What small thing takes your anger from zero to 60 in one second flat?
Oh, it would surely be driving related. Like everyone else on Earth, I get pretty frustrated driving. My biggest pet peeves? People who don’t signal, and people who dilly dally in the fast lane. Especially turn signals. Please use them, ALWAYS. It costs nothing. I use them on private property, I use them pulling into a parking spot. I use them pulling into my driveway.
I learned that having a menacing vehicle is quite a useful partnership with turning signals. When I am in my truck, and I want to change lanes, the first thing I do is signal… before I even look. In the truck, when people see the signal, they tend to get out of the way (by speeding up or slowing down), which is great.
In the wife’s Subaru, though… the signal has no impact. I was so used to people moving when I signaled that I pulled the wife’s car over and checked the signals to see if they were working. When I signal in the wife’s Outback, people either ignore it, or speed up to close the gap and be dicks.
What took you years to connect the dots?
How the highway system is way better organized than I could have imagined. I learned a ton about this working for AAA, but some I knew. Like, highways that go vertically across the US are odd numbers. Freeway exit numbers match mile markers. That mile markers start from scratch at state lines. That 3 digit highways are loops that go around large metro areas. That highway numbers go up as you go North & East. – example… the lowest horizontal highway that goes across the US by width starts at the I-10… bottom of the country. I-40… still in the lower half, i-70… across the middle, 1-90… now you are at the tippy top of the country.
What would you say if you wanted someone to join your cult?
We have punch and pie! “more people will come if you have punch and pie!” – Eric Cartman. Or… free haircuts.
What is the most genius marketing strategy a company has ever used?
I like a good pivot. I remember the ads of my childhood, and apparently these were the plagues of the late 70s and early 80s America: dandruff, ring around the collar, and static cling. These issues seem to constitute 80% of all advertising. AND… you don’t hear anything about any of those things.
But a smart company lives and adapts. Look at Xerox. They used to make copiers. They probably still do. But, they saw the digital age coming, and the myth of the ‘paperless office’. Know what they do now? They run call centers. Thousands of them. Back to my mention above comes Bounce. Bounce is a dryer sheet that would stop static cling. Static cling isn’t so much a concern anymore… so now they advertise and sell themselves as a pet hair removal product.
Then – https://youtu.be/YkYlM13-nDA
Now
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3u1xGESru2k
What is a “how the fuck did I not know this” fact that you know?
For this, all credit and love goes to Rob Lowe. Look at this brilliant brief bit he did with the cast of Community after coming back from a hiatus. I think it is a Funny or Die clip, but please do enjoy. NSFW language. I have watched this prolly 30 times.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gJmT7jsfENo
I am Correct 