I can distinctly remember for instance, where I was when I found out that John Lennon had died. For the record, pardon the pun, I was in my apartment in London listening to BBC radio 1, and wondering why the DJ was playing Beatles records constantly and sounding absolutely suicidal while he did it. And then of course I found out why.

Steve Jobs also had a profound effect on my life, so I will always remember where I was when he died too. (Well, I was at home working on my Apple Mac of course, using all my various Apple software, and surrounded by every Apple product known to man, woman, child, cat, dog and budgerigar.)

Steve was a genius. He may well have been the head honcho of Apple, but in reality he was also the Chief Visionary Officer for all us human beings, too. And like no other guy or gal in our generation, he had the ability to imagine the products, gadgets and technology of the future and the vision to bring them to life today.

Luckily for us, Steve’s all-seeing eye — or should that be “i”— led him to give us the iMac, the iPod, the iPhone, the iPad and, of course, iTunes, and in short order. In doing so, he revolutionized the way we live, work, play and communicate. So no wonder Twitter was #isad when he died.

Steve Jobs was also a brilliant “creative” business guy. While many of his contemporaries brought boring-looking, dollar-generating products to market — I’m not mentioning any names here to protect the geeks in question — Jobs adopted a different strategy. He believed that the way to worldwide success, and personal satisfaction actually, was to create products that were beautiful outside and in, and that consumers would absolutely adore.

He therefore hired engineers, industrial designers and graphic designers to ensure that Apple’s products were not only more innovative and easier to use, but looked cooler and hipper than the competition too.

The fruits of everyone’s labor paid off as millions of people bought and devoured Apples, and the company’s profits soared as a result. (Note to all the suits out there who think creative people can’t run businesses: Er, yes they can!)

Unlike many of his silicon chip and blue chip CEO rivals, Steve Jobs was also an extraordinary marketer, perhaps the greatest marketer of his generation in fact. He understood that people don’t buy products, they buy brands. Jobs therefore controlled all aspects of his company’s brand and imbued every product and retail store with Apple’s cool, sophisticated, stylish brand values.

He also hired world-class advertising agencies and invested heavily in the brilliant campaigns that they developed for him. And to great effect too. The “Think Different” and “I’m a MAC, I’m a PC” campaigns worked wonders for Apple, and undoubtedly helped the company establish itself as the brand leader in so many industry sectors.

Steve did an amazing job of direct marketing too — by directly marketing his new products to the industry and the press himself at various trade shows and conferences. And doing so in a way that demonstrated his honest and sincere belief in their potential to greatly impact our lives.

Was he a difficult guy at times? Well, that’s what they say. Did he have incredibly high expectations? You bet. Did he push his people to do better? Every day, and by some accounts every night too. Geniuses are not the easiest people to work for, as many of his employees will attest.

But Steve Jobs leaves behind an extraordinary legacy, a plethora of breathtaking, ground breaking products and a company in Apple, that recently surpassed Exxon Mobil to become the most valuable on the planet. And everyone at Apple should be proud of that.

There have been many words written about Steve Jobs since he passed away, but none have captured him perfectly — none that is, except a paragraph of copy written for a wonderful 1997 Apple commercial that was produced by TBWA/ Chiat Day.

The words were written to describe many of the geniuses that had enriched our lives by that point in time — including Albert Einstein, John Lennon, Maria Callas, Martin Luther King and Amelia Earhart. Fourteen years later, those words apply to Steve Jobs totally and absolutely. And here they are:

“Here’s to the crazy ones. The misfits. The rebels. The troublemakers. The round pegs in the square holes. The ones who see things differently. They’re not fond of rules. And they have no respect for the status quo. You can quote them, disagree with them, glorify or vilify them. About the only thing you can’t do is ignore them. Because they change things. They push the human race forward. And while some may see them as the crazy ones, we see genius. Because the people who are crazy enough to think they can change the world, are the ones who do. “

Yes, Steve really did change the world. So where were you when Steve Jobs died? More to the point, where were we all when Steve Jobs died? In a far better place because he actually lived.

Now, as we all know, Mr. Murdoch and his family own numerous publications, including a number of newspapers that are famous for their exaggerated, factually distorted, often sordid, very funny and nearly always punny headlines.

So in order to give you the lowdown on the hearings that were held last week, I thought it would be appropriate for me to describe the various goings on in the tabloid headline style of the masters — The Sun, The Daily Star, The Daily Mirror, The New York Post, and of course, the dearly departed News Of The World.

(Note that I have included both Murdoch and non-Murdoch owned publications in my list of “tabloid headline masters” as I do of course want to be as fair and balanced as the Fox News owners would expect me to be.)

