i'm the worst.

I’M THE WORST! It’s been an eon. A full on eon since I last wrote in here. Valentines day to be EXACT and I hope that everyone took my advice and had a great time.

My roommate and valentine Dani and I made a lovely din with crazy Amsterdam theme shaped pastas with some meat sauce and salad and taste tested a big thing of valentines chocolates (I prefer the American ones) and watched like 4 hours of Parenthood and drank a bunch of wine. Now if that isn’t an ideal situation I am unsure what is.

P.S If you don’t watch Parenthood you don’t know what you’re missing. Log into Netflix and start watching right now. Amazing show.

Otherwise, we have been absolutely swamped with stuff at the agency. All of us have our sights on some awards briefs…so it has been a constant flow of ideas. (Some good…some shitty.) Being a creative can be incredibly hard. I have a whole blog post on that I will do one day soon. But I’ve been coming home and slowly dying and going to bed and have had no time to write to you all. And isn’t that just the wurst.

 AHAHAAHA. Wursts.

On the weekends we have been AGGRESSIVELY exploring Amsterdam. I am very happy to have Melissa Kern in my life because she is the one planning this stuff and telling me I have to be in a certain place at a certain time. (She always suggests 10 am and I rally for 11am. It’s early guys. IT’S EARLY!!!!!) This b needs to sleep. And that's primarily what I would be doing this entire time here if it weren't for her.

So we’ve been going to museums. To markets. To shows. To different countries. (Belgium) and it has been very exhausting and GREAT. Really. I promise I will detail them more.

I’ve also been struggling with the themes to discuss here in my blog. I’ve had a couple on my mind: portions in Europe (teeny,) mean people, being a creative when you don’t have any ideas and might die or your head might explode, how Amsterdam is above the law. The psychology of the Bachelor (with no medical evidence.) Why I love Stroopwafels. How I already miss Amsterdam and I haven’t left. And will my blog live on after my travels??????? When international tay is no longer international??

And I’m gonna get to them. I promise. If you have any favorites let me know.

But first I have to go to Paris.

Our crew from our Miami Ad quarter is pretty tight knit. We have kind of been traveling in packs for our QA. A big chunk of us are in Europe right now, scattered all over. Two of the larger groups are in Amsterdam and Paris…so the AMS crew is headed to the city of love this weekend. I WISH EVERYONE COULD BE THERE!! But I know it’s going to be a great time.

I decided to wait on my “mean people” post until I went to Paris because if the rumors are true and past experiences are relived then………I think I’m gonna have some material.

But watch out PAIR-EE (phonetic) because this American girl who has an American flag sweater and saw some boots that are kind of patriotic that I literally might buy is COMING TO YOUR CITY. (I have worn the sweater in public in Europe only once.)

Also I’ve been sick. It finally happened. A cold attacked. I’ve looked like a piece of garbage. This sounds dramatic but its true. First off, I’m pale as z. It’s terrible. Then, it’s so dang cold all the time and my skin dries out and then the corners of my lips crack and then BAM!!!! I’M THE JOKER!!!! WHY SO SERIOUS!!!!!!!!

Oh and I should also probably talk about this situation:

We went on a wild night on the town. Had a lot of dranks. Did a lot of dancing. Lost the boys and then found them shortly after with painted faces?? Two girls from Ireland had set up shop and were painting faces in the corner. It made absolutely no sense but we all did it and the girls got promptly and kind of unnecessarily forcibly kicked out.

I slept in it. I hate myself.

Anyways, exciting stuff.

I said I wasn’t going to do it but I decided to listen to my podcast with Jimmy.

Jimmy is one of my Miami Ad friends. He’s a very talented art director and a really fun friend to have anddddd he has a very lovely podcast called “The Saucy Sauce Show.” It details his journey in advertising: the people he meets, a little bit about them, a lot about the field we work in. I’ve been tuning in as he interviews a lot of my advertising friends…and this week I was the special GUEST WOO HOO!!

I drank a bunch of wine during it while I detailed how I came to be a copywriter, a little bit about Sons of Anarchy and the Bachelor, and a lot of good little discussions about the craaazzzyyy world of advertising.

We had a lot of fun…and it cracks me up that it is listed as “explicit” on itunes. So, if you feel like it you should definitely check it out!

P.s I said I wasn’t going to swear on it but I failed. Obv.

