The Small Stuff That Doesn't Need, or Even Want, a Thread. #6

[Spockydog]

19 minutes ago, Tears of Lys said:

So how did your presentation go?  Inquiring minds and all that.

The big presentation is on Friday afternoon. I will be honing it during a series of meetings with partners and investors in the City this week, culminating in a trip to the Parliamentary Estate. I can't believe I just typed that out. lol.

Anyway, on Friday I will presenting my seriously hare-brained ideas to a bunch of wonks, as well as at least one sitting MP (whom I don't feel it is appropriate to name at this point). Actually, my ideas can't be that hare-brained if they got me in the room in the first place.

Once again, I can't believe this is my life now.

Anyway, our full website will be launched in the next few days, and everything will be revealed. Just working out some technical issues.

Edited September 10, 2023 by Spockydog

[Mr. Chatywin et al.]

Wear fake glasses if you don't actually already do. It will give you +2 wonk. 

[Fragile Bird]

I’m sitting in a salon getting a mani/pedi and a one line message pops up on the all-news tv station saying 40 people were killed in a drone attack on a Khartoum marketplace.

I cannot express how grateful I am at such times to be living in Canada.

[HexMachina]

4 hours ago, Tywin et al. said:

Wear fake glasses if you don't actually already do. It will give you +2 wonk. 

Incorrect. Wear a pair of fake glasses, walk to the front of the room, remove said fake glasses to reveal the exact same pair of fake glasses underneath.

Your move *flex*

[Larry of the Lawn]

8 hours ago, Tywin et al. said:

I can't speak for the entire continent, but in my area yard sales are dead. As a kid in the 90's you'd see them everywhere in the summer and fall and they would be packed. These days I only see a few of them and there's barely anyone at them. >90% of the stuff is junk, but once in a while you'd find a gem. If I had to guess their decline is mostly due to people becoming more isolated. 

I've never been to an estate sale, but I hear they can actually be pretty interesting. 

Huh, yard sales are a huge deal here.  On weekends between memorial day and labor you can't chuck a brick around here without beaning a yard sale shopper.  

[Mr. Chatywin et al.]

1 hour ago, HexMachina said:

Incorrect. Wear a pair of fake glasses, walk to the front of the room, remove said fake glasses to reveal the exact same pair of fake glasses underneath.

Your move *flex*

Interesting play, but in this scenario your hand that removes the first set of fake glasses needs to have an aggressively large pinky ring on it. 

1 hour ago, Larry of the Lawn said:

Huh, yard sales are a huge deal here.  On weekends between memorial day and labor you can't chuck a brick around here without beaning a yard sale shopper.  

I guess they're just dead where I live. 

[HexMachina]

35 minutes ago, Tywin et al. said:

Interesting play, but in this scenario your hand that removes the first set of fake glasses needs to have an aggressively large pinky ring on it. 

I guess they're just dead where I live. 

Hmmm. I'd settle for an opera glove

[Mr. Chatywin et al.]

8 minutes ago, HexMachina said:

Hmmm. I'd settle for an opera glove

I could live with that if Spocky got himself a gold tooth quickly.

Now the only question is do you go with the traditional three piece suit and tie, casual suit with no tie or what seems to be trendy, dressing like you're a 16-20 year old boy at fancy meetings. If we set him up with the latter he's going to need a tastefully large gold chain and maybe a quick neck tattoo as well. 

So many decisions to make...

[Tears of Lys]

I suggest a nice traditional suit, well-fitting of course, a monocle AND pinkie ring.

Amazing what one can accomplish when simply growing tomatoes.    

Seriously, I'm quite excited for him!  

[Tears of Lys]

On the subject of yard/estate sales, they're going gangbusters around here.  The biggest thing is not hand tools, rather vintage jewelry.  I collect it but can't be arsed to go looking for it.  

[LongRider]

25 minutes ago, Tears of Lys said:

a monocle AND pinkie ring.

Outstanding idea!  What an impression he will make on the moneybags.

[Mr. Chatywin et al.]

21 minutes ago, Tears of Lys said:

I suggest a nice traditional suit, well-fitting of course, a monocle AND pinkie ring.

Now we're cooking with gas, but if we go down this road he'll also need a top hat. And maybe one of those canes that suggests secretly there's a blade in it he can pull out. 

And I've changed my mind, if it's a suit he should definitely wear an ascot. Perhaps also with a single tastefully large giant cross earing in one ear. And of course he needs a grill if the gold tooth isn't happening. 

[Spockydog]

2 hours ago, Tywin et al. said:

I could live with that if Spocky got himself a gold tooth quickly.

Now the only question is do you go with the traditional three piece suit and tie, casual suit with no tie or what seems to be trendy, dressing like you're a 16-20 year old boy at fancy meetings. If we set him up with the latter he's going to need a tastefully large gold chain and maybe a quick neck tattoo as well. 

So many decisions to make...

First thing imma do when I get PAID is get my arse, quite literally, down to Harley Street, to get my Farmer Giles sorted, before grabbing a brand new shiny set of chompers.

I've already treated myself to some nice clobber. Imma going full-on fuck-off-CEO-casual. I bought a lovely soft-leather messenger bag, and, to go along my fifteen-year-old (yeah, that's right, never been sat on) silver-mirrored Ray Ban aviators, a fancy leather business card holder to hold my ridiculously expensive business cards.

I didn't dare get myself new shoes. I might be business-rusty, but I'm not feckin' stupid.

Edited September 11, 2023 by Spockydog

[Mr. Chatywin et al.]

12 minutes ago, Spockydog said:

First thing imma do when I get PAID is get my arse, quite literally, down to Harley Street, to get my Farmer Giles sorted, before grabbing a brand new shiny set of chompers.