Here then are the “facts” about the hearings as reported by various media outlets, and the imaginary tabloid “headlines” as created by this media outlet, i.e. yours truly.

Fact: On Tuesday July 19, Rupert Murdoch, one of David Cameron’s biggest supporters, was called before parliament to testify about the Hackgate scandal.

Headline: Man blamed for David Cameron’s election finally held to account.

Fact: Murdoch’s wife, Wendi Deng, attended the hearings in support of her husband and sat behind him as he spoke.

Headline: Woman stands by her man as he testifies about boobs.

Fact: Rupert Murdoch’s son, James, was also called to testify, but it remains to be seen whether his was successful in assuaging the concerns of MPs.

Headline:  MPs don’t buy The Son!

Fact: As attention turned constantly back to Rupert Murdoch himself, the severity of the situation facing the News International chairman became increasingly apparent.

Headline: Phone hacking puts Murdoch’s ass on the line.

Fact: Although the various members of the committee were deferential to and respectful of Mr. Murdoch, they still pressed him repeatedly to answer important questions about the scandal.

Headline: Fox News owner hounded by animals in parliament.

Fact: In the course of the hearings, Rupert Murdoch denied any knowledge of the widespread phone hacking that has allegedly taken place at News International.

Headline:  Rupert Murdoch confesses to being a know nothing!

Fact:  Rupert Murdoch also stated for the record that he was let down by people he had trusted at News International and they in turn, were let down by people they trusted.

Headline: Man who made billions passes buck.

Fact: Towards the end of the proceedings, a British comedian, Jonnie Marbles walked up to Murdoch unchallenged and shoved a shaving cream pie straight in to his face.

Headline: Murdoch eats humble and shaving cream pie!

Fact: Wendi Deng immediately jumped to her feet and punched Marbles in retaliation for his assault on her husband.

Headline: Hack Wars: The Empress strikes back!

Fact:  After a 10 minute recess, Rupert Murdoch bravely continued his testimony, apparently unfazed by the shaving cream pie attack.

Headline: Nudespaper baron continues to bare all in hearings.

Fact:  Before the end of the proceedings, Rupert Murdoch confessed that whenever he visited Downing Street, he was asked to enter by the back door, and duly obliged.

Headline: It’s official! Murdoch confesses to back door deals with Downing Street!

Fact: News International stock’s price rose during the course of the day and ended up by 5.6%, at just under $16 a share.

Headline: Wall Street wankers put their faith in phone hacking plonkers!

The fact is headlines sell newspapers.  And no one knows that better than Rupert Murdoch. But as he reflects on a week where he, his family and former employees made all the headlines themselves, I suspect he won’t be too upset. Because the News International scandal is, after all, selling millions of newspapers — including many of his own.

As Anthony will be considering his career options sometime soon, I would like to give him a few, helpful suggestions in my capacity of business and image adviser extraordinaire. So dear Anthony, put that blackberry down and listen up because here I go.

First of all, you should hang out your shingle – but absolutely nothing else whatsoever — and try to become a social media marketing consultant. As you probably know, this is a rapidly growing field and you do seem to have a natural talent for it.

You have already proven to the entire country that you know how to use Twitter and Facebook to devastating effect. And you could feasibly claim that with just one tweet you ensnared coverage of your credentials and positions on all the broadcast networks, every cable station known to man, and thousands of web sites all over the Internet.

So trust me, it wouldn’t take much to convince your former democratic colleagues that you would be an invaluable asset — as opposed to an ass-et —in the 2012 election campaign.

Given everything that you’ve recently learned about PR crises and how to manage them (after you mismanaged them), I also believe that you could pursue a very lucrative career in crisis communications consulting — of the political kind, of course. Your list of potential clients would be enormous and you could demonstrate your ability to work across party lines by counseling errant republicans and democrats alike.

Indeed, I am sure that Arnold Schwarzenegger, John Edwards, Chris Lee, and John Ensign would readily sign up as clients. You could charge them a fortune and advise them of the three most crucial things to do when the maid, videographer, picture, staffer or tweet hits the fan. (And as you know, those “things”, in no particular order are: 1. Fess up immediately, 2. Fess up immediately and 3. Fess up immediately.)

As you now have unbelievable name recognition, you could, if you prefer, seek a lucrative career as a spokesman for some of the most famous companies in the country. And although I don’t want to be one of those people who make fun of your name, really I don’t, you would be a natural spokesman for Oscar Mayer’s Wieners, Cockburn’s Port, Cox Communications, and yep, even Dick’s Sporting Goods. (Sorry, Anthony, I couldn’t resist, but you get the drift. There’s money to be made from the right brand endorsements, baby!)

