I finished two books this weekend. Being a desperately slow reader, that's quite a feat.

One was David Niven's "the moon's a balloon". Yes, you've probably read it: the charm, the anecdotes, the sex-drive, the ridiculous things he'd accomplished by the time he was 30.
What I loved best were the little Noel Coward moments. A 5-year-old Godson brings a heavy brass tray crashing down on Noel's balding head, and Noel, without flinching, all smiles, without at pause, says:
"You know what I'm going to get dear little Nicholas for Christmas? A chocolate-covered hand-grenade".
(BTW, how do you type an umlaut over Noel?)

Always see the funny side. That also seems to have been Frank Johnson's motif. I was singing at his memorial service on Friday. All the bigwigs were there - Michael Howard, Matthew Parris, David Cameron, who read (I felt tacit approval having cycled there; he arrived in a large Merc..), and countless hacks and hacked. People who come to memorial services can't be all bad.
Anyway, Frank Johnson managed "to see the absurd in everything". As well as appreciating the beauty of music. And enjoying dining alone. And reading prodigiously.

Which brings me to the second book. The 22 immutable laws of Marketing, by Al Ries and Jack Trout. It's uncannily similar to the 22 immutable laws of Branding - which is probably a good thing. Two laws stuck out for me...
The law of Candor says you should admit a negative, and let the customer twist it into a positive. So Listerine, fighting against a new "great-tasting" mouthwash called Scope, didn't reformulate their mouthwash: no, they emphasised their antiseptic taste - "Listerine, the taste you hate twice a day." I hate the taste, so it must be killing germs. Clever.
The second was "The Law of Hype" - the situation is often the opposite of how it appears in the press. Often products that get splashed across the front page actually never make it, whilst the successes creep up slowly with subtle endorsements on the back pages. Obviously, that's nice to know as Firefly hasn't hit many front-pages yet. But is it still true in the Internet age? (The book was published in 1992).
Actually, it does seem to ring true - journalists spot stories, not trends. The iPod worked its way into the consciousness and only became big news when thousands of people had them. The iPhone went straight to the front pages - so here's betting it won't live up to the hype... Red Bull worked its way into the vernacular via students. "Cocaine" hit the front pages and just got withdrawn from sale in the US.
So there you have it - don't believe the hype.