The Honest and Genuine fable No 1

The Skeptic and the Cynic:

Once upon a time, a skeptic and a cynic boarded a cruise ship; and as they left port, the opening-night Gala dinner was held. Afterwards, the skeptic took his brandy and cigar with him onto the deck, because he wanted check out the lifeboats.

He noted their position, capacity and fitness-for-purpose.

All of a sudden, he noticed, underneath the top of one of the lifeboats that there was light escaping from beneath the tarpaulin.

Underneath - in a fully inflated life jacket - was the cynic.

And that is the difference between a skeptic and aa cynic.

Long, long ago, in an era far far away your genial hosts fulfilled a rather long held fancy - to be published in The Chap Magazine.

The problem was that the final feature was a savigly edited version and for many a month we thought the original was lost.

Until now.

Skimming through a hard drive we've just discovered the original which we very much hope you enjoy.

Mr Coleman’s TALES OF HONEST AND GENUINE SPORTING ENDEAVOUR: part one.
Sporting connoisseurs still speak in hushed tones of the tumultuous contest between noted duellist and gentleman adventurer, Enoch “Soames” Soames and Caswell Cornford, most notorious rake of late-Victorian and Edwardian England. It was the epoch-defining moment in that most gentlemanly of sports, Bar Billiards.

It was a battle between good and evil, self-improvement and self-abasement, their antipathy matched only by their adroitness and tailoring.

Relentless promotion of the feud by the mountebank, Cuthbert Le Fré, had raised the purse to an unimaginable ten guineas, with Soho’s Glasshouse Stores taproom erecting temporary galleries to accommodate the swell of spectators. Amongst the grotesque and sinister masses were Mr HG Wells - whose love of the game was well-known - and his close companions, Mr Bernard Shaw and Mr Elgar. Wells, indeed, cited the sport as one played in his vision of Utopia, entirely as a result of the nervous excitement this particular match gave him.

Their contrasting style of play was mirrored by their preparations. Mr. Soames partaking of many renowned tonics and elixirs, followed by a pioneering treatment to cleanse the body’s humours with Swiss oxygen (pictured, with Mr Le Fré);

Mr. Cornford’s provisions consisting of several large gamebirds, copious quantities of laudanum and a meticulous peregrination of local bordellos.

Once the pre-match exchange of Coats of Arms had taken place and the two gentlemen had posed for the commemorative Toby Jugs fired in their honour, the formalities drew to a close.

The two men barely contained their mutual repugnance at the opening handshake: an audible bark escaped Mr Soames as he identified Mr Cornford’s improperly turned shirt cuff.

Soon Mr Soames was in amongst the balls and scoring freely, prompting the other chap to nervously twirl his silver-topped cane – a gift from the young Nawab of Pataudi. And so the pattern was set: Soames studiously building breaks with sensible shot-making and little fuss; Cornford, cocksure, swaggering, audacious, by turns frustrated and then devastating.

“That is what the crowd pay to see!” sniped Mr Cornford, after potting an outrageous triple-cushion red, gesturing contemptuously at the lithographs placed around the arena celebrating Mr Soames’ endorsement of various pomades, nostrums and Mr Gillette’s new-fangled safety razor.

Mr Soames was ever the gentleman, never failing to doff his hat to his opponent in recognition of the role Lady Luck often plays in the sinking of one’s balls.

As the match meandered sedately to a climax, there was an interruption when several burly factotums had to be called to remove the excitable Mr Wells. His attempts at ‘thought transference’ had caused one of the gin drinking slatterns in the cheap seats to burst into a rendition of the music hall standard, ‘Ballyhooly’ – whose key of E Major was entirely inappropriate for a contest of such import.

With the final ball sunk and victory consummated for ‘Soames’ Soames, the two gladiators relinquished their steely grips on their cues, loosened their cravats and retired to their respective gentleman’s clubs.

It was not the first pitched battle between the two men Shaw later described as “the panjandrum and the popinjay”, and it would not be the last.

The iPint. Yes. That iPhone application that's been proudly sprayed across the creds of a certain ad agency as proof of their digital skills and fast paced ability to crack a simple idea that is spread by thousands.

Admit it - we've seen at least one plank in the pub using it - quaffing their imaginary lager to the delight of their equally hilarious chums.

And each time that H&G logged into the apps page - there it was - a constant reminder of what seemed to be a great, easy and of course free idea that users by their thousands downloaded much to the delight of Carling, the brand attached to the free Ap.

Except in a classic and frankly typical twist turns out the idea wasn't theirs. One of the team had seen it in America and decided to take the idea for their client.

Granted they offered to buy the licence from Hottrix (the actual creator), who politely declined as they were shifting plenty of units at $2.99 a pop.

So BMB thought, sod it, and stole the idea anyway. Allegedly of course.

Currently the latest state of play is that Hottrix are sueing for £7m for lost revenues and irrepparable damages.