Now, given your pre-scandal ease in front of the cameras, you should also absolutely consider a career in television. Consider this: CNN hired Elliot Spitzer even after he admitted using the services of call girls while he was attorney general and later governor of New York. So I’m sure that CNN, at the very least, and possibly NBC, ABC, and CBS would be very interested in you.

In fact, to be honest, I can easily see you being the host of a number of great current affairs shows — including Anthony Weiner 180, Hard Face the Nation, Dateline with Anthony Weiner, or even This Week With a Guy Who Needs a Job When Christiane Amanpour Has a Day Off.

And before I forget, please, please, please don’t rule out an acting career either. In the last three weeks, you have after all demonstrated the ability to deliver the most fictional lines — “I did not send that tweet”, “My system was hacked”, and “I was pranked” — without batting an eyelid. So if a casting call goes out for HBO’s “ In Treatment” series” throw your hat (or should that be your underpants) into the ring and keep your fingers crossed that they need an actor to play the role of a sexty — I said “sexty” not “sexy” — politician.

But when all is said and done, the best career advice I can give you dear Anthony, is to
keep a low profile for the next few years and run for Republican David Vitter’s Senate seat in Louisiana in 2016. As you know, in 2007 Senator David Vitter confessed, with his poor wife standing alongside him, that he had used the services of a prostitution ring on several occasions back in the late 1990s. Not only did Vitter survive the scandal, but he was actually re-elected— yep re-elected!!— to the Senate in 2010 by his constituents.

So Anthony, as you consider your future career options, please take note: No matter how much of an ass you are, there is always room in politics for a weiner.

It’s awesome fodder — if you like watching men in tights strutting their testosterone stuff, zapping the bad guys while talking gibberish, saving the world via incomprehensible storylines, and getting the girl in the end despite being unable to string two sentences together.

Now, I know that these comic book movies have driven millions of males to buy movie tickets, but they’ve also driven gazillions of females nuts. (Me included, particularly as I had to sit through Thor last weekend with my awesome, but comic book loving hubby, Paul. Dear Paul, you owe me 10 chick flicks for that!)

So to balance the movie landscape, I’d like to make some suggestions for a series of movies that would show off women’s unique strengths, and their ability to use their superpowers to save the world, males of all kinds and the box office from ‘men only’ disaster. Yeah baby!!

But wait! Something’s just flown into my imagination. Is it a man? Is it a plane? No it’s a bird! Super Bird! So yes folks, the first heroine I’d create just has to be Super Bird!
This brilliant bird would have super strength, hearing, vision and patience, so she’d be ideally suited to solving the world’s most pressing problems. In fact, in her first movie, Super Bird would end all wars, poverty and global warming. AND liberate women all over the planet. AND still have time to go shopping at the mall. She’d be some lady, and her under cover name would be Hillary of course.

In my humble female opinion, a movie starring The Flash-ette would also have massive box office appeal. Now, don’t get me wrong, the Flash-ette wouldn’t have to “flash” anybody in order to achieve her super hero goals. Nope, she’d rely on her super powers alone — and like her male counterpart The Flash, she’d have the power to do anything she wanted at super speed.

In her first starring role, The Flash-ette would land a job at the world’s most male dominated corporation, and she’d climb the corporate ladder so quickly that the evil company villain, Pig Man, wouldn’t have time to harass her, fart in front of her, or get in her way. Once ensconced in her role as CEO, she’d zap all the chauvinists in the board room, elevate super cool guys and gals to replace them, instigate equal pay for both sexes and give everyone Friday afternoon off to get their hair and nails done. (Men included.) And she’d do it all in a 120 minutes flat. Awesome!

In a nod to all my fellow mothers of teenage boys, I would also absolutely have to develop the super hero character of Frontal Lobe Woman. I can see the most dramatic scene from the movie now. A teenage boy, he of the underdeveloped frontal lobe, climbs onto the ledge of a window 20 stories high to retrieve something of vital importance to his survival and life— a nickel that has fallen out of his pocket. As our teenage boy gets stranded on the ledge, an onlooker shouts… “This is a job for Frontal Lobe Woman!!“

Frontal Lobe Woman immediately jumps into her car, which is appropriately called, the Labotomobile, and goes straight to the scene without getting lost anywhere on the way. (Well, she is a super hero!) She then flies up to the ledge, rescues the teenage boy and his nickel, and gently zaps his brain so that the frontal lobe develops fully and instantly — thus ensuring that he will no longer be a danger to himself and his mother’s sanity. I can confidently predict that me, my pals and our therapists would queue around the block to watch this one.

Now, as my women superhero world would be a fair, just and equal one, I would of course include super hero women of color — such as The Green Hairnet, The Red She-Devil and my personal favorite, the Blue Biatch.

