleagues, or intercambios (language exchanges).

Café Solo – a very strong and small serving of coffee; generally a single shot of espresso. I have no statistics to prove this theory, but I most commonly witness people ordering this version after lunch for a quick pick-me-up, therefore reducing the likelihood of falling into a food coma, or after dinner for the sobremesa chats and table lingering.

Café Solo Doble* – same as above but with a double shot of espresso and maybe a larger vessel (pending the bar/cafe)

(Café) Cortado – an espresso cut with steamed milk (from Spanish verb cortar), typically 1:1 – 2:1 espresso to milk ration, and served in a short and stout glass. It’s similar to the piccolo in Australia, the Gibraltar in US and to the Italian version of a caffé macchiato. Popularly ordered around the merienda hours to give a little jolt as well as the illusion of eating something sweet between meals (with the addition of sugar packets most likely).

Café con Leche – to reiterate from above, this is one of Spain’s most popular drinks, and often the favorite for its balanced flavors and comforting sensations, equal parts milk and coffee. Breakfast is a common timeframe for this size, as is the merienda a 5pm snack hour, but it’s really as classic as El Clasico (a futbol / soccer match). Sometimes this drink will be served table-side, with the waiters pouring the (very) hot milk into a short & skinny glass, or wide brimmed demitasse cup.

(Café) Americano – an espresso shot served in a larger glass and watered down. Usually ordered by out-of-towners looking to replace their usual coffee routine since you won’t find filtered coffee in many places in Spain; espresso machines are the norm, or instant coffee.

Café Manchado – a less common order, but a popular choice nonetheless for those that like their caffeinated beverages just “stained,” the literal term for staining a short (café con leche) glass of milk with a small amount of espresso. May also be referred to on some menus as a lágrima – from other Spanish speaking countries like Argentina.

Café con Hielo – during the hot summer months the Spaniards cool down with this espresso and ice cubes, served in a whiskey glass.

Café Suizo – a shot of espresso served with a dollop of whipped cream; identical to the Italian ‘espresso con panna’ although not very common on Spanish menus.  (I like La Granja Viader in Barcelona for this drink because of their homemade cream).

Café Bombon – a café solo (espresso) served with a hefty spoonful of condensed milk, thought to have originated in Valencia, Spain.

Carajillo – a café solo served with a touch of brandy, although whiskey or rum can be substituted.

Trifásico – a less common and often regionally ordered drink along the Costa Brava and Costa Blanca, the trifásico includes three ingredients: coffee, milk/cream/or condensed milk and a liquor (usually anything from whiskey, brandy to Baileys).

Know your caffeine preference upfront, otherwise they will assume you want regular or strong espressos and coffee. Typically decaffeinated, descafeinado, comes from an instant coffee packet,  so if you want decaffeinated and from the espresso machine you must request for example, café _________ + descafeinado de maquina.

AND if you didn’t have enough already: You also have the option to speak up about your exact coffee preferences; so with the cortado or the café con leche you could order ‘corto de café’ (literally short on coffee) or ‘largo de café’ (long on coffee).

*Double shots – If you’re looking for more caffeine that resembles a ristretto then you’ll need to request that your drink be made as a double shot; the standard is one. To do this, use the above terminology but add doble to the end, e.g. Café con leche doble, cortado doble, manchado doble.
**Also note in Spain, unlike in Italy (or other countries that I haven’t visited yet), if you would like a glass of water to go with your coffee, you must ask your server for it – un vaso de agua por favor.

Sugars / Sweeteners
Spaniards are quite generous with their sugar packets, the processed white variety, or common table sugar. Bars and cafés often put of a lot of effort into insuring that theirs are printed with their business name and address (reminds me of the omnipresent matches in the US during the 90s). Should you need more however, simply ask “me traes /or me das un poco de azúcar por favor?” (will you bring / give me sugar please?). If you’re a fiend for raw sugar, azúcar de caña,  is the courser, less processed version (sometimes) available.

