The art of slowing down

A little more than 20 years ago, my friend, former roommate and younger brother of my one-time writing partner, wrote a book — pictured above. My copy is gathering dust in my garage, along with a host of other accoutrement from a life I barely recognize or remember. 

Time does that.

You can read more about it by purchasing your copy (still available on Amazon) here.

The point of the book is self evident. And the task at the time was way easier for Augie, than it was for me. As in 2003 I was commuting more than 106 miles a day to beyond the Orange Curtain. Had two mortgage payments, and two daughters in an obscenely expensive private grammar school, where they could fingerpaint and sculpt clay, with materials that must've been imported from artisans in the hills of Tuscany.

Fast forward 22 years later and I have successfully exited the rat race that once consumed me. And sadly, like many fathers/providers, defined my identity.  

I was, until recently, convinced I had stockpiled enough nuts to make it to the finish line. Considering how much the current regime has destroyed my blood pressure, that finish line may be closer than I had thought. A silver lining, as it were. 

Additionally, I have been sidelined as of late, due to consecutive bouts of deteriorating health including Norovirus, Flu, a painful fall on my tuchas and most recently, a THR, total hip replacement for those of you yet untouched by the surgeon's scalpel. 

Happy to say, that is all in my rear view mirror, now equipped with one of those magnifying attachments to enlarge images. Old people hacks. And slowly returning to my vigorous exercise routine.

Suffice it to say, I have begun taking the Slow Down message to heart. Because now I have time to.

If you haven't retired yet, or the industry hasn't retired you, to be more accurate, the transition is not as simple as you might expect. It was made even more difficult during my last decade in advertising, where it was not unusual to get briefed on an assignment at 10 AM and expected to have solved it by the check in time at 4 PM.

Fuck that and fuck those clueless people who agreed to such bullshittery!

Sorry for the burst of rage, I just took a moment to look at my 401k funds. What's left of them.

The point is I am slowly embracing the Slow Down philosophy. And not surprisingly, it is taking time. And it will take time for you as well.

I wake up. Lay in bed as long as I'd like. I look at the clock less often. I do as I please. And don't do what I don't do what doesn't please me. I eschew drama, and there's still plenty of it. I putz around the house. And just successfully replaced a hallway light switch, my second in a week. I read. I write. After a lifetime of providing for others, I can concentrate on providing for myself. It's an unusual, but good feeling.

In the near future I look forward to warmer weather, when I can reacquaint myself with my hammock.

Pass the cardboard...er, matzo

Years ago, some enterprising young Iranians focused their antisemitic efforts by staging a Holocaust Cartoon Contest. They offered up $25,000 to the aspiring cartoonist who could come up with the most vile, disgusting ugly cartoon that mocked the murder of 6 million tribe members (one out of every three Jews in the world's tiny Jewish population.)

Not to be outdone, a couple of Israeli guys said, "Hold my slivovitz" and staged their own similarly themed contest. And raised the ante to $50,000.

It was all very distasteful. But the thick, almost impenetrable Hebraic skin goes a long way in explaining our longevity. Particularly in world that is often antisemitic, anti-Israeli, or anti-Jew. Call it what you want, they all stem from the same chalice.

In the same self deprecation vein, not to mention heretical, I bring you the cartoon above which pokes some good natured fun at the upcoming Passover celebration. The caption is: "we mark the door with blood, so god knows which first born babies to smite."

It's not laugh out loud funny, but it does question the fallacy of the lord, and does appeal to my wide, and growing wider, streak of atheism. 

BTW, being Jewish and being an atheist are not mutually exclusive. I would posit that our willingness to embrace cynicism and question everything, has also contributed to our standing as one of the longest surviving tribes since the Garden of Eden.

Two weeks ago, Ms. Muse offered to drive me to the supermarket in order to re-stock my barren refrigerator and pantry. 

The minute we entered the store, we were assaulted by the full on Easter onslaught. There were plastic eggs (the real ones are still too expensive), chocolate bunnies, and yellow and pink streamers festooned on almost every aisle, from pickles to peanut butter. I was surprised there wasn't a man or a woman sporting an Easter Bunny Costume, hawking Easter paraphenalia to any unwary shopper in hopping distance. 

This may be a by-product of our new authoritarian regime, as state legislators in Texas are currently eyeing a bill that would outlaw Furries. And Fur-adjacent characters.

Nevertheless the Easterization of the store was quite ubiquitous. The lone exception being the end cap (sorry for the marketing retail talk) display on Aisle 13 -- Ethnic Foods/Strange Rituals.

To wit:

There it is, the makings of real holiday celebration.

Let me save you the trouble of zooming in. You have your Borscht, Red Beets, Sardines, Chicken Broth, grape juice (our sugary equivalent of the Easter chocolate) and you've got a fine selection of Baron Herzog Cabernet Sauvignon. 

I took the liberty of looking. They even had some Special Reserve from February 2023, a particularly good month, I'm told. 

400 years of bondage in the hot Egyptian sun and this is how we celebrate?

In the words of Jon Stewart, we gotta do better.

 

Old Man Rant #739

Let me start this post by stating I have no desire to start. Work, that is. 

I'm done. 

Between delivering newspapers, mowing lawns, flipping burgers, tending bar, scrubbing hospital pots, cleaning up god-awful college dining rooms, driving forklifts, flipping steaks, omelettes and flounder, clerking in the mailroom, and writing (pimping out my brain cells) thousands and thousand of ads, most of which never even got made, I am so done.

Nevertheless, I am still fond of scrolling through LinkedIn. Mostly as a distribution channel for this old blog, but also to stay abreast of what's going on, in what was my industry. 

I don't need to tell you, it ain't particularly good. 

And that's being generous.

There's the upswing in successful indie agencies, but those toiling at the 5 major holding companies, I'm sorry, 3 major holding companies, soon to be 1 major holding company, have been left holding the bag. Sadly, this includes many friends and former colleagues.

When a job listing does come up, I watch, incredulously, at the dozens, sometimes dozens of dozens, of applicants all fighting for the same tasteless, meaningless morsel of underemployment. 

More often than not the opportunity is a demotion. Involving the promotion of some new drug, Flexicol or Ubivix. Or, if it's for a legitimate carmaker, beer or even a casual dining chain, the salary as well as the qualifications are insulting at best.

And usually begin with: "Social First."

In other less polite words, and I know this from my experience at PayPal (started by Peter Thiel, the Right Wing's own George Soros) they are less interested in people who can develop big ideas and most interested in dispirited people who are familiar with social media templates -- banner ads, email blast, carousels, ad infinitum. 

It's all so fucking backwards.

If I were to apply -- and again I have no interest in doing so -- I wouldn't make the first cut. Mostly because all the "Social First" work I have done in the past never made it into my portfolio. It's out in the ether somewhere. Probably in the vicinity of Uranus. 

Moreover, it's all CRAP.

But here's the irony of it all. The people I know who have mastered social media, and made it work for them, often going viral in a small but vital arena, are folks my age or older. 

Take Bob Hoffman for example, whose posts and columns gave way to lucrative speaking engagements, around the world. Or my friend and fellow blogger, George Tannenbaum, whose blog is read industry-wide and who posts new ads for his rapidly growing small indie agency, GeorgeCo. I know of no other two individuals who have mastered "social" more than these self admitted geezers.

Not to toot my own social media horn, but even some of my prolific Trump-trolling has amassed some significant eyeball coverage.

All this is to say, if I were looking to staff a creative department, I wouldn't begin with the phrase Social First. 

I'd start with Talent First.