One night not so very long ago, my self-imposed daily writing word count goal loomed. But I was feeling like a sleepy dumb rhinoceros, and didn’t know what to write about.
So, I decided to play a game. It worked like this: J would prompt me with problems — potential gold mines of of disruption potential, as we’d say in the vernacular of innovation — and I would come up with solutions.
What resulted? Why, nothing less than a surprisingly fertile bounty of billion-dollar business ideas!
But alas, I’ve no time to build every business. So, I’m sharing these results with you.
Problem:
Occasional minor silverware-induced annoyances.
Solution:
Slurp Dawg — a revolution in hands-free eating.
It’s a bowl that’s ergonomically designed to conform to your face so that you can just mash your mouth down onto your pile of food-mush and chomp down all those calories sans fork, knife, or spoon, leaving your hands free to type a great American novel, or massage your girlfriend, or 10x some code.
Problem:
Awakeness. The problem is that it runs out too fast.
Solutions:
There are many.
The first is Restore-Yo-Self, a rejuvenative liquid solution that comes in a handy spray bottle which you can mist into your face to blast it with a fresh wake-up shock, and which is infused with not only stimulating essential oils but also caffeine and other things like ginkgo biloba.
Another solution is to just get a different clock, stupid…the product by the way is called Different Clock, Stupid! It’s a clock where each half hour is labeled as an hour (and the minute hand rotates at double speed) so that you feel like you’ve been awake for twice as long.
Third solution: you could get a Buddy Friend, which is a figurine of a little cute creature that sits at your desk and soothes you at regular intervals with aphorisms intended to optimize your perception of time.
Problem:
Teeth get dirty.
Solution:
Carry around a small satchel of Denta-Grit every day and sprinkle a teaspoon onto each meal. That way, when you’re snarfing grub from your Slurp Dawg, you’ll get a dose of auto-cleansing action built right in. Kind of like how you add sand to a rock polisher machine and let it tumble around for a long time to get your rocks all smooth and pretty, except with your teeth, and also it kills bacteria, and is somewhat less abrasive.
Problem:
How do you know what outfit to put on every day? It takes too much time.
Solution:
Ah, the age old wrench in the machine of morning routine. You de-bed, shower, brush your teeth on autopilot, dry off your naked self, and everything’s hunky-dory until, uh oh!, what the hell are you going to wear, it’s so hard to match different items and colors and things!
Well, you’re in luck if you’ve happened to purchase a set of Drawer Dwarves. These are handy clothes-wrapping devices that you use to wrap each of your favorite outfits up in a bundle so that you can simply pull one item out of the drawer that will contain everything you need to be comfortable and stylish for the day.
Problem:
Traveling takes too long, why can’t we teleport?
Solution:
Yes, this is a major problem arising due to the pesky points at which our current technological frontiers butt up against laws of physical reality…but that doesn’t mean there aren’t solutions, if you can think outside the box!
Speaking of boxes, have you tried Vacatio-Box?! It’s a vacation in a box.
Why spend all this time going somewhere when you can (almost) just have that somewhere come to you? I mean sure, if you have months to frolic around, it’s probably better to still go do that in the real world of places you want to go, but if you just have like a long weekend, there’s no need to blow like half your vacation days traveling with planes and car rides and long lines and blah blah that all sounds sooooooo boring and non-fun.
With your Vacatio-Box, just select your destination and preferred leisure activities, and $99.95 gets you a package shipped straight to your door, filled with two or three approximations of cool things at your destination where you wish you could go for real! It’s a lot more fun to just use your imagination anyway.
Like instead of you going to Italy, we’ll send you ingredients for making pasta, and a long Fellini movie on Blu-Ray. If that sounds good, order now and receive two for the price of one!
Actually though, there’s an even better way to save all the time and hassle of travel.
Introducing the new FTAAS product: Hypno-Self.
Pioneers in the fake-travel-as-a-service industry, Hypno-Self provides you with a trained professional to simply hypnotize you to think that you’re actually in a different place. If it’s a business trip or something, no problem, local partners are standing by globally to hypnotize your clients too; they’ll never even know the difference.
Problem:
Humans can’t easily run on all fours, even though it seems like a thing that would be fun.
Solution:
Paws-ibility are artificial paws that you slip onto your feet and hands so that you can bound about to your heart’s content. These are no mere slippers; they’re spring-loaded for maximum locomotive energy, and they facilitate the best exercise of your life.
When you wear your Paws-ibility, nothing will be impossible…except your annoying natural bipedal instinct. After your first romp, you’ll never be the same.
Like I said, much as I’d love to pursue all these ideas at once, I can’t possibly find the time. I’d love nothing more than to see you take one of these surefire seeds of a billion-dollar business and launch it right to the moon.
And hey, friend, one last thing: if you want to take me on as an advisor for a few points of equity, I just may have a hard time saying no!