Buff it up

Anyone ‘long in the advertising and marketing tooth’ will admit (not necessarily willingly) that on occasion they’ve been handed a product of questionable credentials in need of some 'tender loving care'.

The brief my vary, but the common threads are pretty standard. The task? Promote said product/service. The method? Buff the product until your elbow screams. The parlance? ‘Polish that turd’.

When it comes to the home time commute from THE SMOKE (no longer an everyday occurrence for this humble scribe I'll grant you), my mind is seldom distracted from the melee ahead. Normally the thought of a Bond Street tube concession, manned (womaned) by an eager gang of overly excitable, dentally perfect Iberians wouldn’t interrupt my normal transitory curmudgeonly mien, but…

A week in the Costa Del Permatan has patently made me more prone to the overtures of our Latin cousins and their wily ways.

They sell GADI, an unction purporting to transform the skin of my tired, wizened boat-race into something approaching that of a baby's harris. (Catalan Rhyming Slang!)

‘What’s it made from’ said our inquisitive hero. ‘Mud, from the Dead Sea. Very pure. Very good’, said our dusky heroine.

‘Is that the same Dead Sea, where for thousands of years nothing of flesh and blood - or cellulose for that matter - has had the good sense to inhabit on account of its ‘toxicity’ to life?’

To which our ravishing Senorita said, ‘Si, the Dead Sea is too pure for life’.

I’ve polished a few ripe ones in my time, but the 2016 prize goes to…

GADI – Gunk Applied to Daft Idiots.