Okay, failure-in-the-making. It's brand new, and time will tell. But come on. This is more of an attempt at a corporate image makeover, which makes it that much worse. Ahem...nowthen: Burger King has created a fake "theme" band named CoqRoq. (Quickly check out BK.com and you'll see how prominently the site is featured.) That's right, CoqRoq. The joke being that since about seven or eight people worldwide thought that their Subservient Chicken site was worth visiting twice, and its "star" was some dude in a rooster costume, that it must be a good idea to stretch the theme another mile and a half. CoqRoq, the official band of Burger King. If you don't believe me, check it out now, cuz I doubt it'll last long. Yes it's true, Burger King does indeed have an "extreme" and "in your face" mascot rock band named CoqRoq, and yes, Burger King's business is indeed food.

People are getting paid to conceive of this shit—paid well. Sack the ad agency. Sack the Coq. Sack the rest of the band. But the best part of this story is this...read this very brief article. Okay, so the statements were caused by "malfunctions in the Flash and XML programming". She must have assumed that she was addressing a world of luddites, cuz this is a dumb, blatant lie of the worst kind: the kind that assumes the rest of the world is dumb and will buy it, while the opposite is true. You don't have to be a Flash/XML whiz to know that "malfunctions" are not going to be caused by Flash or XML, at least not in this way. It's like saying "the construction of this house is faulty because of the hammers and nails."

Uh, no, Edna, SVP for global communications for Burger King, Esq., this was a malfunction of your judgment.

She's an idiot. Sack her.

Side note: I haven't had one in a long time, but I absolutely LOVE whoppers. I might even be inclined to go get one again if I were to see an ad that convinced me that I'd be glad I did. Maybe some meek little guy in the corner of the board room should raise his hand and suggest that they revisit the food-centric ad campaign used during their largest growth period, stop over-thinking its target demographic, and stop inaccurately pandering to them. Gee, maybe. (If you can't even pander effectively, how can you get giant corporate ad contracts? Someone? Anyone? Little help?

Update: One day later, the CoqRoq link is no longer a feature of the bk.com home page. You can still find their embarrassingly bad idea at coqroq.com.

On a Completely Unrelated Note...

It's time to put the space shuttle to bed and dream bigger dreams. It's curious that there hasn't been any talk about why we're still using this old clunky, expensive technology, more than 25 years after it was introduced, when there are so many cheaper, cleaner alternatives that have been beyond proof phase for years...? I hope this is the last shuttle flight. Time to turn it into a giant museum. Space exploration HO!, but let's upgrade the ship, huh guys?

Labels: advertising

But you've heard enough about the weather.

Used to be that when thinking of beer, I'd want to check out lists like this and explore all kinds of exotic brews. Not anymore. Last summer, in an effort to shed a few lbs, I switched from Any beer to Michelob Ultra. I endured the slings and arrows; the words 'swill' and 'piss' were tossed around. Didn't take long before I went from tolerating it to really liking it to loving it to can't drink much of anything else. Beer-wise, that is. It's so light that Harp now feels heavy and difficult. Sam Adams? Fuggetaboudit. Tastes like a meal.

I Hate Huckabees

Nik and I watched the annoyingly titled "I Heart Huckabees" over the weekend. Someone told me it was good. It wasn't. It was one of the worst movies I've ever seen. Ever. I know exactly what it was trying to be; I know what it was trying to do. It achieved nothing but aggravation. It was a two hour nuisance. It's a film bent on conveying depth and metaperception while conveying and perceiving nothing. Instead of 'sound and fury', it finds its way to nothing through incessant chatter and chaos for chaos' sake. And it does this within a "comedy" wrapper, but don't be fooled: there's no laughter to be found in this movie. It might make you crack a brief grin once or twice, but when was that ever enough? It might very well be the most annoying movie ever made, and I'd like my three bucks back, plus interest.

Ads of the 50s & 60s

Love that early advertising art, particularly from the fifties and sixties. So many different artists seemed to converge on a style. This site has a nice collection worth checking out. Some of it's hilarious. My, how advertising has evolved...

Linkage

• Toothlessness in Appalachia has a nice ring to it.
• Okay, doesn't this collection of "featured marchers" smack of a little hypocrisy? These people all own their own jets. These jets eat more fuel and spit more junk into the air in a single cross-country trek than a Hummer will in a year. But the placards will read "Kill Your SUV" and the like. Laurie David, wife of billionaire comedy writer Larry David, is at the driver's seat of the anti-SUV crusade. Yet they own a Gulfstream jet and use it often. Cough cough...Throw a rock in the air, you'll hit someone guilty.
• Maybe this is the answer.
• I got a kick out of this Google earnings commentary.
• We're searching bags randomly in NY now. I'd be for this if the concept hadn't been overrun by the agents of political correctness. There are already reports of 85-year old ladies having their bags pillaged in the name of "fairness". This is the epitome of stupidity and waste. See the ACLU. You know, a little profiling would go a long way in this war on terrorism. It has ALWAYS been the way of wartime, and in wartime, you have to do what works, because you're trying to WIN. If it hurts a few feewings, then it hurts a few feewings.