Honey is very rare to accompany coffee in Spain, but still worth a shot if this is your preference, and you ask nicely. The word for honey is (la) miel.

Now the above mentioned list should allow you to order a coffee or espresso throughout any part of Spain with no problems. Be sure to visit my favorite neighborhood vendors and recommended coffee shops; Toma Café in Madrid, La Bicicleta, and Satan’s Coffee Corner in Barcelona (more Spanish coffee shop recommendations at bottom of page).

However, if you plan to “monkey see monkey do” and order a coffee like a local when in Málaga, then pay attention to the following:

Café Central tucked along a narrow side street in the old city of Málaga has claimed the invention of the following coffee ordering standard, a brain scramble, un cacao mental, for outsiders but none the less a fascinating Andalusian idiosyncrasy. The story goes that the camarero, D. José Prado Crespo, or Pepe for short, was fed up of dealing with crazy customers requests, “Pepe ponme un poquito más” “a little more coffee/milk” or “¡ya está! suficiente leche ya” “OK, that’s enough milk.” He developed a ten level café system to simplify his work life as well as the lives of his coworkers.

Ordering a coffee in Málaga, Spain requires a bit of practice. Or point and smile : )

Since its conception, the system has been adopted by the majority of the baristas and servers around Málaga. It goes like this: nube, sombra, corto, entrecorto, mitad, solo corto, semi-largo, largo, and the solo. The nube, or cloud, contains a splash of coffee, the mitad is equal parts 1:1 coffee and milk, and the solo is the same as in the rest of Spain, all black. However nowadays we give the servers even more work, non-fat milk, soy requests, or even the size of the glass is ultimately “your wish is my command.”

If the above is altogether too complicated, ordering “un cappuccino, por favor,” will be internationally understood. Just keep your standards in check, this won’t be Italy — which according to the INEI consists of: “traditional cappuccinos are made up of 25ml of espresso and 125ml of steam-whipped milk, starting with cold milk (3-5°C) and brought to a temperature of about 55°C and then poured over Italian certified espresso in a cup the size of 150-160ml. The milk must be fresh bovine with a minimum of 3.2% proteins and 3.5% fat, and steam-whipped in a specific way.” Precise isn’t it?

Maybe a café con leche in Spain is the way to go after all!

The post Ordering Espresso in Madrid appeared first on Media Guy Struggles.

Because half of the tables have been annexed by local suburban squatters who decided that any place with free WiFi is the perfect spot for an ad hoc Regus office. These “patrons” were done eating…if they ever ate at all. They’re simply sitting there rat-a-tat-tatting on their laptops and electronic notepads turning our shared public space into their personal office, oblivious and uncaring that their misplaced multi-tasking has become a public nuisance. 

They made it cool to hang out at the coffee shop all day…sigh.

The post Café Squatters appeared first on Media Guy Struggles.

I can tell you that I’m not in federal court with one of those cantankerous Californians filing lawsuits against Starbucks, hell-bent on taking down the the java king over underfilling their lattes. I mean, geez, cozy up to the barista and get a little more milk poured in. Last time I complained, I got a free drink and a new coffee. What a deal!

There may be some truth that I am at the movies taking in Central Intelligence, starring Dwayne Johnson and Kevin Hart. I’m not used to standing on line for a movie, but I definitely wanted to smell what The Rock was cooking and I had a fresh, fully-filled Venti drip from the aforementioned Starbucks, so life was good. The movie didn’t disappoint, but honestly, the movie industry itself is starting to disappoint.

They seem to be in panic mode because of Netflix, spiraling costs and the rude, loud unwelcoming nature of the movie theatre experience itself. But as I sat through nine movie trailers (yes! nine! — shame on you Cinemark) totaling twenty-four minutes I realized something else: there’s no mysteries or surprise anymore.