The Biatch would be the most accessory laden femme in the universe and all her super powers would be embedded in her blue bag, necklace, ring and earrings. Although merely fashion accessories at first sight, these items would have the power to emit bolts of lightning that could vanquish any bad guy that makes the Biatch blue by being a threat to women-kind. So heads up bad guys. Don’t upset the Biatch because she has the power to be a total and utter biatch!!

In her debut feature, the Blue Biatch would track down and corner a powerful married politician that she catches cheating on his wife, bonking a nanny, screwing up as the Governor of a huge state, and lying to millions of his citizens at the same time. In an incredible finale, she’d vanquish the bad guy before he can inflict more unbearable pain on the world by returning to his former career as an actor. The title of the first Blue Biatch movie would be, um, well, The Exterminator.

Yes people, we on the feminine side of the biological divide know there are big bucks to be made out of women superhero movies. And we wait with bated breath to see when the macho loving guys who dominate the decision making process in Hollywood are going to start green lighting them.

In the meantime, I’d like to say one thing to all the gals out there in the film and television industry who are trying to create movies and TV shows based on strong women characters. Ladies, you are all superheroes to me.

However, I also know that no matter how much wealth and privilege you’re born into, money can’t buy you class. So as I sat there in front of the TV last Friday morning watching the royal wedding — with a cup of British tea in one hand and a crumpet in the other — I thought it would be pretty interesting to see how many of the attendees would maintain or improve their public images and demonstrate that they were, well, class acts of course.

The most royal person at the event was undoubtedly, the revered ruler of our land, the head honcho of the Commonwealth, the big cheese of the Church of England — yep, our very own Queen Lizzie 2.0.

Our little Lizzie has shrunk so much over the years that she’s often called Her Royal Lowness, as opposed to Her Royal Highness — but she still stands head and shoulders above the rest of her clan when it comes to projecting an air of, pardon the pun, majesty. So as you’d expect, she did justice to her HRH brand on the day, and even though she’s 86 years of age, she didn’t fall asleep either. Rock on Lizzie! (Or should that be rule on???)

Then of course, there was the father of the groom, His Royal Highness Tywysog Cymru. (That’s the Prince of Wales to you.) The Prince has had ups and downs with his public image over the years, chiefly because of, how can I put this politely, the ups and downs he constantly had with Camilla throughout his marriage to Diana.

Thankfully for Charles though, time is a great image healer, and he is now viewed by most Brits as the slightly eccentric heir to the throne that he actually is. As if to prove the point, there was Charles before the service chatting to Kings, Queens, Princes, Princesses, commoners, and yes, even plants. (FYI, Prince Charles confessed some years ago that he, um, talks to plants, so it was no surprise to see them invited to the wedding and actually sitting in the abbey.)

There were of course some Brits in attendance that I was very concerned about from a “PR disaster” perspective, and they included another native with a title — Boris Johnson, the Mayor of London.

Boris was educated at the very best schools in the country but is nevertheless a self-confessed, blithering buffoon. He once famously said: “If you vote for the Conservatives, your wife will get bigger breasts and your chances of driving a BMW M3 will increase.”

Thankfully Boris’s biggest faux pas on the day was going on national TV and calling the revered Archbishop of Canterbury, “The Arch Bish.” That is unfortunately the equivalent of calling The Pope, “The P.” and in front of millions too, but who cares! At least he didn’t utter the word “tits”.

So what of the commoners then? Yep, the ordinary people who were invited to the wedding to rub shoulders with the royals, the titled, and the entitled just for the day. Well, I’m pleased to say that the family of the bride — Michael, Carole, Pippa and James Middleton, represented them brilliantly.

As you probably know, the Middletons rose from working class backgrounds and built their very own British empire around a company called “Party Pieces.” Among other things, their firm sells a “Best of British Party” range of, er, um, plastic and paper cups, plates, napkins, table clothes and cake stands. It’s not exactly posh, regal-like stuff and I’m sure there was a lot of nervousness about the possibility that the royal wedding cake might end up standing on a Middleton polyurethane, fluoropolymer thingamejig!

I am reliably informed however that the Middletons resisted the temptation to provide their particular brand of party paraphernalia for the reception itself and settled for the Queen’s super duper best china instead. It was a strategic PR move that will endear them to the British public, and their no doubt relieved in-laws, for years to come.

And finally, I couldn’t end this royal wedding blog without mentioning the stars of the show itself, William and Kate — the handsome, humble groom, and the beautiful, graceful bride. Though one was a royal and the other a commoner, they seemed perfectly suited and totally in love, and they didn’t misstep once on their big day. (No image consultants or media trainers needed here, that’s for sure.)

