The King of Madison Avenue

Yesterday we hosted a book signing for Kenneth Roman, former CEO and chairman of Ogilvy, for his new book on David Ogilvy, The King of Madison Avenue. It has received positive reviews, and interest in what is arguably one of the most famous men in advertising is at an all-time high due to the popularity of Mad Men.

He told a few anecdotes about David and shared the discrepancies he found in his research between the myth (some told by the man himself) and the fact. One thing was clear: David was a charming genius who understood how to sell: his clients' products, his agency and his image.

During the signing I told Kenneth that I began my advertising career at Hal Riney & Partners (previously O+M West, now Publicis/ HRP) sitting underneath a gigantic portrait of Ogilvy. I made the mistake of asking a colleague who the old man in the portrait was in front of Hal and got a polite bollocking (and a history lesson). I told Kenneth I never imagined then I'd be heading up experience planning at Ogilvy in London all these years later.

Mr. Roman kindly inscribed my book: 'For Brian - David would have admired what you're doing - and that you trained with Hal. With best wishes, Kenneth Roman.'

That made my day. It will likely make many days ahead as it reminds me of the power of the legacy embedded in the organisation he built. Ogilvy retired in 73, and passed away in 1999, but ten years on he's still very much with us.

Sure-chigai tsuushin, or “passerby communication.”

Wired reports that hundreds of Dragon Quest IX players are gathering in front of Yodobashi-Akiba department store in Tokyo with their Nintendo DS in hand to share tips and valuable 'maps' with each other.

Players in Tokyo are leaving the Nintendo in communication mode as they make their way through their day and collecting connection messages (pings) from other players also in communication mode that sometime include valuable tips for the gameplay, making it one of the biggest crowdsourcing game features ever.

Visit Denmark, they're easy apparently.

A remarkably ill thought out video by VisitDenmark was pulled after complaints that it promoted promiscuity and made Danes look like promiscuous whores.. In the rambling movie, a gorgeous Danish woman holding a baby encourages men to visit Denmark so that she can find the father of her baby - the product of a drunken one-night stand. Really, one wonders how these things get past the idea stage and how the threat of fatherhood would persuade people to visit.

Navigate London's 'designscape' with this gorgeous city guide.

Afterall magazine have put many brilliant visual culture articles in their archive online for free.

Art and death

Spent the day in the park reading the excellent Cabinet Magazine and learned, among many things, that the Pre-Raphaelites used a paint pigment called 'mummy brown' which was made of ground human and feline mummies until the 20th C. when the supply of mummies literally dried up.

Cabinet is a brilliant blend of the unusual and the explicative and satisfies curiosities about the world one never knew they had.

We used to joke that six weeks was the gay relationship equivalent to the seven-year itch. Well the itch needed scratching and so after 7 weeks of ambivalent dating T. and I ended it last night. Rather definitively. I'm not sure why some feel the need to sever with cruelty when an unambiguous 'this has run its course' would suffice. It was what I was my goal. His was quite different. More of a 'let me give you a good reason to delete my number from your phone' strategy. And it worked.

I wasn't in love with him and was becoming sure I wasn't going to be. I try to pretend it wasn't his age. It was. Or his immaturity. It was. Or a basic lack of mutual interests. It was. We weren't suited, but I liked having someone in my life. Someone with whom one can experience basic intimacy. It had been far too long. It awoke a desire to be with people again. And for all of those things I should be grateful to T. Once I stop hating how it ended. I've never believed that relationships should be judged or remembered solely by their end, and it would be ridiculous to call that a relationship, so I'm hoping that after a good cry and a good pout and maybe a pint of ice cream I will look back on my summer fling with T. and smile.

Hello constant companion

I am spending the next two weeks on holiday in London, at home, with small projects and goals and desires to sort and heal some things and clear out others. I've resisted the urge to call it a staycation, to feel guilty about not chasing the sun and take my bad habits on tour, to worry if I'm hiding away. I need to concentrate on making positive change in my life and to find a desire to create again. To feel each hour passing. To pay attention when anxieties and fears surface. To connect to more of live around me.

So here I am. Not entirely sure what to do with myself. Letting myself feel tired and worn down, but being aware of why and what I am doing knowing that good decisions will bring good changes - even despite the immediate discomfort they bring.

I asked to change medication yesterday. I never felt right on the sertaline. Less anxious, but not focused, balanced or happy. I forced myself to feel positive, but it was appearance and not real change.

Changing medications brings short-term side effects that aren't totally pleasant, anxiety and nausea. Restless, dream-filled sleep. Meditation helps some, but mostly the knowledge that it is temporary and that real comfort may be coming. Will be coming. Will make it a bit easier to change, more equipped to deal with the positives and negatives that life offers.

More equipped to connect and to create. That is my focus on this next period.

A therapist once told me that I live too much in my mind, so much so that I've let my body fall into disrepair. I'm now trying to focus on living in this body again. Repairing the damage. Meditation helps to place myself back into my body and I spent a good deal of time in the last few days in a body scan. The gym and Justin are a great help in that. Moving the body, making it contract and stretch and pull and push and do more than I think it should or can. At first the pain made me anxious, but I'm starting to sense the difference between good and bad pain.

Now, I concentrate on how I eat. Not necessarily what, but how. How mindlessly I feed it. How little aware of eating I was, waiting for feelings of happiness and euphoria to come. How able I was to turn off the feelings of discomfort that would follow. How little I tasted of the vast amounts of comfort I was eating. It is hard. I am not consistent. It is the single most important change I can make and therefore one that I'm most resistant to. The mind and emotion rally to act as they did before. To protect what they know. To give breadth and permission to the bad habits. I'm trying to re-wire the pattern. It is difficult. It requires finding satisfaction in other places.

How? How I connect and how I create. Connect and create. Simple and powerful, straightforward and complex words.