GUEST BLOGGER: CJ KAPLAN

We promised Guest Bloggers and we are delivering! My friend for 45+ years, CJ, gets bragging rights for being our first Guest Blogger - and we hope he will inspire many more of you to follow. Please let us if you are interested.

Zoe tends to be a big fan of rules so in that spirit, here are the Official Zo Much More Guest Blogger Ground Rules:

• The prompt is simple: Any angle that you can relate to Zo Much More (it does NOT need to a testimonial)

• The length is your choice: We recommend you aim for somewhere in between haiku & War and Peace

• The requirement: A picture of you with your bracelet … or swag bag, or however else you interacted with Zo Much More (if possible)

With that, we present: It’s All in the Wrist - A Guest Blog by CJ Kaplan

Photo Credit: Lisa Kaplan

I’ve always been a bracelet guy. Oh, I had a brief dalliance with a gold rope chain in my teens and twenties, but that phase mercifully passed. My love for bracelets, though, has endured.

For my high school graduation, I got a heavy silver ID bracelet which I still wear on my right wrist to this day. Over the years, that metal monolith has been joined by numerous gimp bracelets, macrame bracelets, friendship bracelets and rubber cause bracelets. Indeed, it is rare to see me with a bare wrist. Currently, both arms are adorned with multiple bracelets in different colors and styles and in various states of decay. Like a favorite pair of boxer shorts, I will wear a bracelet until it quite literally disintegrates.

And yet, despite all my years of bracelet wearing I had never come across anything like the Zo Much More Collection. The first one I got was the tri-tone JWG model which I customized with my kids initials–S, A and E. (Although when I showed it to my son Eric, he said “Why’d you get those random letters, Dad?” Ah well. So much for familial gestures.) The second one was the ACEing Autism bracelet that Mira gifted me for being part of the Flutie 5K Team.

Both bracelets are bright, comfortable and super tough. I don’t take them off to shower or workout and, in a month of wear, neither has so much as a ding. And Mira knows firsthand what kind of abuse they take in our daily Boot Camp class.

If bracelets are your thing like they are mine, check out the Zo Much More Gallery. They’ve got a lot of great styles to choose from and you can always create your own custom family bracelet. Even if your kids don’t appreciate it.

CJ Kaplan is the Executive Creative Director at Carbon and the co-author of the music and humor blog Exile on Newbury St. He is way too competitive in local 5Ks and, as a result, his wife refuses to run with him.

(Editor’s comment: This blog entry is proof that you can take the man out of advertising but you can’t take the advertising out of the man.)