Why I started selling artwork 4 1/2 years ago...

Kurt Cobain, Sharpie scribble style drawing, 18" X 24", November 2017.  This was the first drawing that sold at my first solo show.

The first two decades of the 21st century have been a rough ride for me.  My weird line of odd jobs led to a good paying job as a lighting technician in 1998.  Basically, I was a lighting roadie who didn't go on the road.  I worked in a warehouse in North Hollywood, cleaning and prepping lights to go out to TV shows, movie premieres, and corporate parties.  I made $14 and hour, got a fair amount of overtime, and liked my job.  But I had what appeared to be a tiny hernia when I started.  That turned into a huge hernia, due to the daily heavy lifting.  I had to take time off, had issues with my insurance, was unable to get surgery, and wound up working as a taxi driver in late 1999, back down in Huntington Beach.

In 5 months, I went from a cool job with money in the bank to living in a taxi, working 7 days a week.  That was my situation as I watched the new millennium roll in, on New Year's Eve 1999.  I soon had a room to live in again, but a long period of struggle began.  My car got towed in 2000 for parking tickets, when I was just starting to get back into the entertainment industry.  Back to taxi driving, an industry which soon got disrupted by new technology.

That intro into the 21st century led to what has now been 20 years of financial struggle.  I just figured out that I've spent 11 years and 9 months in some form of homelessness, since August 1999.  I was working full time (or far beyond full time in the taxi) for 7 1/2 or 8 of those years.  And I've now spent 3 years and 9 months actually living on the streets, in three states.  There have been a whole bunch of reasons for this struggle, and that list does not include alcohol and drug use.  Those aren't my issues.  I don't drink at all these days, I just quit when driving a taxi.  I don't use drugs, other than the occasional prescription for an illness.  The stereotypical homeless issues aren't what led to this struggle.  I had an incredible amount of pressure from outside forces on my life, I didn't have a real strong direction at times, and I just couldn't find a "real job" for years at a time.  Nobody wants to hire a former cabbie for a "real" job.

By November of 2015, I was living with my mom, at 49 years old, for three years, after my dad's death in 2012.  We lived in a small apartment in a tiny town in North Carolina.  I couldn't get hired for any job at all, not even for a restaurant or gas station clerk.  We lived off my mom's social security check, and I drove her around for doctor's appointments, shopping, and scraped by.  The only thing I did that made any money was my weird, unique Sharpie marker art.  I'd occasionally get asked to draw a kid's name, by their mom, to put up in their room.  I'd done those drawings for my niece and nephew, and others wanted drawings.

So I decided to focus on my Sharpie marker art.  It wasn't some idea of "I want to become a famous artist."  It was simply that nothing else I was doing then gave me any chance of making any kind of living.  So I stepped up my artwork, started drawing people, and promoting my drawings on Facebook.  I had a following from doing several years of blogs, for the Old SchoolBMX freestyle world.  While I have always been a creative guy, I was never known as a visual artist.  I literally didn't have a dime when I started.  I only had some art supplies, and a $65 refurbished laptop, still running Windows XP in 2015.  I had no idea what would happen.

Because I was just scraping by for so long, and in and out of homelessness, I couldn't raise any money from family or friends to give my little business idea a real chance at "success."  But I started getting orders.  I learned how to promote my art well online.  I started selling artwork, originals that first took 22 to 25 hours each.  These days, my large drawings take 40 to 45 hours each, and I can sell them for $150-$160 pretty easily.  So I can sell art, at least until this Covid-19 shutdown hit hard.  But I was never able to make decent money for the time I was putting into my drawings.  But I HAVE been able to scrape by, as a working artist, for 4 1/2 years.  I had no idea if that was possible when I started. And now I have about 120 drawings to show for this time period.

With the Covid-19 pandemic, and the economic downturn, things have finally slowed down, though I was doing better when the virus first hit.  But I'm back in Southern California, where I want to live, and in a big metro where other options are available, now that the virus and recession have slowed down buying of almost everything.

I'm now going to head in another direction to work on earning money, though I still want to spend some time doing artwork nearly every day.  But I somehow managed to survive, though homeless much of time, as a working artist, starting from nothing, in an obscure, rural, North Carolina town.  I have very little money, but I have this body of work online, and have established myself as a unique and halfway decent visual artist.  And that's pretty cool.  I've sold about 90 originals and maybe 120 prints, over this time.  My art has sold, and is hanging on walls, on 6 of the 7 continents, a 8-12 countries, and a dozen U.S. states.  Really.  I never expected that back in 2015.