If Diana was indeed watching from up above, she would have been proud to see that William and Kate both have, what Earl Spencer once famously said of her — an internal and external beauty, and a natural nobility that is classless.

So yes, there were several class acts at the royal wedding. But when all was said and done, William and Kate were the classiest act of all.

There I was sitting in my office one lunch time devouring, well, a hamburger of course, when the Birds Eye Peas account director marched in. (Can’t remember the chap’s name after all these years, so for the purposes of this blog, he will be called Pea-ter.) The aforementioned Pea-ter was a man on a mission to put peas onto dinner plates in every house in Britain.

“We need a commercial for Birds Eye Peas — and we need it in a hurry.”

“Great!” I replied, trying to hide my Big Mac in my desk drawer as quickly as I could so my veggie loving account director wouldn’t see it.

“Well, there aren’t many constraints on this job.” he said confidently. “You just need to show pea seeds, peas in a pea field, peas in their pods, peas being harvested, peas in a packet. And you need to mention the product name three times, use the Bird’s Eye brand theme music throughout and generally tell the world that Bird’s Eye Peas are the best veggies in the universe at every opportunity. All in 30 seconds flat.”

“Lovely.” I said, knowing full well that it was going to be hard to create anything lovely, or even remotely memorable, in 30 seconds out of a list of totally and utterly unmemorable requirements. But given the almighty vegetable task before us, my creative partner — and saner life partner — Paul Gayter and I crossed our fingers, uttered the words “lettuce pray” and promptly set to work.

And I’m proud to say we had a “Brainwave!” We wrote a commercial which had an orchestral version of the Bird’s Eye music playing throughout, and featured a farmer walking through a pea field telling viewers about everything he needed to create the perfect Birds Eye Pea — thus enabling him to articulate all of the client’s requirements. But we didn’t stop there.

At the end of our proposed commercial, our farmer looked straight into the camera and declared that there was one thing he really didn’t need to fulfill his “perfect pea growing” objective and that was of course an orchestra. The camera then pulled back to reveal that a full-scale orchestra was encamped in the pea field behind him and had been playing the Birds Eye brand music throughout the commercial. A funny little twist and one that would have made the commercial very watchable, and yep, even memorable — well at least in our opinion, any way.

The big marketing cheese at Birds Eye Peas was an imposing man called Eric, who looked as if he’d been raised on a diet of steak and Guinness and could punch the living day lights out of anyone who disagreed with him, including the three little minions – three little peas in a pod actually – who always accompanied him to meetings. So we were more than a little nervous about presenting our idea to him. But come the day, we, the agency trio of Pea-ter, Paul and Flora, filed into the conference room and pitched our proposed TV spot with gusto.

“I like it…” said Eric emphatically, as soon as we’d finished.

“…up until the orchestra.”

“…Er, but that’s the idea, Eric.” I said doing my best not to sound disappointed.

“It may be your idea, but my idea is to sell peas.” he said emphatically.

“And I can tell you without hesitation…” Eric continued

“…that there’s not enough pea-ness in this commercial.”

I of course did not hear “pea-ness”, but instead heard “penis.”  So to my ears the marketing director of a world famous global brand was sitting there effectively instructing us to put a male sexual organ into a commercial in order to boost sales. OMG!!!

I knew that such a bold marketing move would undoubtedly have the desired effect, but all the implications of putting a penis in a Birds Eye Pea commercial and then airing it on national TV flashed before me.

“Eric, er, um, I think we might get arrested if we put a penis in this commercial.” I answered while everyone in the room tried to suppress the desire to giggle uncontrollably — everyone that is, apart from straight faced Eric, and his straight-faced minions.

“ I frankly don’t care…” said Eric, completely oblivious to my interpretation of his words.

“ I want more pea-ness in this commercial and unless I get more pea-ness in this commercial, I’m not paying for it.”

In our business, when a client plays the “I’m not paying for it” card, account guys stand to attention and start groveling immediately, unashamedly, and incessantly. Pea-ter therefore quickly jumped into the fray and began to butter up the client like there was no tomorrow.

“Eric, we totally understand what you mean.” he said, doing his best to move the conversation back from “penis” to “pea-ness.”

“So if you want more pea-ness in this commercial, we’ll make it happen.”

“ I do.” replied Eric. “So take out the orchestra, take out the idea, put more pea-ness in the spot from beginning to end, and never, ever forget that peas pay my mortgage!”

We of course fully understood that Eric and his peas were also paying our mortgages. So our overwhelming desire to giggle at Eric’s repeated use of a phallic sounding vegetable phrase stopped immediately. We stood to attention, thanked our client for his feedback, and retreated to our office to execute his instructions and kill an entire bloody orchestra, and the cute little idea that went with it.

