Starting a New Business (Part One)

Blocking the Sidewalk

In the past I ran my own business for several decades (can't remember how long). Then I slowly drifted into retirement and finally quit the small league collecting checks from customers 15 years ago. I use the Bank of America for some unknown reason probably because they were everywhere in California. Never used them for business just personal crap.

LA River

When I go online to my bank account to see negative numbers (remember math in school when they told you a negative time a negative gives positive results, not so) the bank is always trying to have me start a new business account. So maybe I should start one but what?

LA County

Too late for the dot.com stuff, my days in computers are really old school, insurance or car theft (auto dealers) doesn't fit my ideas. A few months back I got interested in birding and read various books on the subject. Never thought you could make a living watching birds or counting them. So that niche has been taken.

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New businesses need an expanding market place where items are plentiful. So I looked around where I reside and thought what is there here that they are plenty of? Well ecotourism is a really big business, world wide people spend thousands to travel around the world to see species that are in danger of being eliminated.

Los Angeles Harbor

Then Shazam, the light bulb blinked in my sailboat cabin, only have one 80 watt bulb but a single flash in the darkness can be very bright. I could start a ecotourism scheme where we tour the world  observing the Homeless.

My idea sorted of copies bird watching. You start by buying one of my to be published books or follow me on the web at "Homeless Watching.com" The fun and enjoyment of this sport is quite remarkable

Now you must realize that this is in a prenatal development stage, a work in progress. If you have ever scored baseball you would know you need a score sheet to record all the items of play, balls, strikes, hits and outs (all that shit that baseball nuts love). My homeless score sheet allows you to record location of sighting including GPS data and value points plus bonus points for added descriptions.

San Pedro Pacific Street

For those without throw away income simple observation can be a simple starting point. Lots of expensive equipment can be purchased later such as hidden microscopes and cameras or video. I personally try to look like a bewildered bird watcher carring my binoculars and a Nikon with telephoto lens.

Old School Pedro


I am currently trying to develop a scoring system takes in the difficulty of the sport and how rare the sighting is.

For example a simple homeless sitting on the curb is less points that one at a city bus stop bench but if the homeless is asleep the score is higher during daylight. Homeless on a skateboard is a higher score that one on a normal bicycle.  One must be careful with wheelchair scoring. For example is person just using it as a chair or he/she really needs it. If you try scoring the wheel chair and later find the device was later loaded in to a white land Rover you loose one thousand points. Bicycles get one point no matter what the size. Please multiply score with each addition bike if complete. Extra loose wheels and frames only get half points.

If is hard to score personal cell phones and bling watches and for now I will leave those for later.

Some dumpster divers appear to be homeless but may not be. Also the size of the backpack can also be misleading.

Trailers and shopping carts are also hard to score correctly. same goes with tents and sleeping bags. With shopping carts the farther the distance from the store removal the higher the score. Trader Joe's is a higher point value that the 99 cent store/dollar tree store.

Old City Hall

Plastic bags, suit cases and cardboard boxes scoring will come later.

Distance traveled and expenses involved while building your homeless life list is weighted. If you are on a business trip and see a homeless person pissing in front of your hotel your score would be less that if you traveled to that destination just to add to your life list. We want to promote travel for the sake of seeing more homeless not just traveling.

Camping at the Post Office

Homeless signs can be homeless made as opposed to home made or printed at the local library. If the homeless has a ink jet printer he or she may be an impostor. Pets also can be tear jerking but remember he/she may be renting the dog.  A person with a well fed pit bull is borderline. One dog is one extra point, each additional dog is two points, cats are 3 points each. Birds should not be included for points as these maybe just pigeons looking for their own handout.

                  This will be a first edition so you might what to collect this rare item.

        The Next Blog (LIFE SCORING FOR HOMELESS WATCHING) IS UP NOW

    All Photos in this Blog were taken by my self the Author

Beyond My Bicycle Budget

Does Johnnie Walker Black taste better than Red? In the past when I was a scotch drinker I also worked in Canada. Canadian whiskey prices were much lower above the border than in California where I lived. So I became fond of Walker that was priced out of my California budget. Ask any bartender or cocktail waitress if the bar customer can tell the difference between "well whiskey"  and expensive label drinks after a couple of shots. I would suspect the answer would be no.

Fuji Pro and Schwinn Paramount 1938

I have been riding bicycles for more than a few years. I don't drink scotch any more but I have two sailing friends that drink scotch. One buys his at Costco the other imports his from Scotland both taste the same too me. Back to the bicycle thing, I prefer my wheels to have matching rims, tires and hubs. My fixed gear rear wheels collection includes one clincher, two sew-ups (tubular). I can make an almost pair of tubular but not so with the clincher. I need to purchase a matching pair. Prices vary from dam cheap to several thousand.

Painting Bob Jackson 3 years ago

My last matching pair were Zipp with a carbon disk rear and Zipp rim with Phil Wood hub and bladed stainless spokes. The most expensive Zipps out there now are close to $4,000.00. I am still stuck in 1950s price range.

Schwinn Paramount

My knowledge of current prices comes from reading Bicycle Blogs and Internet searches. My budget is beyond purchasing bicycle magazines to look at and there is no reason if I can't afford to purchase the mag I sure as hell can't afford the shiny stuff inside.

This clip is from YouTube and is my son Dylan recently jumping stairs at UCI. The reference to El Toro is the stairs at El Toro High School which is located in Lake Forest. Before Lake Forest became a city the area was called El Toro. The Main street is El Toro Road, El Toro Library and Post Office then they got fancy and changed the name. There isn't any natural forest there or any real lakes. The El Toro Stairs add rails and attracted zillion of skateboarders then later twenty inch bikes. My daughter Frances went to ETHS but you will not find that in her bio. The area around the campus is somewhat hilly and when the school was built they did't grade it level so the parking lot between the Gym and office building has a small slope on it. Same with the stairs from the lockers down to the office. Many years past I was skateboarding with Frances and she fell there and banged her head. Neither of us wore helmets, probably no skater did then. Anyway Frances has not been right since then. (Father Humor).
N. Y. Bike Snob makes a living bashing Freds and I enjoy reading it. This morning I was reading a local blog where the author described the pleasure of shelling out almost 2k to buy a Brompton so he could use public transit and save the operating cost of his fossil fuel 4 wheeler. A fold-up can be purchased at Big 5 Sporting for $199.99. If one has the money to buy a Brompton please don't think I am whining it is good for the manufacturer to sell product. My neighbor suggested I get a folding bike and suggested Big 5. I have ridden the trains here in Los Angeles with my bike and there is ample room but I don't do rush hour so a fold-up doesn't fit in.

My current bicycle collection stands at seven. Included is one Specialized S-Works Cross Country that retailed for around five thousand USA dollars. My out the door price after discounting was $3,500. Now that was several years ago but the current S-Works CC is $11,500.00 plus sale tax in Los Angeles, California adding $1035.00. The S-Works shown in the link in a 29 inch whereas mine is only 26 inch.

These price increases don't make too much sense but I am not a MAMIL or a saddle based weekend jolly.  All these clever descriptions (middle age man in lycra) can be confusing as I first thought it was another reference to something similar to Rapha or Assos. After receiving a nice compliment yesterday about my tanned legs I coined a new acronym "OFSSL" (old fart still shaves legs).

Currently I am trying to get some Thorstein Veblen books and since he existed before e-books I might just have to ride up to my local library (it is all up hill) and get an old fashioned style book with pages. Velben Goods and the Theory of the Leisure Class. Being of a discursive nature Velben got me thinking about reading Vance Packard books and his bashing.

This is not me riding.