Labels: commentary

So Microsoft has finally released the name of its next operating system. Windows Vista, eh? Can't say that I like the name. Phonetically, it's just a bit awkward. The "ohs" sound in Windows does not marry very nicely with V. It's not easy on the tongue. Windows XP was easy on the tongue. The "ohs" sound blended perfectly and strongly with "ex". Win-dohs ExPee. Sounds good. But Windows Vista...eh. Even worse, some will refer to it as Microsoft Vista, and that's bad nomenclature. The ft in Microsoft is horrid next to V. Say it. You can feel your tongue and lips performing acrobatics right between the two words. No flow. No grace.

Why they didn't hire somebody to consider these things is beyond me. Or maybe they did, and they selected someone really bad at it. But no, it was probably named by an executive committee with a dozen or so finalists pulled out of a hat. Or maybe it was a blind vote over bagels and doughnuts. Hey, I liked XP as an OS so I'll probably like Vista all the more. But come on...Windows Vista?

And this early promotional teaser page will probably be parodied all over the Web for the next month or so. They really lobbed an easy pitch, and folks like SlashDot will be swingin' for the fences. After all, how long as Longhorn been delayed? When did we first hear about it? Having people standing on a summit looking to the horizon just has a certain "Waiting for Godot" feel to it. That said, Microsoft has been quiet for so long that I wouldn't be surprised if they meet their goals for Vista and start a new cycle of growth.

England ought to listen to old recordings of Winston Churchill. England got hit again, but this time, thankfully, the terrorists failed to deliver any infidel souls to Allah. But on the news, BBC, CNN, Fox, MSNBC, I don't see any anger. I hate to say it, but I see more simpering than anger. This isn't the England of old. I figured I'd see and hear anger. Strength. Resolve. I expected British leadership to insist to a world audience that Muslim communities do more to help weed out the terrorists, and that Muslim leaders denounce terrorism, loudly, and without exception.

This is what has to happen. The Muslim world MUST step up and denounce this insane interpretation of their religion. They, after all, stand to lose the most if this shit continues. And it will continue.

While the mainstream media continues to keep us occupied with meaningless drivel, fascinating news continues to swarm around us, underreported, under considered, under the rug. It's an ongoing theme, and it will be until the trend reverses. Not holding my breath.

Labels: ponderage

Once upon a time somebody directed me to a blog—it was a parody of blogs and It Was Hilarious. I have tried and tried to remember the name of it, to no avail. I have searched for it and have found ripoffs, but the one I'm thinking of eludes me. It's not in my history, it's not in my bookmarks, it's nowhere. It was a blog that simply recorded, in excruciatingly boring detail, each day of a man's life. I can't find it (little help?), but for all I know it's 6 feet deep in the Page Not Found cemetery. Actually, the one I found might have been a ripoff of some other true original. That's how much I remember about it. I clicked, I laughed, I moved on. But then I laughed some more. In the car, in the shower, walking the dog. Certain phrases stuck to me and kept me giggling spontaneously. I'd like to find it again. I can't. But enough about the mystery. This is, after all, about mundanity.

In honor of this long lost source of boring hilarity, and to perhaps assist you, dear reader, in helping me hunt down The Original, I bring you the first five minutes of my Tuesday morning:

Ahem...

The dog licked my hand. That's how I got up. My left arm was a slab of meat. I had been sleeping on it all wrong, and now it felt like dead weight. This must be someone else's arm, cuz it sure as hell isn't mine. Can't even make a fist. It won't do what I think I'm telling it to do—like, move. It's also meat freezer cold cuz of the fan. And the lack of blood. Then comes the tingling. Then the alarm goes off but I can't use the dead arm, which is closest. But of course I tried, and knocked over the water that I had forgotten to drink last night.

I soaked up the water. I walked to the bathroom and had a piss. I say "had a piss" here and not "took a piss" because I heard an English fellow say this and I liked it. Taking doesn't really make sense, does it? Anyway I flushed it out of my life and had a look in the mirror. There's this one wrinkle under my eye that's always pronounced for the first half an hour or so of every day. It's how my face folds when I sleep on it. I looked at it for a while and shook my dead arm to get the blood flowing some more.