The Birds Eye Pea commercial went into production shortly thereafter and hit British TV screens a couple of months later. Sadly it didn’t have a powerful, memorable idea in it at all and promptly sank without trace. But I can absolutely, hand on heart confirm, that it did feature one heck of a pea-ness.

So in attempting to understand how Starbucks arrived at this head scratching decision, I found myself imagining a conversation between Annie Young-Scrivner, the CMO — the chief marketing officer, or Chief Macchiato Officer if you prefer — and Howard Schultz himself.

And, in my little noggin, the conversation went something like this:

Annie: Howie, when you finish that cup of tea, can I have a word with you. We, your innovative marketing folks, have had an idea that could change the company beyond all recognition.

Howard: Lay it on me…while I finish my cup of tea.

Annie: Well, you know that we have our company name on every cup of Starbucks.

Howard: Yeah, yeah…

Annie: And you know that means that millions of Americans are walking around every day carrying our cups and promoting our brand for free.

Howard: Yeah, wonderful, yeah…

Annie: Well, we’ve decided to er, move away from that a little bit.

Howard: We don’t like free advertising?

Annie: Er, well…

Howard: We don’t want to have millions of people walking around every day promoting our brand?

Annie: Er it’s not that Howie. We just think we need to simplify our message.

Howard: OK…

Annie: By getting rid of the message “Starbucks” altogether…

Howard: Really???

Annie: And focusing our marketing efforts on the mermaid.

Howard: What mermaid?

Annie: The one in the middle of our current logo, Howie.

Howard: We have a mermaid in the middle of our logo? I always thought she was a siren.

Annie: Siren, mermaid, whatever Howie. We think the company and the brand would be served better by getting rid of the word “Starbucks” on every coffee cup.

Howard: Oh yeah?

Annie: And er, allowing the mermaid/siren to breathe and promote the brand all by her beautiful self. It’ll be totally cool. Very 2011, in fact.

Howard: H’mmm. So let me get this straight. We’re going to take our company name off the coffee cups and lose all the free advertising benefits that go with that.

Annie: Er yes.

Howard: And we’re going to spend millions of dollars re-producing non-Starbucks coffee cups for er, Starbucks.

Annie: That would be correct.

Howard: And millions more telling the world that we’re hanging our hats, coats, coffee and vente lattes all on a mermaid???

Annie: That’s the plan Howie.

Howard: Are you totally nuts, Annie???

Annie: Er, only nuts about our coffee, Howie. Look, Wall Street will hail you as a visionary — someone who saw the market potential of a mythological aquatic creature, or a bird woman, depending on whether they think we’ve got a mermaid or a siren in the logo.

Howard: H’mmm.

Annie: And Starbucks will get a lot of worldwide free publicity out of the announcement, and that means you will too.

Howard: Cool.

Annie: And every coffee lover on the planet will be able to see you tweeting, blogging and spreading the word about the new logo on your Facebook page as well.

Howard: Awesome.

Annie: Trust me, Howie, there will be a lot of benefits to this — including the fact that you are going to look as if you are one of the few CEOs in the universe who totally understands social media.

Howard: I’m going to look as if I totally understand social media? Me, 57-year-old Howard Schultz?

Annie: Yes Howie.

Howard: That’s great. But tell me, do I have to pretend to know what Threesquare is?

Annie: You mean Foursquare ?

Howard: Threesquare, Foursquare, Fivesquare Annie, it’s all the same to me. Do I have to pretend to know about it?

Annie: No Howie.

Howard: Thank God for that. Well, now you’ve spelt out the benefits, I think it’s a pretty cool idea. Very 2011, in fact. So what the hell, in the words of my second favorite brand, Nike, let’s “Just do it.”

Annie: That’s great Howie. Let’s celebrate with a drink.

Howard: And let’s start as we mean to go on. I’ll have a coffee this time — with milk, sugar, and no Starbucks name on the cup.

That, my friends, is how I imagine Starbucks came to abandon its famous logo and its brand identity. I still think Starbucks is one of the coolest companies on the planet, but I have to confess that after this teeny, weeny nutty decision, I can’t imagine what the company is going to do next.

As I did the very same thing myself, I thought I’d take some time out this week to give you my thoughts on the commercials that were dished up along with everything else.

Well, the evening started with a great ad for ear plugs as Christina Aguilera screeched her way through the national anthem, doing a passable impression of a cat in agony as she went. In addition to being off key, Christina was also “off script” as she managed to mangle the words to the national anthem at the same time. (Honey, get a grip! Even I don’t mangle the words to the national anthem and I’m British!) I was thankful that Christina’s performance ended in 2 minutes 14 seconds precisely — yes, I was counting — and so I think, was everyone else in America.