Here’s the link guiiisseee. Check it out. EXCEPT THE PHOTO IS SO GROSS I COULD KILL JIMMY! I don’t look like that. I refuse. That’s sick me. Not regular me. I pray. Omgomg.

http://thesaucysauceshow.tumblr.com/post/44131694735/episode-03-taylor-garrett-our-guest-today-is

Anyways, I’m off to france ya’lllllll and you’ll hear from me when I get back. I PROMISE!!!

Au revoir

xo tay

don't hate valentine's day.

What a waste of time and energy. I’m serious.

I decided to write today to intervene on anyone out there who may be a V-Day hater.

WHAT’S YOUR PROBLEM!?!?!!

Let’s discuss a couple of the big reasons people claim to hate Valentines Day. See right now I could go and do some research and all of that crap but honestly, I’ve been researching stuff for various briefs all day and I am in absolutely no mood. So I’m just going to rely on my own past experience for this and if anyone disagrees or tries to cite facts…….like, I’m not into that. Anyone that does that I liken to the people who comment on online articles just to start fights/be a douchebag/feel good about themselves. A different breed of people I would never want to interact with.

So let’s begin: one thing I always hear people say is that “Valentine’s Day was made up by Hallmark to sell stuff!!!!”

The people that say this seem so GENUINELY outraged about this ‘fact.’ Well, I tried to research this but when I got to Snopes and there were like…500 different threads on it I decided ain’t nobody got time for that so…I’m not sure. BUT I’m just gonna go out there and say:

First off, if anyone made anything up to sell stuff it was amazing advertising people like ME!!!!! Advertising agencies, creatives, etc. And if someone made up Valentines Day to sell cards well they did a DAMN GOOD JOB and I wish I had thought of it first. I feel as if my field of work is sometimes so shrouded in mystery to civilians, as I call all of you not in advertising as if I am like a 4 star general or something, but brands that do cool stuff did it because an ad agency did a lot of thinking and creating for them. Just saying.

Also: if you decide to hate brands that invent things to sell stuff I am about to drop a serious bomb on you.

Grilled cheese was invented by the advertising agency JWT. (Where I will be interning next, in New York City. I need an Apartment from April to mid-June can anyone holla at me???????????) Long story short and again I’m not gonna fully do my research but they had the Kraft account and to sell more cheese they invented it and okay invented is a strong word but they got it out there into the world and I don’t know google it!!

Anyways, the point I am making is if you hate things ‘created’ by companies to sell stuff then you hate grilled cheese and that z-ing freaks me out and I wonder how we tolerate eachother? And you also hate me…because doing that is pretty much my job, and in that case FINE! Be miserable on Valentine’s Day! I don’t care!!!!!!!!!!

*Oh and Wikipidea has a whole history of Valentines day with all these facts and shiz so I mean, I would just send someone that link if someone tried to pull the Hallmark card on me. (HAHAHAHA how good was that???????? You know it was.)

Next up are the single people. And this is just the worst. I get it, being single sucks. You think I’m shouting from the rooftops how much I love it? Also as I write that I gotta admit being single doesn’t necessarily suck. It all depends on where you are in life, what you want, what you’re doing, etc etc like I actually can’t get into that right now because that is a WHOLLLEEEE OTHER THING.

So I’ll speak like this: If you’re single on Valentine’s day…that’s just that, and WHATEVER? It’s supposed to be a day of love and your love doesn’t HAVE to be romantic love. If it is then that is GREAT and you should do whatever the z you want on Valentine’s Day. And single people: don’t go around ruining it for everyone. It’s not a good look.

And last: to the people that say it should be like any other day because you should always be showing the people you love that you love them. I agree. I really do, but life gets in the way. I SHOULD floss every day, but do I? (I put that in question form because I know my dentist reads this. Hi Darlene. Hi Jane. So I’m not going to actually answer that question….)

Anyways, the sad truth is that sometimes we get so busy and stressed and crazy that we DON’T take time to say “Hey, I really care about you,” and if Valentine’s day can be a reminder to do that…then I don’t see what the problem is?

But to the people who do manage to be like that every single day: call me.

But, anyways, Valentine’s day haters: Don’t you think we have enough regular days? Regular days of routine that mush into one long period of time that can pass before you know it without making any cool new memories? Isn’t it nice to have something out of the routine?