Now there is so much information, so far in advance before a movie comes out that it’s anti-climatic. Everything about it is known. You feel like you’ve already seen it. What was intended to promote a film, now serves as buzzkill instead.

I loved the movies once. Still do. I went with my mom to see a movie almost every Tuesday when I was a kid. Top Gun was in theaters so long that I was able to take three different dates hoping to find that lost, loving feeling. (The same crash and burn scenario occurred all three times, yikes!) Now my son and I count the days down to the next Star Wars installment a year in advance.

My first theater experience I can remember was seeing the blockbuster Earthquake in 1974 when disaster movies were all the rage. I remember looking up in awe at the big screen and waiting for the Sensurround to kick in.

What’s Sensurround you ask? Only the greatest thing ever in 1974! Here’s the theater notice that appeared in newspapers all over the country:

“ATTENTION! This motion picture will be shown in the startling new multi-dimension of Sensurround. Please be aware that you will feel as well as see and hear realistic effects such as might be experienced in an actual earthquake. The management assumes no responsibility for the physical or emotional reactions of the individual viewer.”

Who wouldn’t want that?! Yet, I digress…

Anyway, as the opening credits rolled all I knew was this was an epic disaster movie set in my hometown of Los Angeles and you knew it starred Charlton Heston, Ava Gardner, Lorne Greene, and George Kennedy. Beyond that? Everything was onscreen, unfolding right before my wide eyes. Today? You would have seen a sneak peak trailer sponsored by Pepsi a year ago. You would have read reviews, seen a bunch of Internet bloggers dissecting it, along with IMDB and Rotten Tomatoes, reviewed that would have added to you skepticism to see the movie in the first place.

If Earthquake comes out today, I am already sick of it before I click on Fandango to order a movie ticket. I not only know what parts of Los Angeles are ruined, but also how many died and how many floors are left of the Capitol Records Building. Why? Because all of the details would have been reviewed over and over again.

Hey movie industry, SPOILER ALERT!: you’re spoiling the movie going experience by vomiting too much information about the movie before it’s released. It would be like George R.R. Martin revealing the end of the last Game of Thrones book in the Forward. Bring back the mystery and mystique.

There are no movie scenes anymore that make us gasp because they’ve all been rumored, teased, speculated, or openly discussed or seen. There can never be the surprise of a Psycho shower scene because we would have already seen it in the trailer and watch Alfred Hitchcock dissect it on Conan or Jimmy Kimmel Live.

Movies should be an escape from reality. And I mean the modern reality of knowing way too much about the movie before you plan your Friday night trek to the movieplex.

How about bringing back ignorance as bliss?

When I walk into a theater, I want to literally and figuratively be in the dark about what I want to see.

Give it a try yourself and you’ll find that you like your movie experience that much more.

The post Movies Have Lost That Loving Feeling appeared first on Media Guy Struggles.

I’m at the LA Art Show rubbing elbows with Oscar-winner Anne Hathaway and Natasha Henstridge, the alien goddess from Species. Getting here was another story. The traffic from Hollywood to the

dilapidated convention center in Downtown Los Angeles was nothing short of terrifying frustration. I mean, really? 58 minutes to go 5.5 miles? Sheesh! And that’s not counting the 22 minutes I spent at one of our new Dunkin’ Donuts with a winding line of coffee hipsters.

Once upon a time strolling into your local cafe or McDonald’s or food truck to get a cup of inspirational joe to jump start your creative process was simple. You ordered it black or cream and sugar slapped a George Washington on the counter and sauntered out with contented smile to greet your mountain of work. Since when did getting coffee become such an ordeal?

Like many of America’s problems, this one is rooted in a common theme: too much variety. Of course, you can get any of these varieties:

…and this doesn’t include the Frappuccinos and the food…yet I digress.

