Arianna Georgi

I spend a lot of time thinking about branding.  This is partly because I am really fascinated by the psychology of sales, but also just because I have way too much time on my hands.  Anyway, a while ago I read a book called “Trading Up.”  It was basically about how people will pay more for things they perceive to be “treating” themselves too.  It might be the same product as something else, but if they perceive it as a treat, they’ll pay more.  So, for instance, I might go to Starbucks and pay 5 bucks for the same coffee I could get up the street for less, but the Starbucks atmosphere, the smiling clerks, Nora Jones, and comfy couches all make me feel I am getting something special.

Anyway, all of this got me thinking about my own brand loyalties.  Of course there are the standard things I have loyalty to, my perfume brand, my shampoo, my gym, Coffee Bean and Tea Leaf lattes, etc.  But there are some other, really weird things I either have a rigid loyalty to or a disturbing lack thereof:

Strange Brand Loyalties

• Goya black beans
• Kerry Gold Irish butter
• Blue Diamond Almond milk

Strange Lack of Loyalty

• Morning news team:  any of them will do, they are all obnoxious.
• Body Wash: despite my rigid love of my shampoo
• My car:  A Honda.  Although I love it, I would really drive just about any car that runs.

Some loyalties are to be expected… your favorite beer… your brand of sneakers…  But others grow over time from sort of strange random co-dependence on products and good feelings you get from seeing them used.  Anyone else?

Tags: branding, Goya Beans, loyalty, marketing

Reasons:
1. They have horrible screaming fights like every day. It seriously sounds like Jerry Springer.
2. They watch sports at high volume all day on weekend.
3. They sweep their cat litter and hair onto my porch.
4. They have terrible taste in TV. During the weekdays they watch sitcoms I would never watch. I watch a lot of TV, but even I am snobby sometimes.
To be honest, at this point I have created an elaborate back-story for my neighbors that makes me hate them even more. She is a nurse at a local hospital- one who is rude to patients and won’t give anyone extra apple juice. I have decided this mainly because she appears to work strange hours.
He is getting his Masters in pharmacology and does a lot of online gaming. I know this is half true.
Anyway, this is sort of a cop-out entry to appease Analise, but I really do hate them.

Tags: making stuff up about people you don't know, neighbors, Stupid TV

When I was in college I didn’t buy my cigarettes at the corner deli.  I regularly went to the corner deli for toilet paper, beer, pints of Ben and Jerry’s Ice Cream, and stale fried rice at 3 in the morning; but not cigarettes.  Why was this?  Because I couldn’t stand the thought of the sweet looking man who at the counter and his awkward 13-year old mustached son knowing I smoked.  I smoked two packs a day and New York is very cold in the winter, but still I made the trek to the “other deli” the one that smelled like onions and was manned by a very unfriendly woman who wouldn’t make eye contact.  I just couldn’t deal with the idea of the man and his son, at home, saying things like “she looked so sweet” or “who knew” (probably not in English, but you get the idea). 

I don’t smoke anymore, but I am still consistently shocked by the lengths I go to just to prove to strangers, (who could probably care less), that I have a strong moral character and don’t suck.  At the gym, I often force myself to watch CNN.   The gym TVs have cable and there is a full range of Kardashian and Jersey Shore-related TV to tempt me, but I can’t stand the thought that other gyms goers would know  I watch that stuff. 

“Look at her,” they would think haughtily while they watch KPBS, “rotting her mind with reality TV!” 

A similar thing occurs at the doctor’s office, where although I would love to read about the latest Teen Mom crisis in US Weekly, I read National Geographic. 

“Look at her!”  I imagine the doctor saying to the nurses, “a young woman reading National Geographic!  What uncommon class!”

The list goes on and on.  I don’t buy beer at the pharmacy when I pick up my (very routine) prescription (because the pharmacist would judge), I have a hard time reading the junk chick-lit novels I want on planes (because people would assume that’s what I always read), I force myself to order the more adventurous dish over the typical one (because I’m that kind of girl).  I strive to impress people who probably don’t even give me a second glance.  And what does it get me?  An hour of bored elliptical machine, ignorance about the lives of teen moms, and no beer!  Not to mention walks through the snow and rain…. 