Which brings me to this thought. If you blatently rip off someones elses idea and badge it as your own, then frankly, you deserve all you get.

Hot off the press H&G are excited about winning a Campaign Media Award for the Halifax and Sun partnership. The idea ?

We managed to convince News International to create a completely new newspaper for us. For a year. With our own journalist.

Well done us !

While one half of H&G is set in rant mode - and very good it was too - the other half of the dynamic duo has had a rather entertaining afternoon submerged in the land of records and 'bitchin beats'.

The tracks in question are for the up and coming Prodigy album 'Invaders Must Die'.

Look out festival land - some of these numbers are going to be huge live !

Hopefully look out for the anarchy that will hit the streets once the campaign goes live early next year.

Posters in flames ? You heard it here first.

How advertising works: part one...

Short answer: nobody knows. Slightly longer answer: if I knew, I wouldn't be here - I'd be enjoying my soon-to-be-submerged island in the Maldives.

What I hope H&G are here to do is to explain why certain things work and certain things don't.

And hopefully to have some fun at the same time.

Take, as a perfect example, the Cadbury's Gorilla. (Can you feel it, coming in the air tonight?).

Clearly, this was a critical success: winning all sorts of awards...and of course, increasing sales by a giant 9% year-on-year. Our favourite award was for our old agency which stood on stage and describe the TV strategy was about buying 'big spots'. Sorry, 'talkabout TV', whatever that hackney phrase might suggest !

Against a year where Cadbury's didn't advertise. Erm. Ah, well.... nope. No excuse. It didn't really work. Didn't. Work. At All. But industry people liked it.

So of course, it must reproduced with a further Magnum Opus. Which you are currently seeing as a bunch of airport trucks racing. To a theme tune of - currently - Bon Jovi.

Gentlemen: one cannot polish a turd. A sow's ear - or dog's puckering rectum - and this is just that.

Admit it: you don't know why anyone liked the Gorilla - and it didn't work then either - but you wish to recreate it, because the client wants "another one: just like that".

If you would like to know why it "worked" you know where we are.

JR

11.34 Jack says "I remember studying in college John Major's election victory in '92 as a demonstartion of how market research - which had Labour MILES ahead - is inadequate as a predictor of human behviour. Major won, but the polls had him losing by 6-7%; but when asked, people would not admit they were Conservative...but they did - in privacy - vote that way.

Analogy to America? Well, who, to a pollster, would admit they were a racist?

23:07 We've had some real issues over a flippant observation. McCain has a certain mannerism with his arms. Sort of like both arms with every gesture are being prodded up with two sticks. Kermit like. Think about it and let us know.

23:07 We've had some real issues over a flippant observation. McCain has a certain mannerism with his arms. Sort of like both arms with every gesture are being prodded up with two sticks. Kermit like. Think about it and let us know.

22:59 The Paxman debate now rages. They seem to be calling things already...madness...remember the 'hanging chads'

10:41 It's difficult. Really difficult. How can we sit here eating hot dogs and munching Us related snacks (cheeseits are winning)

10:45 We have Ugly Naked Guy over the road from us. It's official. Plums out and visible to us all so great excitement has reached H&G towers. It may just be about the downy hair we can revoltingly see but could it be a predictor of the lightly afro'd potential leader of the free world ?

10.37 Is that what Obama is about? The end of lying, the end of hypocrisy, the end of corruption? I would be very surprised if he is.

22:18 First time the 'Wasilla' factor is mentioned. We await a Jackie Onasis style montage of expensively dressed Alaskan Vice President hopefull waving frantically while also speaking. Almost a patting of head while rubbing stomach that could win her the top spot in US politics. Sorry. Second spot. For the moment.

22:25 We've taken a break from the 'real' coverage to branch into The Daily Show. Which we feel is a) funnier and frankly b) more accurate. Go Stewart !

22.27 Watching yesterday's Today Show and noting today's Guardian: what happens to satire should MLK/Rosa Parks/JFK/Jesus win? Disappointment awaits us. Like New Year 2000, something landmark and noteworthy happened, but nothing will be different. For New Year 2000, we based an exultory party on the birthdate of a fairytale figure no more real than Santa Claus (and no less human-created). Is Obama so different?

Does the world change because a black man has a chance to control America?

Fuck I hope so.

10.10 Dana Bash (CNN) should not be on TV. Or any visual medium. Anyone would think CNN was British judging their allowing ugly people like her on TV.

DISCLAIMER: H&G are in an emotionally heightened state and therefore judgemental today. You know, judgemental and intolerant, like Sarah Palin's God.

10:06 Bill Schnieder, the Peter Snow of America, spells out the terribly basic rules of democracy. ie that people vote and that someone counts the votes. We fear that this kind of coverage spells a worryingly 'basic' approach to coverage. Will there be Dimblebyesque insight or will it be hours of 'my fellow Americans'. We suspect the latter......

