Crushing Krisis

Comic Books, Drag Race, & Life in New Zealand

A Moment of Krisis

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Watch as I answer today’s NaBloPoMo writing prompt: “When you are writing, do you prefer to use a pen or a computer?”

Somehow I don’t forsee these getting any more serious.

What I didn’t say in my moment is that I’ve also always been obsessed with the idea of permanence and archiving everything, so it makes sense that I don’t like to write things in pen – much harder to back up that way!

What about you? Are you a pen and pad devotee, even in our digital age, or would you happily elect to forget the dying artform that is cursive handwriting?

See me rock with Filmstar for free on 11/18!

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Reasons why you should plan to attend Filmstar & Cris Valkyria and the Opponents on Friday 11/18 at Fergie’s Pub.

(a) I play bass for Filmstar; E sings lead vocals.

(b) This could be Filmstar’s final gig of 2011, and it’s on a Friday night in a bar and it’s free. Beat that.

(c) I have been quietly agitating for a split bill with Cris Valkyria and her band since before I joined Filmstar.

(d) E’s minimalist concert posters have been growing increasingly awesome.

(e) The past handful of new songs from bandleader Glenn have been amazing, and I have to think we’ll play at least a couple at this show including at least one debut.

(f) Did I mention free?

Mark your calendars!

What are brands to you?

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Let’s conduct an experiment. There are no right or wrong answers.

Below are five consumer brand logos, and I want you to just shout out the first word that comes to mind other than the name of the brand.

(Don’t worry if other people are around, they certainly won’t think you are weird.)

(Well, I guess that depends on what you shout.)

Ready?

Got your words? Don’t forget them.

This is a common exercise to run with focus groups, or in training around brand identities.

The last few times I’ve done it, the majority of people have responded to each consumer logo with a noun. It might be the brand’s most prominent product, sphere of influence, or figurehead. McDonald’s gets “fries, burgers, fast food, toys, grease.” Apple gets “iPhone” but also “music” and “Steve Jobs”.

Still remember your words? Say them again. How many are nouns?

Not all brands get nouns every time. Brands spend significant time aligning itself with a particular adjective or phrase. In my session this week, the word cloud for Mercedes was almost entirely “luxury” or synonyms. No one has said “cars.”

(Also, brands in a crisis will get the word associated with their crisis, even if it’s not brand relevant. Right now Johnson and Johnson’s logo might elicit “cancer;” banks logos might get “occupy” or “1%.”)

Say your words again. How many of your words weren’t nouns?

I have discovered that I never, ever respond with nouns. It’s not like I’m trying to be contrary. Nouns never pop into my head. My words for the logos above were: healthy, unavoidable, wasteful, killer, and cohesive. In effect, my associations with brands are about perception, not products or people.

I suspect some crowds are more predisposed to give perception answers over the product answers. I’m sure there are studies to explain it.

For the moment, I’m only interested in you. What were your words?

Before you leave a comment, I have one final brand for you to shout out a word for:

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Monsters In Plain Sight

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I seem to have a magnetic, animal attraction to strangers with monstrous personalities.

Not in a sexual way. No, this is a totally platonic urge to toss myself into the maw of a crazy person to be shredded by the sharp teeth of their personality.

I will always choose the most terrifying, egomaniacal person to pair with given any group of relative strangers that needs to break into smaller groups. It doesn’t matter whether it’s for conversation or to board an amusement park ride – I will select the monster.

I apparently have a deep-seated urge to spend time in the company of sociopaths. I want to impale myself on the pointy bits of their psyche.

I’m trying to figure out why I keep doing this to myself. Is it a masochistic tendency? Do I get off on defending myself against these beasts?

Am I a Monster Hag? Like, is my inner OCD Godzilla looking for long term companionship with someone else’s terrifying personality traits? Do I feel like I am a monster who needs to wrangle with my own kind, like grown men on a movie set dressed in massive rubber suits.

Worse: Am I that monster?

I don’t think so. I certainly hope not. I might like to talk about myself, but I also have the journalistic urge to know more about other people, which hopefully tones down my horror as a chat partner.

I think it’s more likely that I see the potential for me to be a loudmouth in a pairing with someone slightly retiring, so I try to pick the one person in a crowd of strangers who seems more gregarious than me. Why have us both dominate conversation with someone else when we can banter loudly with each other? It’s just like dinner with my Italian family!

Except, I’m gregarious on limited topics. I don’t, to draw from a recent actual example, open conversation with a stranger with, “I think I know how we can fix all of your problems.”

What I forget is that my friends who can maintain conversational gambits with me, interrupting back and forth, are all (mostly) sane, (mostly) rational actors in life.

They are not monsters. Even my loudest, craziest friends did not start out as these disaster-movie drop-outs. No good can come of connecting with them.

The next time I get to pick my own social poison I am going with the opposite of my gut. If there is a loudmouth hand-raiser with crazy eyes, I am making a bee-line for the shy one with the nice smile.

It’s for their own safety, as much as it is for mine.

What about you? Do you find yourself facing off against conversation monsters? What is your exit strategy?

(PS: This post was drafted as “that girl is a monster,” but I didn’t want anyone to get the wrong idea. However, feel free to listen to Lady Gaga singing “Monster” now that you’ve read it.)