Also. I don’t know about you but I don’t have enough energy to hate anything else because most things that I hate I hate very passionately. Like slow walkers and strangers who stand too close to me are pretty much using up all of my hate.

And if you use it as a day to feel bad for yourself then I feel bad for you. Also, I’m sure you have plenty of Valentines: friends, family, coworkers that you tolerate. But for some reason you’re choosing to ignore them, and that’s just mean!

You’re really mean.

But I’m not mean. At least I’m not anymore since my internet black out taught me that Karma is real and I can’t afford another experience like that. (P.S MY INTERNET IS BACK!!!! YESSSSS. This may directly have to do with my change of heart.)

Here. I wore my red flannel for you today. I look great in red.

SO, on that note, to anyone that needs a Valentine: I’ll be yours. Let’s decide that wherever we are in the world tonight we will drink a glass (bottle) of wine and eat a lot of chocolate and laugh a lot and do whatever we want and CELEBRATE Valentines Day.

It’s a lot more fun than hating things. I promise.

xo, your valentine, tay

karmageddon.

We did a campaign here for a back to school type thing targeting the Dutch youth. The more research I did on them the more I realized that I might be a 12-year-old Dutch girl. (If you haven’t seen Never Say Never you have absolutely no right to shit on Bieber! The kid is a PRODIGY! He taught himself to play those instruments himself when he was like 5 and OMG you are so mean and ignorant just watch the movie, GOD!)

Anyways, while researching we found a list of cool new words that the youth these days are using. All kinds of weird mashups and abbreviations of normal words. One of them being:

Karmageddon.

After more research right now I’m finding the word existing much before now and a bunch of very odd google images. For instance:

............jealous.............

(comments like this got me here.)

Whatever. So the idea behind it is when all of your bad karma catches up to you in a total shitstorm explosion everything in your life sucks holy z this is the end of all days way.

SO YAH IT HAPPENED TO ME!

The thinking behind periodic shit talking: if you do it sparingly, like a random burst here and there, karma doesn’t connect all of it and you kind of get off scot free.

OR SO I THOUGHT

As you all know from my last entry, I went on a z-ing rampage. After I ended that I felt better but then I was annoyed by various things:

1. THAT PERSON on Facebook that has to ruin a post by writing something dumb. The person that just HAS to comment stupid stuff. Like I literally have no idea how to elaborate this because we all have like 5-6 different Facebook friends that are this person and you either know it or you don’t. That’s just it.

2. SLOW WALKERS: Yah no problem why don’t you just jaunt along at slug speed because I have literally nowhere to be and it’s not like 20 degrees outside. Get the z out of my way.

3. PEOPLE DOING THINGS I DON’T LIKE. Stop doing it. I don’t like it.

So yah. Good stuff. Point is it was the worst day ever. So when I got home and was ready to sit down and watch (one of) my favorite show(s) The Bachelor, a day late (will never not be upset about this) and I got that dreaded page:

THE DEVILS WORK!!!!!

So this sent me into another thing I strongly dislike: dealing with technology.

I turned off the router. I turned it back on. I unplugged it. I plugged it back in.

NOTHING WORKED!!!!

And also to make matters worse: I’m living in the Netherlands. My life (my friends, my family, my dog) is in the United States. (Land of the free, home of the brave, if you forgot.) And so, I do not have a Dutch phone. I rely solely on imessage and Facebook to speak to my life. And guess what??? In turn, my life depends on:

THE INTERNET.

So, when the internet stopped working, Dani and I essentially disappeared from planet Earth as we know it. We couldn’t get in contact with our friends here because we couldn’t imessage them. Everything was falling apart.

And thus began our terrible journey with KPN in the Netherlands. I will sum up some of the happenings because it honestly pains me to remember them nevermind detail them.

Attempted to get in touch with our landlord who speaks very rough English and has almost no idea what to do about technology. This has been a nightmare.

Our very nice downstairs neighbor (also now internet-less) was in Malaysia for two weeks for work and therefore we could not get in touch with her. Eventually we touched base with her boyfriend who is also very nice but couldn’t really help us.

Keep in mind we DON’T HAVE A DUTCH PHONES! Dani has a very limited data/text/phone plan that we have slowly been eating into. Oh yah slowly except when we accidently ran it up 200 bucks which we now get to pay yaayyyyyy this is great because I’m rich and not a struggling student at all……………………..which is why I drink 3 dollar wine? 200 bucks isn’t exactly something we have to just make it rain, and everyone knows the bargain shopper I am so yah I’m gonna end this paragraph because the thought of flushing this money down the toilet is inciting a pre-vom type experience in my mouth.