I've already treated myself to some nice clobber. Imma going full-on fuck-off-CEO-casual. I bought a lovely soft-leather messenger bag, and, to go along my fifteen-year-old (yeah, that's right) silver-mirrored Ray Ban aviators, a fancy leather business card holder to hold my ridiculously expensive business cards.

I didn't dare get myself new shoes. I might be business-rusty, but I'm not feckin' stupid.

Okay, Idk the Farmer Giles reference, but another power move you might want to consider is coming to the meeting with a 6 to 8 foot snake draped on your shoulders. Honestly I want to suggest a Pulp Fiction style gimp on a leash, however I think that's the play if you decide to turn down the first offer and do that in the second meeting. 

Or you could wear an over the top coat and have a parrot on your shoulder. It's your choice. Just make sure you iron whatever you wear. Have some class. 

[Spockydog]

3 hours ago, Tears of Lys said:

I suggest a nice traditional suit, well-fitting of course, a monocle AND pinkie ring.

Amazing what one can accomplish when simply growing tomatoes.    

Seriously, I'm quite excited for him!  

Oh, thank you so much.  

I put the rest in spoilers, cos my reply kinda grew.... 

Spoiler

I've just been looking at my website. At what I'm responsible for birthing.

I can't quite believe that what began as a means of securing my brother's medicine during Covid has turned into, well, whatever the hell is actually happening to me.

If it wasn't for Chops, and our situation, I wouldn't even be here. First of all, by now, I'd probably be some miserable, bald-headed, Head of Acme Consulting, scars from the ravaging of my fingernails, scored into my face.

I dragged myself up from nothing. Turbulent, crazy childhood. Time spent in care. Time spent in prison, too.

Then I put all that behind me to somehow rise up through the world of Corporate Business Travel, ending up as some kind of young, sexy, world-travelling-Winston Wolf, sent in by Blue Chip companies to kick the arses of their flailing Project Managers, making an absolute norse of hundred-million-dollar projects.

But yeah, as everyone is probably bored of hearing by now, I gave up all that shit when my brother got ill. It was quite the change. And, as my mum got older, I spent more and more time looking after her.

Over the years, as my savings disappeared, I had to rely more and more on my mum for help. But I never felt poor. I swear to god. Not once in the past, *checks* fifteen-years, have I ever wanted for anything.

I had kind of resigned myself to this existence. No, not exactly resigned. There had been a complete paradigm shift in my approach to life. I didn't care about finding a wife or having kids anymore. And, even though, as I lost touch with many of my friends, and spent more and more time at home, it occurred to me that I was happy. Happier than I had ever been.

Happier than anyone I knew.

I finally had purpose. My mission in life was to protect and care for my brother. He's such a gentle, tender soul. Oh, god I love him so much. Oh, shit, and now I'm crying.

I'm crying because he got sick and had to retire at a young age. I'm crying because, these days, he barely leaves the house. He has a medical pension but, all things considered, it's not that much.

But it was enough for him to pay for every single penny of the R&D of The Lazyscrog, the invention that kickstarted everything, and is now in the process of changing both our lives. And my mum's life, too. She's not short of a bob or two, so she was the one who paid for our first two patents.

So, today, we each own 33% of this.... thing.

A thing that people tell me may go on and change the world.

I don't know about any of that. Not really. But when HGF's IP exploitation people sit you down and start using terms like "multi-sector, widespread disruption," and "literal game-changer, and "potential unicorn," it's difficult not to get swept away by it all.

Especially when they start talking about things like TAMs and SAMs and SOMs (exactly how many zeroes in six-trillion, anyway?), and then start showing you graphs and charts, with mind-boggling returns for capturing just a minute fragment of these  enormous markets.

As I said, I can't believe this is actually happening.

But, then, nothing has happened. Not yet. Not really. 

Now that our IP is secure, I'm finally able to turn years of planning into action. These are plans I've been formulating ever since we lodged our first patent application.

Although, many of the items on our project plan were brought forward after literally the first major company we reached out to offered us £150k for our patent after one meeting *nervous laugh*

Needless to say, I told them I would think about it.

"Taxi!"

That prompted me to work up a brand new pitch deck. I didn't bother including any company financials or earning projections. All I did was demonstrate what we know, as well as what we believe, our technology can do. Along with our global agriculture TAM, and details of exactly how we believe each sector can be disrupted. 

Literally everyone I have sent the deck to has granted me a meeting. But as I said, nothing has actually happened. Not yet.

Anyway, this post turned into ... something. Imma put it in spoilers.

 

Edited September 11, 2023 by Spockydog

[Spockydog]

1 hour ago, Tywin et al. said:

Okay, Idk the Farmer Giles reference

Look it up. 

Edited September 11, 2023 by Spockydog

[Mr. Chatywin et al.]

59 minutes ago, Spockydog said:

Look it up. 

If this is what I think I found... Tolkien had quite the imagination. 

[Spockydog]

Lol. But, no, I do believe that was Farmer Maggot. 

[polishgenius]

Nah Farmer Giles of Ham is a non-LotR short story by Tolkien. A sort of St George parody. 

 

Tip for Tywin: You have to google 'Farmer Giles slang' to get the answer you need. 

[Mr. Chatywin et al.]

46 minutes ago, polishgenius said:

Nah Farmer Giles of Ham is a non-LotR short story by Tolkien. A sort of St George parody. 

 

Tip for Tywin: You have to google 'Farmer Giles slang' to get the answer you need. 

So essentially Spocky is the dog dragging its ass on the ground all the time?

Fitting.