Upcycling my Idea Graveyard into a Sandbox

I enjoy working in the financial industry, I genuinely do.  Plus, I am lucky in that my job allows me some access to play in the creative playground and roll down pithy hills and swing on alliterative branches- all within the clear line of sight of content reviewers and regulators of course.  

Today, I received an email from our agency partner with 4-5 subject line suggestions for an upcoming recruitment email.  This was followed by an email from our account director hinting at the suggestions that she refrained from sending through sheer self control.  Yes, we would have passed on those suggestions but it got me thinking about the content that I inevitably throw into the trash chute, even though it is often the garbage that gets me to the final draft.

I used to think of it as a content graveyard, a dark place where ideas were buried, never visited or remembered beyond a hasty burial.  Frankly, I really like some of these ideas, some are bombs and some are the product of way, way, way too much caffeine and not enough laps around the office.  To fart on someone's creativity, writing, brainstorms or ideas is what breeds self-conscious, desperate girlfriend behavior and manifests in bouts of impervious writer's block and alcoholism (see: Hemingway or my old boss).  That said...

Welcome to my sandbox, where the dummies, loners, weirdos and sluts of my ideas can play in the sand (this is not a progressive sandbox with those redwood chips or foam blocks instead of sand and cat turds).  They are not equal, some got here through old fashioned spit-balling with glitter pens while others rode in on the substance abuse express, scribbled in lip liner on a napkin.  But, what they all have in common is they were rejected by my superiors but now shared by me. All specific identifiers have been removed.

Post titles and subject line suggestions:

Are XX Investments the Beanie Babies of the Investment World?
Portfolio Yoga: Downward Dollar-Cost Averaging
You Advised the $%&! Out of Us!
All's Quiet on the Sequester Front

On home country bias:
Agoraphobic Investment Portfolios (on Home Country Bias)
The Emotional Hindrance of Ethnocentric Investing

All the Single Countries (I included instructions for the reviewer that read, "Note, this sounds best in Beyonce's voice")

Erotic Fan Fiction: How the Grinch Stole Christmas but Cindy-Lou Who Stole His Dignity

I'm adding to this a little each day or, as my father would say, "Every little bit helps said the little old lady as she peed in the sea."


Prologue

Cindy-Lou Who had just turned 22,
"It's time," she thought "I know just what to do.

It was 20 years past that he ruined her Who-Christmas
"But now it my time. Let's revenge fuck this business!"

Logue

Every Who...
Down in Whoville...
Liked Christmas a lot.

But the Grinch...
Who lived just north of Whoville did NOT.

The Grinch hated Christmas, the whole Christmas season!
And the Who's were to blame (and we all know the reason).

Yes, there was a brief window, a blip or a tic
When the Ginch's tiny heart grew the size of a brick

The Whos joyful singing had melted his soul
it opened his floodgate and sparked up the dormant coal.

After robbing them, pillaging and double decking their crappers
The Whos taught the Grinch the best gifts aren't in wrappers
They welcomed the thief into their houses open-armed,
and let him carve the roast beast that was sustainably farmed.

After feasting he sang and played with all their Who toys,
Paying close mind to the Who girls and boys.

"They're such stupid brats," the Grinch thought with a snort,
as they ripped apart bed sheets to build a large fort. 

The Grinch rolled his eyes and his attention did sway,
while his acidic heart began to turn gray.
His stomach then rumbled and jabbed with a start,
Oh fuck, thought the Grinch, a spicy beast fart!