I finally make it to the front of the line and I ask for a large coffee and the I’m asked, “Iced or Hot?” Now I’m as open-minded as the next guy, but I recoiled. “Allow me to give you a quick tutorial…” I whispered. “The day ‘hot’ is not the default assumption for a cup of coffee is the day I drive over a cliff Thelma & Louise style. I would no sooner ask you for an iced coffee than I would sit down at Ruth’s Chris and ask the waiter for a frozen steak and point.” At that point the young lady behind the counter was near tears as she suggested I leave.

So I drove to a Starbucks where their drink menu is even more absurdly huge and I’m forced to change my vocabulary to Italian. Small is tall, medium is grande and large is venti. The twentysomething couple in front of me ordered a caramel praline Frappuccino with three pumps of mocha, a pumpkin spice loaf slice and two straws. They probably could have heard me roll my eyes but they were too busy talking about buying a new outfit for their beagle.

A rendering of Shaq’s sweet bronze statue to be.

Not a soul in that Starbucks was ordering a regular coffee but me. I felt as if I walked into a Nordstrom and asked where I could buy a pair of dungarees and a straw hat. The barista asked me my name to write on the cup and I told it was “Exasperated.”

I did strike up an interesting conversation while waiting for my coffee that required a pour-over since they were out of regular coffee. The lady in front of me noted that only in LA could people come together after parting so acrimoniously. Under the heading of “reunited and it feels so good,” the master media manipulator of NBA past, Shaquille O’Neal, and the Los Angeles Lakers has reconciled. Thanks to the Lakers and AEG, the Diesel is getting a bad-ass stature at Staples Center some time during the 2016-2017 season. At least there’s free wi-fi, right?

What happened to the regular cup of coffee? Let’s invest in a red can of Folgers or a blue can of Maxwell House and not worry if the beans were picked by a kid making ten cents a day. Pour that black gold into a ceramic glazed 22-ounce mug and celebrate the simplicity of inspirational caffeine.

How foolish of me to have wasted all that time shopping for some java. The convention had a Starbucks one escalator ride down from the main entrance at the art show. It justs goes to show you, inspiration is everywhere!

A pregnant Anne Hathaway rocked the red carpet seventies style…

…with a mini Marc Jacobs dress and Miu Miu sandals.

Natasha Henstridge still among the finest Species at any event.

Ever find that diamond Billy Zane?

Ever catch Odette Annable in Banshee? You should.

Kathleen Robertson is a hidden treasure.

Perrey Reeves sparkled.

Oh Donna…Sarah Rafferty aka Donna Paulsen from Suits has the best walk in Hollywood.

The post In Search of Coffee and Art appeared first on Media Guy Struggles.

How to slow down your life…right now…just as soon as I see what my Starbucks name is…

In what is definitely solid proof that the Internet (and Starbucks for that matter) is a place of endless possibilities, some brilliant dude or dudette has created a name generator that simulates the experience of having your name name misspelled on a Starbucks drink cup. Here’s mine:

Now that we have that squared away, and we are enjoying some java forms, have you ever thought of other ways to embrace the moment? Yeah, I know I am sounding like some seventies guru in a tunic, but the last episodes of Mad Men have me looking in the mirror. I mean after Megan went nuclear on Don with her “aging, sloppy, selfish” rant, I’ve been itching to write my own $1 million check. But how? Perhaps living in the now is the key. Let me give you an example…


It’s finally Friday night, the beginning of a weekend of freedom, which also happens to include your birthday. Your family, friends and spouse all have celebratory plans for you.


You have a rewarding career and a network of beautiful people who want to rejoice in your life. As you walk out to your car to officially kickoff the fun, a giddy thrill washes over you.

Live in the now and you might avoid this look! photo: Justina Mintz/AMC

But as you click the seatbelt into place, rather than sitting in awe of how lucky you are, a list of concerns begin worming their way into your consciousness: “I need gas, but the conveniently located gas station charges more than others … I hope it’s not a surprise party … Maybe I should get the beverages I like before going home … I haven’t been to the gym all  week … Did I pay the electric bill?”


