THE TRUTH
It is true I retired from teaching classes two terms ago.
It is true my husband, pets and I are moving to South America.
It is true there are other things to do on Thursdays than spend eight-ten hours on Skype.
Relative Real A$$holes: See Kamikaze Copywriting Occupational Safety Rules 18-22
To the student too slimy to face me with his opinion: It is true anyone - even I - can be an a$$hole. It is also true calling me one on a form without signing your name proves my assessment and you weren't paying attention.
The construction of your other sentence fragments revealed your secret identity as clearly as your signature would have.
Had you listened more closely, you might have learned something about alternate writing styles.
Great Line. Take it Out. Put it Back In. No, Take It Out. No
There was something in the same critique I'd like to clarify.
Yes, I sometimes make students change a line, then change it back. A sign of advancing senility? No, something I do in my own work all the time.
When you change one line - one word, one punctuation, one line break - in copy, it often dictates previously beloved lines must change with them. Adding or subtracting lines can also make the line we love obsolete.
A new approach may be so much better than your previous version. What was once your best line may now be the weakest.
At times, corrections in information, solidifying or changing the copy's style/voice/tense/whatever makes good lines go bad,
Other times, changing anything - or changing the whole thing - still doesn't solve the problem.
As frustrating as it may be for any writer, going through the above exercises only proves what a great - or lousy - line it really was.
It's part of the process. It also prepares you for clients, CDs and other higher ups who aren't happy with anything you write - until they change something.
The End?
I've never been a dependable blogger. I still owe readers several posts I promised and never delivered.
I am considering publishing this entire blog into several smaller booklets for distribution.
I am discussing publishing ebooks on various important subjects - everything from job interviewing to quitting to all you do in between - in tandem with at least two other "experts" with differing views.
I keep promising myself a new site, linked to this blog, to do those things plus a few goodies to help you concept, find work and show off your A shirt form (I had two my last term, so I must not have been
that big an a$$hole), connect with mentors and a host of other thoughts.
Right now, however, I have to sell everything we own (looking for stacking Russian dolls depicting President Bill Clinton and his most notorious paramours? How about three framed prints of various Dogs Playing Poker scenes?), find a place to live, probably in Cuenca, Ecuador (where even butterflies have humane constitutional rights), figure out the right CBD doses to keep the pets quiet on an International Flight and hug a few people good-bye.
Watch This Space
I'll let you know what's next as soon as the dust clears. Meanwhile, watch your Kamikaze Copy Sins. Keep those concepts Kamikaze.
If I pick up some freelance or get a question from a former or someone else's present student, I may even add posts here as they arise.
Keep Kamikaze Copywriting Occupational Safety Rules #21 and #22 in mind:
21. Just because he/she is an a$$hole does not mean you should be one. (Agencies know who the a$$holes are - if they're there, it's because someone much higher up than you feels they are somehow necessary.)
22. Keep your honest opinions of a$$holes to yourself. Remember. Advertising makes strange bedfellows (except for Safety Rules #9-#13.)
What are Safety Rules #9-#13? Something else I may publish.
