other times i’m a copywriter. college marketing. it’s actually pretty fun and i like the people i work with.
but the higher ed audience can be tricky. you have to think like them, but you haven’t really thought like them in a long time (for me, eleven years). that can lead to a lot of trouble.
whenever things get a little corny in a meeting, i start arguing passionately that we should develop a whole campaign around the concept of a robot with a mohawk. for example:
i got a new boss a few months ago. it turns out he’s a good guy, but at the time i didn’t know anything about him. one morning at a meeting we were talking about how to utilize social networking and i didn’t like where things were going. as things started to get a little tense, i actually busted out with:
“i’m not against edgy stuff. i’m the guy who made up the idea of a robot with a mohawk.”
a real life emotional teenager
then-new boss looked really confused, but nobody else in the meeting batted an eyelash because they were used to it by then. the thing is, i’m pretty sure there are people at my work who think i would like to develop a campaign around a robot with a mohawk.
i’m going to tell you something right now: when i’m talking about a robot with a mohawk, unless we’re debating the merits of short circuit versus short circuit 2, i’m really talking about something else. this may go for other things, too.
on an unrelated note, here is a quote from kierkegaard:
There was a man whose chatter certain circumstances made it necessary for me to listen to. At every opportunity he was ready with a little philosophical lecture, a very tiresome harangue. Almost in despair, I suddenly discovered that he perspired copiously when talking. I saw the pearls of sweat gather on his brow, unite to form a stream, glide down his nose, and hang at the extreme point of his nose in a drop-shaped body. From the moment of making this discovery, all was changed; I even took pleasure in inciting him to begin his philosophical instruction, merely to observe the perspiration on his brow and at the end of his nose.
back to the real topic:
at work we recently had to enter a competition to decorate a school mascot. i managed to convince a number of my colleagues that we should turn the mascot into a robot with a mohawk. cooler, or maybe less cool, heads prevailed and the results were as decent as you could hope for from such a corny competition. but a different group put a mohawk on their mascot.
my style is viral.
Your style was assumed by a skywriter whose work I admired recently. He was grounded for insubordination. Later I saw children holding balloons in your style. Then elements of your style floated to the surface of the lake. Picnickers stood and pointed.
yes, it’s out of my hands now. i apologize for unleashing it on the world, and i thank you for keeping an eye on it.