Candle Hats and Christmases: Season’s Greetings from Signalwrite Marketing.

In most self-portraits it is the face that dominates:
Cezanne is a pair of eyes swimming in brushstrokes,
Van Gogh stares out of a halo of swirling darkness,
Rembrandt looks relieved as if he were taking a breather
from painting The Blinding of Sampson.

But in this one Goya stands well back from the mirror
and is seen posed in the clutter of his studio
addressing a canvas tilted back on a tall easel.

He appears to be smiling out at us as if he knew
we would be amused by the extraordinary hat on his head
which is fitted around the brim with candle holders,
a device that allowed him to work into the night.

You can only wonder what it would be like
to be wearing such a chandelier on your head
as if you were a walking dining room or concert hall.

But once you see this hat there is no need to read
any biography of Goya or to memorize his dates.

To understand Goya you only have to imagine him
lighting the candles one by one, then placing
the hat on his head, ready for a night of work.

Imagine him surprising his wife with his new invention,
the laughing like a birthday cake when she saw the glow.

Imagine him flickering through the rooms of his house
with all the shadows flying across the walls.

Imagine a lost traveler knocking on his door
one dark night in the hill country of Spain.
“Come in,” he would say, “I was just painting myself,”
as he stood in the doorway holding up the wand of a brush,
illuminated in the blaze of his famous candle hat.

This Billy Collins poem appeared in the mid-1990s. Always a great favorite or mine, its message is pointedly related to the holiday wishes from Signalwrite this year.

Its warm-hearted sense of humor, about one of the world’s great artists who was himself known for a sense of self-amusement, is just right for wishing my clients and colleagues, family and friends a wonderful Christmas season and an outstanding 2012.

Signalwrite Marketing’s professional and personal life have been filled with laughter and you have all played a part in it. The number of adventures, conversations, meetings, programs, and visits during which laughter broke out is uncountable…but pretty large.

“Laughing like a birthday cake” has made my professional life wonderful. Merry Christmas to everyone. May you keep it in your hearts all year long. Happy New Year too, when all good things will come to you and bad ones never appear.

Next Christmas, let’s plan on getting together and wearing candle hats. For now, the very best of the holiday season.

Goya: “Self-portrait in the studio” (c. 1790-1795). Oil on canvas, 42 x 28 cm. Museo de la Real Academia de Bellas Artes de San Fernando (Madrid, Spain). See No 20 here. Minor photo: Stellan Skarsgård from Warner Bros film “Goya’s Ghosts.”

See Christmas Ads. Buy Christmas Ornaments. May the Force Be with You.

Doing some mild holiday shopping, I note that the Hallmark Star Wars Christmas Ornament Collection for 2011 includes a Darth Vader in Lego version. The mind boggles, for $39.95 especially. Checking online, there’s a more…festive… R2 set: the black and bronze bodied R2-Q5 and red-trimmed R2-A3 from the original trilogy of films, first offered at the 2011 New York Comic Con – the pair’s available for $119.95 via the web.

LA-based writer Kristie Bertucci has a post on the GadgetReview blog wherein she reveals her top 16 Star Wars Christmas ornaments. From 1997 to the present, here they are to liven up your 2011 Yuletide trees. (Not ours, sorry: I was never quite this much of a fanboy.) According to Hallmark itself, though:

Since 1996, both Hallmark and Star Wars collectors anxiously await the release of the new Star Wars Hallmark ornaments. Always some of the most anticipated ornaments released annually…

The company’s advertising continues to be as heart-grabbing as ever – see one spot running now on YouTube. Evocative stuff given our troops are finally coming home, home from Iraq. My favorite isn’t on Bertucci’s list. Hallmark had a rather early 1998 Boba Fett ornament – see upper left. In the words of Stan Hope, “For bounty hunting the Xmas bounty…” Now $25-$40 on eBay.

That was then, this is now: the 8.5” Boba Fett with Carbonite Christmas Statue from Kurt S Adler. C’mon: the gift-wrapped Han Solo carbonite panel. The thermal detonator with the red bow. The candy cane!

Just six shopping days left. Seriously, how does this not say the Spirit of Christmas to you?

Hoping Christmas ‘10 Is Way Merrier – and Wishing You a Super-Fine 2011.

I read that North Carolina artist Joseph Cudd roughed out the designs of these “Winter Holiday” stamps by hand, then fine-tuned them via computer, just so the United States Postal Service™ could deliver them to the public in October, 2009.