And today, and in deference to the joy of our last minute by minute blog on sport..tonight...it's the election night !

Stay tuned political fans and more soon....

And we ask one question to start things off.

10:01 Could Wolf Blitzer have been successful if he had not been christened Wolf Blitzer ?

Having landed safe and sound from Moscow there are several things that one half of H&G discovered.

Firstly, that the much vaunted Russian economy seemed to have collapsed while I was there.

The other that the other half of H&G has messed around with the 'Profile' section in order to use an amended version of this blog during an interview. For those wondering why Jack suddenly had control fear not.

The monkeys have only briefly been let out of the asylum.

So, a quick thanks to a sibling for this latest piece of breaking news.

We've always been partial to Bacon. Indeed in earlier posts you'll note that there are specific rules about the consumption of Bacon and Cheese in combination. But we hadn't noticed this site before.

H&G wish we had the time to actually write a full time blog on Bacon...but as there are so many things to critique or worship in this life we are greatful that there are others who can.

So. The final post for the great adventure. It's a short one really and that's because it's trying to sum up the frankly unsummariseable.

Russia is for want of the word.

Random.

More than the outback of Australia.

More than northern Laos.

And definitely more than most of India.

It's a place of utter confusion, suprise, mystery, incomphrehension, rudeness, charm and frankly the bizarre. But it's also wonderful and deeply historic with all that's been this adventure.

I've spent 2 weeks in one of Stalins great edifices to the world. One of his absolute 2 fingers to the West, and yet it's also strangely humbling to be in a place of historical significance, guarded by 3 old ladies and their two pet dogs.

I won't miss the inability to communicate even the most basic of desires...but everything else....

Well..what a roller coaster.

You shoud visit.

Customs, as HSBC have often told us, vary around the world. And I've just had this brought home to me by the fact that one of my colleagues has finally whispered in my ear that my habit of whisting has caused something of a stir in the office.

In Russia to whistle indoors is considered deeply bad form because it means that the person causing the offense is about to loose all their money. It also spreads the bad luck around.

So, suitable chargrined I thought it worth checking up on any other customs that I may have inadvertidely infringed.

It seems that I've upset several restaurant owners by not handing over my coat to the attendant. This dates back to the days when diners would come in from the cold covered in ice and snow. To drape onces riding cloak over the back of ones chair would therefore fill the establishment with a slushy mess - hardly the done thing.

When giving flowers one should only give odd numbers. Unless that person is dead. Pretty clear I think and not one that I've upset anyone yet with !

Before leaving the house for even a couple of days, all members should sit in silence and contemplate life for a moment.

Then finally, shaking hands while wearing gloves is utterly unacceptable - even if it's many degrees below zero. The only exception is if you are a person of such extreme power that you extend your hand in the intended 'shake this you insignificant insect'. there's a rather good story about glove wearing and indeed shaking between a former head of my former agency and someone else also rather senior within the same company.

I'll tell it to anyone who knows me - and it rewards every retelling !

Another tale from Moscow, albeit short but hopefully rather sweet.

Traffic is a bit on an issue. In fact it's been known for a relatively simple journey to take 2 hours or more, if one strikes Lady Luck unawares.

So the great and the good of this fair city have a failsafe plan. Blue sirens for all important people.

Like a never ending episode of The Sweeney various unmarked cars go hurtling past, with large stick on siren resplendant and coiled black wire trailing back inside the vehicle.

'Must be an important politician I mused'.

Except it seems that with typical Russian attitude the occupants might not be quite so important.

It seems that local Russians, seeing in their eyes as something of an opportunity to get home for tea quicker, have been purchasing said blue sirens by the box-load.

So we're now in an intruiging situation where the local police, knowing of this blatent law breaking, are now periodically stopping supposedly important cars on the off chance that it's a miscreant.

I'd love to see the look on officer Vlad when he opens the door to see Mr Putin staring back !

Leaves. Not the most dramatic of openings I will confess, however as Autumn hits Moscow it's all proving quite dramatic for the locals. You see Moscow is blest with two things of relevance to this musing. Many trees and a desire for civic neatness.

Which means that with a State eager to ensure high employment there's no reason to have such pesky things littering the pavements or parks. So everywhere you look there are people equipped with rather feeble brooms frantically sweeping and tidying the never ending application of Autumns golden, leafy blanket.

It's a mission that can never be completed and one due to play out for the next few weeks, puzzling me no end.

The question I keep asking myself is this. 'Why not switch from daily to weekly sweeping ?'.

At least that way I, and al l the other children in Russia, can enjoy kicking our feet through them before they're tidied up !

Strolling through Victory Park, a place built in memory of the defeat of the Germans, I've been struck by the prevelance of flowers in Moscow.

While Amsterdam is famed for it's stalls of tulips I've never really seen the locals carrying them that much.

