One of my early memories, from before I started school, so I must have been four years old, was my mother taking down Christmas decorations. It's a sad memory. It was early January. My dad had gone back to work (as a math teacher). My brother and sister had gone back to school. It was just mumsie and me. The house was sort of chilly and grey feeling. She put Christmas music on the record player. And methodically took down ornaments, wrapped them, and put them into the large cardboard carton where they lived. And she wept the whole time.…

Here's the story as it was told to us. One day, our friend Bobby Joe Jones was picking up his daughter at Brownies. He got there a little early, and was treated to a troop of little girls singing, "There was a farmer had a dog and Bingo was his name, oh, B-I-N-G-O, B-I-N-G-O, B-I-N-G-O, and Bingo was his name, oh!" Bobby Joe was an art director|producer at the time for J. Walter Thompson. And J. Walter had been given the assignment to differentiate Oscar Meyer Bologna. Bobby Joe morphed the two ideas and the result was this Clio Hall…

Smart little brother is back in town. Could you feel the lift in the median IQ of South Carolina about 7:00 this morning? He said the secret conversations with those people about that thing are going well. Nuff said.We're off to American Grocery. I'll give you a review. Yeeha! Good times.

This is a bit of a follow up to my post of June 13, in which I wrote about a mysterious car, with what looked like evidence of fowl play. I haven't gotten the chance to check in with the attendant, but the car is still there. As far as I know, it hasn't moved. Of course, the door is now closed. If I learn more, I'll fill you in. Here's my theory...Guy lives in the condos, next to the garage. Rolled in late at night, after a road trip, a little tired, perhaps a little tipsy. Opens the door…

I know this will seem a little out there, but I thought you might want to hear about the night, back in the late 1980s, when I met an angel on Green Avenue. There used to be an audio studio called Mark Five / Sandcastle, in a sort of industrial part of town off of White Horse Road. I was there producing some music for Quincy's Steakhouse late one night. I had been dropped off at the studio. And since I finished around 9:30, and since I lived not too far away, I decided to walk home. I was a…

Found a very convenient space on level two this morning. Then, as I was getting out of the car, I noticed a car across the way with the door open. I walked over and noticed that there was nobody in or near the car. Clothes were strewn across the back seat and passenger seat. Fast food bags and CDs in the passenger seat and on the floor. No dome light or door-open chime. Apparently the door had been open long enough to kill the battery (all night?). I reported this to the attendant, who immediately picked up the phone to…

Thursday morning, I'll be talking about branding to a group of small business people for the Chamber of Commerce East Side Council. This sort of thing is always a source of some anxiety for me, because no two of these folks need the same thing. Branding is so personal, ya know.I think I'll start by qualifying the group. How many are in retail? How many are in a service business? How many are in manufacturing (not a lot, I'm guessing)? Then, I'll probably talk about, "a brand is a promise." I like that approach to differential advantage-keeps you customer focused.…