Out came USPS with the 44-cent reindeer, snowman, gingerbread man and toy soldier without really knowing just what kind of business and economic conditions we the “public” were going to see here in that year, and in this one too.

It’s possible to use each of these wonderful winter figures to underscore our challenges:

▪ “It never reins but it pours, deer!” for example.

▪ “That’s the way the (gingerbread) cookie crumbles.”

And let’s get real: that’s not a “toy soldier” lower right – that’s a nutcracker. (Know what I mean?)

I’m soliciting more holiday puns from you, based on these stamps – I’ll post them in the COMMENT section if and when you send them in.

Much more important, this display is Signalwriter’s own way of wishing all of you – clients and colleagues, family and friends and utter strangers – a wonderful Christmas season and an outstanding year ahead.

My life’s been filled with pleasure and delight thanks to the part you’ve played in it.  Thanks to you, I’ve had another year’s worth of meetings, adventures, programs, visits, conversations, developments and successes; an entire 12 months of engagement, with laughter (and beer) on the side.

In this fine Houston, TX season where the only snowflakes appear on stamps…the very best of everything to you and yours!

Season’s Greetings from Signalwrite: Hugs and Kisses Come Standard.

This past year calls for comfort food. Since I can’t package meatloaf, it’s got to be chocolate. That’s why the special Signalwrite Snowman comes filled with chockies to help see this bad old year out and a bright new one in.

I have a real belief that life is sweeter because of good clients, good colleagues and good friends…like all of you. One more time, I’m reminded of the rewards of amiability.

Thanks for making the year more like chocolate and less like, say, spinach. Not that there’s anything wrong with that except how would it look, spinach stuffed in the Snowman Mug? (At least it, too, starts with “S.”)

To the recipients of the actual gifts” “Enjoy!” Eat them up yourself – it’s difficult to ration them this time of year. Or share them with friends if you are feeling especially generous. And thank you most of all for your continued faith in me.

For those who did not, by reason of distance or absence, get their hand-deliver holiday chocolates (Hershey’s Kisses, Hugs and other such-like yummies) – ‘zounds! Just let me know. Like the adventures ahead for next year, there’s more where these came from.

Best of the season from Signalwrite Marketing Communications. (C’est moi.)

Very Merry and Extra Happy all of these: Hanukkah (which began 12/11 – now over); Christmas Eve on 12/24 as usual. Kwanzaa starts Saturday, 12/26. Remember “Festivus for the rest of us” added by Chuck Curtis. And "Merry Chrismakah, Hannumas" from Mark Lipschitz. And another “Thank you” to Prism Design for the this year’s Snowman tag design.

Clue One: Snow Summons Harbingers of Signalwrite Client Gifts.

How could anyone imagine they’d be lurking in such numbers? Yet at the first sign of snow, here they come, their shining faces ready for the next critical step in the Signalwrite Marketing holiday gift program. Coming soon to a pair of welcoming client hands nearby: Hanukkah a week away and Christmas just around the corner.

What’s this year’s gift? Clue Two will be on Prism’s Use Your Bean blog on Monday. Maybe you’ll guess lucky and get a double helping of Something Special.

…To China

Flying to China, traveling
“Via regions closer to the North Pole,”
You can save three hours.

Dashing through the gemstone sky,
You note, besides the ice,
Some tiny speedy dots in line ahead.

Seeing with a sharper eye than ours,
You will discern the shapes of that odd chain,
The antlers of the reindeer in their harness.

Bringing up the rear, the black stuffed sleigh
And tiny, red-robed figure – infinitesimal:
The sacred Santa weighs the naughty and the nice.

Flying to China, if you’re good,
You’ll see this sight just once in life.
Or roving (very lucky) at the right time of year.

“Flying to China” was created for and first read aloud at John and Susan Reeves’s Christmas Party. Thanks to everyone for giving me a chance to read this – and to Susan, who suggested a poem in the first place. Merry/Happy. Copyright © 2008 Richard Laurence Baron. All rights reserved. Photo by Orin Zebest, San Francisco, CA.

Coffeehouse Christmas

“The world really is our coffeehouse.” Here’s where we meet, talk, discuss our businesses, share one another’s lives. It’s where, when you walk in the door, you will hear me call out, “Merry Christmas!” (or “Happy Hanukkah” or “Happy New Year” or many another seasonal greeting).

This year, 2008, has been chills and spills and thrills from the get-go. You should know: You have hung in there with me among all the bangs and blows of a bizarre 12 months. If it wasn’t a family death, it was a great big trade show or a trip to Denver or a hugeous hurricane.

