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As a copywriter who does a lot of writing and editing for technology companies, I think about words constantly. What they mean, what they imply, how they’re arranged into graceful sentences, and so on.

Now, I like the writing I do. It’s a privilege to write about a product or service in a way that makes it come alive to the reader, clearly conveys benefits, positions it effectively vis-à-vis the competition. And I love a well-turned phrase, something my clients seem to appreciate as well.

Still, the writing I do on a daily basis isn’t always “fun.” By that I mean that I can’t—and don’t—opt for frivolity or downright foolishness in written expression. That’s why I love the Washington Post’s Mensa Invitational New Word Contest. This lovely event, which I hope is still going on, invites readers to add, subtract, or change one letter in a word and create a new meaning. A case in point is “Intaxication, or the euphoria at getting a tax refund, which lasts until you realize it was your money to start with.”

The other day, as I was struggling with something and getting increasingly hot under the collar, lo and behold, “flustration” popped into my noggin. (It’s got that yummy southern feel, I think.) As in, “Mary Lou got so flustrated that she had a hissy fit.” And the meaning? “Frustration so severe that it’s greatly unsettling.” Now strictly speaking, this is not an entirely new definition. It’s really more of a tweak, but it’s an honorable effort nonetheless.

Talk is cheap, they say, and that can be true. But words, even made-up words, are a continual joy. My day would be complete if someone told me that “irregardless” had made a come-back. Just kidding.

With Style

Just recently, I wrapped up the first edition of a style guide for one of my clients. I was pretty excited when the job was finished, which may prompt some to ask, “Hm, get out much?” Still, the sense of accomplishment in putting this project in the can—even if I’ll be updating it in a few months—is undeniable.

Just what is a style guide, you ask. According to Wikipedia, it’s a “set of standards for the writing and design of documents, either for general use or for a specific publication, organization or field.” Consistency of writing style across documents is more than a mere nicety, and one large organization I write for has several pods of editors scattered throughout. (All the more reason to make sure that what I send over is polished.)

If you write for a living, of course, you’re familiar with the tomes that dictate the use of commas, hyphens, capitalization, titles, academic degrees, and so on. We writers have more than a passing acquaintance with The Chicago Manual of Style, a multi-pound beast, and The Associated Press Stylebook, both of which are living documents.

The story behind the genesis of “my” style guide is simple. One day, in the middle of hustling to meet a deadline, my client and I said to each other, “Hey, we really need to write down the standards we use when we edit these data sheets. Maybe it shouldn’t all be in our heads.” So, I set to work to capture what we were doing. Things like using “real-time” with a hyphen when the expression is an adjective. Or “web services,”  rather than “Web Services.” Or “UNIX,” rather than “Unix.” Some may take issue with our choices. After all, everyone has favorite usages, but consistency is key. Putting simple style concerns on automatic pilot is what allows you to concentrate on doing great writing.

When you write copy for a living, you’re always alive to the possibility that it can be done better. And that you’d best be learning from those around you.

Andrew Ogilvy was alive to that possibility too, and here’s what he says on page 88 of Ogilvy on Advertising, a wonderful book that I just got from Alibris: “It is no bad thing to learn the craft of advertising by copying your elders and betters.” Now, Mr. Ogilvy was (I bet) a charmingly irascible Scot, so he could get away with pronouncements like that. In our politically correct and self esteem-driven world, we certainly don’t have “betters,” do we? And we consistently honor our elders, right?

Ah, but I digress. Mr. Ogilvy’s point is that it’s o.k. to copy. Even good. He copied the best of American ads when he worked in a London ad agency and later began to do his “own thing.” By that point, I suspect, what he had learned from the writers in the U.S. had become second nature, and he could gracefully add his own signature touches.

Notice that Mr. Ogilvy didn’t say “plagiarize.” There’s a difference between outright theft and using what you’ve learned as a platform from which to launch your own excellence. I suspect that we copywriters all do that. We imitate the rhythm of another writer’s sentences, grab onto verb usage or word order, and then we go for what makes the work our own.

A few weeks back, esteemed colleague André Paquin turned me onto a great video from the California College of the Arts. “Enter the Serif” is a less-than-two-minute-long gem, and it’s all in good fun. Still, it got me thinking about how our words actually look on paper (screen) and how they work with type fonts.

If I were writing a humorous piece, for example, I’d never choose Times New Roman, that conservative type style so beloved by accountants and lawyers. It wouldn’t be wrong, exactly, but it just wouldn’t strike the right note. If I were sending someone a serious letter, then I probably wouldn’t go for Comic Sans MS, which actually does seem to work o.k. as my default email font. If I wanted to get someone’s attention, Courier New would lack impact. And both Verdana and Tahoma feel just about right for web posts. As I get older, Arial is getting harder to read, and though I like Calibri, it feels slightly lumpy.

