SALEM OR
The Time's, They Are
A' Changing!
A' Changing!
The Story of CCTU's Move
How much would you pay for a joke?
Not to buy one, like some novelty item such as a farting toilet paper roll or a singing bass fish plaque, but to TELL a joke of your own? Well, way back when I purchased the domain name for CCTU, that's exactly what it was - a joke between me and comedian Tim Bedore (often featured on The Bob and Tom Show on radio) - he (Tim) was going on about "The Animal Conspiracy", and so, as I joke, I went out, purchased the domain name CCTU, which stood for "Cat Counter Terrorism Unit", a spoof not only of "The Animal Conspiracy", but also of the popular TV show at the time called "24". Jack Bauer (Keifer Sutherland's role) was an Agent for "CTU", the "Counter Terrorism Unit" (a fake government agency) and spent all his time yelling at people to get down and crawling around in ventilation ducts.
My "joke", to Tim Bedore, was that the Animals had their own counter terrorism unit, dedicated to eliminating the "Human Threat"....and I can't find it right now, but at some point in the future I'll post here the actual picture, taken from a FARK "Catruday", that I used to "support" my Conspiracy Theory - it's a picture of a little Orange Tabby (who I renamed "Jack Meow-er") crawling along a ventilation duct!
So, how much would you pay for a joke? That particular joke cost me about $250 bucks, but at the time, I had that kind of money to throw away on just making myself silly giggle.
Turn the clock forward to today (29 Oct 2010), and now I don't even have $10 bucks left to my name. I've been unemployed for MORE than 2 years now (my last working day was 24 October 2008) and I'm forced to go back to school because none of the skills I have are anything anyone will hire me for.
So as the saying goes: "Playtime is over!"
First, to anyone out there even remotely in my situation - working a job you can't stand, or not working at all, I say this to you: Go back to School, Learn a Trade or Occupation that you can make a living at. Don't keep knocking on doors because I'm here to tell you that won't work. Two reason I now know WHY that won't work are (1) You are competing with way too many people for the small handful of jobs out there, and if an employer is going to hire you, you have GOT to ALREADY HAVE the skills set the employer needs. The days of "apprenticing" or "learning on the job", which is how I taught myself TV Graphics and became a Chyron Operator, are gone. With literally hundreds of applicants to wade through for any 1 position any employer has to offer, an employer has neither the time nor the need to take on someone they have to 'train up', and (2) all other factors being equal or even discounted (like your age), an employer, faced with dozens if not hundreds of applications for a job, has to cut down the cost and time it takes to sort through all those applicants, and the number one criteria for the First Cut (people who will get, at best, a "thanks but you're not what we're looking for right now" letter) is Education - ANYONE without a degree, at the bear minimum an Associate's Degree, but in many occupations the minimum should be a Bachelor's Degree, has no realistic chance of being hired unless they have "networked" for the position ('Networked' means you are either a friend, relative or "buddy pal" to whoever the Owner is or the person in HR who is doing the hiring and reviews). Unless you've already got an "in", you will get NO WHERE without a degree.
This is why, after 30 years, I, myself, am back at school - with only a High School diploma, you can't even get a job at McDonald's anymore - in a recent Government survey, the Department of Commerce determined that 24% of the employees of fast food joints nationwide held a B.S. degree or higher! In fact, they found no less than 4% of workers in the fast food industry held Ph.D's!!! So the days of just graduating High School and being able to make it in the Work Force are long, long gone.
"When I was a Child, I thought as a Child and did Childish things. When I became a Man, I put away my Childish Things..."
--Corinthians 13:11
And so the whole point of this Story - it's time for me to put away my childish notions of how the world used to work.
The world, as I knew it, used to be a world where Hard Work Alone was enough to succeed, or at the very least you could earn a living wage, provide for your family and their comfort, provide for the future of your children, or at the least be well enough off that you did not have to worry about whether or not you could put food on your table and a roof over your head.
