Earn easy money at home by just listening to me...

OK, Time for you to collect what you are due. The world was mean, it wasn't your fault, and you are OWED!

Readers of MY blog will be rewarded. Line up at the trough and get your piece of the American Pie. This service is brought to you by our absurd system of lawyers and class action suits. I know what you are thinking: "I can't be part of those class action suits because I am a defenseless poor person, unable to exert monetary damage on anybody else." That may have been true yesterday, and most certainly will be true tomorrow, but TODAY you can join the masses and collect what is due to you. Now if you are one of those goody two shoes that feels that ethics and morality should interfere with your daily scramble for cash, you can rest easy: The money is either going to YOU or it is going to someone else. And they don't deserve it.

This is exactly like the CD wholesaler's lawsuit that I told the Annual4th folks a couple of years ago that we all profited from.

You tell them your name, they send you and 12 million of your closest friends a check for $25, and then they write out a big check for $36million (plus expenses) to those nice lawyers who were only looking out for your best interests.

It seems that the credit card companies were having a little problem with their math when they converted foreign currencies through your credit card. American Express did their math correctly, but MasterCard, Visa, and Diners Club may not have had your best interests in mind. If you used a credit card for ANY overseas purchase or ATM transaction (yes, Canada and Mexico are now overseas) between February 1, 1996 to November 8, 2006 you are eligible for this simple refund. In fact, since it is so darned difficult to track those nasty overseas transactions they are making it simple for you: "If you traveled outside of the U.S. for less than one week or had foreign transactions of less than $2,500 using your eligible cards during the 1996 to 2006 period" you are eligible for this $25 refund.

"But wait Mr. Moneybags, I traveled MORE than one week and used my credit card when I was there!" you may be asking...

Well, as a matter of fact, Mr. Moneybags and his wife Beth had gone on a cruise or two, and tested the CAN/AM border crossing procedures a few times. In fact I even took an engineering class in Montreal for eight days and blew loads of money trying to eat enough to stay warm, but I still went for Refund Option 1 to get the EASY $25 by filling out the GREEN FORM.
For you folks that want MORE than $25, there is Refund Option 2, the BLUE FORM, and you simply make estimates of how much time you were un-American.
For the accountants among you (Psssst, David) there is Refund Option 3, the RED FORM which you supply receipts and they send you bags of money in return.

Ain't America Great? Grab your piece of the pie TODAY!
You can't apply more than once, so choose your options carefully.
Don't worry, the helpful lawyers will still get their $36,000,000 dollars plus $5,000,000 for expenses plus settlement expenses EVEN if everyone you know applies for a refund. Lawyers are very careful to do THEIR math correctly.

So what are you waiting for? Go get your money at http://www.ccfsettlement.com/.
Thank you for listening, my finder's fee is only 4% which you can hand to me the next time you see me, if you are so inclined. Or a hug. Or a drink.

New Hampshire Primary Day

There are some people that have not experienced what it is like to be in New Hampshire during Primary Season. It is absolutely amazing. EVERYBODY takes it very seriously. It is an important job and they don't take it lightly. I don't think that you could get the same candid response from a large state. The candidates would not be able to traverse California to meet people everywhere and would end up parking themselves in front of a TV camera, which just doesn't give you the same feel.
The phone NEVER stops ringing, the mailbox and diners are stuffed full of politician stuff.
The citizens hate being bombarded but accept it as part of the job.
I was watching TV with some teenagers recently and I explained to them during one of the candidate's "very important messages" to the American people during an episode of "Grey's Anatomy" that the rest of the country is still seeing KIA's "Maniac dancing salesman commercial" and are still being told how important "Super White" clothing is and that they haven't lived until they have eaten a breakfast burrito with "real egg byproducts" included with the other secret ingredients. In New Hampshire, these commercials are gone. America's economy can go to hell, there is only one thing to advertise: the candidates. The teenagers in this state just assume that the entire country is being bombarded like this.
Surprisingly the stores are still in business and I looked around and in this little town, the whites are still "SUPER WHITE" so obviously everyone is still buying the correct laundry detergent.
Maybe we don't need quite as many ads as the companies think that we do.