But in Moscow everyone seems to be clutching bouquets flowers. Men. Women. Young and Old. They're clealry wrapped as gifts for others but I thought what a great and unremarked custom. Whoever you are to bring flowers to the person you're visiting.

Makes me want a return to pipes and hats all over again.

Todays entry concerns weddings. Customs vary across the world. For many it's a special day celebrated with friends. For others it's an elopement to the Little Chapel of Love in Vegas. But for Moscovites things follow a rather different routine.

Weddings, you see, happen very early in the day in Moscow. Why is that I here you ask ?

Well that's so that they can hare around the city in stretch limos all day desperately trying to ensure that they have their photo taken in front of every key monument in the city.

Fountain with ponies. Check

Tomb of unknow soldier. Check

Bridge looking over vast Peter the Great statue. Check

Lenins tomb. Check

The list goes on - but what makes this giant photo race all the more amusing is the quantity of brides jostling for position for the next photo.

My host and I spent a happy half an hour just standing watching the bridal carnage as it swept past...groom looking suitably hangdog and the rest of the bridal party desperately trying to keep up.

Perhaps made all the funnier if you then set these monuments within sea of general tourists that are already there.

It made for quite a sight !

Last night I braved my local highstreet intent, not on staying in, but braving my lack of language and indeed alphabetical knowledge to get something other than a European meal.

I wanted meat Russian style and I knew it !

But here was the catch. After 30 minutes of walking around and beseiged by a fearsome array of illuminated and flashing signs I was unable to discern what lay behind them. Windows are often either blacked out or papered over and there are no handy menus to pick from. Was it a 24 hour techno club, a strip bar or a fine restaurant ?

So I grasped the nettle with a bar that I could at least see served beer (and that is an international word wherever one travels!). It opened out to become a full Metro theme bar - the Soviet underground recreated before me.

I spied an escalator going down, dodged the guard standing at the top by wagging a single finger and pointing at my chest - which I hope conveyed the sense of 'there's only me, I won't take up much space' to be greeted by the most wonderful scene.

Carriages, signs, stained glass, chocolate brown couches and booths. Heaven !

Then came the true challenge. Beer was delivered alongside a menu.

No pictures.
All writing in cyrillic.

Ooops.

I reached into my bag for the guidebook I had been lent confidently turning to the section at the back containing simple words and translations. This section, the one guaranteed part of every guidebook wasn't there. Nothing. So I plucked the only Russian food I could think of out of the air and with a grin repeated 'Stroganoff' until my waitress understood.

Was it worth it ?

It was magnificent.

Next week watch this space. I'm going to try for dessert as well !

Todays musing concerns TGI, that bastion, or not of consumer research.

Much amusement has always focused around the relative bluntness of 'lifestyle statements' which ask respondents on the level to which they agree to a long and sometimes amusing list of questions about their attitudes to the world around them.

Corkers from the UK questionaire include the likes of ;

'real men drink beer', 'I like to drive fast' and 'a womans place is in the home'

But it's been fascinating looking through the equivalent Russian survey which has a rather eyeopening list which include 'sometimes I think of things which it is better not to mention to others', 'it is unwise to express your opinion', 'Russia should ban imported products' and my favourite....'I am proud that I have both masculine and feminine characteristics'.

My point is not to chuckle..but to say this. You can do a lot worse when learning about a culture of a nation by reading the kind of questions that are asked in surveys.

Fascinating stuff.

Rain has finally made it to Moscow and it changes the view rather a lot from my concrete building. Somehow everyones shoulders are just that little bit more hunched and a the bright lights of packed (but extraordinarily expensive) clubs and dining places seem a little more tempting.

However tonight I'm hoping to leave with enough time to contentedly purchase a bottle of wine and something European and then the wonders of Slingbox will be unfolded.

Slingbox for those that don't know is a rather nifty gizmo that plugs into your Sky+ back in blighty and then connects remotely to a foreign land via the interweb. So much so technology advance. But what I love is that feeling that when you press a button something happens a long way away as the method of communication are the infra red sensors setup in front of the UK Sky box.

Pressing a button in Moscow is actually more long distance remote than broadband...which reminds me of the first ever remote control VCR players.

My dad brought it home and proudly set it up. The only thing was it was pre infrared. So the 'remote' was actually a large, black, snaking cable designed mainly to trip up any tray carrying mother that ventured into the room.

And if you remember such a thing consider yourself dated to over 36 !

Today the language challenge vs food capture starts. Our man from Moscow had been reduce to gesticulating wildly and pointing at various food sources in shops and delis in an effort to get fed.

After 45 minutes I had 'captured' 3 peaches and a packet of 6 rather tasty lemon muffins. It has to be said I'd also had to pass up on several stalls selling hot and good looking cheese and ham paninis but how to order.

The alphabet is different. The language barrier absolute. Only those items in reach of my finger tips could be obtained and never before had I imagined that I would be rendered as mute as a red faced Harry Enfield type holiday maker on a sunny beach holiday. Not even speaking slowly would conquer this divide.