The world as it really is now, however, is a different place. Now, it doesn't matter if you've got 30 years experience doing virtually anything and everything - from grading lumber to writing payroll programs - it just doesn't matter what your skills WERE, it only matters what your skills ARE. In THIS world, now, things like Loyalty are meaningless - you could (and I did) work my ass off making many, many other people wealthy (some of them VERY wealthy) and the only reward for your hard work and efforts is a pink slip when some bean counter somewhere decides that YOUR job just isn't "cost effective" anymore. Which is one of the reasons why I am taking a degree in Accounting, because when the Layoffs start, I've noticed, the Bean Counters are almost NEVER on the list of people being laid off.
In THIS world, things like Integrity are meaningless. YOU may be ethical and play by the rules, you may keep on the "straight and narrow" path, but while you are doing that, a dozen other people are taking the short cuts, cutting the corners, getting so far ahead of you on that path that by the time YOU get where you're going everything you wanted is gone - already taken by those who got there before you.
So it's time for me, Matthew L. Baun III, to give up the "childish" notions that Loyalty to a company will be rewarded. That Hard Work Alone will get you anywhere. That having Ethics and Integrity are nothing more than slowing you down on the Path to your success, making you nothing more than a Stepping Stone for someone else to profit from.
So while the CCTU started out as nothing more than a girly giggle for me and 1 other person, now I'm converting it over to an actual Business Model. The "Matthew Baun" that was more interested in video games and websites than in being a B.I.G. (Big Important Guy) is now going to focus the not inconsiderable powers of The Mind Of Matthew on earning a buck.....many bucks, in fact.
My declared major at CCC now is Accounting and Business Systems. And my "10 Year Plan" is..
2014 Graduate with BS in Accounting and Business Systems. At that time, if I can find a job paying at least $40K per year, I will move into workforce and get some on the job experience, otherwise I will stay in school and go on to...
2016 MBA with emphasis on Business Model and Theory. I hope to earn a Sigma Black Belt by this time. The game plan from here is to move onward and upward to Business Venture Banking and Management. By this time, I also hope to have successfully passed my Series 7 Broker's Exam, so that I won't have to cut anyone in on "a piece of the action" when I start investing in companies.
2018 Pay willing, I hope by this time to have completed enough education to become an Actuary. Those are the people who "set the odds" for the underwriting of insurance policies. They also start at about $140K per year.
2020 By now, I hope to have at least one (quite possibly more) businesses of my own, with the Ultimate Goal (from 2010 to 2020) of earning $1 Million Dollars per year in income. When my annual salary hits the $1 Million mark, I know I will have reached the goal I set out for myself now (in 2010).
and frankly, I don't even care anymore how I do it. I've spent nearly 30 years of my life making OTHER lying, thieving bastards wealthy beyond the dreams of avarice, and I'm sick of it. I'm sick of a world where people like Kim Kardasian can make $70 million dollars a year when she obviously doesn't have the brains God gave a snail! I'm tired of a world where I have to worry about how I'll pay for food next week when people like Bernie Madoff's Wife, never charged with anything, walk out the front door with very likely more than $10 BILLION DOLLARS of OTHER PEOPLE'S MONEY!
We live in a world now where the consequences of one's actions only matter if you are poor. If you don't believe that the rich live under different rules than we do, just ask Robert Blake, or O. J. Simpson...they got away with murder, and only because they were wealthy.
And I suppose that's my goal as well now - to be so rich that I could shoot or stab someone to death if I felt like it and not spend a day in jail over it.
Hey! I'm smarter than Kim Kardasian. I'm more intelligent than a Robert Blake. I've more "mad skills" than Roy Speer ever even dreamed of. Why shouldn't I be as wealthy as they are? If a person coming to this country without even the language, let alone legal visa papers, can make a better than decent living (and if you don't believe that, just walk into any 7-11 in this country!), then why, with all the advantages I have (language, legal citizenship, some brains) can't I do the same?
So that's why the change at CCTU - lacking the money now to form a more 'proper' business model and web presence, I'll simply use the 'confusion' over the meaning behind CCTU to create a business front, at least for now.
All the internet silly stuff, the multiple projects I have running, may (or may not) have time for from this point forward, so they will be updated as I can get around to it. But top priority now is building the Empire, so all the silly stuff will get shoved to www.docbaun.com for the foreseeable future.
it's time for me to put away childish things.
