The Next Career Has Begun

The bullet has been bit(ten) and an eBay store has been started. It hasn't been as easy as I had expected, but it is happening. Here's the link, should any one care to look:
http://stores.ebay.com/Hot-Dogs-and-Bait

It's a new venture, so please be gentle with your criticism. Maybe in a couple weeks, it will have been developed to the point imagined at the start.

In considering what I wrote a few posts back and doing some hefty research into what's selling, I came across the idea of selling ads from old magazines, mostly of a fishing theme to start. And so I did it.

One of the convincing ideas was that I had bought an ad for the sailboat I bought a few years ago. It's been on my wall and frequently viewed. So, we'll see if I can find something that is of similar value to someone else. That, after all, was the whole idea as originally spewed forth.

In looking through some of the magazines I got to get started, I found a fabulous editorial about an organization called the Future Fisherman Foundation. One of their main functions is running a program called "Hooked on Fishing—Not On Drugs." What really impressed me was that the initiator, Tom Bedell and the Berkley Company, set it up without mentioning the company. Talk about giving back!! It sounds like a terrific program. Here's their link:
http://www.futurefisherman.org

It's been a good week, overall—starting the eBay store and finding out about the Future Fisherman Foundation. Those two things are exciting. Wish us all luck.

A Lesson Learned

They say “time flies when you’re having fun.” Looking at the date of the previous post makes me wonder just how much fun I’ve been having. It sure didn’t seem like that much fun, although life has been going along pretty well and there is no room for complaint. That’s not too bad, when I think about it.

There is one thing I have learned that I really want to pass along to anyone who publishes something. And it is: double, better yet, triple proofread before publishing. And make use of SPELLCHECKERS.

Typos have long been a pet peeve of mine, having been a typesetter for many years. I mentioned this blog to my brother a few days ago, and he emailed me with a short lecture on spelling errors, pointing out several he had noticed. When I recovered from my mortification, which was especially huge because I thought I had corrected everything, I copied all the posts and ran them through the spellchecker in Word, which found about 6 or 7 additional typos. My apologies to anyone else who was offended.

Until I find where Blogspot has hidden the spellchecker, I will create these blogs—and anything else to be published—in Word or something else with a spellchecker and paste it into the post dialog box.

My brother is thinking of starting a small publishing business for those authors whose work is not of interest to the world of regular publishers. It would be interesting to know if anyone “out there” would find such a service of interest. It seems to me that the “print on demand” idea might be valuable for such an endeavor. Research is underway, in a small fashion.

I’ve actually been thinking about and researching the results of the last post. The result is that I’ve come up with something to begin trying to sell on eBay and actually think that it may have be successful. I will keep the subject quiet for now, lest the secret gets to too many potential competitors.

Products derived from "Hot Dogs and Bait"

So today, as I get closer to beginning my next career (online marketing), let's consider what might develop from the words "Hot Dogs and Bait."

Hot dogs are a kind of food. Probably not gourmet by most classifiers, but something which is enjoyable and provides at least some of the necessary parts of the food chain. Low level, easy, common, many variations. So we have enjoyable and necessary.

Bait is something used to attract something else, in this instance, fish. Fishing is an outdoor sport or recreation, or a livelihood for some. I am going to exclude fishing for a living from this blog. So we're talking about having fun outdoors.

From the above, I think we can start to look at things having to do with fishing and other outdoor activities, food, enjoyment and necessaries. Not an all inclusive list, but broad enough for a beginning. Food for thought for the next installment.

Da Bears

There's a line across the living room. Da Bears fans go on this side, the other ones go over there. I would have liked to arrange it so that only those on this side could see the TV, but unfortunately, my bride, the one who is going to provide all the food, is one of the others and I had to let her see. There's no heat or running water in our dog house, if you get my drift. But any team that would sneak out of town in the middle of the night doesn't have any business being in the Super Bowl. We'll see how it is tomorrow.

Meanwhile, I'm trying to figure out how to list some of the neat blogs I've visited on this blog. It's probably just me - I'm sure I saw that it could be done.

Go enjoy the game.

Continuing to be amazed at all the things you guys have done and are doing. Thanks to all.

My brother sent me a draft of a book he's hoping to publish. It's a collection of poems he has written over the years based on his farm near Flemington, NJ. I didn't know he was so good at capturing feelings about things we walk by and take for granted.

My wife gave me two tickets to a Devils-Rangers game a couple weeks ago as a Christmas present. That resurrected my old (from college) love of hockey. Been hooked on the Devils games since. They've changed a lot since the strike. Seems mostly for the better. The All Star game last week was a terrific show of the talent in the league. I helped out as a student trainer during my college days and sometimes have to fill in at the hockey games. Hadn't seen that much blood since watching autopsies in my pre-med days (they cured that interest and I'm still trying to figure out what I want to be when I grow up). What a great game against the Flyers last night. Can't believe the Flyers are in last place, playing the way they did. But I'm glad the Devils won.

The guy from the marina down the road just came by and said he had finally cut out the centerboard from my sailboat which got wrecked in September when Eduardo passed by. Now I have to see if the guy who had wanted it in October still wants it. I hope so—I haven't thought of what to do with a centerboard that is too heavy for one guy to pick up.

I've got to work on my picture taking to see if I can add something worthwhile to the web, after seeking what
willetphoto has done.