And so it goes.


“I think we’ve all had this experience, which often has us psychically living 30 minutes into the future – no matter how great the present circumstances might be,” says Steve Gilliland, a member of the Speaker Hall of Fame and author of the widely acclaimed “Enjoy The Ride,” for which he is set to publish a follow-up (“Detour, Developing the Mindset to Navigate Life’s Turns”) that will be released in May 2015.


“Are we doomed to this torrent of noise which distracts us from enjoying our life? We don’t have to be.”


Don’t live your life 30 minutes ahead of the present. If you won’t live your life now, in the present, then who will?


An older man came up to me, grabbed my hand, and said he wished he’d heard me speak decades ago,” Gilliland says. “After I asked why, he said that when he was eating lunch on break or dinner with his family, he was always thinking about what he had to do after the meal, which represented his daily life. ‘At the age of 97,’ he said, ‘I’ve officially lived my life 30 minutes ahead’ – 30 minutes ahead of whatever he was doing at the moment.”

• Live more! It’s better than crying before you’re hurt. Don’t put your umbrella up until it rains. Worry restricts your ability to think and act effectively, and it forces you to mortgage fear and anxiety about something that may never occur. Laughter is the opposite. When you laugh, you’re living almost completely in the moment and it’s one of the best feelings you can have.
• No one can ruin your day without your permission. As much as we cannot control in life – our genes, our past and what has led up to today – there is much control we may take upon ourselves. Today, for example, we can understand that life picks on everyone, so when the going gets tough, we don’t have to take it personally. When we do take misfortune personally, we tend to obsess, giving a legacy to something that may make you a day poorer in life.
• Cure your destination disease. Live more for today, less for tomorrow, and never about yesterday. How? You might have to repeatedly remind yourself that yesterday is gone forever, yet we perpetually have to deal with now, so why not live it? And what if tomorrow never occurs? There is a difference between working toward the future, which is inherently enjoyable in light of hope, and living in an unrealistic future that remains perpetually elusive. If tomorrow never comes, would you be satisfied with the way today ended?

“It is not how you start in life and it is not how you finish,” Gilliland says. “The true joy of life is in the trip, so enjoy the ride!”


————-


 AD OF THE WEEK


A new feature that I am adding is the “Ad of the Week” (or month or whatever) that highlights some of the best work in the world. 


Most of you have seen the iconic Pulp Fiction scene where Butch Coolidge (Bruce Willis) has a flashback. The scene shows the time when his deceased father’s fellow POW Christopher Walken brings Butch his father’s watch. You know the watch that was smuggled in with some, er, uh delicate and dedicated hiding. This one is actually a parody of the Apple Watch commercials narrated by Walken. Enjoy.

The post Slow Down appeared first on Media Guy Struggles.

Just enough time before Christmas to squeeze in a few tidbits from my latest trip in Japan.

So here I am knocking out the next season off Miss Pilot and in the middle of it I was called away to a wireless company prove how fast their data speeds are. How did I do it? I used the old fry shrimps in three seconds advertising metaphor…Impossible?

Take a peek:

All of this was happening while our friends in North Korea revealed their end game bullying Sony Pictures to pull the poorly conceived Interview from theaters in perpetuity. Who will save Sony from themselves? Perhaps Bruce Willis and Rudolph! Take a look at Fly Hard, a Die Hard/Rudolph Parody Trailer Movie Mashup:

My final bit of embarrassing work centers on my new ice cream commercial that began airing this week. (You may remember my previous headshaker from Lotte… However, this is ten times worse, but it pays the bills!:

At least there is Chocolate Eclair coffee at Starbucks here…More from Tokyo in the next column.

The post Yippie Ki Yay: Notes and Videos from Tokyo appeared first on Media Guy Struggles.