When the actual ads started, there were good, bad and downright ugly ones all on view. So let me do us all a favor and start with the good ones. Now, I have always been a sucker for Westerns. So I have to say I Ioved the tough old, grizzly cowboy ad for Budweiser — particularly when the grizzly guy himself started singing Elton John’s Tiny Dancer. As the Budweiser client is clearly not averse to paying heaps of money for famous old songs, it might be cool for the tough old grizzly to make a second commercial — this time showing his more feminine side and singing “The hills are alive with the sound of music” as he downs his Budweiser.

There were also a number of pretty funny ads/skits featuring those perennial sellers of products — dogs, beavers, cute kids, babies and yep, famous celebs, too. The stand out for me was probably the Volkswagen Passat commercial featuring the kid in his Darth Vader suit. Beautifully acted by the kid and nicely shot and produced too. “The Force” was certainly with everyone involved with this ad.

The Budweiser servile dogs commercial was cute — although the People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) might have something to say about all those dogs performing incredible feats of servitude in a commercial, and at non-union rates no doubt. The best line of the night, however, belonged to Eminem’s commercial for Chrysler, which addressed the problem of getting American consumers to kick their addiction to foreign imports by proudly declaring “Chrysler. Imported from Detroit.” Brilliant.

Unfortunately, there were a number of bad commercials for us all to digest with our chili too. Where shall I start? Adrian Brophy starred — or should that be bombed — in a hackneyed commercial where he chose a glass of Stella Artois over a number of beautiful women. (Yep, that old joke). Groupon managed to offend the world with their tasteless commercial for Tibetan curry, and HomeAway chased away huge numbers of their own potential customers with a totally incomprehensible commercial that featured a “smushed up” baby in the middle of all the incomprehension. (Honest to God, who writes this stuff? And worse still, who approves it and pays millions of dollars to produce and air it??)

As for the “ugly” commercial, well, for yours truly, that particular “accolade” has to go to my company namesake, Teleflora. (But of course.) On Sunday, we were told that the key reason for sending flowers using Teleflora is that “Teleflora says it beautifully. Because frankly you can’t.” Really? No one in America knows how to say things beautifully? No one at all? From this Flora, to Teleflora, that is a bunch of begonias. So with every fiber of my being, with the fullness that comes into my bosom whenever I think of your tagline, with the fire that ignites my soul at the very thought of dealing with you, I have decided with a heavy heart, that sadly, very sadly indeed, I will never use your service again. (Was that said beautifully enough for you?)

So there you have it folks. The Super Bowl commercials were a mixed bag of nuts — almost certainly written and produced by a mixed bag of nuts given the kind of people that work in the ad profession. With that said, I’ll bring this special Super Bowl blog to an end because I have to run. I’M GOING TO DISNEY WORLD!!

Leo once famously said: “Creative ideas flourish best in a shop which preserves some spirit of fun.” He instinctively knew that when creative people got in the mood and got in the groove, they could create campaigns that could launch their clients into the stratosphere and generate millions of dollars in revenue.

Over the years, creative people at Burnett have delivered on Leo’s philosophy by producing one wonderful campaign after another — including “The Army of One” for er, the army, “Fly the Friendly Skies” for United Airlines and “The Marlboro Man” for yep, you guessed it, Marlboro. So given this track record of success, it won’t surprise you to know that Leo Burnett’s executives often went out of their way to ensure that fun, and indeed happiness, pervaded the creative department. And no one went further than the London office did way back when Mrs. Thatcher was in Downing Street and everyone in Britain was in flares.

At the time, depression had descended over Burnett’s creative people for a variety of reasons — many of them unbelievable and all of them un-publishable. (At least in this blog anyway.) But suffice to say, life officially sucked. And so did most of the product coming out of the creative department. So the agency that created the Pillsbury Doughboy desperately needed to lift everyone’s spirits — and help their creative people produce, well, more dough, boy!

Enter from stage left a creative account guy. (Yep they do actually exist at times and the Leo Burnett agency has them more than most.) His idea for solving the problem was crazy on paper and in practice. And it was this: hire a psychiatrist and invite him into the agency to talk to the creative people en masse and help them with their depression issues. (That was essentially account guy code for “hire a guy who deals with nutcases on a daily basis to deal with the nutcases in the creative department”, but never mind.)

In the advertising and marketing industry, nobody ever runs away from crazy ideas because they have a habit of working. And sure enough, the agency management team quickly signed off on this particular “mad man” suggestion, and an “en masse therapy” date was set.

