Living Online

Even though I am a big fan of smart phones, I do see that they have added more complexity to people’s lives. Studies show that we are all becoming more and more stressed due to the fact that we cannot get away from being constantly “on.”

I can recall being on vacation and having to find a pay phone to call my employer to see how things were going. Even in daily life, time in the car meant “alone time” when traveling to job locations because no one was constantly ringing your cellphone to ask for favors.

Some people have actually solved this problem by doing what is called “turning off their phone.” I know, crazy, right? No matter where you go you see people basically married to that pocket communicator and even on dates people will sit there and text who-knows-whom while their date does the same.

Ol' Dutch is about as bad as the next in this regard and I am starting to be a tad concerned that I have caught the dreaded “text” disease. Every ding or vibration of my phone has me reaching for that tool of the Devil to see who had a birthday, what politician lied now, who got shot, what kid needs money or Trixie's latest instructions.

The latter is the worst as I used to be able to say I didn’t hear her or remember her instructions but now she has legal proof that she sent them to me via text.

Don’t get me wrong, there are wonderful advantages to having these new-fangled contraptions such as being able to see the granddaughters pet the cows, do a dance recital, sing a song or pick their nose. Well, most of it’s good.

One thing that has come to Ol' Dutch of late is the advent of online surveys. If you have not gotten into this aspect of modern connectivity then let me take a few moments to explain.

Someone, somewhere will decide that they need a sampling of Americana and will offer to pay any qualifying online idiot to fill out a survey. This can be anything from soup to nuts and includes political choices, food shopping trends, new car buying decisions, health care insurance questions and about anything you can dream up.

I am not sure where they get their money but just this past week a crisp new $2 bill came in the mail for about five minutes of my time. That would translate into about $24 an hour and that ain’t chicken feed in anyone’s books. Another survey soon arrived and I now have another $5 coming in the mail.

At the rate these invites are escalating I soon will be on my way to making real money on the Internet from the comfort of my recliner. No more will I have to hustle and compete in the real world for dollars as I can just wait for it to come to me in my post office box.

Now you may assert that this is not “real” money. But, let me remind you, all businesses take a while to build up and I am working on this on a daily basis by surfing the Web for more opportunities to voice my valued opinion.

Since Ol' Dutch spent his entire life providing for a spouse and kids, he never did get to have a good boat. But now I can see that with just a little bit of work that dream may now be a reality.

My brother-in-law just bought a new boat and it was somewhere in the $22,000 range so taking that price into consideration Ol' Dutch only needs 6,286 more surveys to get that new boat.

I will have to up the rate of survey taking however to make this work because at the current survey payment schedule it’s going to take me about 120 years to save up enough to make a trip to Bass Pro Shops. I am not sure even they will go that long on payments?