If you’ve had the time, you’ve been able to track Richard-and-Barbara’s travels by the blog posts about coffeehouses: Plantation Coffee in Phoenix, Dalhart’s Superstar Coffee Company, Bastrop’s Coffee Dog. The road traveled has had quite a few caffeinated pauses (a seeming contradiction) along the way.

Despite everything…here we are again in December, at Christmastime. It’s amazing. You’re amazing. You’ve stuck with me through thick and thin this year, as colleagues and kin, friends and acquaintances.

I’m very grateful: My thanks for your business and support, love and kisses. ‘Tis the season to be merry and I hope you enjoy every vivid moment of it.

Also, please accept my best wishes for a fruitful year ahead. We will have many new things to confront together, some to be accepted, some to be overcome. All can be done at our nearby coffeehouse with a fresh cup of java or two or three. I’ll buy.

Merry/Happy all of these: Hanukkah begins 12/21 – the same day as Winter; Christmas Eve on 12/24 as usual. Kwanzaa starts 12/26, which is also Boxing Day (I always thought that was the day you cleared up all the thrashed Christmas wrappings). And “Festivus for the rest of us” added by Chuck Curtis. And "Merry Chrismakah, Hannumas" from Mark Lipschitz. Thank you to Prism Design, Inc., for the holiday coffee label design.

Gifts: Armaments

The newspapers are filled with ads for very expensive watches (if you’re a guy) and the latest celebrity brand perfumes (if you’re a gal). The airwaves offer big-screen TVs and iPods.

‘Tis the Season to be buying. If you’re buying big, Neiman Marcus offers its 100th Anniversary Fantasy Gift: An Imperial Lilies of the Valley Fabergé Egg for $3,525 (including shipping).

But what to do if you are confronted on Christmas Day by a Rabbit with Big Pointy Teeth? (This is what comes of watching “Monty Python & The Holy Grail,” a seasonal favorite.)

The Holy Hand Grenade of Antioch is available for only $17.95 – an important reminder that comes to us from geek blogs. This plush version comes with critical instructions:

First shalt thou take out the Holy Pin. Then, shalt thou count to three, no more, no less. Three shalt be the number thou shalt count, and the number of the counting shalt be three. Four thou shalt not count, nor either count though two, excepting that thou then proceed to three. Five is right out. Once the number three, being the third number, be reached, then lobbest though thy Holy Hand Grenade of Antioch toward thou foe, who being naughty in my sight, shall snuff it.

This is the stuff of legends, friend, even though this model “does not really light up or explode.” Well.

Go up-market if you like to the 50-caliber Barrett M82A1 sniper rifle for something over $8,000 – it puts the Fabergé egg in the shade and offers “unmatched respect.” I kinda like that. This is NOT something you’re likely to see advertised in a pre-Christmas Valassis insert. Think of it as a 30-pound stalking stuffer.

Quite a bit more stress-y on the Visa card, The Joint Air-to-Surface Standoff Missile (JASSM) may or may not be available in time for Christmas; it depends on the success of its testing program. Lockheed Martin promises superior performance and affordable price – plus videos if you visit the company’s on-line shopping site.

Me? I’ll settle for the Holy Hand Grenade. Just the thing for a Big-Pointy-Teeth-Rabbit-free holiday season.

Joyful Year

Thanks to you, I had a ball this year. What Charles Dickens wrote in “A Christmas Carol” is as true for me as he’d have it for the story’s main character:

…He was wise enough to know that nothing ever happened on this globe, for good, at which some people did not have their fill of laughter at the outset; and knowing that such as these would be blind anyway, he thought it quite as well that they should wrinkle up their eyes in grins…and that was quite enough for him.

A year’s worth of joy should not be saved up ‘til Christmas. Fortunately, some of you have kept up with news and adventures in my business, my family, my life. So it’s likely that you’ve seen your names a time or two (or more) throughout the past 12 months and received my gratitude along with it.

It’s time to say “Thank you,” plus sincere greetings for a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year – and everything else you celebrate during this month.

Because you’ve been part of it, you have contributed so much to me and my family. You are my colleagues, my partners, my friends. I am grateful for the work, the relationships, the collegial enjoyment of many hours spent with you.

You are the ornaments of my life. Best wishes for a world full of joy this season and for the year ahead.

Thanks and special wishes to Prism Design for this year’s illustration.