I’m in the middle of Hollywood with some interns (no, not Lewinsky-types, actual interns interviewing me for a Pepperdine University thesis they are writing for their masters degrees.)

We were at a Starbucks because I was still reeling from losing $100 in the office pool. I bet all my M&Ms money that George Clooney was going to get up, put on his best black Oscars night leftover suit, start sweating profusely, text “ABORT! ABORT!” to an unlisted number, and wait for a helicopter flown by Leo DiCaprio and a dozen 25-year-old models to rescue him and fly to Bang-A-Ho Island where he can be single forever. But he didn’t do that, and now someone from accounting is happily skipping to the 7-11 to buy $100 worth of Flamin’ Hot Cheetos and day-one pizza slices. THANKS ALOT GEORGE!

I haven’t been interviewed in a long time. The last time was that Italian Business Week-esque debacle that still has the Eastern Mediterranean villagers sharpening their pitchforks and lighting their makeshift torches. Yet I digress…

So, “This fame thing?” I tell them, “Really f**ked me up for a really long time. I didn’t know how to do it; I didn’t know how to engage with it; it stressed me out. And people would say, ‘You just have to be yourself,’ and I was like, ‘But I don’t know who that is yet!’ New York. If you can make it there, you can make it anywhere. I need to get back there. Once upon a time I was famous in New York. The ad exec knew I would bring them the best commercials and juice stories.

The bottom line remains for those jumping into advertising: Don’t do it!

Advertising is the industry that people who were not lucky enough to get actual “creative” jobs end up in. These people—creative people whose artistic or literary dreams did not work out, often due to economic forces far beyond their control—find themselves in a position in which they are obliged to use their creative talents for purely commercial ends. Selling soap, so to speak. This causes quite a bit of cognitive dissonance. These people therefore expend quite a bit of time and effort justifying the position they find themselves in, in life. (As do we all!) Having justified their position to themselves, they seek to bolster their justification by attracting others like themselves into their same field. The more creative artists who do advertising for a living, the more of a real, justifiable, creative career it must be. They therefore use their considerable creative talents to sell the field of advertising itself, to their peers.

Do not fall for it, kids. Don’t go into advertising.

Advertising is a far more stable career than art, or music, or writing books, or journalism—the fields that many of the people in advertising wanted to go into, originally. Those creative and artistic fields are extremely competitive. They are harder to break into. They tend to be less lucrative. Forging a successful career in any of them through one’s own creativity alone is a dream that will come true only for a relatively low number of people. Lots of people want to be famous musicians. Only few will achieve that. For the rest, the advertising industry awaits, ready to use those same creative talents to sell things. Advertising is a field that is not going away. It will take you just as readily as the cold, uncaring whims of public attention will spit you out. It is a profession in which you can build a stable career. It is a good living. And Mad Men. Mad Men. So glamorous.

Don’t go into advertising.

Advertising offers the creative person a bargain: You can use your creativity. Just not for yourself. In fact, you must use your creative skills in the service of something diametrically opposed to the ideals that creative people generally espouse. You will sell your creativity, for a tidy sum, to the world’s faceless corporations. You, the artist, will paint their faces. You, the musician, will give these corporations their voice. You, the writer, will help these corporations speak poetically. Your creativity is pooled and used to give character to something that has no character: a corporation, a machine that makes money. Your talents are used to give that machine a soothing, attractive halo. This, at the end of your advertising career, will be the sum total of your creative output. This will be your artistic legacy. This will be what all of your poetry has accomplished. A pretty face on the machine. You, yourself, and your own soul are not part of this equation. Your own creativity does not serve those things any more.

Don’t go into advertising.

Your creativity, as trite as it sounds, is worth more than that corporation will ever pay you. We all need jobs. There is nothing wrong with doing something that is not your dream job, out of necessity. But it doesn’t have to be advertising. If you are young, you have time to try a lot of things. Try to be a writer. Try to make it with your band. Try to be a working artist. If it doesn’t work out financially, at least you gave it a shot. And you never have to stop making art, regardless of your circumstances. Unless you agree to sell your creativity to that machine.