So to the gap toothed and amused Russian lady who finally twigged what I wanted I offer my thanks !

So what of dinner I hear you ask ?

I'm working on the pronuciation for 'beer' as we speak. Hopefully this will suffice !

On another note I was woken by a loud explosion at 5am outside the window. I'm staying on the 12th floor so as you can imagine it was rather disturbing. In my sleepy haze flashes of Armageddon and urban warfare made my cower beneath my blanket.

Fortunately for this write it seems to have been a firework.

Why it was let off at 5am I shall never know.

But I live to write another entry.

'til then I bid you adieu.

This week, H&G are on international duty. While one half languishes rather nicely in Vegas racking up his debts before his softball tournament the other is earning a brief crust in Moscow.

How very Credit Crunch avoiding of us both.

So today sees my attempt to understand and navigate the entire Russian media market in the space of a morning before the team start their planning work on Coke.

Things are very much the same as when I started in media. TV is starting to become fragmented but only just. The internet reaches only 25% of the population. And Cinema still doesn't get used because it's so expensive. With increasing wealth and general optimism about the future people have more time for entertainment and spending on themselves but that means more time commuting and less time with the family.

So much so different !!!!

The biggest challenges it seems are the trading ones still rather fond of big TV buys of coverage instead of planning to where the audiences are going or spending their quality time.

We shall see if by the time I leave the concept of word of mouth can even be introduced. At the time of writing that's a very alien concept !

Much was made yesterday about the long awaited switch-on for the Large Hadron Collider.

But none of the commentary tickled us quite as much as the words of page 3 'stunna', Keeley.

Now we're all aware that the small text box is never written by the model herself the joby being given to a low level hack forced to churn out cheery assessments of the days news and turn them into into a haiku of believable model speak.

So hats off to whoever wrote yesterdays piece because it brought a wry smile to our lips.

'Keeley can't wait for boffins to turn on the Large Hadron Collider today. She said 'It's so exciting. The machine's main purpose is to explore the validity and limitations of the current theoretical picture of particle physics'

LOL !

Dare we admit that time has flown rather fast of late. Turmoil has hit H&G towers of late, but with a location on the 10th floor this write is much improved !



And it's therefore with pleasure that we showcase our latest work for the Halifax and it's offshore banking services.



You see it's rather hard to target Expats because, well, they live everywhere. They're all rather different kinds of people. And they've all moved abroad for many reasons. Some for filthy lucre. Others to open that long dreamed about bar in the Costa Del Sol !



So instead of racing around in the internet chasing British Expats for their money, we created something for them instead that they wanted. An Expats newspaper. Fully staffed by journalists.



And written for us by The Sun.



Go to www.thesun.co.uk/expats



Enjoy !

A rather nifty tool was brought to our attention this fair morning by a fellow blogger. Head to 'wordie' and you can enter either a series of words or a url, then play around with fonts, colours and layout.

A masterpiece such as this can be created.

News has reached H&G of the latest viral work of contempt for Vauxhalls Insignia launch. We get the Men in Black take off but don't understand the following

Why doesn’t the car drive out of the alien spaceship hole ?
Why does it drop from the sky ?
Why are their women suddenly serenading us ?
And why is it targeted at holiday makers walking down the South Bank ?

£30,000 spent on talking to a group of people who probably don’t even have the Vauxhall brand, because it’s called Opal in Europe.

Just had the latest edit of some recent work we did on Streetcrime using a tip top Txtual Healing artist, Paul Notzold, out and about in Shephards Bush. We asked passers by to tell us what they thought about Streetcrime.

They answered in their droves

H&G have had a long long few weeks pitching on the beloved Channel 4 account. We await the news of the result with trepidation. However, something during the process has got us to thinking about a new, and of course, occasional series.

The Pitch Video.

The reason for this post - well, that would be the delight that we've found in watching one of our competitive agencies pitch group on Facebook. One which through their clearly poor digital expertise they forgot to make private. Yes dear reader. MEC has been supplying agency land with free mirth for the last few weeks with their 'amusing' Big Brother type videos proving that 'MECIS4Real'.

All I can say is.


Click here...to Enjoy.

So, Wimbledon, fourth set, and this is what makes Britain great:

Federer takes the plastic off his replacement racket and the ball boy takes the plastic off him and puts in the bin. They have a bin - a standard, swing-opening, freestanding unit in Wimbledon branded colours - on Centre Court. To teach you good refuse disposal habits, I think.

Would you get that at any other final anywhere else in the world? I say no.

As submitted to the Hard Sell column in the Guide section in the Saturday Guardian newspaper.

SOMERFIELD

There is a grand, venerable literary tradition known as "alternative history". Put simply, these novels are thought experiments defined by a high-concept 'what-if?' premise; what if Britain had beaten America in the War of Independence, what if Geoff Hurst's second goal hadn't crossed the line, and the daddy of them all:what if Hitler had won the War?