My point for this post?  I tried something that sounded ridiculous, and had a lot of success in spending time doing work I loved doing, but didn't make much money.  In crazy times, when options seem limited, you never know what is possible, until you try.

Kobe Bryant tribute art skateboard deck, one of my recent works. #sharpiescribblestyle

Potential Side Hustles for 2020

With 40 million people newly out of work as I write this, and another million or so likely to added tomorrow, side hustles are on a lot of minds.  Here's a very smart, hard working woman, sharing her best advice on side hustles.  This video was made in January, you know, before... things got epically crazy.  But many of these should still be viable, and maybe right up your alley.

There will NOT be enough good paying jobs for the next ten years. Period. Now what?

At the beginning of June, 2017, exactly three years ago, I moved out of my mom's small apartment in Kernersville, North Carolina, where I'd been living for "free" for nearly five years.  I moved into a lean-to, yes a freaking lean-to, in the woods in Winston-Salem.  I couldn't get hired for any job whatsoever in K-ville, and had begun to sell my Sharpie art online.  I started, literally, without a dime to my name, just art supplies, and a $65 refurbished laptop. 

My mom's place was a completely toxic environment, and she couldn't handle money.  Every time I sold a drawing, I couldn't even invest the $50 I made into more supplies.  I intentionally became homeless, simply to have the chance to build my art into a business, some day.  OK, it's still not a "real" business," but I've sold 90 or so originals, and over 100 prints, and have survived mostly off those art sales, ever since. 

After three days in the woods behind Bolton Park in Winston, some guy gave me an old, six man tent.  I lived in that for about 11 months, until a few days after the Carolina lynch mob showed up, in May 2018, insisting I stop blogging.  But that's a story for another day.  Anyhow, I had been a taxi driver before that, until computer dispatching (new technology) disrupted the taxi industry (before Uber and Lyft disrupted it more). 

I'm smart, I can learn most skills quickly, I work hard and smart, but I still couldn't find a job in that area.  ANY job.  I didn't start selling art with some dream of being a famous artist some day.  I started selling it because selling my Sharpie drawings was the only thing that made me any money at the time.  Art was simply the best place for me to start.  I've had several people help me along the way, in bits and pieces, but I've never been able to raise enough money, at one time, to give my business a legitimate chance at success.  But I have sold a lot of artwork. 

Three weeks into living in the woods behind Bolton Park in Winston, I started a new blog, combining my Old School BMX freestyle stories, my Sharpie scribble style artwork, and my thoughts on the future and the economy.  That last part is what my geeky, brainiac side is fascinated with.  The second blog post I wrote, this one, on June 27th 2017, was about the long term trend of humans losing jobs to new technology.  I embedded the very same video above in that post.  I saw this long term trend of massive job loss as one of the biggest issues facing our society in the next 20 years or so.  It's part of our continuing shift from an Industrial Age society, to a fully functional Information Age society.

A study by Oxford University, in England, in 2013, concluded that about 47% of all human jobs, could be lost to new technology, "in the next 20 years."  Hey, guess what?  We are now 7 years into that 20 years.  Even worse, 40 million Americans have lost their jobs in the last 2 1/2 months.  Most of those are supposed to be temporary layoffs, but it's becoming clear maybe half will be permanent. 

This brings us to the uncomfortable truth, there simply will not be enough good paying, traditional jobs, for the next ten years, and probably 20 years.  So what do we do?  

Professor Richard Florida, known for writing the book, The Rise of the Creative Class, and several later books and articles, suggests working to make service worker jobs better paying jobs, through unions, getting Congress to raise minimum wages, and other similar measures.  That's a great idea.  But it requires American Republicans and Democrats to work together on a major issue.  I simply don't see that happening fast enough, if at all.  Those who want to work on that issue, more power to you.

In three years of thinking about this issue, the best real world solution I see is for millions of Americans to start some kind of small business of their own.  For a couple of years now, I've thought working to encourage and help millions of Americans to "create their own job," in other words, some small business or freelance gig, is the best solution. 

With the Covid-19 pandemic triggering the already weak economy to finally collapse, we're now in the place where some solution needs to happen, fast.  So if you're suddenly out of work, along with 40+ million recently laid off people, and 4 1/2 million unemployed before that, what do you do?  Start by asking yourself these questions?

