A Litter of Names for Your New Labradoodle or Other Canine Beast

by be. aaron

Paisley

Freeso

Penny

Sam & Dave

Vera, Chuck & Dave

Peeve

Lana

Evelyn Champagne King

Hairy

Iggy

Nosey

Bruno

Hattie

Humbert (Humbert)

Imelda

Imogen

Kitty

Maurice

Ernesto

Marcello

Perry

Callooh

Callay

Mavis

Dino

and my personal favorite,

which I may later rescind for my own use,

Inez.

Bouquet of Beauteous Garden Words

chez carole jardins

by be.aaron, copywriter extraordinaire and conceptual gardener

For those of you who, like me, imagine the joy of working in the garden but prefer to loll about in the a.c. of your hut instead…

dahlia

allee

pergola

gazebo

espalier

bougainvillea

rudbeckia

hollyhocks

wisteria

Fun-Scary

by Betsy Aaron

Maybe it’s the influence of Mercury in retrograde, when things from the past purportedly pop up, or perhaps it’s my current search for work, which compels me to waste time daily by checking out my horoscope on as many sites as it takes until I find an affirming message, but I’ve been thinking a lot lately about my early days when I worked as a freelance writer/producer for many cable networks.

I worked most happily at Nickelodeon as part of a stellar creative team and what made it so rewarding–believe me, it was not the money (I wrote one :30 for Nick-At-Nite that ran for a year and I was paid $300 for it!)– was that I always asked to think and do my best.

One of the writers there shared his formula for success: happy-sad. Everything he did made viewers laugh but also invited them to connect in a heartfelt way. Since then, I’ve often used happy-sad to inform my commercial work and whenever appropriate, I’ve passed it on.

I am re-entering the world of broadcast media after a hiatus and the process has been daunting. I’ve had to do a lot of soul-searching about the choices I’ve made and what I want to be doing next. In the course of this exercise, I’ve been able to identify my own personal formula — which I call fun-scary.

More often than not, I’ve lived without a safety net. I’ve said yes to lots of risky projects and ventures and I’ve had to wonder whether or not I am allergic to security and routine. What propels me is curiosity, challenge, the desire for experience, the same things that get me to sit still long enough to enter the fiction zone.

Writing is probably the most fun-scary of experiences. To the list I would add: launching new cable networks with crazy deadlines, and sometimes for crazy people. Swimming in the ocean is fun-scary too. One minute you’re floating on your back, the next, you narrowly miss taking a pounding in a crashing wave or you suddenly notice that you’ve been carried out by a riptide. Delight, meet terror. The first time I did a headstand in yoga was fun-scary, and it made me laugh out loud. First-time experiences often deliver the jolt of fun-scary. Some people call this beginner’s mind, it’s a state of focus, clarity and open-mindedness that guides you — without the negative expectation that might come from past experience, towards a successful outcome.

I recently had a new sexual experience, which, at this point, I didn’t think was still possible. I don’t mean to be a tease but further details would definitely be a case of over-sharing. It was completely fun-scary– but alas, in this context, newness has the shortest of shelf-lives.

I would have to add India to the top of my fun-scary list. I had no frame of reference for it and no expectations; every second of it was new and beyond my imagination.

The first day of kindergarten: fun, not scary. A life-threatening disease: scary, not fun. Putting stuff out there on this blog: fun-scary.

Sign o’ the Times: & vs + etc.

by be.aaron

An Ambivalent Spiel

Since I am not a semiotician, typographer or graphic designer, I have to ask: why is the ampersand (a word I like,) now so often, and improperly, replaced by the plus sign? As you know, and does not always equal plus; precise meaning is often defined by context– and in no way can the two always be used interchangeably.

So why am I ambivalent? I have to admit, I’ve been experimenting ( see above revised tagline) and I find that the + sign is far sexier looking than the stodgy &. Is this trend, like Arial becoming the new Helvetica, an Internet-influenced design choice?

I suspect that replacing the & with +, irrespective of meaning, is the equivalent of answering the phone with“Hey” instead of “Hello.” A lot of my friends are parents who have adopted “Hey” so that their children will be more inclined to take their calls.

I don’t want Andy Rooney’s turf if/when he should ever retire/die (will he ever do either?) but I do want to come out here and now and admit that I find “Hey” annoying. It’s unnecessarily abrupt: I don’t have headphones on, I am listening to you. Worse, it’s too obviously co-opted from someone much younger than you. When you say “hey” to your kids, students, employees, they still think you are hopeless. Can we please agree that “Hey” is so over?

For now though, I think it might be okay to use + instead of & – as long as you mean what you say.

Off-site Spiel

by be. aaron, copywriter extraordinaire

No one assigned to write should have to do it in a cubicle. OK, maybe journalists– they’re always shown pecking away at their keyboards in movies and on TV and though I’ve done all kinds of things, I’ve never attempted to report the news. Technically however, they are at work in a newsroom, not a cubicle.

It’s not just that copywriters need an environment free of distraction, because working off-site, which sounds so much more professional than working at home, presents loads of distractions: dog-walking, eating, errands, puttering, pacing, staring out the window. Procrastination is as essential to the writing process as picking one’s nose. And like the latter activity, best done in private.

Non-writing activity is productive because diversion allows ideas to bubble up from places so deep, dark and inaccessible that they require trickery to tap into. Of course, the creative nap, (literally sleeping on it,) is also an effective way of having ideas– again, an activity which cannot be comfortably undertaken in a cubicle.

Clients think that working off-site means that I am in my jammies all day; mais non, getting dressed is part of the procrastination process. There’s the issue of color palette, footwear choice and of course, the accessories. Even if no one sees me at work, I am looking good.

If the assignment is to write copy that connects with consumers, one must be out in the world to witness how things are actually consumed. A cubicle reduces all consumer activity to abstraction sans context. (For more on this, or if you’d like to use more persuasive arguments than mine to convince your boss to let you telecommute, consult “The Practice of Everyday Life” by Michel de Certeau. It’s thesis is essentially, if you are naming nail polish colors, go out and get a mani/pedi.)