While Radio 4 have dabbled with the genre, it has been left to Somerfield to pioneer its use in TV commercials.

It's the year 2003 - as denoted by the slavish rendition of Busted haystack haircuts on the teenagers - and a typical Arian family are trouping around the downmarket suburban hellhole of Somerfield, and yet when the first impish scamp opens his charming stage school gob, a stream of estuary English burbles forth.

As the nightmarish proto-past unfolds, the viewer begins to look for subtle signs in the mise-en-scene, the better with which to clue us in on those little differences which the Reich regime has wrought. But no, there is no bratwurst aisle where the crisps used to be, no lederhosen-ed surly school leaver shop assistants, an certainly no sudden ruthless efficienct to the shopping experience.

It seems as though a benign dictatorship is in progress, where ice cream is half price and bog roll two-for-the-price-of-one. But in a twist worthy of M Night Shymalan, the horrible truth of the Fuhher's victorious legacy is revealed in the appaling non-joke ending: in just 50 years, they have expunged all traces of British humour.

The first ever H&G TV diary begins here:

8.08 Italy v France...loser goes home...hopefully the winner does too.

8.09 Timmy Ribery carried off. I, for one, as a fan of the ugly footballer, am disappointed.

8.11 How many dodgy penalties and decisions do the Italians get in major tournaments? Oh, and here comes Jean-Alain Boumsong, who was such a success at Newcastle.

8.14 Misses his fourth chance of the game...fumbling monkey.

8.15 Five chances in the game.

8.15.1 Severed horses head arrives in Tonis bed.

8: 17 Fellow commentator comments 'Sidney Govou, if he signed for Cardiif City I'd be devasted' and 'I hate the Italians'. The commentary box is awash with optimism and fellow Euro love.

8:18 Mark Lawrenson uses most soulful, disappointed sigh to emphasise the words 'woefull, just unbelievable' as Motson witters on with another pointless '1970's' statistic.

8:23 Free kick. Motson unable to pronounce 'Bouffant' in any other accent than 'Boooooofont'. Lawrenson clicks his teeth unhappily at the dialect difference.

8:25 A slight diversion of conversation has resulted in the most excellent agreement. That we are pleased that we are the very few who believe that cheese is always better than chocolate. Instantly we are setting up the Facebook group 'cheese is way better than chocolate'. The link will follow soon.

8:41 To alleviate the nonsense being talked about by Hanson and that wee little chippy one from Aston Villa the group is created. 'Cheese is way better than chocolate'. Join us now.

8.49 the whole bbc studio is miserable. they've a lovely foreign jolly, spend all day playing golf, and look like they're playing Who-The-Fuck-Just-Farted?

9:01 The football is back. The goal from the Dutch gives the Italians a huge chance but Benzema is flailing around, a small child desperate for his poorly analogised toy.

9:02 Commentary team taking a quick break due to arrival of wet Brie and wild boar slices. There will be no pieces of chocolate cake (for obvious reasons) and cups of tea like the usual Cricket Brian Johnston team in this box.

9:12 We've decided to avoid the Italian goal so we can play poker. And eat more wild boar. Unprofessional but certainly pleasant. And agreeable.

9.12 Will just mentioned Portuguese holding midfielder, Deco. He's my vote for Most-Likely-to-be-a-Waiter-Who-Flirts-with-Your Mum-On-Holiday Award.

9:30 It's official. The Italians have got to the ref. A corner to the French. No. An innocuous challenge by Henry. Yellow card. Shame on them.

9:37 Question. Which Italian player if handed a banjo and asked to hit a cows arse would not be able to hit it ?

9:38 Answer. If you need to read that you haven't read our general thesis on 'Toni, wonderprat'

9:39 Oh god let it stop. The BBC crew have excelled themsleves in dour commentary. OK, we know the British suck. We're disappointed as well. But your sunning yourself in warm temperatures doing nowt but look a bit sad. Stop being Emo. Cheer the f*ck up !

Here at H&G we've been a little tardy of late. Work and a few other commitments to the cause have left us a little short of time, but there's nothing like poor work to pull us back into the game.

However there's nothing even more like poor work that costs clients a fortune to really get our mouths foaming.

Reader, we present for your scrutiny, the latest National Insurance Savings ad.

3 months ago : After several failed tissue meetings, 'Agency' runs out of ideas

2 months ago : Late one night the bottom drawer of 'Celebrity' gets broken open.

Today : A Caruso like montage of clever Celebs expouds the joys of NIS.

Now don't get us wrong. We know people. And people sometimes like those nice men off the telly. They trust them a little more than offficial looking folk in white costs professing clinical trials. But we should credit them with the ability to spot phony, poorly scripted, bowel-slackeningly bad copy.

It's nothing short of the worst ever 'perfect day' take-off ever audaciously presented and then bought by any single client.

Good luck credit crunch.