What skills do you have that you may be able to do as a freelancer, side gig, or small business?

Are you willing to learn the other skills needed, and take on the responsibility, of being a small business?

Look around your town or city.  What products and services does it need right now?  Can you provide any of those?

What do you actually like to do?  You're much more likely to stick with something you enjoy (for the most part), than with something you're doing just for the money.  

 What ideas came to mind answering these questions?  Start there.

As I struggle to get my own little business going, this blog will share my thoughts, ideas, lessons learned (from successes and failures), and videos from other people, creating and thriving in small businesses.  Hope it may help you in this crazy time we find ourselves in.  Much more to come. 

Gary Vaynerchuk of VaynerMedia talking about the Flip Life

As of this morning, 36 million Americans have filed for unemployment in two months.  A lot of people are struggling now, as the Covid-19 virus shuts life and businesses down across the U.S., and much of the world.  Damn near everyone is looking for ways to make some extra cash right now.  Yes, I know you can't go to garage sales, or even have one, in most places.  But this video will get you thinking about other opportunities while we wait and see how the job market, and the real world economy shake out.  There are lots of places to look for bargains online, if flipping, or "wheeling and dealing", as we called it when my dad took me to garage sales as a kid, interests you. 

33.5 million Americans file for unemployment in 7 weeks...

In a quick hit to jobs, never before seen in American history, we now have 33.5 million+ new unemployment claims in tha tlast 7 weeks (as of today, May 7 2020).  This number doesn't include people who've had their hours reduced, had their pay cut, or independent contractors and gig workers who have less work.  Here's the CNBC report on today's unemployment numbers. 

Why I started trying to make a living with Sharpie art

Goofy alien drawing, in my Sharpie scribble style, from 2011, I think.  I figured out a cool way to shade with Sharpie markers in 2005, but I wasn't sure what to do with that style.

In late 2015, I was miserable.  Can anyone now, in April 2020 relate to that?  Yeah, I thought so.  I was 49 years old, 368 pounds, unemployed, and living with my crazy mom in a tiny apartment in a small town in central North Carolina.  I could not get hired for any job.  Period.  Not a cashier job at a gas station, not a restaurant job.  Over 140 online applications, over a couple of years, led to nothing.

I've done all kinds of work, three years in restaurants when I was younger, and hard labor like furniture moving.  But I have also written for BMX magazines, worked on the crew of TV shows like American Gladiators, been a roadie-type lighting guy in the Hollywood area.  My most recent "career" was as a taxi driver, 5 1/2 years in the Huntington Beach area of Southern California, and then a year when I moved (though I didn't want to) to North Carolina, where my family wound up living.

I was born near Akron, Ohio, and grew up moving around small towns and rural Ohio as a kid.  I was a smart, really dorky, Midwest kid.  I was an incessant daydreamer, and liked to read and draw and wander around the woods.  My childhood was a time, the 1970's, when the American Middle Class was still going strong, and there were thriving factories in every city and small town.  Men worked in the factories, or the office next to the factory, like my dad, a draftsman/engineer.  Women mostly stayed home with the kids.  Families could live on one income pretty easily then.  Most couples could save for a few years, maybe borrow a little money from Grandma, and buy their own house, while still in their 20's or early 30's.  My parents bought their first house for $10,000.  But we moved a couple years later, while I was still a toddler.

Every adult I knew hated their job, or at least hated their boss.  But they wouldn't quit.  They made good money, and hating your work for 40 hours a week was the price everyone was expected to pay for providing for their families.  It was simply not to be questioned.  You didn't have to like your job, you just had to do it.  Companies back then didn't want your ideas or thoughts, they just wanted to My dad, a mechanical genius, really liked his work, solving mechanical problems, and designing machine parts, or whole machines, like buses or locomotives.  But there was also some asshole at work that made the job tough to deal with. shut up and do your job.

Then, in the late 1970's, something weird started to happen.  Factories, which everyone assumed would be in business forever, started to shut down.  At the same time, new technologies began to appear and invade our lives.  Cable TV.  Pong, the first video game.  Personal computers that you had to learn code to operate, but couldn't really do anything.  Video cameras.  Technology kept progressing, and part of that was new tech and industrial robots that took millions of  human jobs, while millions more jobs were outsourced to places with cheaper labor.  Those Midwestern factory jobs first went to the American South, like Alabama or Mississippi.  Then jobs moved to Mexico, Taiwan, Japan, South Korea, and eventually China.

