Hard Work/Easy Steps To Branding Yourself

I turned on the tv early last night and then went into the kitchen and couldn't see the screen but I heard a voice that I remembered always sent chills down my spine. I walked into the living room and sure enough, staring me in the face, swastika on forehead, cigarette in hand, Charles Manson, probably one of the most notorious figures of our lifetime.

I had to look twice. I shouldn't have been so surprised they had given him yet another Andy Warhol 15 minutes; I worked in news for nearly two decades before saying "enough is enough" as I saw it going in a direction in which valuable camera-time was being handed over to the infamous, rather than the famous; and often the famous had worked hard and been productive all their lives to get where they were. In other words, sensationalism was winning out over positive broadcasting. I am not saying stories of such notorious characters should not be mentioned or remembered. It is important to remember the Holocaust. It is important to remember Hilter; and for obvious reasons. It serves the educational process. Media can have a powerful effect on teaching a government, a citizenry, an entire nation on how not to repeat the errors of the past.

After accepting what I was seeing, I said to myself, "Okay, maybe it is time for Charlie to show his mug to remind us what we don't want to be. The problem I had with the program was he was given an entire hour of nothing but his predictable rambling. He was having a blast. The media was showing the world, "Look, doing something crazy like brainwash people into killing other people, and you two, a half century later, can still be a big celebrity." And that is exactly what was happening. I kept thinking to myself, why couldn't this cable news program dedicate a full hour to a captain of industry such as Bill Gates or Michael Dell or the founders of Google who do so much good in the world. I could have even tolerated another Donald/Rosie fight over Charlie's mug; or pretended like I cared about "Barbara Walter's torrid sex life" now being broadcast from here to eternity due to her new kiss and tell book. Barbara's love life will be remembered for a month or two to come until someone else writes one better and more graphically.

By the way, when the Monkees (remember the sixties band) had auditions, guess who showed up with his guitar? You guessed it. Old Charlie. Not to mention Steven Stills. Neither made the cut.

Manson, I do not believe, was on Andy Warhol's mind when he was telling us how to get our 15 minutes of fame. He knew the steps, and none of them required any evil or violence.

Are you still waiting for the Andy Warhol promise to happen to you? Freud felt something drives everyone. What drives you? Maybe it is not fame. Maybe it is money. Maybe it is doing good in the world. Maybe it is having money and doing good in the world with it. Whatever it is, you are probably bright enough not to sit around and wait for it, but to work for it.

As a cartoonist and writer, I have had way more than my 15 minutes, and I am grateful for it. I have been able to help other people, animals, and environmental causes, and do things I never dreamed I could do.

The steps to fame or success or both are fairly simple, but hard work.

Know first what your dream is. Without that, there will be nothing but false starts and no follow-through.

Take action on that dream. Keep taking notes as it grows and changes. Make a plan. Seek out the right people to help you make it happen.

Use modern technology like the net to accelerate that dream. Andy Warhol and his friends Marilyn Monroe and so many others did not have the luxury of the Internet. Norma Jean never had a blog and Andy did no social networking. You can. You can learn article marketing. Do it. Don't stop with just a few articles. Blog, write articles in online magazines. Learn about quality back-links. Learn all you can. Keep working daily even when you don't feel like it. Success happens when you are not even aware.

Repeat that process every day. Now you are not just successful but happy with what you are doing and have become. Congratulations

Why Participate In Surveys?

I will be writing an article about this soon. It is an easy and
wonderful way to make extra cash to pay those ugly bills, especially
during slower market seasons. When choosing a survey company, make sure
what you are doing. Research, know they've been around and really pay.
This one does.

World's Worst Fish Pun Story

Now reaching middle-age, reaching minnowpause, a good many folks think I'm mentally eel. My theory though is that I've haddock with life, not unlike Salmon Rushdie or Marlin Brando. Mahi oh mahi. Since I've always marched to a different drummer, you know, or sang like Tuna Turner. I live down on squid roe. and been a shad bit egocentric, people have tried desperately to save my sole. Holy mackerel, if I could count the times. Those bassturds. They just perch up on their high seahorse and talk down to me as if I'm pond scum. So what's it all about, Algae? So you feel I'm shellfish and cruel but read between the line, swivel, and hook.

For awhile I tried corporate America and I played a rather decent upwardly-mobile guppy. I made a great deal of money but always felt crappie. You may grunter at my humor but who are you to judge? Take your fathead elsewhere. I'm not just another John Dory writer, you know.

So soon, I was swimming with the sharks and swam back to shore. Nay, I was no angelfish, that is for sure, but I was sturdy as a rockfish. Like othe baby boomer, I was striving to be an upwardly mobile guppy. I am certain a lot of my problems is that I listened to too many rock bands in my youth and don't follow direction well due to my being hard of herring. I do have faith; I'm not one of those agnostic fish-types who PONDers if Cod even exists up way up in the heavens.

More than once, in fact lox of times, I would start a project early in the yearling, and never finish it. This only served to bait the public into calling me a sucker(fish) or even worse!! I can stand the heat. Nobody can lure me unless I let them. I know how to take care of myself. I left home at age 15 and was an urchin ever since. The streets are hard for a fighting fish but I made it after all. Many times I was on the bream of success and blew it just like any blowfish would do. One time I even trout for major league football (no kidding) during the USA league. They laughed me off the field treating me in a clownfish manner. I didn't like it at all.

There are plenty of fish in the sea. If one does not want to know me is "that's their net loss". It's my own fish philosophy; well I actually plagiarized it from decarp "I swim therefore I am wet." And to them I simply say "Caviar Emptor", and yes, even Carp Diem (as obvious a fish pun as it may be...but I digress into deeper waters).... But in my own way, the world is my oyster and nobody can take that away from me. I continue to have a porpoise in life and really, isn't that what counts? I could have turned out evil like Jack The Flipper but noo. I became an outstanding citizen nevertheless. They will never make me walk the plankton. Some of my story may be sardinonic but that is the way it goes. It helps me cope through the rough seas. If they think I'm some kind of shrimpleton, they are just being crabby in my humble opinion.

And so the world evolves. And I will think of a new philosophy as soon as I have time to mullet over. But I will. Because I'm the reel thing more real to my mom than Maggie was to ROD Stewart. You can count on that. I may fail a lot but when I throw a strike, no catfish hunter has a thing on me. So when I change no neon tetra light is going to go off. It will be a gradual thing. And I'm not sea lion either. I am truthful; hook line and thinker. This is no moray-eel issue. It's simply another bottom-feeder situation.

Footnote: No aquatic creatures were injured and killed during the writing of this article; at least not on porpoise.

www.londonstimes.us (click on cartoon archives and then fishing)