Saturday, July 26, 2008

Motivational Breach

Littering the fishbowl landscape of your place of business is something far more insidious than cube farms, bad coffee or HR Directors who haven’t been laid since the Millard Fillmore administration.

It’s the ultimate pseudo-philosophical garbage, spun as panacea: motivational accessories.

You’ve seen them on the bookshelves and desktops of many an executive – plaques, prints, calendars, and, yes, even stuffed animals (“Reach for the Stars” plush starfish, anyone?) meant to “inspire.” One Web site, where you can buy these ghastly items, has even coined a cutesy-poo name for them: “Successories.” That’s right. Hallmark stock imagery + believe-it-and-it-will-come-true bunk = executive success!

One motivational print, simply called “Achievement,” shows a small group of healthy trees sitting at the pinnacle of a barren mountaintop. The quote underneath: “Unless you try to do something beyond what you have already mastered, you will never grow.” According to the Web site’s promotional copy, “In an act of sheer will, the trees achieve the unthinkable by thriving in this unlikely setting.”

Three problems: 1) Rocks are loaded with nutrients which readily allow trees to grow on their surface, so the act is hardly “unthinkable”; 2) Trees have no will, thus their growth has nothing to do with pluck; 3) Is there a soul on earth for whom these bromides actually work?

Imagine an insurance salesman aimlessly walking the halls of a monolithic company, lukewarm coffee in hand, halfway to his monthly quota. He approaches the “Achievement” print, recently encased in a faux mahogany frame, and is quickly mesmerized by its powerful balance of imagery and words. He’s suddenly filled with the urge to do his job with more passion and purpose than ever before. He wants to grow, dammit! And he knows that from this day forward, he will sell Medicare Supplement Insurance with the same verve that allowed a bonsai tree to take root on a sedimentary rock!

Sound realistic? I didn’t think so.

What is this cottage industry known as “motivation” anyway? Are we so infantile that we cannot glean enough motivation from the prospect of our paychecks or, better still, from the innate rewards that come with a little sweat?

But if all else fails, don't fret. The “Leap to Success” plush frog can be yours for only $5.99.

Thursday, July 24, 2008

The Book of The Year Is...

Standing Still, by Kelly Simmons.

This psychologically rich, achingly beautiful first novel is both a deeply satisfying meditation on crime, truth, matrimony and motherhood and a top-notch kidnapping thriller. Turn to any page and try not to find a moment of personal recogntion, crystallized in creamy prose. I dare you -- I double dare you -- to call this "chick lit."

I will avoid a story overview with the intense hope that you discover every ingenious machination of structure for yourself. Ms. Simmons writes with what can only be described as forensic elegance. Indeed, she could really teach the current crop of celebrated post-modern novelists a thing or two about narrative propulsion.

Friday, July 18, 2008

When Did This Happen?

* When did "invite" become a noun? Are we so starved for time that four-syllable words have become too arduous? Warning: I will not respond when you ask me if I've received your "invite".

* When did "irregardless" stop causing offense? The prefix means "not"; the suffix, "without". The negation leads to "regard". Double negatives are bad enough. It is quite a trick to jam one into a single word. This crime of inclusion is oddly antonymous to the "invite" problem.

* When did "bad boy chefs" become popular? Perhaps the pertinent question is why? If your idea of a fun evening is watching a sweating, adenoidal jerk shriek "not enough basil!" then by all means, have at it. I, however, don't really need "edge" with my pancakes.

Sunday, July 13, 2008

LOL RIP

While the rise of online chat and text messaging (and syntactic idiocy) has led to an increase in febrile three-letter abbreviations, none are more grating than "LOL." This absurd sobriquet has exceeded, on the annoying-meter, such Joycean utterances as OMG and BFD. Why?

1) It's inescapable. LOL (which is not an acronym, as many people incorrectly assume, because it is does not serve as an accepted word like "RADAR" or "NASA") reached the exhaustion point within the first week of its inauguration. It is increasingly difficult to read a single electronic "dialog" without this three-lettered beast volleying between its neanderthal authors.

2) You are not actually laughing out loud. You have nothing literate to say in response to an amusing comment (and I'll bet it was quite the bon mot), therefore you resort to Pavlovian hackery. It has truly become the phony laugh-track of the digital age.

3) You are not 14. Yes, that is the "LOL" cut-off. If you are, heaven forbid, an adult in a business setting and you find yourself tapping out these letters (or, for that matter, writing "411" instead of "information"), please realize that yours is an empty existence.

Monday, July 7, 2008

Sins of the Flush

In my 18 years as a professional writer, I've been exposed to enough spoonerisms ("A well-boiled icicle"), malaprops ("they vaseline back and forth"), split infinitives ("to boldly go"), and other verbal and written monstrosities ("let's look at it from a 360-degree angle," "your" vs. "you're," "I" versus "me," etc.) to keep the descendants of Strunk and White bathing in caviar for decades to come.

But nothing -- I mean nothing -- stokes my righteous indignation quite like the "flush out" versus "flesh out" mistake.

A common example: "We need to flush out that idea."

No, plebeian, that is decidedly incorrect. Unless the idea in question is hiding in a thicket, what it needs is to be fleshed out; meaning, given more detail or information. In other words, provided with more flesh to aid its bare-boned essence. When you flush something out, you are either teasing it out of hiding or ridding it via your subterranean pipes.

Stay tuned for my "irregardless" diatribe, coming next week.