Consumer Escapes - The shallow end of the March Madness office pool

While I'm productively "working" by writing in a blog, every other working American it seems has his/her nose to the grindstone - the NCAA Men's Basketball grindstone that is. Why has this become such a gigantic mass escape? We don't fill out draw sheets for the NFL playoffs. It's certainly not the money. (I won a pool in 1989, lost every other year and am down hundreds of dollars.) I believe it's the need to "be right all the time" manifest in millions of office pools.

I can hear it now, "hey, how many did you get right in the first round? "Lose any of your Final Four teams yet?" Or, my favorite, "who's your bracket buster?" Note that they're your teams, regardless of where you actually went to college. Somehow by being correct in prognosticating, or a little more correct than your work mate, you're entitled to months of bragging rights.

So go Cornell, 'cause I've got a chance to get the edge on the whole finance department. Maybe later I'll post about those folks who complete multiple draw sheets. Shame on them ...

Thoughts on a final escape

For a year now I've been pontificating (occasionally ranting) about personal things and situations that have a broader connection to consumer escapes. At SMZ, we talk about helping make brands a part of the consumer's Escape Plan™. Most of the time the commentary has been light in tone, attempted to be whimsical, and hoped for the reader to make linkage to the pursuits of a serious advertising agency. Yesterday, with the loss of a family member I was reminded that the final escape - death - is no laughing matter.

My step mother-in-law, Susan Swift, courageously battled ALS, Lou Gehrig’s Disease, for years. And I mean battled! (I hope you never experience this disease first-hand, but I encourage you to read up on it.) Through Susan's final months, final days, final minutes, final breaths she was alert and in control. To the point of choosing how and when to escape pain and suffering to go to her final resting place. Susan was loved and she will be missed. Not for what she did for others, which is a list a mile long. Not for what she did for my wife and daughters, an equally long list. But for knowing when to live for herself, when to live for others, and ultimately, deciding when living was no longer living.

In my future posts I will try to stay to the task of discussing escapes that are genuine, meaningful respite from the every day. I don't need to waste time on the time wasters because if I learned anything from Susan's life, and death, it's that time is precious.

To our breath and dreams.
 Jamie

p.s. If you're so moved, memorial contributions may be made to Pathfinder International, Shake a Leg Miami, or Vitas Hospice Care.