On the given day, the entire creative department filed into the main agency conference room — a sad, dejected, miserable bunch, who were hardly in the mood for the “don’t worry, be happy” pep talk that was coming their way. The 9:00am start time for the pep talk came, and unfortunately went. So did 9:15am, 9:30am, and 9:45am. At 10:00am, an embarrassed HR lady shuffled up to the front of the room and explained the delay. “Er, well, we actually hired a psychiatrist to come in today and talk to you about depression, but I’m afraid he won’t be able to make it after all. He, er, well, committed suicide over the weekend.”

Hysteria erupted. Wailing wafted through the corridors of the agency. And the Leo Burnett creative folk began to cry uncontrollably — with laughter. Rightly or wrongly, people’s spirits were lifted by the black humor of it all and before you could say, “snap, crackle and pop”, the black clouds that had hung over the creative department simply evaporated into thin air.

The Leo Burnett’s creative folks quickly went back to their brilliant best and as you’d expect, they soon began producing great campaigns that generated mega mula for their clients. All this was conclusive proof that the agency that gave us the Jolly Green Giant knew how to give us jolly creative people too — albeit it with the help of suicidal psychiatrists at times. Leo would have been proud.

First of all, in the political world, I can confidently predict that John Boehner will not make it through any session of Congress without blubbing like a baby on the hour every hour. Mr. Boehner’s tear ducts will attract the attention of major advertisers, and he will be approached by none other than Kleenex, who will offer our recently dubbed “weeper of the house” a lucrative deal to become its spokesman. In doing so, Kleenex will beat out overtures from another company with perfect “John Boehner brand credentials”, Simply Orange.

The most notable state marketing campaign will come from the bankrupt state of California, who will publicly plead for financial help from its wealthiest citizens with an ad campaign featuring the tag line “There are some things money can’t buy. For everything else there’s Meg Whitman or Carly Fiorina.” Jerry Brown, the new governor of California will also go on the offensive with a campaign that will seek to shift blame for the state’s financial woes. The tag line will simply be “California. It’s not our fault, it’s San Andreas’s fault!” (Ouch.)

In sport, Tiger Woods will make great strides on and off the golf course. He’ll polish up his clubs (as it were) and his image by negotiating a sponsorship deal with “Mr. Clean.” This will be a marketing deal made in heaven for Tiger, because as we all know, he spent all of 2010 being “Mr. Come-Clean”. In terms of American football, I’m going to go completely out on a limb here and predict that the Washington Redskins will not win the super bowl. And in soccer, I see that after an exhaustive search, DC United will definitely find a new home and will be called Bermuda FC from March 2011 onwards.

Social media will continue to explode this year. Facebook will again grow in leaps and bounds, and as it does, the company’s founder, Mark Zuckerberg will spend millions building a brand personality. His own. In addition, social media sites targeting the over-60 crowd will be ubiquitous. So look out for the launch of Myopiaspace.com, Youwhatnowtube –- complete with a logo design featuring a cupped hand held up to an ear — and For-Getful Squares.com among others.

As for traditional media, well, a slew of new and successful TV shows will hit the small screen this year. (Does any one actually still have a small screen??) These will include the former directors of Lehman Brothers starring in a financial show entitled “The Biggest Losers”, and Levi Johnson fronting — but thankfully not full fronting — a Sarah Palin focused show. Despite protests from the would-be Presidential candidate herself, Levi’s show will either be called “Sarah Palin’s Alas…ka” or “Godzilla from Wasilla”.

There will be some interesting developments in the music and theater worlds too. The Rolling Stones will announce their fifteenth final farewell tour and it will be sponsored by Zimmer Frames. Lady Gaga will team up with the Goo Goo Dolls, for the Gaga Goo Goo world tour. And the producers of the show Spiderman will solve all their problems and will re-launch their production with a new and more appropriate title: “Spiderman: No strings attached. And fingers crossed.”

The world’s big brands will continue advertising heavily in 2011, and will even increase their ad spends as the economy improves. However, in a dramatic breakthrough for TV advertising in general, the couple featured sitting in the “His-n-Her” bathtubs in the Cialis ads, will finally get out of their tubs and have a shag.

As for the business world, well, it’ll be business as usual. The stock market will go up. And then it will come down. Good companies will thrive, great brand ideas will help companies prosper, and 20 year olds will develop even more ideas that will change the world. (Note to 20 year old daughter. You’ve had a great idea. Get cracking!!)

It will be a crazy year folks — full of ups and downs, and highs and lows, just like any other year. But according to my wonderful crystal ball/ornament, this coming year is going to be a hell of a lot better than the last.

I wish everyone a happy, healthy and prosperous New Year – including my new avid reader, B. Obama, whoever you are.