Anyways, so we try to call KPN a few times. Dutch people that don’t speak English talking to Americans. NOT GREAT! No dice there.

When we finally get a guy to come we see that the wire goes into the wall, down the stairs, in 500 different walls, all through everywhere, who z-ing knows. I basically freaked out about this. Since our neighbors weren’t home and the Hempshopper downstairs was closed, we couldn’t figure it out. I pointed out how this whole wire system appeared to be “poor planning” and the Dutch KPN guy informed me that this is how it is here……………(take me home.) I made a plethora of other displeased comments and I’ve been spending a lot of time just genuinely outraged. Customer service here is not good/NON EXISTANT.

Now we’ve been going back and forth with basically our own KPN guy and it has been a freaking disaster ever since. The guy never comes on time, (IF HE DECIDES TO COME.)

Dani and I have been under pretty much house arrest because the windows for the KPN guy to come are essentially the entire day.

On a serious note, it is really, very unnerving to not be reachable to ANYONE. Friends, family, etc. I don’t like the kind of helpless feeling that comes from it: that even in an emergency I would be off of the grid.

Anyways, we spent our days just like looking out the window longingly at the outside world. Once a cat walked by and it was probably the highlight of the day.

THANK GOD THOUGH, Dani, an angel, had a ton of Parks and Recreation episodes on her computer so we did have some semblance of the outside world, but we were going stir crazy. We spent a lot of time sitting in different chairs in the apartment. Staring off into space. Thinking about the meaning of life.

I could have written the next great American novel.

But instead we sat across from each other in weird chairs putting clothespins on our bodies like they were little piercings.

It was grim.

LONG STORY SHORT IT’S BEEN A WEEK AND WE STILL DON’T HAVE THE INTERNET.

It might be because of the construction next door which would just be perfectly perfect and amazing and awesome and great.

So, yah. I don’t know what I did to deserve this. I’m serious. I don’t talk that much shit. I talk a normal amount of shit and a slightly higher amount when I have just been woken up and/or I am hungry.

But really, no more than the average American shit talker.

But, this American shit talker is stuck in the Netherlands with no internet and no twitter to tweet about it on.

Pray for me. Pray for me and all others like me that must live in an internet-less world. It just ain’t right.

Ugh fine.

Don’t.

You should probably be praying for actual real problems.

I’ll just go twiddle my thumbs in another random chair in my apartment and hope I survive this.

Karmageddon is real.

xo tay

super bitch.

I’m a forced to be reckoned with today.

*FYI, my dear friend Kathleen and her family use the letter “z” to replace the four lettered offensive F word. They do it because they are polite and nice and the ladies act like ladies (most of the time) instead of like me: a drunken offensive sailor dropping f bombs like I’m being paid to do it. I have begun practicing using Z instead. Example of use in speech: “That z-ing car cut me off!!!! I hate their z-ing guts and I hope they go home to watch their favorite show that they have been waiting all z-ing day to watch and the z-ing thing keeps z-ing buffering!!!! HAHA!!!! Z YOU!”

^^See. They totally don't look like they use the F word.

And now I’m going to go on an epic, (probably useless) rant. But I need to do the equivalent of screaming before one of my dear, innocent friends gets some random shit that has nothing to do with them. Warning: many capital letters to come.

And in all seriousness my mood has nothing to do with ANYONE! It’s just one of those CATDAMN DAYS.

People say you can wake up on the wrong side of the bed…but I get out on the same side every day, and I’m not ALWAYS a big bitch. (You wouldn’t dare contest me on that now would you? NOT ON THIS DAY!) Anyways, I have to say it probably has to do with the fact that there is CONSTRUCTION going on in the building next to us.

FYI Next to you in Amsterdam means ON TOP OF YOU. Every wall touches every building. Nothing is freestanding. Except for God (churches) and Royalty (palace.) Otherwise you better be ready to get z-ing up close and PERSONAL, GUYS! Which anyone that knows me knows that that doesn’t exactly FLY WITH ME.

i.e if someone even THINKS OF COMING CLOSE TO ME in the department store or the grocery store I WILL END YOU!!!!!! I will end you! I will do that terribly awkward thing where I speak out loud to you but not TO YOU.

