People pay attention to what interests them, and sometimes it happens to be a drone.

Or, as the increasingly over-quoted Gossagism has it, an ad.

For proof, we didn’t have to look much further than the New Jersey night sky — a state overly maligned, if you ask me — for the last couple of weeks.

“It was big as a car…” “…a bus…” “…a house…”

And, in a paroxysm of conspiratorial joy, well calculated to inflame the hearts of less-than-jolly red-hat wearers everywhere:

“It came from Iran.”

Oddly enough, it’s precisely this desire to tell and be told stories that stands as our biggest human bulwark against the soulless mechanization of creativity.

Great stories captivate. Entrance. Motivate.

They sell endorphins, newspapers, rating points, and, you bet, advertising schedules.

And look at how happy this particular story made us all.

Neighbors had reason to theorize in hushed tones with neighbors.

Parents got to comfort saucer-eyed children.

Law enforcement authorities got to be authoritative.

Journalists got to journalize, politicians to politicize.

All, while the rest of us got a welcome distraction from the impending impendingness of 2025.

We know all this. In fact, from Orson Well’s “War of the Worlds” in 1938, to this most recent combination whatisit and whodunnit, the evidence is incontrovertible that great tales, well told, are beyond powerful.

So, what gives with the lame and lackluster crap we’re being served across virtually all the commercial channels and screens this holiday season?

Where are the products of all those fertile minds inventing intrigues of charm and surprise and loss and redemption?

Where are fainting Santas and M&M's (https://lnkd.in/dPtG9uMm)?

Where’s a quirky, charming and oddly monikered penguin for British retailer John Lewis (https://lnkd.in/dMvD-Rg6)?

Where are the epics, like Sainsbury’s “1914” (https://lnkd.in/dsP4-fXt) and “ “Plug Boy” https://lnkd.in/diMPGFkN

“Data,” the always interesting Bob Brihn conversationally underhands, “makes people lazy.”

“Maybe because,” adding my thought to his, “it gives us the illusion that we know enough about an audience to think we know enough.”

Ergo, we stop thinking, dreaming, imagining, reaching.

Forgetting, there’s a corollary to Gossage’s happy homily:

No interest, no attention.

All of which results in a spate of dull and "been there/seen that" duplicative; entirely pointless or far too pointed; a holiday season of advertising that feels more like the demon spawn of SEO crossed with a TikTok silly dance, served with a side of emotionally fraudulent banality.

Even while the dark canopy above is illuminated by intrigue, allure, and tension — the North Stars of great storytelling.

You know, given another week, I bet those drones would have been the size of aircraft carriers.