The dog came in and wagged her tail which means food would be nice but we both know that Nikki already fed her but she tries this every morning regardless. We've gotten our signals crossed and fed her twice just often enough to ensure that she'll never forget it. I almost don't notice the wagging anymore.

The toothpaste has no cap. Oh, there's the cap, at the bottom of the thing that we keep the toothpaste in. I squeezed out a dollop (which is a word I really hate but use it here just for the opportunity to say that I hate it) and went to work on the pearlies. I had read the day before that you can stay more mentally alert throughout the day if you switch up the habits you take for granted the most, like brushing with your dominant hand. I'd like to be able to try this out but my left arm now feels like it's the test subject for a thousand acupuncturists-in-training.

My forehead had an itch. I scratched it. This relieved the itch, and I continued to brush. I spat, rinsed, and stared at my morning wrinkle some more. I thought about rubbing some kind of lotion on it, something from Nikki's vast assortment of products, to see if it would look smaller tomorrow morning. I decided not to bother. I could make a fist now.

I turned and stared out the window for a minute. A mother was strolling her baby across the street. No one I know. The stroller had three wheels. It was blue. I thought, This would be a Folgers moment if I just had a cup of coffee to sip on.

I walked downstairs to make some coffee. I put the beans in the grinder. Not Folgers, mind you. Folgers sucks. But so does the coffee I stupidly bought at BJ's when we were stocking up on bottled water.

WAIT A MINUTE WAIT A MINUTE, I just read this back and it's all wrong. Completely off the mark in my attempt to rip off that blog that had cracked me up so. There wasn't any of this detail or reverie. It went more like this:

I got up. My arm was numb. I spilled some water trying to turn off the alarm. The dog was in my face. I had a piss and a shiver. Then I brushed my teeth and stared at my wrinkle in the mirror. Had a look out the window. Saw a mom with a baby in a blue stroller. I wanted coffee, so I went downstairs and made some. The dog followed me downstairs. The dog always follows me downstairs. The dog always follows me upstairs, too. A light was on so I turned it off. I stood in the middle of the room for a few seconds, forgetting what I was there to do.

Then I remembered: coffee. I made the coffee and then I drank the coffee, but at first it tasted like shit because I had brushed first. Sometimes I remember to drink the coffee first, and then brush. But not today.

[Thus ending the example, which is designed to both jog my memory and hopefully help you help me find the blog in question.]

Labels: commentary

• Last weekend my brother asked me who I thought would win the Open Championship. "So far, Tiger has won every major that Jack Nicklaus officially says goodbye to. It'll be four for four," I said. This didn't take any sleuthing, but I grin every time I hear the announcers call it Tiger's "Goodbye Slam". I also said that, like St. Andrews in 2000, it wouldn't be close. So far my crystal ball is gleaming. Gleaming I say.
• I had to stop work and watch Jack play his last competitive golf hole. I had to see him walk over the Swilken bridge one last time. His final drive was perfect, his final approach excellent, and his final professional stroke dropped in for birdie. A fitting end, and a par 72 on the oldest golf course in the world. I was misty, but hey. I mist easily. What really got me was seeing his caddie (son Steve) choking up, and Tom Watson weeping openly. The best ever is officially done. Sniff.



• Changing the subject a full 180 degrees, this made me laugh so loud my dog came running to see if I needed help.
• Read this brief article about one of our latest weapons: directed energy beams, just like in the moooveeez. I'm just glad we've got 'em, and not them, no matter who they are. (I'd like to say them is here, but I'd get emails.)
• Play Guess-the-Google and lemme know if you can beat my score of 231. (It'll take about 4 minutes)
• I've written a few training books on how to avoid creating Web sites that look like this. It's hard to believe how bad some sites still are out there. Anyway, seeing this great parody cracked me up. Now take a tour of the rest of the garden and be impressed.
• Fuggin China, man...
• Way to go, Jacques.
• And because it's Friday, the latest technology in beer tapping has arrived.

Labels: ponderage

If you follow golf in the slightest bit, you've heard the name Michelle Wie. If lint plays a larger role in your life than golf, you still might have heard the name Michelle Wie. She's the female Tiger Woods (in-the-making). She's 15, hits it a mile, has the short game and imagination of a seasoned pro, and might just make it to the 2006 Masters if she can win an exemption at this week's U.S. Amateur Public Links. I hope she makes it. It could help ensure that Martha Burke's Assholes Without an Argument (AWA) stay home.

