A Coupla Advertising Memories*

I knew an art director in New York who worked at an agency in the Chrysler Building.  Early one morning she called in a bomb threat so she go to the Barney's Warehouse Sale.

I was working freelance for an agency that was in a new business pitch.  Most of the creative department was working fairly long hours, and one evening, maybe around 8, one of the (female) creatives came out of her office with a male coworker.  She walked across the common area and threw away their used condom.

We had a receptionist at one agency who was a bit dotty.  She was ancient, dressed inappropriately, had brittle over-bleached hair and wore a mask of makeup.  The reception area was the only place with any common seating so we'd congregate there on occasion.  One day she came out from behind her desk, hiked up her miniskirt and proceeded to adjust her stockings and garter belts.

Same area, some of us talking about local restaurants and eating out.  One of our admin chicks, a girl named Melinda walked up and interjected into the conversation: "Eat eat eat!  Doesn't anyone FUCK anymore?"

Same agency, the Creative Department hosted the Halloween party every year.  It was always a blow out and spouse/SOs were not invited.  This particular year one writer and a woman from the graphics department were having sex in his office.  As luck would have it the writer's wife showed up about the time they finished up their playdate.  Did I mention everyone is drunk at this point?  Anyway, Wife tries to open Writer's locked office door; other coworkers are trying to distract her; Writer opens the door looking as one does when one has just had sex and... Wife is outraged, goes into the office and proceeds the pull Writer's five-foot ficus plant out of its pot and starts to swing it at everything and anyone in her way.  I felt bad for the ficus.

Same party.  Two guys dressed up as the Blues Brothers, complete with little baggies of 'cocaine' (I think it was actually coffee creamer).  At the end of the night they threw the baggies away in one writer's office.  The next morning, we noticed that the cleaning crew had thoughtfully taken the baggies out of the trash and placed them on the writer's desk.

One of my first CDs was a great guy but very volatile - could get crazy angry at the drop of a hat.  One day I was sitting in my office and I saw his jambox go flying by my door.  Right behind it was CD, chasing it and beating it with a baseball bat.  He couldn't get it to work and come to find out it hadn't been fully plugged in.


*Several people have complimented me on this post (Elle, you should totally get PUBLISHED!)  But in the spirit of full disclosure, every story mentioned here is true.  The only thing I elaborated on was the jambox/baseball bat story.  It might have been a golf club.