Anyway, my New Year’s Resolution this year (yes, it is only November, I’m a planner, I plan a few months ahead) is to stop over-thinking.  Not just this, but work, friends, and everything.  I’m going to relax and go with it.  And if the guy next to me on the plan thinks I am ditz because I have the latest Twightlight novel, I guess that’s just how it goes.

So I finally watched The Notebook, a movie I have had on my list for the last five years or so, mainly because it is constantly on Top 100 lists:

• Top 100 Chick Flicks
• Top 100 Movies to Make You Cry
• Top 100 Movies with an Office Supply in the Title
• Top 100 movies with Unrealistic Male Characters Women Compare Their Boyfriend To. 

Anyway, I have been wanting a good cry, and it seems unanimous that this is like the saddest movie of all time, and it was on demand, so I watched it.

My review in two words:  It sucks.  Here’s why:

1.  The dude is pretty much a creepy stalker

I know it’s supposed to be romantic, but in the first thirty minutes the guy:

• Stares creepily at the girl while she rides a merry-go-round
• Threatens to kill himself if the girl won’t go out with him
• Makes the girl lie down in the middle of the road in front of oncoming traffic

I am not a very romantic person myself, but I am pretty sure these things are huge red flags and not at all romantic.

2.  The Sex Scene SUCKS

You know what was sexy?  That time we had sex in a gross abandoned house and we just stared at each other and then took off our clothes with zero foreplay.  Oh, wait, that wasn’t sexy, that was just the sex scene in The Notebook.

3.  The actual notebook is not around that much and the guy should just buy a computer already

Enough said.

4.  And most importantly…The movie is NOT sad

Once upon a time two people feel madly in love with each other and then got married and lived together for like 30 years.  Seriously.  The only adversity they faced was super hot James Marsden and he was totally nice about the whole thing.  Boo-hoo.  Get over it people.

Anyway, I was utterly disappointed by how NOT SAD this movie was and I am now mad at every one of you who told me it was good.  Next time I want to cry I will watch Armageddon.

Tags: disappointment, Movies, The Notebook

Sometimes when my friends tell me stories about their babies, the only way I can relate is to bring up my cats. “I just feel a little worried about leaving him,” someone will tell me about their anxiety over their upcoming trip to Cabo and their three month old. “I know exactly how you feel,” I’ll say, “when we got Hot Dog I left like a week later to go to Park City and I was really stressed the whole time.”
I always throw in “not that I am comparing your baby to my cat” because that is the polite thing to say, but really that is exactly what I am doing. I have compared my friend’s babies to my cats when we discuss feeding, discipline, and funny habits like chewing on blankets. “It’s so funny how she has her own little personality already,” my friend will tell me about her newborn. “I know Charlie had a very definite little character like that from the time he was a kitten.”
All of this may just be a symptom of my much larger and more worrying descent into a full-on crazy cat lady, but I think it has more to do with the fact that things are changing and it’s hard for me not to get left behind. In the last three years almost all of my friends, mostly without consenting me first, have decided to take the headlong plunge into motherhood. I’m at least five years out from even considering the thought. Actually my most frequent reoccurring nightmare is that I discover I’m five months pregnant and had no idea. Panicked because I have been drinking and (occasionally, when I am drunk, smoking) and eating sushi I rush to the doctor but nothing can be done. At the end of the dream I give birth to a dog. I don’t even like dogs.
So lately I am Peter Pan tapping on the windows of my Wendy friends. “Let’s go do keg stands,” I yell, “let’s spend 150 dollars on a meal at that new restaurant downtown.” They smile at me sadly and shut the shades. The only thing I can even come close to comparing the responsibility of having a newborn to is having a cat. And one time I got drunk and accidentally locked the cat in my bathroom all right. I am pretty sure you can’t do that a baby.
And that’s just it. I have no idea what the hell I am talking about and not even a basic understanding of why my friends are so tired all the time, or why they suddenly want to talk more about poop then beer. But I am trying. It’s because I know my friends are worth fighting to relate to, even if the whole motherhood thing is beyond me now. One day when I have thirty cats, I’ll expect the same in return from them.