The slow-paced world I knew a kid, that never seemed to change, started changing rapidly while I was in high school.  To find better jobs, my dad moved us west.  From 8th grade in Willard, Ohio, we moved to New Mexico for a year, then Boise, Idaho for my high school years.  A year after I graduated, my family moved to San Jose, California, where my younger sister went to high school.  I finished my summer job in Boise, managing a tiny amusement park, then moved to San Jose.

Though I was pretty smart, I didn't have any money to go to college, and didn't have any real career draw.  I wanted to start a business of my own, someday, so I "took a year off" to work and hopefully figure things out.  So I worked at the Boise Fun Spot amusement park, then a big Mexican restaurant.  In San Jose, I got a job at a Pizza Hut, and soon became the de facto night shift supervisor.

What sent my life in a weird direction, was getting into BMX bikes in high school, while we lived in a trailer park, for a year.  I got into BMX racing, and then, in 1983, the emerging sport or BMX freestyle, or trick riding.  I was one of those kids that always sucked at sports growing up.  With BMX, I found something I loved enough to stick with, and get good at.  BMX freestyle, which was something most people didn't even know existed in 1984-85, became my life.  I riding my bike, practicing my tricks, for 2 or 3 hours everyday, and often more.

In San Jose, I knew there were a handful of pro riders in the Bay Area, and many good amateurs.  So I started a zine, a small, self-published, Xeroxed (the term we used then for photocopying), mini magazine.  I read about zines in FREESTYLIN' magazine.  I started my own zine as a way to meet the San Francisco Bay Area freestyle riders.  That worked, and soon I was riding with some of the best guys in our tiny sport.  My zine wound up landing me a job at Wizard Publications, the publisher of BMX Action and FREESTYLIN' magazines, located in Torrance, California, southwest of L.A..

At the end of July in 1986, I got on a plane in San Jose with my BMX bike, a suitcase, and $80.  I was picked up at LAX, and driven to Torrance, by my new co-workers and roommates, Gork and Lew, and FREESTYLIN' editor, Andy Jenkins.  I was suddenly a part of the BMX bike industry, and riding with the top riders in the sport at night.  My heroes had become friends and acquaintances, at age 20.  While most people my age were working lame jobs or a junior in college, I was proofreading two national magazines.

I didn't click well with the guys at the magazines in a working way.   We all got along, but I just wasn't punk rock enough then, and not the right fit for that crew
.  I soon got laid off, and they replaced me with some unknown, East Coast BMXer/skater named Spike Jonze.  He turned out to be the right guy for that job, and crazy talented in the long run.

I got a job editing a BMX freestyle newsletter.  That led to producing low budget videos.  That led to a job at a skateboard video company.  That led to working on TV show crews in my mid-20's.  And that led to me burning out in 1995.  I wound up working as a furniture mover, and doing a few other odd jobs in the 1990's, and then becoming a taxi driver in 1999, then into the 2000's.

Taxi driving began to die in 2003, when the CB radios used for dispatching in the cabs were replaced by dispatching computers.  I wasn't a tech guy, wasn't real interested in computers or "that internet thing," in the early 2000's. I didn't own a computer.  I went to the library and rented time on a computer to check my email, and Google a couple of things.  I was a serious Luddite then.  I didn't realize then that it was new technology that would kill the taxi industry, first with cab dispatch computers, then later with Uber and Lyft.

So I ended up a deeply depressed guy, living with a crazy woman, my mom, in a state that I fucking hated, North Carolina, in 2015.  The only thing that I did then that made me any money, was doing Sharpie drawings of kid's names.  Moms from church, or from my niece's cheerleading team, would ask me to draw the names their kids in block letters, fading the kid's favorite colors.  I made $20 each for 4-5 hours work.  But I did one drawing every few weeks, if that often.

Finally, in November of 2015, I decided to focus all my efforts on making money with my Sharpie art.  I started, literally, without a dime.  My mom was always in financial crisis mode, and I lived there for free, in exchange for driving her wherever she needed to do, doing the "man" things around the apartment, and that kind of thing. My mom, being who she is, belittled and berated me for not having a job 15 hours a day.  It sucked.