Excerpt number 53 from H&G's file marked: "Misplaced Outrage".



ITV have been fined 5 million quid. Apparently Robbie Williams would only present the "People's Choice award" at the 2005 British Comedy Awards if Antandec won, so producers announced them as winners even though Catherine Tate garnered the most votes.



The outrage is that the Great British Public ran up a £7.8 million phone bill voting on this, clearly with the highest percentage of these freespending culture-vultures believing that Catherine Tate is the funniest person in Britain.



What?



In these negative equity, 30,000 die-in-Burma, $122-a-barrel-oil-price times, people are spending that kind of money on some arbitrary, empty and meaningless phone poll?



That, my friends, is an outrage.



And check out the sentences highlighted in bold above.



And they did it to vote for Catherine Tate.

Here at H&G our generosity knows no bounds so we've decided for a limited time to give away 100 free cases of Becks. Yes, that's right.

FREE BEER.

If you'd like to apply then click here to submit your name and email address and we'll get back to you soon !

Sometimes it's important to raise the key things in the industry.

Sometimes it's more important to smile.

Thankyou Chuck Norris fans for this all time great one.

Our favourite 'Chuck Norris is suing Myspace for taking the name of what he calls everything around you'.

Genius

Campaign Magazine asked H&G to give their perspective on a key issue and the below article is an advance copy for our readers to peruse prior to the June publicatation date. We hope you enjoy.

PLANNING SANS FRONTIÈRES

The development of mankind can be measured by bursts of invention. Since the discovery of fire and Homo erectus learned the pleasure of his first barbeque, these fundamental occurrences have signalled great leaps in our ability to control and harness the world around us.

In similar, albeit less dramatic fashion, the microcosm of advertising can also be charted. Fixed boundaries that agencies work within, slowly moving outwards with each new media, creative or technology development.

The first major change came when TV audiences fragmented away from their annual date with Morecombe and Wise and planners slowly realised that 400 TVRs no longer constituted a targeted strategy. Equally when the Outdoor industry began to measure exposure based on eyeballs rather than traffic count, this new information allowed planners to avoid the barely visible sites secreted under dark railway arches in favour of more effective ones. The list goes on.

In short, planners adapted and improved their targeting. However, they did so on their own terms and, as change occurred infrequently, in their own time scale. The boundaries within which they had planned only moved in small increments, so their thinking only had to make small adaptations as well. Posters became lenticular but remained the same size. TV spots made gestures towards interactivity but were still, first and foremost, TV spots.

Yet with Digital things are moving at such a speed, and across so many different aspects, that many planners are struggling to keep abreast. Social Networks, personalisation, convergence, user generated content and peer to peer sharing are just a flavour of the new digital reality. A dazzling list of new unchartered areas with no rate card or easy menu from which to buy or well trodden format within which to illustrate your creative genius.

For planners, as creatures of habit, boundaries are comfortable and offer something safe to plan within. Campaigns can be referenced historically and results quantified by case studies. So ask a planner to move outside their comfort zone and more often than not things fall apart.

But where some find this uncomfortable I believe we should embrace this liberalisation of thinking. It reminds me of the Playstation launch tv script which said to play was to live ‘a life of exhilaration, of missed heartbeats, to command armies and conquered worlds’. In digital we can do this. We can literally create new worlds, we can mobilise a nation, we can build free services for our audiences and we can give them a platform and a voice.

Best of all. They get to decide. Great ideas are shared. Bad ideas ignored.

If you work in an agency, doesn’t that send a shiver of excitement down your spine? If you are a client don’t you want your team to be inspired by an explosion of opportunity rather than fearful of it?

Enough of the theory. The key areas for me are as follows. The first is with audience research. In traditional offline media thinking the world of audiences is built on research anchored, or more accurately, weighed down, by the UK base from which its research is driven. In addition some of it may be months or years old. Every single offline media strategy is therefore based on historic UK consumption.

Why should we settle for this ? How can we aim to influence audiences habits when all we’ve done is look backwards ? How can we justify creating future facing plans based entirely on what people used to do?

In Digital we don’t need to be constrained by these boundaries. Digital behaviours ebb and flow across the world and trends in Asia and the US filter through the ether to affect the UK.
Understand this flow of audience behaviour, of global trends becoming local, and we can glimpse insights that traditional media with their historic research can only hope to achieve.

If planners must open their eyes to this new era, then we are also obliged to help media owners and clients do the same. Our ideas are given credence and stature by the partnerships that we form, the sites or digital spaces that have a particular audience, or by an editorial perspective that we find appealing for our clients messages. So we must inspire if we are to create.

Of course, some agencies will be happy to continue in the status quo, cheerfully trading within the boundaries in the same old ways. But if you want to create something new you need to work closely with both sales and editorial and you have to pitch your idea to them as if they were clients not servants.

