Earlier this month, my 95-year-old Grandpa Jim drew his last breath, and in the days following the funeral, I planted the task in my mind to come up with a defining memory I had of the grand ol’ man, and I believe it’s finally come to me. While catching a bit of Pulp Fiction, of all things…

I’m not sure of my age, but I’ll hazard a guess I was somewhere in the 8 to 10 range. In those days, thanks to time spent with both of my grandpas, I had a particular, well, infatuation for all things fishing. My tackle box was absolutely stuffed with every lure I could get me hands on. The entry for the term for fishing in our encyclopedia at home was tattered. I knew far too many details on every piece of fishing gear at our local hardware store. That sort of infatuation.

During one of our many trips back to my parents’ home range, Grandpa Jim thought feeding my infatuation was the order of the day, and off we went to some local fishing hole for the afternoon. Excited to catch as many fish as I could, I grabbed my aforementioned tacklebox, borrowed one of grandpa’s rods out of his garage, and loaded up what little gear one needs for such a trip into the back of his old pipe tobacco scented station wagon.

For whatever reason, that day the fish just weren’t being agreeable. A couple hours in, and with many a lure change gone by, not even a nibble. Sensing my growing frustrations, grandpa reeled in my rod, cut off whatever monstrosity I had attached to my line, put on a simple bobber, sinker, and a worm-threaded hook, and handed me back my rod along with an orange soda. And said to me,

‘Son, the point of fishing isn’t really to catch the fish…’

The rest of the afternoon was spent quietly watching a bobber bob, drinking orange soda, eating bologna sandwiches, with but a few words spoken in between.

I couldn’t tell you whether the actual catching of fish got any better that day. But, it was my best day fishing.

‘That’s when you know you’ve found somebody really special: you can just shut the fuck up for a minute and comfortably share silence.’
– from Mia in Pulp Fiction

RIP Grandpa… I’ll miss you!

As a continuation to my comments concerning the food we eat from earlier today, this was today’s randomly chosen podcast that came up for me to listen to on the way home from work: From On Being – Driven By Flavor.

May as well finish the day’s theme out and pull up Food, Inc. on Netflix…

As a freshman in college in 1989, I participated in one of the many rites of passage for those leaving home for the first time: I applied for my first credit card. I received the card shortly before Christmas that year, if I remember correctly. To go along with that awesome feat, I went almost immediately into debt. For whatever reason, I can even tell you what my first purchase was:

• Beet by Eleventh Dream Day
• Earth, Sun, Moon by Love & Rockets

And if I went back to Iowa City, I could probably even point out the building that the music store those CDs were purchased was in. Hell, it’s a college town, the store may just still be there. About the only place an independent store like that could still survive.

But that’s neither here nor there. My point is, the day prior to that purchase, over nineteen years ago, was the last day I was free of credit card debt. Sometimes it was only a small amount. Often it was not. But it was always there.

Until today.

Thanks Matt! Thanks Dennis! And thanks eBay for the big ol’ direct deposit!

Ideas can be life-changing. Sometimes all you need to open the door is just one more good idea.
— Jim Rohn

I used to lurk in many marketing forums. And while there is a ton of information to be eked out of many of them if you search hard enough, I have finally whittled my way down to just two that I visit with any regularity.

Nothing To See Here, Move Along…

Some were easy to drop, because there just wasn’t that much there to begin with. Think the 4HWW forums.

Tim Ferris’s book was great as far as motivation goes, and offers up a wonderful alternative to the normal life. But as far as specifics, the forum, as well as the book for that matter, are borderline useless.

Oh, Look At That Shiny Red Thing…

Then there were forums that are just far too easy to lose yourself in. For days. And weeks. And months.

Think The Warrior Forum. Absolute tons of great information. So much, in fact, that for the chronically distractable like myself, hanging out only ensures that you never get a damn thing done. I had to move on, to move on.

The Most Dangerous

But my recent trimmings were because of the state of mind encountered at every visit. The unfortunate thing is that both of these were for products I really like.

For instance, the Build a Nice Store forums (members only). I deeply appreciate the Build A Niche Store software. I used it to achieve my first real (and continuing) online successes. That $97 spent on it have been recouped many times over. But the forum has got to go. Far too many of the regulars are nothing but complainers, either permanently convinced that eBay is out to ruin their tenuous business or so set in their particular method of doing business that anyone attempting something different is immediately pounced upon as either a fraud or a simpleton. I’m sure that the tone of the forums certainly helped to push me away from future development with the software altogether recently.

And while I may be too logic driven to be able to accept everything about the law of attraction at face value, I am certain that always looking for the dark side pretty much guarantees that you will eventually find it. Life is far too short for that, so so long BANS forums.

Save The Best For Last

Oh, about those two remaining forums:

• Earn $1k A Day
  Dream It, Believe It, Plan It, Achieve It. Great people, great ideas, and amazingly, a truly supportive community of marketers. But then, what else would you expect from Dennis Becker?
• Campaign Blasts
  The methodology you get with the ebook is awesome, but the push one gets from participating in the blast challenges via this forum is worth admission price X 10. Oh, and if you hurry, you can get in the next blast challenge: It should be starting up in about 30 minutes…

Yes, they are both paid memberships. And yes, they are worth every cent.

Shall we join the Young Earthers and wish the universe a Happy 6,009th? Nah, I prefer at least acting the rational being.

Instead, I’ll better spend my day celebrating the 5th birthday of the iPod. Maybe I’ll just load up a handful of Science Friday episodes and be awed by the natural world. Or load up on a little Open Source Sex and, well, just enjoy… Or maybe even grab a few Webmaster Radio episodes and see if I can figure out a way to double up my online income.