June 26, 2009
1) It smells.
2) Sick days are for when you’re sick. Not taking sick days and being paid for them is ludicrous. Not only does it serve as a deterrent for people to stay home when they really *are* sick, but people aren’t entitled to be compensated for staying healthy. Why? Because they already are—it’s called a salary.
3) People are unemployed and city workers complaining about not getting a fair shake. Gross.
June 18, 2009
If people only wrote when they were inspired, nothing would get done. There would be nothing to read on the back of a cereal box. Magazines would only have two articles. Manuals would be comprised entirely of graphics (think IKEA). Oh, and brochures just would not exist.
If you’re a TV or movie watcher, and I suspect you are, you’ll notice that some of the most memorable and interesting characters are writers—which may or may not be because the scriptwriter is egocentric. Anyway, it’s funny to me that the caricature of a writer is someone who is sharp and artsy and conflicted, usually carrying some sort of mood/personality disorder.
I guess it’s not altogether false—I mean, look at me, I’m a bloody genius, a psychological enigma. But writing is often associated with a romantic, almost spiritual experience that I find difficult to appreciate as a professional writer. I think it’s the people who don’t have to write every day—those who “write on the side”—who see it this way. These are the people who don’t receive briefs or word counts or deadlines.
Even writer’s block is portrayed as this internal angst that the writer has to overcome before creating her masterpiece. What they never tell you is when your deadline is in five hours, you don’t have time to go out for coffee and get introspective. You have to produce. Plain and, well, not that simple.
Writing has a very practical, tedious and uninteresting quality to it. Even the most creative fiction writers have to trudge through apathy. What does this mean? Most of us writers are generally grounded and sometimes even boring individuals. You heard it here first.
It’s not that I don’t like the caricature–it’s nice to be considered intriguing just by telling a stranger what I do. I just feel like telling the truth today. Now if you’ll excuse me, I have to finish an article about a construction company, after which I will write about medical technology.
June 9, 2009
Lame t-shirt
I’m in the midst of researching an article on Generation Y (aka Millennials) and what we bring to the workplace. It’s been really fun so far, because research is essentially like reading my horoscope, only instead of being categorized in one of 12 months, it’s one of six 20-year spans. I get to read tonnes of material and feel validated because I relate.
Can we really lump millions of people into one category and call it an identity? Probably not. After all, not everyone born after 1980 is a tech-savvy, hyper-consumer with an Arts degree and a quarter-life crisis under his or her belt. There are plenty of exceptions to the non-rule.
However, if people are products of their culture, there could be something to the generational tendencies. While we don’t all line up on the Myers-Briggs personality test, we did experience the same social and political events in our formative years, which probably had an effect on our collective values. If nothing else, I think it’s worthwhile to pay attention to patterns of emerging paradigms, especially when they are as awesome as ours. The more I find out about what Gen Y is doing in the workplace, the more I’m glad I was born in the eighties.
Here are some highlights. Millennials:
This is great stuff. We are a generation that wants meaningful lives.
Gen Y-ers aren’t always met with open arms—labelled entitled and whiney, much like our post-war predecessors. As a group, our reputation for job hopping is met with disdain, as is our lack of willingness to wait around and pay dues.
To me, these aren’t necessarily bad qualities.
Dissenting tradition will always be frustrating for those who have clung to it for a long time. But I think it’s called fresh air when earning company loyalty takes more than a paycheque and when quick solutions are more valuable than keeping up appearances.
Like us or loathe us, Gen Y is a group to be reckoned with. As children of aging Boomers, the Gen Y population is large enough to make the changes that Gen X couldn’t. Now it’s a matter of what we’ll do with the influence. As not to be too proud, I am reminded of the hippies who grew up to run the very corporations they once despised. I’ll revisit this topic when I have a mortgage.
May 25, 2009
The Toronto Weekend to End Breast Cancer is on in September and we’re starting to see the commercials for it now. I love breasts. I don’t love cancer. So I’m definitley for the cause.
What I’m less enthusiastic about is the guilt-inducing promotion. This year’s campaign to get people to register for the city-wide walk uses the tagline “Breast cancer is hard. Walking isn’t.”
Maybe I’m overly sensetive, but I find this a little dramatic.
As far as disease organizations go, breast cancer has got to be among the most successful for fundraising. People are all over it. Pink ribbons are everywhere–on bumper stickers, sponges, pens, football fields, tupperware, t-shirts… you get the idea. They receive loads of support every year. I don’t think we need to be emotionally manipulated to get involved.
If the commercial was for anything else (i.e. homelessness or starving children), I like to believe I would be less irked. It’s not that breast cancer is less serious than other causes. But the organization has already done so well getting financial backing and media exposure that tactics like implying no one cares makes them sound ungrateful.
May 21, 2009
It’s getting warmer, hot even. It’s supposed to exceed 30°C in Toronto today—a nice, but slightly uncomfortable temperature if you’re anywhere but at the beach.
It’s one of those days when I’m glad I live in a developed country where air conditioning is not only available, but expected. There. I said it. I am a sinner among you. However environmentally terrorizing, air conditioning is a luxury that I happily take advantage of.
Now that my dirty laundry has aired, I need to say something important. There are limits. I repeat: there are limits. Air conditioning was created to make people comfortable, not cold. As I sit in my office—a.k.a. the refrigerator—my jacket is on. There is a literal breeze in here, except it’s constant and hardly refreshing.
Image from sangrea.net
I know my boss occasionally reads this blog…so I will give him a shout out along with a plee to fire the person who sits next to (and controls) the thermostat—a man who claims his long sleeve collared shirts make it unbearably hot in the summer. It’s a fair statement, except that it’s now colder in here than when it was outside in the winter. I think said man is secretly sadistic and likes to see me suffer—a fireable offense.
If he is, in fact, telling the truth about office dress codes, I wonder if we’ll start to see businesses adapt their expectations to suit the actual weather and not the artificial environment we create at the expense of Mother Nature. If mandated clothing is what is keeping businesses from reducing their GHG emissions, I think it’s fair to re-examine what is appropriate office attire.
Be advised, I am not arguing for mesh t-shirts or running shorts—then no one would be able to concentrate—all I’m saying is I don’t want to unpack my wool sweaters for June.
May 15, 2009
As a smaller-busted female, I take this personally. Just sayin.
May 6, 2009
If the name “swine flu” offends some Muslims and Jews and their sensetivities to pork, how do you think this gelato ad will weather in Catholic communities?
Call me crazy, but I don’t think people are going to be too keen on this baby–and not only because it’s not that clever. This is the sort of thing that agencies should just see coming.
I can’t imagine a bunch of copywriters in a boardroom thinking that this will slide under the table. Granted, controversy garners attention to the product, but you might as well post a billboard that says: “SEX! Now that I got your attention, buy this gelato”. Nyuk nyuk nyuk.
Sometimes advertisers let me down. These people are supposed to be society’s creatives. I think of big-shot agencies that take in stacks of portfolios every week, and then I see ads like this, and I am convinced that getting in to commercial advertising must be all about who you know.
I expect this in a brainstorming session, sure, but I also expect everyone else in the room to promptly belittle the idea and then move on.
Anyway religous fanatics, have at it. They’re probably counting on your shock and the power of your subsequent word of mouth promotion. Guh.
