|
Total Views:
161
|
Slow Learning Curve
My eighth grade shop teacher, on the first day of school, stood facing his class, with his right arm extended horizontally forward, his index finger raised about 45-degrees from the perpendicular, and said, real solemn, impressive, and sincere, “One word.” Since this teacher-tactic had never been used on us in that manner, --- we paid attention. He then discloses the ‘word.’ He says, “Plastic.” It was 1967. He was talking about the future. He was wrong.I first conceived somewhat the power of the computer in 1984 when I took a vocational class on electronics. My mind opened; my imagination went wild; I got ideas. The first money making idea that came to mind was a service I needed, which would alert me to an upcoming birthday, or to any similar, annually occurring, budget depleting event, requiring/demanding cards. That would solve the, “Sorry, I didn’t get you a card,” problem I have. I was sure others had it as well.
Which led to the realization that, unless I took prompt action, ‘someone’ else was going to come up with a service which automatically mailed customer-pre-chosen cards of this type to the selected people at the appropriate time. If I could think of it, it had probably already been thought of. I was right, it had.
Things happened, one thing and another, on-the-job treachery, divorce, and bad stuff that shouldn’t happen to a dog, so sometime, way later, there I am age 40, never been on a computer, yet my kid raised by the custodial parent is ˝ genius on it. Then, some more repetition of the same sort of life’s unavoidable and avoidable mistreatment and foolishness, on and off for another 10 years, blabla, blablabla, and all of a sudden there I am, age 50, in front of my very own, brand new, 160 gig computer, compliments of my new girlfriend---cuz marriage number two didn’t work out either.
Man, was this going to be fun. I may not be especially good marriage-material, a sound judge of womankind, overly ambitious or remotely lucky, but I’d always thought of myself as rather smart enough to learn to operate, and make money with one of these things. That was two years ago.
Overall, add it up, and I’ve invested over twenty two years of my life since 1984 doing something other than making money with brilliant ideas and products online. Some of the time consumed in dreaming, uh, coming up with ideas that would have made money ‘if,’ was not wasted. As, for example; no one offers live, online, remote control (controlling small tank-like vehicles armed with a 22 caliber compressed-air pellet gun, sighted through a video camera) rat hunting, where the highest bidder might live in London, for example, but gets to hunt rats live online in the sewers of, say, Seattle. Those who pay a small fee, or are members, or sign up on my list, get to watch the hunt. Then, of course, comes the best of the best rat hunts, and rat hunt bloopers video, on CD. Don’t steal this idea. If everything goes right from here on out, I’ll own that site in about a half year.
Either that, or I’ll have an animal site, at which I will offer those who register (anything to get you on my list), a selection of live video feeds from hundreds, maybe thousands of members who have their outdoor, mounted camcorders trained on, and recording, their outdoor birdfeeder, fountain, birdbath, hornet’s nest, bird’s nest, or similar location where animals are likely to provide entertainment, education, or amusement in one form or another. Crows fighting with squirrels, deer eating the neighbors garden, rare birds, stuff like that. Don’t use that idea either.
Now I find that I can operate my way around this thing just well enough so that when I get pretty tangled up, my computer guru girlfriend can’t fix me up in no time at all. Then she says, “Now that you’ve learned to create auto run CDs, you’re ready to write an article which will be used, and forwarded and cherished, and go viral, and finally put some money in your pocket,” and I say, “All right.” And there you go.