According to “Enter the Serif,” there’s been a secret 200-year battle going on between the Serif and Sans Serif factions. Not being a designer, I don’t know much about that, but I do know what feels and looks good, at least to me. I’m going keep on experimenting with fonts, unless a style guide says “no.” (More about style guides soon.)

Lately, I’ve been making a lot of changes in my life. One of them has been to make an attempt at getting organized. To that end, I hired a professional organizer.

Most everyone I know at all well professes astonishment. After all, when they enter my apartment, books are in neat, artful little piles, carefully arranged on the coffee table and in a wicker basket. The bed is made, clean dishes are draining in the rack. Goaded by New England Puritan parents, I pay my bills in full every month. So their response is, “Why the heck do you need an organizer, Sooz? You’re already totally organized.” (There’s another word they use, and it starts with “a,” but I’m not gonna go there.)

I’ve avoided showing them my email in-box or the two large boxes of ancient tax returns, bank statements, and other financial gradu lurking in the closet. Lori Krolik of More Time for You knows about them, because she was the one who told me to—ahem—gently suggested that I get rid of them.

So yesterday, I lost 25 ugly pounds at the local shredders and feel much better already. This past weekend, I learned to use the notes function in Outlook to consolidate all those little sticky-note lists of books to “read one day,” and so on into something lovely. Simple stuff, but powerful.

And the fun’s not over yet. The only question I have is, “What will I do with all this fabulous free time?” The answer, I think, lurks in those as-yet-unsorted notes for a long-dodged book of short stories.

Hoofin’ it over to Safeway on a lovely Monday, I pass the restaurant I mentioned in my maiden blog.

There has been some progress since that post. It appears that the new eatery is open, though, oddly, it’s closed for the advertised lunch trade. The awning over the door sports a new and nicely printed panel with “Now Open,” the new name and hours, and the tagline “All American Cuisine.” Just below the awning, a big banner bearing the words “1/2 Pound Hamburger and Fries, $5.95” flaps in the breeze. A free-standing blackboard advertises a blues band on Friday nights. (No more hookah lounge. Darn!)

Despite these efforts, the place has an unfinished feeling. The big palms still stand sentry by the door in their gorgeous, ornate pots—too heavy to move, I guess. The name of the old restaurant still appears on the windows, and so do those cheesy-looking stick-on letters with the hours. Peering through the window, I see that the place still looks Mediterranean. As I turn and walk away, I notice that the sign on the roof refers to the place as “All American California Cuisine.” A small inconsistency, but an inconsistency nonetheless.

Lest you think I’m being a bit mean-spirited about branding snafus, let me say that I’m rooting for the place to survive and thrive. My neighborhood could use good saloon food and entertainment, and the owners and employees are nice, hard-working people. You should have seen their pride when they first opened their doors six months ago.

So, I’ll clap my hands and wish for the best. It saved Tinkerbell, but it may not work as well here. As my sister-in-law Betty says, if you’re going to change your identity, don’t do it half way and then stop.

More years ago than I care to think about, I sold Dictaphone dictation equipment in Washington, D.C. I was probably the most inept saleswoman the company had ever hired, but in two-and-a-half years I learned a thing or two about the sales process.

So let me tell you about a great experience I had this weekend. You could say that I ended up selling myself with a little help from the salesman, and when you think about it, that’s probably the best way to be sold on anything.

On Saturday morning, I walked into the downtown San Mateo Footwear etc. store with the idea that I’d like to check out MBTs—those funny-looking things with the rocker soles. I’d tried on a similar style of Sketchers at Kohl’s, but with the annoying security tags they stick on athletic shoes, it was well-nigh impossible to get an accurate idea of either the concept or the fit.

The Footwear etc. salesman greeted me with a pleasant smile, and we got down to business. It took about half an hour to get the right fit and to get in some practice walking (as on the deck of a ship). In the process, Bryce and I yakked it up in fractured French and Spanish as we discovered that we both love to talk and adore foreign languages. Bryce listened carefully, too, and was exquisitely patient. He knew exactly when to slip in a quick benefit statement and why I would perceive it as such. He didn’t flinch when I decided to try on the much cheaper Sketchers. He held steady, as a good salesperson does, until I realized that the MBT shoes just plain fit better.

I walked out walkin’ tall, y’all. But just as important, I walked out with a good feeling, a sense of relationship, and not a single shred of buyer’s remorse.