But anyway, this girl is 6 feet tall, has a picture-perfect swing, looks to be headed for greatness, etc. But she still talks like a 15 year old girl, which makes her interviews slightly comical, and slightly uncomfortable. The only word that seems to fit those two opposites is, weird. Yes, her interviews are weird. The Brits might call it queer. They all go something like this:

Yes yes, she's only 15 and she has every right to be 15 and not be expected to sound like a seasoned orator. I'm not, like, knocking her. It's just a weebit funny. That's all. I'd close by saying "You go girl!", but I'm not much of a tired-Oprah-idiom borrower.

• Looky looky, Paris Hilton considers herself American Royalty. I was about to slap my forehead with the heel of my palm, but was too busy typing this already. As empty as she is, the media made her. The people who write and photograph for People and Us and the Enquirer—not to mention those who read these rags (sorry, Nugatory, but hey.)— helped make her the delusional tramp that she is. Don't feed the celebrity hubris machine. If you feel the urge to feed something useless, feed a pigeon instead.
• In a similar vein, (or is it vain?), I had to laugh when I read this CNN headline: People mag scores Pitt-Jolie photos . Wow, what a SCORE! Intrusive surveilance-style photographs of a fully clothed couple taking a kid for a ride on a minibike. Unbelievable score. Better than finding an ancient underwater city that could forever change what we think we know about ourselves and our history. Yep. Wouldn't want to report or follow up on that, would we ABC, CBS, NBC, Fox, CNN, et. al.? Nah. Not when all these celebrities are breaking up and forging new relationships.
• I've often wondered what that ol' coot Ross Perot was up to. I figured he wouldn't be playing shuffleboard and bingo in Florida. Gotta love an old guy who still has a need for speed.
• Finding the long lost notes of Sir Isaac Newton is incredibly cool.
• But this is cooler.
• Looks like we're headed for Summer of the Shark II.
• Forgive the cooler quip.
• Imagine sleepwalking your way up a 130' crane.
• This is great: Enter a keyword into "Montage-a-Google" and get back a montage of images from Google's search app for that keyword. Insta-posters.
• 4 million ain't a bad haul for a chunk of nearly-unusable land a clapboard hovel.
• The more I think about the U.S. retaining its control over the Internet's primary computers, the more I think it's a damn good idea.
• Zombie dogs, eh? Wonder where this is going.
• On its own, the death at the age of 82 of Paul Winchell, the voice of Tigger, wasn't strange. The fact that Piglet joined him the very next day sort of is.
• Is it me, or is there a giant four-fingered fist with a thumb that has a clearly delineated nail imprinted at the bottom of the Pacific, near the Marianas trench?

Labels: ponderage

I might be one of the few people left on the planet who likes desk calendars. You know, these things. I just like having it all there before me—no page flipping, nothing to tote. Each day represented by a nice 3" square. (If you can't fit all your reminders into a 3" square, write smaller, or better yet, simplify, simplify.)

They're probably not popular because they're an open book and anyone can see that you have a dentist appointment on the twelfth. (What word, twelfth...you have to type it slowly because your fingers CAN'T BELIEVE that's how it's spelled—try it.) But over-the-shoulder privacy concerns aside, desk calendars are the way to go.

But finding a good one is as hard as finding hens teeth, to use one of my grandmother's odd generational analogies. The only desk calendars I see are decked out in duckies and bunnies or some mawkish floral pattern. I...just...want...a plain one, please.

At the end of every month I crumple up another month of my life and toss it into my cool IKEA waste basket, which was even cooler before it acquired that mysterious brown sticky mass at the bottom. I just tossed June for an easy 2-pointer and missed. Maybe I should practice it more often.

But it occurred to me that I've been using desktop calendars since 1993, when I first started pushing papers around. It also occurred to me that I once used to save my "completed" months. Well, I looked and found a few from 1997. They were identical to my monthly discards of today. They invariably:

• are littered with phone numbers I can no longer identify. (The important ones are stored all nice and neat in my contact thingy, in case you think I'm Pigpen of the Office World.)
• are littered with doodles. Doodles happen whenever I'm on the phone.
• have at least one coffee stain. All coffee stains are drawn into something more interesting than a coffee stain.
• have at least one thing that I think merits saving, be it a phrase or a doodle.
• have at least one dire reminder of something or other, starred and arrowed to the point that it mars the appearance of the entire month.

In hindsight, the few things that I thought were worth saving were not. They have officially become basket fodder, many years too late. I'd say more about this, but there really isn't anything more to say about this and I've probably stretched it as it is. Happy 4th.

"Time is a great teacher, but unfortunately, it kills all its students."
- Hector Berlioz

Labels: at home