• What comes after $99 million?

    Date: 2009.05.01 | Category: I'm just saying, Worth Reading Again, family | Tags:

    For the last two days I’ve attended the Biz Times conference at the Expo Center at State Fair Park. It was great. And I’m not just talking about the  nine seminars that I attended over those two days.

    The endless candy dishes that lined the vendor supplier booths that I could snack on every 45 minutes was very nice.

    Saz’s was there serving potato chips — and we all know how much I love potato chips.

    The two hour lunches were something that I could really grow accustomed to.

    And dropping my business card into fishbowls to win things like an iPod Touch was not a part of my typical day. (Have one, LOVE IT!)

    But the creme d’la creme was the booth that offered chair massages. If it wouldn’t have been the same masseuse there the ENTIRE two days (what’s up with that?), I would have double-dipped. Maybe even triple-dipped.

    I attended the event with my dad, and on Day 1 the speaker asked if anyone was on LinkedIn. I raised my hand. Me! I’m on LinkedIn! My dad leaned over to me and said: What’s LinkedIn?

    No problem. We’ll be attending the LinkedIn seminar on Day 2.

    That was one of my favorite seminars, presented by Wayne Breitbarth, and the other favorite was about business books, presented by Todd Sattersten. You know me, I love books!

    By the end of the day my brain was spent. On Wednesday night I went straight home, put on my sweats, and vegged out in front of the tv.

    I was feeling the same way on Thursday, and as my dad and I were leaving the last seminar of the day I was a little surprised that most of the booths were already packing up and heading home — even though the expo didn’t end for another 15 minutes.

    The United Way booth wasn’t packing it up though, and as we passed it I noticed their drawing was for a 6-pack of Brewer tickets.

    Well I can fish out my business card for that.

    However, there was a catch. And it involved math. We (my dad and I) had to write on the back of our cards how much money we thought the United Way had raised in the last 100 years.

    And this is where I demonstrated just how broken my brain was.

    They gave us the hint that in the last year they raised $45 million, and in the first year they raised $150,000.

    I could not for the life of me remember what came after $100,000,000. It’s like the numbering system just stopped for me.

    $98,000,000.

    $99,000,000.

    $100,000,000.

    The End.

    My dad’s got his calculator out, and he’s punching in all of these numbers and stuff — but I just brain-farted and jotted down the highest number I could think of that wasn’t $100 million.

    $99 million.

    That’s what I wrote. $99 million. Which is twice as much as they raised in the last year alone.

    So we were walking away and my dad tells me he wrote down some number in the billions.

    And I’m like: BILLIONS!! Why couldn’t I think of billions?

    Of course, $101,000,000 would have worked too.

    Or $999,999,999.

    I think I’ll be waiting a very, very long time for the United Way to call and tell me that I’m the winner.

    © 2009, Outside My Head. All rights reserved.