The Red Sox—will someone please tell me who the hell is Eric Gagne and why is he playing in Boston? Also how about ‘the Youk’ he’s been hitting under the Mendoza line since the All-Star break and the idiot manager still bats him in the 5-spot. Come on. Drop him to 8th; hell Lugo is batting over 300 since the All-Star Break. And is it just me or does Manny seem to have suddenly lost it? I mean he’s the weakest hitting 85 RBI guy in the Majors.

The New England Patriots—okay Tom is a dad and that’s great but get back to camp, you have not looked like a Super Bowl MVP yet this pre-season. Asante, take the money, dude what are you thinking? I just love those big linebackers with all that experience. I think it may lead us to the promise land this year. And you know what else I think? Bill is the best! In fact, after I write this I’m heading out to buy a new hoodie.

The Boston Celtics—Danny Ainge makes me think of “Trader Jack” McKeon. For you young folk, he was the GM of the San Diego Padres baseball team from 1981-1988, who liked to make a trade every day before breakfast. Don’t get me wrong, I like this Celtics team, I think it has a chance to do some damage in a division that could be won by a good WNBA team. But with that said I hope chemistry and ego don’t get mixed up.

The Boston Bruins—really Mr. Jacobs, just sell the team to someone who cares. You and your team have become irrelevant in Boston. Other than that who cares?

New England Revolution—I’ll make this real simple there is only one FOOTBALL team in New England and it’s the Patriots. Case closed. I don’t care. Soccer sucks.

Now if only those teams would just let me be in charge for a day…

Every year when I do reviews I take a look at what the benefits I provide to my employees cost. As you can imagine, sometimes when I see the figures I worry that my defibrillator may kick in. Over the last 5 years the cost of benefits has risen faster than any other category in the company.

I’m damn proud of that. What you say? Well, with a diverse work force (20-something’s to 50-something’s) they all need and want different employee benefits. As you can see from this survey, the type and cost of benefits vary across the country.

I’m really proud of the fact that in every one of the talked about categories (except Child Care) we pay for everything and we have a few extras that I don’t often see offered anywhere else.

For instance, we now offer a fitness consultant. An Exercise Physiologist/Personnel Trainer meets with all the staff members who wish to learn from her. They set goals, talk about nutrition, workout programs, smoking cessation and all manner of things that can affect your health.

The benefit to me is two-fold: the staff thinks it’s a great benefit and I get to help my staff maintain their health and physical wellbeing. And guess what? A healthy staff translates into a lot less sick time. And another surprise…its entirely voluntary and every one of my staff is taking advantage of it.

So, don’t be afraid to invest in your staff in ways other than salary and vacation time. My diverse staff loves the variety and uniqueness of our benefits program. And they like it even more since they don’t pay for it. Trust me, I get every dollar back in a happy, healthy staff.

I know. What a stunner coming from a guy who owns an advertising agency! But sometimes we think we are immune to what we do. So let me tell you what I did that made me realize advertising really does work.

My wife took me out on date night, and to my surprise, wanted to buy me some new golf shoes. Well there we were at the golf store and the sales guy and my wife kept talking about a particular pair of shoes, “Hey, those are the same shoes Tiger wears.” Now I did not just fall off the turnip truck. I did not expect that the shoes “Tiger wears” would totally improve my game but…what the hell.

Then I began to think. If one Tiger product is good for me, more must be better! Next thing I knew I was swept up in the Nike-hype about the new SasQuatch Driver and started hitting a few balls. I was smitten.

The day after date night I went back to the golf store and bought the driver…then a Nike golf glove, Nike head covers, Nike golf tees — but I drew the line at golf balls.

The point being: even my wife knew about Tiger Woods. She hates golf but she, like many, cannot get away from the pervasiveness of advertising in our society. Good advertising sells stuff. It’s okay it’s not a bad thing. But please don’t tell my wife about the driver yet — I kinda forget to tell her.