And now, a word from our sponsor.

To everyone who's been checking in over the last couple of weeks to find--—nope, he still hasn'’t updated his blog, what can I tell you? Life is what happens while you'’re busy making plans. That seems to go double for blogging. Anyway, please don'’t hold it against the fine people who referred you here (Dennis, Edward Copeland, The Siren, Zach Campbell, TLRHB). They did me a solid by linking and saying nice things about me, and I hate to think I'm dropping the ball by letting the site go to seed. (By the way, do you like your metaphors shaken or stirred? We aim to please here a ADS.)

I can't promise that it'll be fast, but there are some fun things are in the works:

A recap of the submissions and comments to the overlooked/underrated films survey, including my own long-awaited, highly anticipated, fully ruminated list of diamonds in the rough; my submission to the South Dakota Dark Best-of-TV survey; a quick guide to making your own pizza at home; and some musings on recent and forthcoming additions to my blog roll, along with some thoughts on the state of blogging from the vantage of my barstool.

Until I can get it together, though, a brief word about a brief word from our sponsor.

I work in advertising. Even though my experience in the industry is basically a million miles from Madison Avenue, I really enjoy it. I've debated about whether to incorporate discussions of ad work into the mix here, but it sort of makes sense. At least from a pop-culture survey, toe-in-the-zeitgeist point of view that we're going for. (Whether I start putting up samples of my own work for review and commentary is another matter.)

So Mini did this online campaign--what's known in the trade as a 'viral.' Something that, rather than being placed in various media is disseminated by indiviuals passing each other and spreading it around, usually via email links.

This one's definitely for a UK audience, but if you enjoyed Lock Stock and Two Smoking Barrels or The Limey, you'll probably get a kick out of it. Maybe even send it to a few of your mates. You can watch my 'chat' with the man here. There's a link at the end where you can send it on if you're so inclined.

For me, this is one of the rare examples of a viral that actually works; it's certainly the only one I've actually felt compelled to share friends--inside the business and out. Which is really the only yardstick of success for a viral. (Well, not that I send it around, per se. But you get the idea.)

Though they use it to good effect here, I have to agree with one of my agency pals that the "you ain't man enough" approach is kind of played out. That seems like a criticism more likely to come from insiders than actual consumers. Either way, this gets the rare and highly coveted "I wish I'd done that" gold star from me.

Anyway, short of turning this into another ad-industry blog (which is how I found out about the Mini viral in the first place), I'd love to hear people's opinions on this. If you've got the stones for it, that is.