Ay caramba! I love to eat. I particularly like the Mexican food served in cheap neighborhood places frequented by those who work physically hard for a living.

But what does this all have to do with branding, you ask? Quite a lot, it turns out. Let me offer up Los Primos Taqueria on San Mateo’s Ellsworth Street (near Poplar for those of you who want to swing by) as an example of branding done right.

There’s no confusion about what Los Primos is—in stark contrast to the restaurant I wrote about in an earlier post. What you get is consistency from start to finish.

The first thing you see when you walk up is “Home-made, authentic Mexican food” hand painted on the plate-glass window. Then you step through the door and are hit by the wonderful aroma of beans, frying tortillas, and carne. Proceeding on to the cash register, you catch a glimpse of the grill cook at work and hear a telenovela or soccer game blasting on the two big TVs. Then there’s the food. Boy, is it good!

Everything about Los Primos, from the patrons grabbing a hearty meal and a beer at lunch to the collection box for a sick relative in Mexico, tells you exactly what you’ll get, great food in a no-frills, workingman’s café.

Whether it’s fancy, polished, or not, I think that’s the essence of branding. A promise, a consistent look and feel, and always-on delivery. Los Primos has it right. I stop by every week, as much for the experience as the food—though you will probably never catch me sampling the menudo. That’s for the boys in long pants, as my grad school dean used to say.

I fall in love too easily. With words and phrases, that is. Maybe it’s because I’m a copywriter, but I don’t think so…

What I’m talking about in this post are all the words and expressions we slip slide into our everyday speech. “That guy is as dumb as a box of rocks,” when we think our Golden Retriever might be smarter than a casual acquaintance, or “Tarry awhile,” when we want someone to hang around a bit longer. In short, the things we say that add richness and color and nuance and all the other good stuff to a human interchange.

The other day, I was having lunch with a friend who thinks that all the fun is being leached out of the language. He was referring to corporate-speak, I think, which can certainly take the joy out of most everything. (Ever winced when you’ve heard someone ask, “How can we language that?”)

In the investigative spirit, I sat down with a friend and her son, Phillino, at Starbucks just a few days after this conversation. Without a huge amount of trouble, we came up with a great, if short, list. Among the entries:

• You git what you git, and you don’t throw a fit.
• Another country heard from… (Thanks to my late mom)
• You’re in a world of trouble.
• Whazzup, dude?
• He’s in deep kimchee (or doo-doo, take your pick)
• Burning the candle at both ends (Thanks to Edna St. Vincent Millay)
• No half-stepping
• Upside the head

I spent a lot of time during my formative years in Virginia and Louisiana, so I’ve got a particular love of Southernisms. One of my faves is “hissy fit,” and you don’t have one, you pitch one. As in “Mom pitched a hissy fit when she saw my new nose ring.”

O.K., your turn now. I’m fixin’ to go off and get me some lunch.

The other day, a visit to Safeway got me thinking about branding, especially brands in transition.

On the way there, I walked past a restaurant that’s changing from one identity to another. The Mediterranean theme hadn’t worked, though the place was lovely and had a great menu. About a month ago, the owners announced they were going to rename it and serve “California Cuisine” instead.

So, the new venue had opened, but if you’d blinked while walking by, you’d have missed that. If you’d stopped, as I did, to take a closer look, you might have been confused. The awning over the door displayed the old name. The gorgeous, hand-painted Mediterranean motif still appeared on the front window. Those temporary-looking stick-on letters displayed the new name, and a hand-made paper sign with new hours was taped to the door. I proceeded on.

The Safeway in my neighborhood is changing, too—becoming a more upscale “lifestyle” store with fewer brands to choose from. During the process, everything has become hard to find. As I was scratching my head in front of the dairy cooler, searching for my favorite brand of soy milk, Sam from the meat department stopped to ask if he could help. He located what I wanted in the proverbial trice, and we had a quick conversation about how much he likes the soon-to-be-new store. The check-out process was just as pleasant. Loni, the assistant manager, and I chatted for a moment, and I left with a warm feeling. The changes Safeway HQ instituted a few years ago—you know, calling you by name, asking if you need help with your bags, and escorting you to the right shelf to find an item—seemed a little forced at first, but now they feel right. And, of course, they reinforce the Safeway brand of quality and service.

As I walked home past the restaurant, I thought about how the owners could have managed the transformation—and their brand—better. We’re all running flat-out these days, but with a bit of planning and a little after-hours work, the new restaurant could have opened with a new look and feel. You could argue that Safeway has more resources than a small business and can do a better job of branding, but I disagree. It’s really all about knowing what you want to convey about your business and finding the simplest and most direct way to do it.