The advertising industry wants you. They need you. Without you, and your creativity, all the corporations lose their faces. They’re not pretty any more. They need you, and your creativity, the same way that a vampire needs blood. They’ll pay you handsomely. But it will never, ever be worth it.

Don’t do it!

The post Vision Dreams of Passion appeared first on Media Guy Struggles.

“Can you whip out the logo for new client today?!”

Are you kidding me? “Whip out a logo?” It’s not as easy as it looks. Every person from the CEO to the janitor gets to weigh in on the new brand identity. It’s simple, right? Think again.

There’s more to whipping out a logo than playing in PhotoShop, slapping a name on a circle and calling it a day. Just because Nike swindled Carolyn Davidson out of her $35 was super efficient in the purchase of their Swoosh Logo in 1971 doesn’t mean they grow on trees (or in college computer labs)**.

Impact is job one of a logo. The subtleties come from special training and a sharp visual eye. Some of this you can learn and some of it, quite frankly, you have to be born with.

“Born with” you ask?

Take a look at some of these logos. They are instantly recognizable. But do you know the real stories behind them? Some of them might surprise you…

BASKIN ROBBINS
We all know and adore Baskin Robbins’ ice cream, founded in 1945 in California by Mr. Baskin and Mrs. Robbins. Their slogan has changed many times over the years, but it often mentions their famous 31 flavors: “31 Flavors of Fun,” “31 Flavors at Their Best,” “Trust 31” and “Celebrate 31,” just to name a few. In the logo, you can also see the number ’31’ in pink in the Baskin Robbins logo, just one of many stories behind famous logos.

APPLE
The Apple logo is well-known worldwide, but did you know that it was created because Steve Jobs had just come back from an apple farm after starting a fruitarian diet? The Apple logo was first rainbow-colored to show that Apple products could create color graphics. The bite was taken out of the apple because Steve Jobs was worried that people would think it was a cherry!

NIKE
The logo for Nike, otherwise known as the ‘swoosh,’ was created by a lady called **Carolyn Davidson in 1971, after she was chosen while working on a graphic design assignment at school. She wasn’t initially happy with the design, stating, “I don’t love it, but it will grow on me.” She was paid $35 for the design, which is crazy considering what it would be worth today!

STARBUCKS
If you look at the original design of the Starbucks logo, you might be shocked – it’s a shirtless mermaid with two tails sitting in a surprisingly sexual way! It is thought that the mermaid is one from Greek mythology. This mermaid design was often criticized due to its sexual nature, so it was adapted and changed to what it is today.

CHUPA CHUPS
The logo for the famous lollipop brand, Chupa Chups, was designed by the wacky painter known for his melting clocks, Salvador Dali, in 1969. The colous for the design were taken from the Spanish flag, because the name ‘Chupa Chups’ comes from the Spanish word chapur, meaning ‘to suck.’ The logo was designed in an hour while Dali sat in a cafe with a friend.

MERCEDES BENZ
Essentially, the Mercedes Benz logo was designed to tell everyone how wonderful they are! The three points on the logo are meant to represent three elements – water, air and earth – and Mercedes Benz’s dominance over all three (due to their boats, airplanes and cars). Modest!

It’s easy to see these logos every day of your life, but be so unaware of how they came to be! There are so many interesting stories behind all kinds of famous logos, it’s definitely worth checking them out. Did you know any of these? Which other logo origins do you know of?

PEPSI
The colors in the Pepsi logo are meant to represent the colors on the American flag, showing the company’s patriotism and pride. That’s not the end of it, however – apparently the Pepsi logo represents feng shui, the Pythagorean theorem, Einstein’s theories, the Earth’s magnetic field and so much more. How? Your guess is as good as mine.

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