Dear Sample A. Whitman:

Exciting news on the medical front. I understand that, in light of the success women have been having with breast self-exams, the next big thing is going to be prostate self-exams.

If I had a short story in me, which I don’t, it would be about a medical research guy who, in the process of testing a new drug against a sugar pill placebo, comes to realize what all before him have missed: that there is no such thing as the placebo effect. Rather, small doses of pure sucrose turn out to actually have phenomenal and wide-ranging healing effects.

Here’s what xrives me nuts. It’s not that, when you pul the plastic Glad trash bag out of the box, you invariably try to open the end that doesn’t open. It’s that, when you then go to the other end to open the bag, that end doesn’t open either, becasue you were right the first time, but you were already second-guessing yourself about having chosen that nd, so, in a self-fulfilling kind of way, you made a half-hearted attempt to open it, having already concluded that you guessed wrong about which end would open, thus failing to open the end that opens. If anyone has a suggestion as to how one can excape this maddening little quandary, please share.

By the way, I’m looking for a new challenge. If anybody out there has a particularly thorny advertising problem, or one that everyone else is sick of or has taken a crack at to no avail, why not let me have a shot at it. I love that kind of stuff. Here’s an example: You have an opportunity to buy some radio time real cheap. However, your client is Watsatiasai® Hearing Aids. Something like that.

Hey! that Ketchum/Rapp Colllins/Lions Clubs TV spot we did last year won a Finalist award at the New York Festivals (Andrea Trotenberg, Creative Director; Melanie Fiacchino, Art Director; Celeste Sciortino, Producer.) Of course, awards are meaningless, so forget I ever mentioned it.

Remember, only 52 more pruning days till Arbor Day.

Stoically,

 

“When things are really going well, be sure to notice it.” - Alex Vonnegut

“They say the first thing to go when you’re old is your legs or your eyesight. It isn’t true. The first thing to go is parallel parking.” - Kurt Vonnegut

Recently spotted bumper sticker: Duct tape is like The Force. It has a light side and a dark side, and it binds the unverse together.

“Is there gas in the car? Yes, there’s gas in the car.” - Steely Dan (from Kid Charlemagne)

“The real condition of advertising speech is not falsehood as much as a kind of truthlessness.” - Jonathan Dee