When I did make a little bit of money, when I sold a drawing or something, she immediately created a crisis that needed exactly that much money.  Then nagged me until I handed it over.   When it comes to guilt trips, my mom is a Yoda-level master.  One of her brothers thinks she has Borderline Personality Disorder, though she never has, and never will go to a psychiatrist.  How bad is Borderline?  Put it this way, if Satan had a horrible mother-in-law, she'd have severe Borderline Personality Disorder.

I was struggling with serious depression the whole time I was living there.  Coming back from the worst bout of depression, I decided to go with my creativity, double down on figuring out on how to make money with my artwork.  When I started, I had a bunch of Sharpies, a dollar store sketch pad, and a $65 refurbished laptop, still running Windows XP in 2015.  The one asset I did have, was that I had blogged about Old School BMX freestyle since 2008, and I had a small but hardcore blog following.  They became my first customers.

 Princess Leia drawing I did in late 2016.  By some quirk of fate, I started this drawing  a couple days before Carrie Fisher got sick, and was still working on it when she died. 

I stepped up my art game, and drew a picture of Bruce Lee, my first hero as a kid, as an example.  I sold a drawing for $20.  Then got asked to do another.  Then another.  I've scraped by for 4 1/2 years now, across three states, by selling drawings.  I've actually sold over 80 major original drawings, and over 100 small prints.  I sold them all pretty cheap, BUT I SOLD THEM.  I'm still selling them.  I'm still struggling, but as so many of America's businesses shut down, I'm still working.  One good thing about drawing, no one has to be within six feet of me while I"m working.

Since I started with absolutely no money, and moved out of the toxic apartment in NC.  I've been homeless most of the time since.  But I have also managed to keep working, despite a slew of really crazy circumstances.

Along the way, over these last 4 1/2 years, I learned a heck of a lot about using my blog for promotion, and using social media platforms for building my building my web presence as an artist and writer. 

So as I continue to work to build my art from a kind of small time freelance thing, to a legit business making me a decent living, I'm starting this blog to share things I've learned about marketing and small business promotion in today's world.  As I looked around in recent months, I've seen that most businesses, of all sizes, don't use today's internet, social, and mobile technology to anywhere near its full potential.  So this blog is a way to share my own lessons learned, and tips, as well as share tips from the other people starting, building, and running micro and small businesses well. 

There are all kinds of facets to running a business in today's world.  One major aspect is that we've had over 26 million people laid off in the last 5 weeks, due to today's economic downturn, triggered by the Covid-19 pandemic.  This means millions more Americans suddenly need alternative ways to earn money.  So that's the basic idea I'm starting this new blog with. 

Here's a second version of the original Bruce Lee stencil drawing I did, when I got serious about making money from my unique Sharpie art.  #sharpiescribblestyle

Laid off? Need cash quick? Here are some legit ways to make money

OK, Gary Vaynerchuk runs a $200 million digital marketing agency now, and a sports management agency, and a few other things.  But "flipping" stuff from garage sales, as a teen, is one of the ways he got his start.  It's the 21st century, the Information Age, and Gary Vee is one of the guys you need to listen to on a regular basis to keep up.  His content is everywhere.

In the last 4 weeks, during this economic meltdown (forget the word "recession," we're way beyond that already), 22 MILLION Americans filed for unemployment, after getting laid off.  Another few million will probably be added in tomorrow's numbers.  That's on top of the 65-ish% of Americans who couldn't and a $400 unexpected bill before the Covid-19 pandemic, and the financial meltdown began.  LOTS of people need cash quick right now.  Are you one of them?

You need cash quick?  
What do you do? 
Yes, everyone's supposed to be homebound at the moment, but that will end before long.  Here are some ideas to start with...

Flipping merchandise-   It's simple, Buy Low, Sell High.  Buy stuff one place at a good deal, sell it somewhere else at a higher price, and make a profit.  Garage sales, yard sales, auctions (online & physical), discount websites, store closeouts, mainstream store sales, these are just some of the places where you can buy stuff cheap.  Then you sell on eBay, Craigslist, Facebook Marketplace, LetGo, Wallapop, your own store (online or physical), a swap meet/flea market booth, your own garage sale.  The key is to know a deal when you see one, AND pounce on it and actually buy the bargain.  Then, have a place to sell it.

Gig jobs- Yeah, lots of good and bad in the news about gig jobs these days.  Hey, I was a taxi driver for 6 1/2 years, one year of which that was actually a cool way to make a living.  Probably not a career for most people, but it may help tide you over financially for now.  Uber, Lyft, delivery services.  Google it and see what's possible in your area. 

