Huckster: The Worst Kind Of Client

It’s common for someone working in advertising to complain about a client every now and then. It’s only human nature as well as science (chemistry). There are the clients who want to play art director, or the ones who like to dabble in copywriting, or the ones who never call back after sleeping with them. But the worst client, by far, is the client from Hell. I’m not talking about a client who is so bad that he or she, metaphorically, is from Hell. I’m talking about the one actually from the netherworld called Hell. Specifically Satan, deliverer of eternal pain and suffering.

What makes Satan so difficult to work with? First of all, he’s Satan. Secondly, he is constantly demanding tight deadlines, outrageous revisions, chicken butchery, and 24-hour attention. Personally, I think he’s doing it on purpose and getting some kind of sick thrill off it. But why? It begs the question, Who is this guy named Satan and what’s his M.O.?

Don’t tell my boss this, but I’m beginning to think the Hell account is more trouble than it’s worth. I know a lot of my coworkers feel the same way. We’re overlashed and underpaid. Not to mention, Hell is a disaster, operationally. Fourth Circle? More like “Forever To Finish Construction” Circle!

Here’s another thing: The Accuser and King Of All Darkness has quite the temper. Okay, so it took Gary two days to return Satan’s call, big deal. I mean, Gary should have called him right back, but I think magically turning Gary into a brick courtyard was a little overboard.

Gary, these days.

I’ll tell you what, there’s no shortage of egos in Hell either. Take Asmodeus, for example, who is the marketing director and your point-of-contact as well as a king of demons referenced in the deuterocanonical Book of Tobit (perhaps you’ve read it?). The guy insists he’s the prince of Hell, when everyone knows he’s just one of seven princes.  But don’t tell him that. If you do, he’s liable to give you less time on that website while simultaneously sleeping with your mother-in-law. I know what you’re thinking: “At least he’s not sleeping with my wife.” True, except for the fact that Asmodeus, Immortal Demon Of Lust, will shapeshift into an image of you when he sleeps with the old Battle Axe, so your wife will think you’re sleeping with her mom. Order up: one set of divorce papers!

Asmodeus is bad, but let’s face it: Satan, Father of Lies, is the worst. I mean, it’s right there: ‘Father of Lies.’ Really, we have nobody to blame for our troubles but ourselves. If the signs were any more obvious, they’d bite off our nose, dip it in graphite and use it as a pencil (happened once). If only someone—anyone—at our agency had read the Bible, specifically Isaiah 14:12-14—

12 How you are fallen from heaven,

O Lucifer, son of the morning!

How you are cut down to the ground,

You who weakened the nations!

13 For you have said in your heart:

‘I will ascend into heaven,

I will exalt my throne above the stars of God;

I will also sit on various jobs until there

Isn’t much time left;

14 Not much time left at all, really;

Nay, there won’t be much time.’

All those hotel rooms on all those business trips and the answer was sitting right there, in the second drawer of our nightstand. But did we open the book? No. No, we didn’t. Not while we were sober anyway.

Well, if you’re in advertising yourself and get the “opportunity” to work on the Hell account, I have some advice. It’s the kind of advice that just might save your life and, more important, your job.

1) The Lawless One does not drink coffee; he drinks tea. This may seem trivial, but, trust me, if you serve coffee that first meeting with him you’ll regret it. Just ask our account coordinator, Jaime. Just kidding, you can’t ask Jaime. Jaime’s dead.

2) Never look at The Wicked One in the eyes when he isn’t speaking. Melissa over here did that and Satan cursed her with a hex in which she will forever smell like Vidalia onions and we all must now call her Vidalia because of this. Well, we don’t have to call her Vidalia, but it’s just too goddamn funny to resist.

3) Dye your hair black.

Well, I better get going. We have a meeting with Satan in five minutes, and I don’t want to be late. An associate creative director named Cindy was late once. That was the last time she was late. In fact, that was the last time she was anything. Cindy died the next day while reading a book of poetry in the park (picnic, lightning, Satan).