Run Paco, Run.

I have an unopened box that has been with me since I left BBDO for the first time in 1997. It has traveled to Goodby, back to BBDO, over to Chiat, to Saatchi and finally here, to Barton F. Graf 9000. It’s labeled “Office Things”. It has remained unopened for so long that it has developed a sense of mystery. It’s turned into a magic box. What’s inside the magic box? It’s just like that box JJ Abrams had at the Ted Conference with the question mark that his grandfather gave him. He’ll never open that box because inside there is mystery, actual Mystery, and if he ever opens that box he feels he will lose his sense of mystery, his sense of wonder.

So I opened my box and there was a bunch crap inside. Expense reports from the Four Seasons, a filofax with numbers to some guy named Ed at some place called Mad River Post. But then, underneath a 3 hole puncher, was a bottle of Drakkar Noir.

Oh lordy, the mighty Drakkar Noir! Woman slayer! Squirt-Squirt and it was over. It’s coming back to me now, I had to retire the ebon bottle when I got married. But that was some sweet-scented scent. Created by the Uber-Frenchman Guy Laroche. And if that’s not a name I don’t know what is. That would be my spy name if it was the fifties and I was in a place with spies. I’d say my name is Guy Laroche and crack my spy whip and laugh and they would all be afraid because I didn’t just smell like some ordinary Huguenot wearing Drakkar, I smelled like Drakkar Noir, the dark side of Drakkar. And they would run, run like that little runt Paco Rabbane used to run. He and the rest of the cowardly Rabbane family from Guy Laroche and his sexy smelling spy whip.

Excuse me, I was talking. Can I finish?

On the RHOC, Alexis was explaining to Peggy how she and Jim started their lives 7 years ago and whatever happened before that, they don't talk about, so it didn't happen. The world began in 2004 according to Jim and Alexis. But Peggy was still trying to talk about the time or times 15 years ago when she and Jim were sleeping together. But Alexis, who you have to admit is the poster child for plastic surgery, she looks great, as opposed to poor Vicki. I mean, oh my god. Four or five years ago Vicki just looked like one of the Whos in Ron Howard's mess, The Grinch Who Stole Christmas. But last night on Andy's reunion part 2 it looked like she got Jowl implants. Her nostrils are still perpendicular to the floor and she still has those sunken, beady eyes, but now her jowls sway from side to side whenever she disagrees with Tamra.

Alexis was blabbing with her self-described perfect lips about how nothing has ever happened in the world before '04 and Peggy went to interject the fact that Jim had interjected her 15 years ago, and Alexis pulls out the old stand by, "Excuse me, I was talking, can I finish?" She then went on for the next 5 minutes explaining how she was talking and if she could just be extended the courtesy of finishing her thought, that would be the lady like thing to do. Peggy didn't help, she just kept jumping in every time Alexis tried to grab a breath - Can, "I fucked him", I, "fucked him", just, "fucked him", finish, "Bang Bang", talking?

Every time someone says "Can I finish?" or "I was talking" what they really mean is "I know I am losing this argument, but I am going to filibuster by talking about the fact that you won't let me finish even though I have nothing more to say." The best thing to do when someone yanks this debating tool out is to shut up. Don't say a word. Because if they actually had something to say, they would be saying it. They are talking when they are asking you if they can finish talking, you have not interrupted someone if they are telling you that you have interrupted them. Just smile and let them flounder away. If that doesn't work, stare at the part of their face that they have had plastic surgery on, like their fish lips or swinging jowls. That works too.