A Million Dollar Idea

11.13.2008

Over the past couple of weeks I've been working out the details for a business venture/idea. I've been thinking of mom and how her cancer is progressing (I know, this is the first time I've mentioned that here on the site so it may come as a shock to those that only know me through Al Gore's Information Superweb) to the point where she's no longer able to take care of herself all the time. Conversely, she's not at the point where she needs/qualifies for around-the-clock care. She's in a gray area where multiple people - friends, neighbors, family - trade off and take turns helping out.

The first thing I noticed was how everybody has their own system of doing things - for example, the times that Mom's meds were being taken was kept up with on a little notepad that had the day at the top of the page, then the time and med taken as a line item. Once you're in the groove of what's going on that works out, but when you're helping out for the first time you have no idea when a drug is supposed to be taken, what it's taken for, or how often - until you go digging through medicine bottles and make a little chart.

My first thought was that there had to be some kind of medication calendar/scheduler out there on the web. 3 days of searching brought me nothing useful. So I started thinking some more... I'm supposed to be a fairly smart guy, not the only one to be sure, but surely I could make something useful to help out.

The first thing I would want is a form printed out. This form (pre-populated somehow) would have everything I would need to dispense meds when they were needed. The column layout ended up looking like:

Med Name	Med Picture	Frequency	Schedule
Name of the drug	Pic of drug, to help identify	How often it should be taken	Day laid out by hour, like in a DayTimer

Within the schedule, there would be a checkbox for when the med was to be taken along with a note area for the actual time along with who administered the med. Mom was getting carried away on her notepad and writing down her drugs before she took them (I think to remind herself to take them) but then forgetting whether or not she actually took them when the time came.

The web developer came out in me soon thereafter. If this could be captured through a website, everyone that was helping out could login and see if the meds were being taken on time. "Hey, mom didn't take her meds at noon and here it is 2:00. I should call and ask if everything's ok!" On top of that, a website could have a clock/alarm as a reminder that it was time for another dose of meds along with all the bells and whistles that websites can generate. By the time it was over, I had envisioned a Google Homepage looking site for caregivers. People's schedules, med schedules, reminders, pharmacy ordering, doctor and nurses notes, etc.

Then on Monday at 2:10PM, I saw where Intel beat me to the punch.

From reading the details, it looks like the home health laptoop does 80% of what I was thinking, along with a handful of other things. On top of that, they already have support from healthcare companies and (it's suggested) a network for gathering and dissemenating information set up. I was still trying to figure that part out.

So it looks like my idea will go on the back-burner until I think up something else that makes it super-cool. Although I was frustrated that Intel beat me to said punch, by them following through I know that I can indeed come up with a million dollar, if not billion dollar, idea.

Permalink mom random

Intertranscontinental Communications

11.10.2008

Today is a day when I stop for a moment to marvel at how simple technology has made some things that I would normally never think about. I got a call from Jerry on my way back from lunch this afternoon. Jerry is in Las Vegas this week - for work, unless he strikes it rich playing hopscotch or something. Jerry was sitting down for brunch and I was in my car. 5 years ago (ish) he would have had to leave me a message either at home or on my work/desk phone. Instead, we chatted aimlessly for a bit.

Out of the blue, I decided it was time to send WWE Jason a text message. The last time I texted him I was in an airport in Canada. Thanks to WWE being international, Jason happened to be at the taping of Raw in Manchester (UK). It's somehow surreal to send Jason text messages while they're taping a show I'll be watching in 6 hours. International text messaging - I love it!

Permalink books/comics wrestling

My Mind Is Wandering

11.09.2008

I'm having one of those days weekends where my mind is wandering, or maybe I'm just easily distracted. There are a couple of things I've been meaning to add to the little blog here for the past week or two but none of them are really worth an entry individually. With that in mind, I present my cornucopia of randomness!

Billy Idol still looking good at 52. Maybe there's something to be said for sex, drugs, and rock & roll?

You can buy Chris Benoit checks online. I've been looking for some wrestling themed return address labels and came across this one. With all the bad press around Benoit killing his family I'm surprised this one is still available (although the check printer is not affiliated with WWE).

Permalink random wrestling

TFMB

10.30.2008

Somewhere along the way of playing games in those carefree summers of the 80's, Jerry (I blame him) coined ourselves The Fabulous Muchacho Brothers. How did Jerry come up with our name? Blame it all on David Lee Roth's Goin' Crazy video and the introduction of The Fabulous Picasso Brothers (take note of 1:19 in the YouTube video below).

A quarter century later, it makes you wonder what the hell we were thinking.

As the age of Al Gore's Internet dawned, lots of little graphics tools made their way to the public. Before high speed access and Flash animated ads, an animated gif was about as exciting a graphic as you could get. Thanks to the DLR video, The Fabulous Picasso Brothers had a logo. With a little tweaking, the Fabulous Muchacho Brothers also had a logo!
Picasso Bros Logo from Goin' Crazy video.

Our logo became a bastardized version of the above while borrowing from a yield sign while making a skinny stick figure (Jerry) and a... not so skinny figure, with glasses (Me!). I quickly took our logo and the gif animating software and turned our logo into a Spy Vs Spy series of animations.

So now, keeping in mind that these were really cool back in the days of the Atari 2600 and gas was a buck a gallon, you can relive the glory days of The Fabulous Muchacho Brothers: Gif Wars!

Maybe they're good in the way the 60's Batman series is good? I need to add a gif with some shark repellent.

Permalink random

Building: Before & After

10.26.2008

I mentioned last week (or maybe the week before) that I was getting a storage building as part of Home Renovation 2K8. Well, I now have a 10x16 storage building in the backyard!

The odd thing is, I haven't put anything in it. It still needs a couple of things. Both Mike (the contractor) and myself were shocked that the slope of the back yard is as steep as it appears once you level out a building. as such, he's going to put something to fill the gaping hole between building bottom and the ground. Additionally, it needs some steps. After that I'll start loading that bad boy up.

The rest of my contractor-provided maintenance is wrapping up. The storm door should that had to be ordered should get here in the next week. The storage building needs a little coat of paint to closer match the house (my house is less blue than Mike thought when he picked up the storage building). I've been keeping Lowes and Home Depot in business the past couple of weeks with little do-it-myself projects, but I don't count those as biggies since I'm able to do them myself. Mayeb I'll throw in some updates as those get done, too?

Now I've got to get back to the fun chore of cleaning bathrooms. Sometimes there's are drawbacks to my fun-loving single lifestyle; I lack people upon which to pawn off chores while being too cheap to hire a cleaning service. At least I'm building character by doing my own cleaning.

As many years as I was told that, I'm still not sure if I'm buying it.

Permalink renovation/remodelling