Somebody remarked on TV recently that New Hampshire is one of the only states that EVERY registered voter in the state has at least once been in the same room and listened to a person that has become the President of the United States of America. We listen, we switch sides, we jump ship, and we lend our support to the various candidates based on what they actually say, not on the little sound-bites that are fed to us. Sometimes we meet the candidate and they only speak in sound-bites and there is no real substance behind it. They have to be weeded out.
What the folks in New Hampshire vote for is only our opinion. A lot of thought has gone into it, but it is only one voice out of 50. Our voice IS the most important voice on this particular day because we put so much research into it, but the other 49 states can redirect everything down the correct path if that is required because of new information.
Almost HALF of the state's voters are "Undeclared" which is New Hampshire's legal term for "Independent". We don't just vote for who we are told to vote for, we vote for who we WANT to vote for, tempered of course by the little dance of "electability" and "throwing you vote away" and other little strategy items that cloud the waters.
This year was our first year that we voted in the big city of Keene. They have different checklists and lines for different parts of the alphabet! They didn't even recognise who we were! In Antrim we used to announce who we were because that is the law, but they already were flipping to the correct page before you even speak up. There were no cookies as a reward for doing your civic duty, I REALLY missed the cookies. But Keene did have a nice touch, they had a table right next to the ballot box so that you can switch back to "Undeclared" immediately after voting for a candidate in one of the two major parties. So you don't have to be a full-time Democrat or Republican for more that the two minutes that it takes to check-in, vote, and checkout. I really feel kind of trapped when I am officially in one party or the other because of all those brainless statements that politicians make when "the other side" is accused of something. So Keene makes it very easy to open both ears again. In Antrim you had to loop around to the checklist person again and change your affiliation and sometimes you could forget to do it what with the cookies and talking and jokes an' all that you get at a small town.

Small town or big town, everybody that I know participates and takes it seriously. Of course I have some friends that consistently vote for the wrong people but I don't hold that against them, they think that they are right even though they are so obviously mistaken. My vote counteracts one of those poor misguided souls and somebody cancels somebody Else's vote. We could actually save trouble if we coordinated our cancellation votes and only have those seven people that don't have a counterpart make the decisions, b-b-b-b-but there is the chance that those seven people would vote wrong, so I guess we will keep doing what we do.
I know ANYBODY reading this in New Hampshire has already voted, but if you live in one of those other states make sure that you weed out the propaganda from the candidate and VOTE.
A helpful hint: If the talking head on TV or on the radio sounds like he is frothing up, what he is saying is probably not entirely based on reality, I mean, you could do as well getting your facts from THIS website (which you shouldn't) than you would from a talking head that is just a leeeetle too excited. Entertainment versus News, step carefully.

Remember that during the primaries you get to actually vote for a person. As soon as the primaries are over you are voting for an administration. The candidate is just the public face for the folks working behind the candidate. As Bob Goldthwaite said a few presidents ago "You can't blame Ronald McDonald because you get a bad hamburger". So vote for the figurehead that you think has a leeeetle more skill than the others and during the actual election you should vote for the administration that is slightly less corrupt and self serving than the other one is. Every short term decision has long term ramifications. We are still recovering from stupid decisions made a long time ago that were obviously stupid and short sighted when they were made. The figurehead did not make the decisions, but the administration that is hiding behind the curtain did. We are paying for it this year, and next year. Saying "nobody could predict this would happen" is a lousy excuse when the people that weren't immediately profiting from the decision were saying that it was a bad decision way back when the profiteers were pushing it through.
Profiting for short term results = BAD
Planning for long term results = GOOD
This rant is over.

faaaarm livin is the life for thee....

OK, nuthin new here... Sorry.... Maybe this afternoon. It warmed up here from "unbelievably cold" to just "unreasonably cold" and ALL of the snow on the barn slid off at once.
I have to shovel the heap-o-frozen-snow so that it doesn't flood the stalls.
I thought it would be more fun to add sharp edges to the horseshoes and they could practice their skating skills but I have been told to shovel instead.
I am also hoping to take advantage of the warm weather to get the tractor running. I understand engines. The horses are about as exciting to me as gigantic guinea pigs.

