#1, with a bullet

As the 8 regular readers of this blog know I have been working a steady, long term freelance assignment for the past month. I'm already up to my oversized aquiline nose in projects. Some incredibly large. Some minuscule by comparison.

I'm just happy to be working. As any 44 year old still in advertising would be.

The guy who I call my boss is Australian. I hate to break out the big broom of generalization, but I must say, I have always enjoyed working with folks from down under. And I'm not saying that to polish apples. Or kiwis. As anyone who knows me IRL, I'm not that type of fella.

I just like the hearty sense of humor that seems to go with that always-charming accent. Perhaps I'm drawn to Australians because way back when, my adventurous 17 year old mother left the isle of Great Britain to go have some mischief in a foreign land.

In any case, I took the opportunity to share this outdoor billboard (see above) from my days at Team One. As you might imagine he had a good laugh over it.

What I didn't tell him but what I have shared on occasion on these very digital pages, is the incredible rapid fire birth of the campaign for Castlemaine XXXX. I'll retell the story only because it merits mentions in these days of advertising gloom and doom.

Three days into my burgeoning career at Team One in El Segundo, where the sea meets the smell of oil fineries, I was asked to jump in on an outdoor assignment for a small beer account the agency had just landed. The copywriter working on the assignment had to fly out of town and my number was up.

I gladly hopped on board and within hours, my partner and I had magically opened up a treasure chest of funny lines. By the end of the day, (Wednesday) we had papered a wall with dozens of pithy statements that celebrated and made fun of the Outback lifestyle.

On Thursday we showed it to our creative director.

By Friday, he showed it to the CCO.

On Monday, they carted the work out to the client.

And by Tuesday, we had a signed estimate and a green light to go into production.

That's exactly how it happened. And if I'm lying, I'm dying.

It was the first and only time I had ever seen ad people resist the urge to overthink, over analyze and over research any creative endeavor. In stark contrast to the way work winds its way through the halls of many of today's ad agencies, where it is comma-fucked and pixel-pricked by un-creative committees.

Of course my perspective on the Castlemaine XXXX miracle has changed over the years. Particularly since I became an advertising mercenary. Because had I been a freelancer at the time, my assignment would have been done by the end of the second day.

"Thanks Rich, we love the work. We're gonna cut you loose. Stay in touch."

 And then I would have had to wait another 73 days to get paid.