-M. Baun 29 October 2010
Not to buy one, like some novelty item such as a farting toilet paper roll or a singing bass fish plaque, but to TELL a joke of your own? Well, way back when I purchased the domain name for CCTU, that's exactly what it was -
My "joke", to Tim Bedore, was that the Animals had their
So, how much would you pay for a joke? That particular joke cost me about $250 bucks, but at the time, I had that kind of money to throw away on just making myself silly giggle.
Turn the clock forward to today (29 Oct 2010), and now I don't even have $10 bucks left to my name. I've been unemployed for
So as the saying goes: "Playtime is over!"
First, to anyone out there even remotely in my situation -
This is why, after 30 years, I, myself, am back at school -
"When I was a Child, I thought as a Child and did Childish things. When I became a Man, I put away my Childish Things..."
-
And so the whole point of this Story -
The world,
The world as it really is now, however, is a different place. Now, it doesn't matter if you've got 30 years experience doing virtually anything and everything -
In THIS world, things like Integrity are meaningless. YOU may be ethical and play by the rules, you may keep on the "straight and narrow" path, but while you are doing that, a dozen other people are taking the short cuts, cutting the corners, getting so far ahead of you on that path that by the time YOU get where you're going everything you wanted is gone -
So it's time for me, Matthew L. Baun III, to give up the "childish" notions that Loyalty to a company will be rewarded. That Hard Work Alone will get you anywhere. That having Ethics and Integrity are nothing more than slowing you down on the Path to your success, making you nothing more than a Stepping Stone for someone else to profit from.
So while the CCTU started out as nothing more than a girly giggle for me and 1 other person, now I'm converting it over to an actual Business Model. The "Matthew Baun" that was more interested in video games and websites than in being a B.I.G. (Big Important Guy) is now going to focus the not inconsiderable powers of The Mind Of Matthew on earning a buck.....many bucks, in fact.
My declared major at CCC now is Accounting and Business Systems. And my "10 Year Plan" is..
2014 Graduate with BS in Accounting and Business Systems. At that time, if I can find a job paying at least $40K per year, I will move into workforce and get some on the job experience, otherwise I will stay in school and go on to...
2016 MBA with emphasis on Business Model and Theory. I hope to earn a Sigma Black Belt by this time. The game plan from here is to move onward and upward to Business Venture Banking and Management. By this time, I also hope to have successfully passed my Series 7 Broker's Exam, so that I won't have to cut anyone in on "a piece of the action" when I start investing in companies.
2018 Pay willing, I hope by this time to have completed enough education to become an Actuary. Those are the people who "set the odds" for the underwriting of insurance policies. They also
2020 By now, I hope to have at least one (quite possibly more) businesses of my own, with the Ultimate Goal (from 2010 to 2020) of earning $1 Million Dollars per year in income. When my annual salary hits the $1 Million mark, I know I will have reached the goal I set out for myself now (in 2010).
and frankly, I don't even care anymore how I do it. I've spent nearly 30 years of my life making OTHER lying, thieving bastards wealthy beyond the dreams of avarice, and I'm sick of it. I'm sick of a world where people like Kim Kardasian can make $70 million dollars a year when she obviously doesn't have the brains God gave a snail! I'm tired of a world where I have to worry about how I'll pay for food next week when people like Bernie Madoff's Wife, never charged with anything, walk out the front door with very likely more than $10 BILLION DOLLARS of OTHER PEOPLE'S MONEY!
We live in a world now where the consequences of one's actions only matter if you are poor. If you don't believe that the rich live under different rules than we do, just ask Robert Blake, or O. J. Simpson...they got away with murder, and only because they were wealthy.
And I suppose that's my goal as well now -
Hey! I'm smarter than Kim Kardasian. I'm more intelligent than a Robert Blake. I've more "mad skills" than Roy Speer ever even dreamed of. Why
So that's why the change at CCTU -
All the internet silly stuff, the multiple projects I have running, may (or may not) have time for from this point forward, so they will be updated as I can get around to it. But top priority now is building the Empire, so all the silly stuff will get shoved to www.docbaun.com for the foreseeable future.
it's time for me to put away childish things.
-