{"id":1499,"date":"2011-09-30T20:48:24","date_gmt":"2011-09-30T19:48:24","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.mmcgrath.co.uk\/?p=1499"},"modified":"2014-08-02T14:09:36","modified_gmt":"2014-08-02T13:09:36","slug":"so-smug-it-hurts","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.mmcgrath.co.uk\/?p=1499","title":{"rendered":"SO SMUG IT HURTS"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>So I was flicking through the property pages of the local paper \u2013 I\u2019m not one of those people who obsesses about clambering to the top of the property ladder but I do occasionally indulge in a daydream about owning a house with a swimming pool. I like swimming. Anyway, I stumbled across a full page advert from fineandcountry.com<\/a> advertising a \u00a34.5 million property in Radlett which looks like it has a lovely swimming pool. And then I read the advert\u2019s copy and well…<\/p>\n

\n

For a life of light luxury and elegance<\/strong><\/p>\n

Entering the exclusive private lane that leads to The Leys you can only feel that you are in a place of success and attainment. Private, secure and surrounded by opulent fittings the full height entrance hall is a magnificent statement of a high achiever. When you own The Leys it tells your friends and family that you have arrived at a place in life that says \u201c I\u2019m happy!\u201d.
\nContemporary style and dramatic statements are evident in every room.\u00a0 Ultimately this house is about lifestyle and expectations of what should be delivered at this level. The pool with gym, games room and entertainment area have been designed by the current owner to provide for entertaining fun parties relaxation and fitness. The perfect design for a family who want seclusion yet warmth and freedom.<\/p>\n

The initial vision and brief by the current owner, who created and designed the property, was to create a benchmark family home full of light and naturally flowing elegance. The end result we feel has achieved this beyond expectations.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

It\u2019s not the poor punctuation \u2013 the copywriter is obviously a stranger to the serial comma \u2013 or the suspect grammar \u2013 I\u2019m as much a fan of the sentence fragment as the next guy \u2013 that bothers me about this advert.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s the smugness.<\/p>\n

The horrifying, cloying, all-encompassing smugness of it.<\/p>\n

From the moment you approach along \u201cthe exclusive private lane\u201d (which private lanes aren\u2019t exclusive?) and enter via the (\u201cfull height\u201d) entrance hall that is \u201ca magnificent statement of a high achiever\u201d I\u2019m itching to punch the person who wrote this, the person who owns the house and any fecker who reads this and even thinks about viewing the house. I\u2019m not suggesting that everyone who feels the need to makes a statement about their lifetime achievements through the medium of large vestibules is, necessarily, irredeemably shallow but I\u2019d be willing to take a gamble on the fact that most of them are.<\/p>\n

But it gets worse. Because now you can look down on your friends and family and scream \u201c I\u2019m happy!\u201d \u2013 as if they would dare doubt (look that exclamation mark, you\u2019re so sincere) that surrounded by all this opulence and magnificence it was possible feel any emotion other than joy.<\/p>\n

\u201cUltimately this house is about lifestyle and expectation of what should be delivered at this level\u201d the advert tells me.\u00a0 I\u2019m not sure what that means but it appears to involve \u201centertaining fun parties\u201d (of course your parties are fun, you own this house, you\u2019ve succeeded, you\u2019ve attained, you\u2019re a winner, people like you don\u2019t throw dull parties). I have no idea why \u201cseclusion\u201d and \u201cwarmth and freedom\u201d might be set in opposition to each other, but whoever wrote this obviously feels they don\u2019t often go together (hence the \u201cyet\u201d).<\/p>\n

This house is on sale for \u00a34.5 million \u2013 that means the estate agent is probably going to earn something between \u00a345,000 and \u00a3135,000 when this property is sold. If I was paying someone that amount of money to sell my house, and I read this advert, I\u2019m pretty sure I\u2019d be demanding my money back. And I\u2019d be negotiating with a baseball bat.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

So I was flicking through the property pages of the local paper \u2013 I\u2019m not one of those people who obsesses about clambering to the top of the property ladder but I do occasionally indulge in a daydream about owning a house with a swimming pool. I like swimming. Anyway, I stumbled across a full […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":1500,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false,"jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false}}},"categories":[20],"tags":[36,37,35],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"http:\/\/www.mmcgrath.co.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/09\/house_advert.jpg","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p27AP7-ob","_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.mmcgrath.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1499"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.mmcgrath.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.mmcgrath.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.mmcgrath.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.mmcgrath.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1499"}],"version-history":[{"count":10,"href":"http:\/\/www.mmcgrath.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1499\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1546,"href":"http:\/\/www.mmcgrath.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1499\/revisions\/1546"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.mmcgrath.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/1500"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.mmcgrath.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1499"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.mmcgrath.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1499"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.mmcgrath.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1499"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}