if Kottke can survive on donations maybe you could too! Can’t hurt to try!

Good luck finding a job dude and if you are ever desperate for hosting, I might be able to put you up for a while (although I don’t know if I could cope with your bandwidth requirements).

Well Les, I will say this about Michigan, I grew up there and its always hell trying to find jobs in any venue. I can only begin to imagine what a computer related industry would yield there, almost next to nothing I suppose. Sometimes the small town mentality and the clickish shit is just too much for me but I’ve found through the years that my best deals came out of the ‘good ol boy’ system and functions quite well in the real world. Bartering on services/skills and labor trades means unregulated and unqualified amounts of nontaxable dollars for our beancounters in washington and (in your case) Lansing too. I’m certain that type of behavior is frowned upon for those doing the collecting & counting of the ‘beans’ as it were. [but somehow it never pays the rent..] Where was I going with this.. hmm.. oh now I remember, I know you had promised yourself and whatnot, dont think anyone thinks any less of you. Last time I checked, there was a link to all kinds of “BUY STUPID EVIL STUFF” down on the lower left hand side of the page. I’m sure moving merchandise would have both and immediate effect and a greater long term effect on popularity. (granted this means volume)
So rather than me give you the shirt off my back, why dont I buy one from you to put on mine. Maybe some mugs too.

I wonder if the release of a “Limited edition numbered signature series SEB one of one hundred t-shirt” is in order? A sharpie and a link will do Im sure. Oh shit I gotta get to work. Will buy some stuff when I get in.

Hi Les, I really hope things get better for you soon - I’ll be keeping my fingers crossed, as I’m sure will everyone else. 

I’d been thinking about buying a couple of stupid evil tops for a while - how much do you think it would cost for p&p to Britain?

Les, hang in there.  We’re here for you.

And if you feel like taking on a five-week project management stint in Angola, let me know and I’ll forward the email I got from the recruiter.  No?  Can’t blame you; that was my answer too.

Here’s my bid for Utopia:
BUY STUPID EVIL STUFF HERE
Buy a shitload, I bought a shitload, My friends
and fam arent gonna know what hit them. There
gonna call me and say WTF?! haha This is gonna
be fun at work too.

I hope eneough of this reaches you in time Les..
..you rock.

Missy, SEB STUFF IS SHIPPED WORLDWIDE
All areas outside of North America shipping-
2 days to process 8-10 days to deliver $7.00US [@3.67GBP]
for the first item $4.00US each addtl item ..

I just woke up after laying down around 6AM today. So far there’s been nine donations and I just want to say thanks for the doing me the favor. Every little bit helps and so far that’s added up to $325.

AndyK, I don’t have quite the readership that Kottke does, but perhaps someday that’ll come to pass. Don’t worry about hosting, my current host is inexpensive and as I mentioned there’s money already in the PayPal account to cover hosting for awhile.

Qoayn, I’ve actually hand signed an SEB t-shirt that was a gift for Elwed from his better half. The signature was terrible because I’d never tried to write on cloth using a Sharpie, but Elwed seems to like it. Please feel free to buy the SEB stuff if you want, but right now I’ve only got a $2 markup on the items sold in the store because I just wanted folks to be able to buy some t-shirts if they wanted to without being gouged on the price. So the volume would have to be pretty high for it to amount to much. Still, at least you’re getting something out of the deal so feel free to pick up a couple if you want. I should probably update the designs so there’s a few more without the really vulgar slogan on them.

In the last eight years almost nine I’ve had to ask for help several times and ate a lot of mac and cheese to survive.  Both can be kind of painful, but there is no shame in asking for help.  I’ve asked you in the past for help and you helped me when you could.  I know it sucks! Keep your head up and the old man and I will see what we can do to help on pay day.  Love Ya!

Hey Les, I’ll donate some bucks as well (as soon as you can tell me if its okay to go on the SEB paypal acc, even though its intended for you and your family (and as soon as I can get some money over to my own paypal account)).

‘Pay it forward’ sometime, okay. You’ll pull thru!

Cindy, yeah, I know. It’s just frustrating going from doing so well to doing nothing, ya know? Love ya, sis, and thanks.

Ingolfson, I’ve made note of how much was in the PayPal account before I asked for help so when I withdraw money from it I’ll keep that minimum to ensure the sites stay active. Which is a long way of saying that it’s OK for you to use the PayPal donation link if you wish to.

I picked up a pile of mugs and a tshirt, 6 items I think. So I guess that’s like 12$ coming your way. Seems like a meager ‘shitload’ I proclified earlier all of a sudden.

Hell, I LIKE the vulgar design.
I was a little disappointed that the Fem’s designs
had omitted them. Along with the children’s bibs and whatnot. (I know just how unsophisticated am i??)