Finally, for clients we need to educate as well and inspire. They have a raft of agencies all vying for the lead voice. Yet no-one has a divine right or deserves a monopoly. Not the traditional creative agency. Not the media agency with the big poster budgets. And not the digital agency. Finally, the Comms agency which demands to be ringmaster in a hazy hypnotists blur of neutrality has no worse or better claim to lead the debate. Just because you have no financial bias toward using any specific media doesn’t offset the simple truth that you may not have had a decent idea to begin with. So why should you be first to speak?

Crucially, then, the boundaries of who should lead the debate must also be broken down. Today it’s about great ideas leading the debate rather than a pre-ordained hierarchy of knowledge. The agency that comes up with the idea the client loves leads things. It’s that simple.

I accept that with this comes potential for conflict but we must recognise that if we think we know the answer then we shouldn’t be afraid to stand up and say it. This the only way we can look each other in the eye and know we did our job. Great work driving great results for our clients.

That’s the opportunity we now have. An age of digital enlightenment where the critical mass of audience volume, the growing understanding of marketeers and the talent within the digital world have converged. Agencies that have the ability to harness these facets using a global perspective and a team of people with interests and expertise beyond traditional disciplines will flourish. These are the ones best paced to plan without boundaries.

The question is, are you up for the challenge?

Ah....the japes of April Fools Day. Humourous stories embedded in Tabloid tales that trick the gullible and silly.

Yet it falls to the BBC to create something that puts a smile on your face. Not quite Perfect Day, but still pretty sweet none the less.

Not wanting this blog to merely become the fickle analysis of Celebrities who look like celebrities it has to be said that admittedly, there's been a glut of late.

So to ensure that a realism is applied to our heady mirth one final entry for the month. Perhaps admittedly a more lateral suggestion.

Orlando Bloom and a plank of wood. What say you ?

Lookalike # 4,132: Franck Ribery and Timmy.

Sometimes, being Honest and Genuine hurts us a little.

Time for a guest post now, from Mrs. H&G, one of our earthmothers.

It's a proper hate rant:

"Right, Zac Fucking Goldsmith. Scythe him offat thehip ? at the knees. Why?

What does he know about hardship?"

'Beauty'. Not a word often coupled with 'Internet'. Occassionally however something seriously pretty arrives on our desk - and the new Adobe Creative Suite is testament to that.

Click on the link, slide the red bar all the way to the right and then turn up your speakers for a sumptous playing card related extravaganza.

Lookalike number 3:

Of course there are differences, one is trying to take over the world with evil schemes, purely for his own greedy, venal ends, while attempting to vanquish plucky Brits along the way....oh, hang on.

Simply do the voice in your head:

Dracula family they are....hmmm...the Nazi force is strong with Price Philip....like crocodile his wife is....

Cool stuff sometimes just happens.


So we bring you 'Sleeveface' (def : one or more persons obscuring or augmenting any part of their body or bodies with record sleeve(s) causing an illusion).

It's superb - next week we'll bring you the H&G results

Sometimes, dear readers, this august organ addresses the more pressing matters in life. At others a more laconical eyebrow is raised at the curios that surround us. This entry is just one of those.


It was with great delight that we recently saw a feature about the deception of squirrels. Apparently 1 in 5 of all 'nut burials' are actually faked. Indeed, when rumbled at their wicked wheeze they are actually then prone to increase their fakery. Holes are dug. Leaves carefully spread over the top. Yet not a nut is to be found. All in an attempt to hide the real stash.


So why were we so tickled you may ask ?

Because we've found someone comparable to our much loved John Malkovich. Finally the mantle of the 'guilty of plenty of acting' award can be passed to a more deserving hero.

A philosophical debate has long meandered around the question 'if a tree falls in the forest and nobody is there to hear it, does it make a sound?'.

And with advertising awards season open for another year we at H&G pose this question. If you make a 90" cut of your tv ad, convince a minute satellite station to run it at 4am and then claim that this was a campaign. Can you in all concience claim this as great work ?

We have one job to do. To create great work which enlightens, amuses or informs the people we hope will buy our clients products. So stop creating things just for your own vanity and start making ads that do the job the client pays you to do.

In 2004 we had Supersize me. But as of tonight we have a new hero. Mr Hugh Fearnley Wittingstall and his campaign to rid the supermarket shelves of £2.50 intensively farmed chickens.

Now H&G doesn't put its shoulder behind any petition but as our profile picture may show we are rather fond of good food, indeed the afore mentioned chef first introduced us to the 12 bird stuff so his words carry good sooth.

The campaign starts tonight on Channel 4 and here is the first of the many facts this rather good programme covered. The average number of birds per metre squared is 17.

We repeat 17.

So if you have but one resolution this year - if you can afford not to don't buy anothe £2.50 chicken. To show how you feel go to his website and sign up. As of 15 minutes into the programme there have been 22,435 signups. We'll update you tomorrow on the latest figures.

Next week, a return to more light hearted matters.