Oil of Olay and Beards

We were enjoying a wonderful Christmas dinner that had been prepared by Mia. Beth and I were asked about the place that we "are staying at". Beth and I are staying at a horse farm in Marlborough with Noel our housemate, two cats, and American dog, a French dog (who seems to bark in English), and eight very beautiful show horses.
One of our dinner companions, I'll call him "Paul", started telling us about a neat guy that he met in Marlborough that he liked, which is something to be noted because "Paul" isn't particularly fond of very many people. He was buying a large quantity of hay from a fellow named Karl. When we heard "Karl" and "Hay" and "Marlborough" in the same sentence we figured out that Karl was possibly the same Karl that normally lives right here in this house. We haven't met him yet because being of above average intelligence, he is still down in warmer climates enjoying winter the way winter is supposed to be enjoyed.
Well Paul and Karl seemed to really click. Somebody asked Paul how old Karl is.
Paul waved his hand and said "Oh, he's about the same age as me".
I leaned over to Jenny and said "Well that really narrows things down".
.
Let me explain how Paul looks. He is tall, has great hair that he wears rather long. It is gray.
He has very bright eyes and wire-rimmed glasses. He doesn't really talk or smile unless he is required to, so he has a minimal amount of wrinkles, in fact, I can't recall seeing ANY wrinkles.
His skin is smooth and healthy looking. All two inches of it. There is about a one inch patch on each cheek that is not covered with fur. He has a very long beard and an even longer mustache.
He wears his fur proudly. It is one of the few things in his life that he has total control over and dammit he's gonna grow it as long as he wants to. It looks good, it's clean, it covers him completely. So you have his hands, his cheeks, and his eyes. That is not very much to use to make an estimate of age from. You could probably check out his teeth if you knew how, but I would be very careful doing that. Beth is probably the only person that Paul would show his teeth to anyhow. He looks healthy. He's cranky enough that you would suspect that he has been around for a while. There really isn't any other way to determine his age. He's ageless. Someday we will all go "Ooooooooh" when we read his obituary.

So you see, Paul's comment about Karl being his age didn't really narrow anything down.
So after my "Well that really narrows things down" comment to Jenny, Paul asked me what that meant. I replied that saying that Karl was the same age as Paul means that "Karl is somewhere between the ages of 40 to 80". Paul said "thanks a lot", but what he didn't realize is that it also is a compliment because of the 40 thing at the lower end of the scale. I really have no clue how old Paul could be. Karl's age is not a mystery to me anymore. Noel was talking about Karl today and mentioned his age. I asked Noel to repeat it. Paul the bearded one seems to have a problem telling the age of other bearded people too. I may not know how old Paul actually is, but at this exact moment Karl and Paul are probably not the same age even though they may look like identical twins. Karl is seventy nine. I wonder how old Paul is. I wonder how old Paul thinks Karl is. I sure wish I could grow a beard.

Time to think about finances.

Hi gang,

It keeps snowing but today it is sunny for the first time since we arrived back in New England. The holidays were better than expected. We are taking care of appointments and maintenance of teeth, mind, body, and automobiles.
I am going to be researching methods of actually earning some income, but it will probably have to be a portable job of some kind because Beth has decided after two weeks of grayness that there is really no need to be in the North for winters anymore.

One of the areas of income enhancement that I am thinking of is the wide world of Ant Lions. The area of Florida we were in last month has a bumper crop of ant lions in the sand all along the dirt roads that we were walking on. When I was doing some research on the little beasts I happened upon a company that buys and sell ant lions.

They sell them as part of an executive sandbox system. You know those little boxes of sand that they sell with rakes and a couple of stones so that you can poke around as a way to relax (and/or get fired) while at the office? They sell them in ALL of the gift magazines, airline safety exit and buy this on your way out magazines, and Brookstone. Well, I never happened to buy one because with the energy level that I have been living with for the last two years, if I was any more relaxed at my desk I would have been officially comatose, and also with the way my desk was meticulously organized a stray cat could have used it as a kitty box and it would have taken me months to track down the smell.

Well anyhow, SOMEBODY buys those things. Well there is one company that adds a little blood and guts to the whole peaceful meditation process. They sell an executive sandbox with ant lions in it so that you can watch little creatures struggle for their life before being eaten. It makes you feel mellow AND powerful. See AntLionDen.com.

Well they need sources for ant lions. Now you may be thinking "I didn't know that I could be raising Ant Lions for fun and profit" as I probably was thinking (but I honestly don't remember). You can. Because they sell the ant lions at the reasonable price of 3 for $10, they must be slamming these things out to happy customers as fast as... well as fast as customers find out that they can buy ant lions for their executive desk.

The AntLionDen actually recruits little kids to collect ant lions for them with their "Ant Lion Wrangler" kit and then pays them Twenty Cents for each one! Now a little kid can collect enough ant lions in an hour to earn FIVE BUCKS! And then they wait. When they have sold enough Pit-O-Deaths to powerful executives they replenish their stocks by sending postcards to the "wranglers" asking them to send more and then just wait for them to arrive.

