Here’s a quick question to kick off Monday morning:

Which advert would you be most ashamed/ embarrassed/ humiliated to have on your showreel?

vs.

Agency fees are exactly the same, and you have to choose one…

I’m a strong believer that you shouldn’t bite the hand that feeds you.

In fact you shouldn’t bite, chew, nibble, gnaw, lick, burn, cut, slash, stab, pinch, hit, slap, poke fun at, or verbally abuse the hand that feeds you.

Even pointing at the hand that feeds you in the wrong way can be unwise.

Which is why I didn’t post this film last week when it was first circulated around the office. But, having had the weekend to think about it, this film could really be about any profession (if you changed a few of the words here and there) and it is actually quite funny. LOVE and their management would like to clarify that this film in no way reflects life in the agency or any of our clients, past or present.

It’s just a funny film with lots of swearing.

Thanks Jono.

As some of you will have already read our joint-MD Richard Hall left us on Wednesday to go traveling. He’s off to Peru, where, quite possibly he will see some stuff. Peruvian stuff. Although Rich has only been with us for a little over a year, he’s made a big impression on us, and he’ll be missed.

But we couldn’t let Rich leave without a few drinks and a nice card.

Good luck Rich and Katherine – we hope all your travels will be good ones.

Some things in life are so bad, they’re actually good.

And some things are so good, they’re actually bad.

And other things in life are so bad they are genuinely bad, but then over time they actually become good.

And then some things that are actually bad, seem good at first, but then go bad, only to come good again for a while, but then end up going back to being bad again.

And some things that are really, really bad, can be rescued by the use of a really, really good copywriter.

The film below is one such example. It was created on the premise that people would actually have a party in their own home to celebrate the launch of MS Windows 7.

Which is a bad premise.

It’s filmed with a group of really bad actors, and have been ’cleverly’ picked to  represent as many different groups as possible. (Male/Female, Black/White, Young/Old, Bespectacled/ Unbespectacled, etc) I couldn’t really work out if anyone from the LGBT community is represented here, but I’m sure it came up in the Pre Production Meeting. I figured the guy with the glasses might have been, but there’s a moment at 3.06 which makes me think he’s got something going with the old lady.

It all sounds like the proverbial recipe for disaster that our parents warned us about when we were younger. But what they haven’t overlooked here is the quality of the writing, which, in my humble opinion, like… totally saves this film and… y’know… gives it a natural, genuine feel.

It makes the unbelievable seem believable.

Perhaps it wasn’t scripted at all – they might have been ad-libbing – it’s difficult to tell. I think my favourite line is: “Oh my gosh, when everyone was there and settled I led an overview of some of my favourite Windows 7 features.”

Developer Rich commented that: “It looks great. Possibly the only way to better it is by beating each of the actors in the face with that laptop.”

I fail to see his point.

Two things of varying degrees of pain happened over the weekend.

Firstly our Finance Director Mr Paul Chorlton completed the Great North Run in a more than respectable 2 hours nine minutes, raising £855 for The Together Trust. If you’d like to add to that total you can do so here. Well done Paul and sister Emma. (Paul’s sister is  called Emma. She’s not a nun, to my knowledge.)

And secondly Freelance legend Mr Matt Booth had a baby boy, Oscar. Or at least his Mrs did. Many congratulations to all. Here’s a photo of Oscar in all his 6lb 3 oz of glory.

Rumours that toweling is covering a large tattoo are yet to be confirmed. But they haven’t been denied either.

In other news, Stephen Owen watched some telly at the weekend. Well done Ste.

Here’s a random “dump” of “things” for your “amusement” and “entertainment” this “Friday”.

First, the worst viral made that honestly didn’t use any digital effects.

(Chris, I know you said you liked this, but I’m getting bored of the whole “No we honestly, reeeeeeeeealy did this, promise” bull. (Pun very much intended.) And I don’t like bullfighting. Or even bull-teasing.)

Second, the best airline ever, which sadly closed in 1982.

More images and film about Braniff Airlines to be found here. Or have a quick read of their Wikipedia page.

Third, the ones with the hairy chests:

Fourth, the brilliantly pointless blog about the use of quotation marks.

Fifth, a nice stunt in Berlin for the WWF. (Animals, not wrestling.)

Not sure which agency did it, but you can see more images in their flickr group here, and there’s a video about it on YouTube here. Slightly more appealing than that other WWF “advert”.

And finally, Ste and Joe found a whole load of brand new posters on the street.  Yes, BRAND NEW. And thanks to their generosity, you too can share their fortune.

Still left unclaimed are posters of Brooke Burke (some damage to bottom corner), Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (x2), Fantastic Four (x3), Transformers, Pirates of the Caribbean and Evil Spiderman thing (above). If you’d like any of these, you should be doing your homework, not surfing the internet.

Have a good weekend. (Not you school kids, you should be studying for exams or something.)

If you answered ‘yes’ then you may also enjoy such pastimes as being rolled up in some carpet and dumped in a layby.

Thanks to Tom Myers for finding it on Robert Popper (aka Robin Cooper)’s brilliant blog. Which I could spend all day reading, but sadly I have work to do.

(If there are any clients reading this, when I say ’sadly’ I really mean ‘happily’. I just get mixed up sometimes.)

Last night we had eight young and talented designers and two young and talented copywriters in the agency with their portfolios. Shortly before they arrived I had a conversation with a member of the Creative Deaprtment who shall remain anonymous. It went something like this:

ME: “Stephen Owen, do you think you could take some shots of the evening for the blog?”

STE: “Yeah no problem.”

ME: “Thanks. We need to make it look like we’re really popular and groovy. Research shows us that people like groovy design agencies.”

STE: “And we are groovy.”

ME: “Yes, we are groovy, Stephen. But we need to be groovier. We want photos of groovy people, wearing groovy clothes, with groovy haircuts, drinking groovy drinks and having fun with other young, groovy people.”

STE: “I could get some groovy hats for people to wear?”

ME: “Groovy. And buy some groovy crisps while you’re at it. What crisps are all the groovy people eating these days?”

STE: “Cracked Black Pepper and Asparagus.”

ME: “Make it happen Ste.”

At this point we high-fived and went our separate ways. Sadly, at some point in the following minute, Ste forgot the conversation we’d had, and so there are no photos from Class last night.

It is also why there is a photo of Ste looking groovy instead.

Anyway, thank you Andy, Ben, Chris, Ed, Adrian, Meera, Nicola, Sarah, Nilesh and Mark for all turning up. It was extremely useful for us, and I hope you also found it beneficial in some way. The work was all excellent and we’ll be in contact as soon as I’m back from holiday, which may be never, but is more likely to be approximately 0847 on Monday 14th September.