Standing on the edge of the cliff with the cold glow of the cruel city spreading out before him, he thought of the harsh events from earlier that night. The call. The panicked voice. The scream. The shot. The dial tone. The race down the steps to the car. The mad dash to her house. The door off its hinges. The body. Not hers. Thank God. The note. The taunt. The rage-filled cry. The thirst. The liter-sized Diet Mountain Dew in the fridge. The search. And now, this. It felt good to finally be able to pee, standing on the edge of the cliff with the cold glow of the cruel city spreading out before him.

This morning, I noticed that the new little animated wheat-nugget-pillow feller for Kellogg’s Frosted Mini-Wheats Little Bites was a southpaw, which made me surprisingly happy, for I haven’t noticed much left-handedness in commercials lately. Thank you, Leo Burnett!

Have the focus groups and approval committees stifled use of the sinister side in advertising because it only represents 10% of the population and they don’t want to offend the majority? Or does left-handedness show up more often than I think, but I just haven’t noticed it?

Does anybody else out there know of examples where lefties made it into a produced and aired commercial?

“I’m flattered, you two. Really I am. But speaking as both your astrologer and marriage counselor, I really don’t see a threesome in our future.”

(a little something for small businesses, and also not-so-small businesses)

Much like college students and tattoos, there comes a time in many a young business’ life when it decides that it needs a slogan. Not wants, mind you—needs!

And just like the aforementioned college-era tattoos, some slogans turn out to be quite fetching, some turn out to be just fair to middlin’, and some turn out to be abominations that inspire facial reactions usually only reserved for the sight of messy diapers and roadkill.

The good ones are also the rarest.
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Nothing deters a cattle rustler quite like a well-branded herd, and with today’s technological advances in freeze and electrical branding, along with traditional fire branding, your ranch can sleep easy knowing that your livestock investment is safe and…

Ah. I’ve just been informed that this column was to be about the other type of personal branding. Sorry about that. I’ll try again.
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When producing a commercial, be careful how the words are wiped onto the screen.

“Sí, Armando. It is true that a great number of our people are highly educated and excellent writers and communicators, but then somebody throws in an unnecessary apostrophe and ruins everything. ¡uf!”

Challenge: Spot the two penis references from the following TV commercial screen grab! Whee!

Difficulty Level: Not hard

Do we really want to give Chrysler billions in bailouts when it has dealers like this?
Stay classy, Dodge of Burnsville, you big, thick, engorged & veiny auto dealer you!

Up next: We’ll examine the advertising of Wanker, Wisconsin’s Wiener Winnebago.

It was about time the old gal got her own toy.
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Rumor has it that this Taco Bell point-o-purchase display was copied almost exactly from a Heaven’s Gate recruitment poster. Sadly, extensive quick-service restaurant (QSR) research has shown that if you were greeted at the front counter with this level of manic enthusiasm, you’d most likely soil yourself, do a 180° and flee.