“Could this person stand closer to me” I say, snide tone, to a friend nearby, or, quite frankly, the air itself. I think half the time I am hoping to provoke them because when I am in THIS MOOD someone is gonna GET IT AND I DON’T CARE WHO IT IS!

This rational idea might have to do with a few notable arguments I have gotten in with strangers.

1. Random guy overhears me say something NOT TO HIM at a bar in San Francisco during a football game, and RUDELY COMMENTS.  “I’m sitting at this table, you’re sitting at that one. Bye.”

2. Douchey guy stares at our boarding passes in Cancun while we wait to fly home. He is a psycho that doesn’t want you standing near the line if they aren’t boarding your letter when his is, of course, before yours. “They aren’t boarding B yet.” “Wow, THANK YOU, officer! We are so lucky to have an air marshall on this flight.”

Like. Those aren’t even funny. They are just snide and condescending. But I take issue with people not MINDING THEIR OWN BUSINESS when they are IDIOTS!

Wow. Today is a serious episode of super bitch.

I got off topic. Anyways, the place next to us, we basically share a wall, so when there is CONSTRUCTION STARTING AT 5 AM, aka a catdamn JACKHAMMER, it is essentially IN our ears.

Periodic jackhammering. No pattern, really, just whenever they appear to z-ing feel like it.

Oh and by the way YESTERDAY I was sick. There’s been a freaking stomach/other terrible things….bug going around that has been taking us out one by one. I didn’t even leave my bed yesterday. I had to force feed myself food, which didn’t take away my cloudy head, shaky feeling, and it was that kind of ill where you don’t even feel like watching TV. I, Taylor Garrett, didn’t even feel like watching TV. I was sick.

So, anyways, I NEEDED this sleep. Long story short: I didn’t have the best wakeup. JACKHAMMERS.

To the point where when Dani finally came down to shower, she looked like she had the same kind of night sleep as I did. Then, as I got ready for work I heard her scream from the shower. “THE Z-ING JACKHAMMER! I FEEL LIKE IT IS INSIDE OF MY HEAD!!!!!!!!!!”

We are disasters.

Then when we went downstairs and saw the culprits, the construction men (just doing their job…I guess…ugh…) neither of us made eye contact with them.

I couldn’t guarantee that I wasn’t going to turn him to stone.

Anyways, I get to work and the ideas, once again, are just not flowing for this one brief. This brief is my goddamn arch nemesis. The problem with being a creative is that when the ideas aren’t coming…they just aren’t coming. And they aren’t going to when YOU want them to. They will come when THEY want to. That’s why we get ping pong tables and shit…so we can do other things while our minds wait for the genius idea. But it’s a very helpless and frustrating feeling when you just can’t come up with a single thing. Feels almost painful, to be honest.

P.s I suck at ping pong so I don’t play because things I suck at suck because 2^nd place is first loser.

Anyways. That was not a good way to start, and now I can feel my bitchiness like a z-ing COLD taking OVER MY BODY.

And then I went upstairs to hear Dani’s partners exclaim that she has “been acting different. What is your problem? Why are you being so angry?”

Bitch crew.

Then I went on a rant about how I hate dogs. (….??? This is actually not true, like, at all.) But all it takes is for one dog to emit a shrill bark in a super bitch’s ear. Then I bitched, aggressively, about like 3 other seemingly irrelevant things.

Then I’ll go on Facebook and ignite old reasons to dislike someone. I dare someone to put up an annoying status today!!!!! I DARE YOU!!! I also can’t define annoying but if it annoys me I’LL PROBABLY UNFRIEND YOU!!!

Jackhammers. Lack of ideas. General tired-ness. I don’t know. But I need to SNAP THE Z OUT OF IT. Right now.

Because just because I am having a psycho bitch attack doesn’t mean anyone that happens to fall in my path should be incinerated. But this is also a warning to not do that thing that annoys me that you know annoys me because while I am usually a smiley little cackling thing…I am rocking a serious blank face and any cackling I do will be 100%, undisputed, pure evil.

So, in the end, I NEED A Z-ING GLASS OF WINE AND I NEEDED IT Z-ING YESTERDAY.

This too shall pass.

Until then,

xo (kind of. not sure if I’m there yet today) tay