Personal services- Do you have some skill that you can teach other people.  Any skill?  How to play the trumpet?  Teach grandmas how to work their new iPhones.  Tutor kids in math since you rocked it in high school.  Whatever.  We live in a very fast paced society, and one on one teaching, either online or in person, is big now, and will be a major sector of the economy going forward.  Just watch.

Help your neighbors during this quarantine-  I met a woman two days ago who said she's been making cash, and helping neighbors, using Nextdoor.  I didn't know this existed.  Check it out, be legit and responsible, and don't scam.  Help the neighbors, do some shopping, stand in a line the older people can't, and make a few bucks during quarantine, and afterwards. 

Give plasma- Yeah, You can make $100 or more in a week letting the scientific vampires suck your blood.  It's just like giving blood, but it takes a bit longer.  I've done this several times.  Google it in your area.  There are health restrictions, recent tattoos, illness, or lots of foreign travel may get you denied.  These places will open up again soon, and they'll need blood plasma, they always do.  Drink a lot of fluids, and take iron supplements, that's my advice. 

OK, it's a short list, but there are hundreds of variations of these few ideas (except plasma).  That should get you thinking...

The economy is nuts... I need to make money somehow... now what?

Here's one of the many reports  about the 22 million Americans that have filed for unemployment in the last four weeks, as the Covid-19 shitdown goes on.  It's Sunday, March 19th, as I write this.

In November of 2015, I was living with my mom, at 49 years old, in a small apartment, in a small town, in central North Carolina.  It was a toxic living environment, in a town where I couldn't even get a restaurant or cashier job, in a part of the country I hated being in.  My life sucked on pretty much every level.  The only thing that made me any money then was doing drawings with Sharpie markers, in a unique way that I invented, that I call "scribble style."  Unable to get hired for any job, after filling out around 140 applications in a couple of years there, I decided to create my own job.

Here's a drawing I did of Kurt Cobain, that was in the first, and only solo, art show I've done, in November 2017.  The owner of Earshot Music turned it into an online flyer. This drawing sold the day before the show, an hour after going up on the wall, which was awesome from my perspective.  Several sales came from that one inty show.

So, like most things, that didn't go as  planned.  I started, literally, without a dime.  I had some art supplies, a bedroom to draw in, a $65 refurbished laptop (still running Windows XP), and a following in the Old School BMX freestyle world, from my blog.  That has been my main customer base.  I've become a working artist, if not a profitable one.  I've scraped by, homeless most of the time, but working drawing, and blogging and continually learning about online and social media marketing, to promote my work.  In 4 1/2 years, I've sold over 80 large, original drawings, each of which takes 35-45 hours to draw.  I've also sold 100 or so small prints.  While this is by no means a raging success, most artists don't sell that much work in their entire careers.

I've done some things right, and made plenty of mistakes.  I've had a lot of headwinds from outside sources that have slowed my progress down dramatically.  Now, about 4 1/2 years later, I'm back out in Southern California, the place I call home.  Still homeless, but I'm able to keep working, to some degree, even while the Covid-19 shutdown goes on, and while the long anticipated "next recession" takes hold.

I've been blogging about the loss of jobs to new technology since at least mid-2017, maybe before.  This post, from June 2017, is the first remember doing on the subject.  I've been an amateur futurist my whole life, and have watched the big house of cards of our current economy stack up into place.  It was obvious, to the few watching closely, that this "recession" would be a bad one, at least as bad as 2007-2009.  I personally think it will be much worse.  But I also know that recessions are the greatest times of opportunity for many businesses, and especially for starting new businesses.

While I work to build my own little business in today's high tech enabled, hyper-connected world, this blog is going to be things I've learned, and ideas from others about how to start a micro (1 person) or small business, in today's world, how grow a small business, and hopefully how to thrive in the craziness of the next few years.  That's the basic idea.  I've done several blogs, fairly consistently since late 2008, and they always wind up going in directions I didn't expect at the beginning.  So we'll see where this one leads.

My main blog over the last 2 1/2 years, Steve Emig: The White Bear, is creeping up on 100,000 page views, and I thought it was time for a change of pace.  I have a couple different directions I want to work in now, and helping people (and myself) start and build small businesses is what this one is about.  Lots more to come...