On Thursday the 7th of August 2008, a few days AFTER the Olympics had already begun, I was offered an opportunity to create a little commercial for a company from my home state. Said company was working with another little company that was involved with bringing the summer games experience to viewers everywhere. They wanted to know if I could deliver a potentially viral “spot” by Sunday night, three days later. While usually having reservations about working for companies whom have parent companies that are a part of the MILITARY-INDUSTRIAL-COMPLEX (because they make weapons that KILL people) I decided to plug my nose and go ahead with the relatively harmless challenge, promising to deliver them the following commercial (mainly because there wasn’t a script or, for that matter, even a concept really. Just the tag line, “leave it to the Olympians”, meaning it was more or less complete creative control, the ideal gig, a free for all, on their bill. Yipee!!!). So we got down to business and the “spot” was conceived and completed all in three days, on time, and all seemed happy. But then the sands started falling through the hourglass and before you could say “that Phelps guy has a goofy ass mug” the Olympics were over and they still hadn’t aired my gem. Bastards. Turns out that it was tested and deemed to have been on some sort of performance enhancers. Yep, banned for doping…my three-day masterpiece stopped by the committee for being too dope.
Here’s what you would have seen if our trainer had not lied about those injections [click on the image above].
And I suppose, in coming clean like Pettitte, retrospective reflection has made me realize I probably deserve this punishment, if not for getting into bed with MIC murderers, then for the hubris of thinking I, a never exercised a day in my life bum, could even ever do something sports-related in the first place. So gold eludes, dreams remain dashed, but on the grave of Jim McKay, I solemnly swear, this contestant shall Live and learn.
-Monihan Monihan, August 2008 bricolagista! 4 life