.

To review: Twenty Cents EACH. Now to most people this would not seem like much, but you haven't been walking on the back roads that Beth and I have been on. There are THOUSANDS of these little things just waiting to be processed, sold into captivity, and perform tricks for food for the rest (of this stage) of their life. You may be thinking "It sure sounds like a goldmine Warren but what about all of those 'wranglers' out there in the system already?" I appreciate your concern, but I have thought about this and have an answer: screw them. they are just little kids, they can't possibly compete against ME! Instead of using the little slotted spoon that comes with the wrangler kit I will modify a portable Dysan vacuum cleaner to sort out the ant lions from the shells and stones and I then I will attach THAT system to a motorized vehicle or a Segway and I will have an Ant-Lion-Combine.

This system will collect so many ant-lions that I will blow this whole market wide open.

The market will be flooded and the prices will collapse and I will have a warehouse full of hungry ant lions that have been devalued to 1.64 cents each. The trick is to boost the market demand so that my Ant-Lion-Combine can make me rich.

DeBeers
DeBeers has a long history of buying a relatively common mineral and warehousing it to keep market prices high. They had created the whole concept of "engagement rings" in a brilliant ad campaign in 1939 as a way to market a colorless stone. They now push diamonds around using shovel loaders in more and more dark warehouses while "releasing" very small quantities to the public at inflated prices that are "what the market will bear". I created a marketing plan that redefines the Ant-Lion as a "living tribute to the ferociousness of my love" for the engagement market. If that didn't work then there might be interest in going for the relatively untapped Father market. I designed a little cage on a long necklace that holds an ant lion's torso leaving the pincers "free". I also designed a companion piece that could be described as a "ant-collar". It is unobtrusive and rather good looking. It is easy to attach to your daughters boyfriend before they go out on a date and is easy to inspect at the end of the evening to see if the ants are all there. Let's just call it a pre-pre-engagement piece of jewelry. Alas, the accountants at DeBeers determined that it is cheaper to store thousands of tons of uncut diamonds in 470 giant warehouses than to try to FEED the monthly output of my Ant-Lion-Combine. They politely declined.


Purdue.
My contact at Purdue has informed me that he is out on disability after an industrial accident. It seems that they loved my idea of using ant lions as a fast growing source of protein that feeds exclusively on garden pests, thus leaving a "very small carbon footprint", but Purdue immediately experimented with growing an oven stuffer version of an ant lion and it tore the arms off of six employees before they could trick it into visiting the "Turkey Hot Dog packing department". Which of course is how most genetic monsters are "re-purposed" in accordance with the "Moratorium against public monster and army humiliation treaty signed at the Tokyo summit of 1976". I think with the proper socialization and careful psychological programs, the Purdue six pound ant lion that they created would have been a wonderful domesticated food source and home extermination device.

So maybe we are back to the executive Pit-O-Death Zen Garden toys. I don't know if there is a big enough market for those.... unless..... ALL of you folks reading this, immediately buy multiple sets of this very relaxing executive toy. But of course, I am not in this business yet. I am just tossing around ideas here.

There is also the secondary market that is linked to this whole executive toy thing.
The food. They can also buy food for their executive ant lion zen-pit-o-death. That is another whole market. These executives (or presumably, their secretaries) buy food so that they can feed these hungry little monsters. Unless they are upper-upper-top-management, in which case they probably would outsource to an office Zen-Ant-Lion maintenance company. Boy those guys sure have a racket, everybody knows how easy it is to maintain ant lions.

But anyhow, back to the food...
Somebody actually raises wingless-fruit-flies to make it easy for genetics scientists that don't like to be bothered using those butterfly nets every time they have to study the nether-regions of another generation of fruit fly. What would Darwin think of us creating paraplegic fruit flies? Well these very same paraplegic fruit flies make terrific ant lion food for the desk because they can't run away. They just sort of tumble down into the pit in their little fruit fly wheelchairs and stare back up at you as you wait for the fun to begin.

So maybe after the ant lion market blossoms I will buy into the defective fruit fly market and then I will go back to Purdue with this brand new idea that I just got...

Wishing you a Prosperous New Year.

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chemo sabe said...
I can see where you'd be getting antsy at this juncture, but REALLY!!!!
Hope you guys have a happy new year!!! This blog has been a lifesaver!!!
love chemo sabe January 3, 2008 11:47 AM
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matt said...
thank you
January 16, 2008 4:16 AM
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