As a matter of fact, [this helps your current situation almost none] I have been stuck in Maryland
for sometime now.. which means I am also stuck in Baltimore/DC corridor traffic sometimes for hours each day. These retards bible thump and squeal about tolerance, rights, reperations, abortion and shit all of the time and thier all fucking racists and hypocrites themselves. Drives me nuts.  It would give me no greater pleasure than to put your motto, (White on Black, retain the font)
in Vinyl Letters across the back of my truck along with the URL. Just Because I cant wait to see the looks on thier faces. They would shit. 5$ says some asshole cop sits on the side of the road for an hour looking up the citation number for that one while a thousand idiots rubberneck and gawk.
Its a big ass black dodge truck too.
Bill-Boards arent allowed in DC.. I can only think of two in the state.

I found your site last week doing some Google search, and have been enjoying it as much as I can since!  I’ll be happy to donate some money next Friday the 29th to help out you (and the site!), cause that’s when I get paid ....
- J

Absolutely, Les. You’re doing a wonderful thing here. Don’t let the assholes get you down out there.

I’m happy to toss some in the pot.

I know exactly what you’re going through Les, I’m down to 12 cents in the bank, although I’ve picked up some work shearing which should prove a temporary fix. Those are Australian cents too, not American.

Of course I don’t have a family to look after.

Hang in there, keep looking, good luck.

Glad to pitch in a bit.  But don’t let any go to them gub’mint revernooers - gifts are TAX FREE, dammnit!

Hey Les, I’ll also chip in some bucks. I’ll never forget the time I was between jobs, trying to relocate to the southwest and discovered I had $5.00 to my name at the ATM. It was tremendously un-fun and certainly gave me some psychoses, but it’s all lemonade now. I know there are several employers in southern Arizona who would snap you up in a heartbeat......

Les,

I am fairly confident that I just made a donation through PayPal. I didn’t get a warm fuzzy reply assuring me of this, but it should have worked. I can’t possibly be that computer inept. I have after all managed to purchase several unneeded items from various online stores. Anybody want a keychain sized scrabble board with wee little letter tiles? If $100.00 doesn’t appear in your account that wasn’t there a few minutes ago, let me know.

Doh!  I just realized - everybody talkin’ ‘bout PayPal, I used Amazon.  Does that still translate into bill payin’ cash?  Or should I undonate and go PayPal?

I’ve made a donation through paypal from the money i earned at the sperm bank.  Isn’t this what communism is all about?  I read everything on this site and try to memorize it, but i also tend to lurk a lot and drool.

I used Amazon also and it worked fine Mr. DoF.

Mayo, I haven’t received a notification of your donation either and I just checked the account with PayPal and it’s not showing anything that I haven’t gotten an email about so I’m assuming it didn’t go through. Double check with your bank before trying again, though. I don’t want you being double billed.

DOF,either or is perfectly fine. Both accounts end up going to the same place technically. Amazon transfers are automatic and PayPal’s I just transfer on my own when I need it.

Again a very big thank you to everyone who has tossed something my way. I am sincerely grateful for the generosity. After subtracting the minor fees associated with each service we’re up to $927 so far and this will definitely be a big help in getting through the next month.

Update on the job search. I had an opportunity come up for a tech support job in Toledo of all places, which would’ve been an hour drive one way that I was more than willing to make. Would’ve put me at a Chrysler plant. They were only offering $15 an hour and I told the contract house that I wouldn’t drive to Toledo for anything less than $25 an hour. The contract house agreed that the qualifications the site was asking for didn’t match up with the rate they were offering so she was going to submit my name with the higher billing rate request. I figured it fall through on that alone, but they called back today saying that the manager had some additional questions they wanted to ask so she wanted to check with me on a couple of possible questions that might come up in preparation. She asked me about my experience with Microsoft’s SMS tools and Active Directory and I answered as best I could. A couple of hours later she calls back and tells me the question the manager had was simply “where does he live?”

Turns out they wanted someone who could be on-call to show up at a moment’s notice and I’m too far away for that to be practical. So another one bites the dust. Dammit.

I think my Paypal just went through, Les. Sorry it didn’t show up yesterday.

No sweat, Brandi. I’m hoping that as more folks stop by I’ll see the trend continue for a little bit. I wouldn’t mind being like Kottke and turn my blogging into a way of life, but I probably don’t have the readership for that yet.

I’m just flattered and grateful for everyone’s generosity.

Les…

I wish I could send more, but I did make another donation to the amazon honor page…

Next I am gonna take a look at SEB schwag to see if I can buy presents for people there

You hang in there, man.  I’ve gone through 3 lay-offs over the last nine years, and there was much suckage to be had with each.

Hey! You guys reading this who have contacts: someone let the Daily Show know about Les and his abiliites.  Maybe someone will hire him to write political and religious satire for a living, so he can stop wasting his time on this weak-ass computer shit.  Waste of talent.

Or, someone in the local area there needs to sponsor our boy on a billboard ad campaign.  Rent-A-Tech, or something like that.  Help the brutha out!

In the meanwhile, I’ve done what I can.  Five years ago, I’d have recommended you move here to Portland, OR, when tech businesses were booming.  There’s been a serious decline here, also.

Les:  Mac at Pesky Apostrophe put in a plug and a link to this, so maybe that will help.