Jun
27

Welcome to My Pet Hydra: A Brief Introduction Pt 2

The aforementioned shifting of designs is not Frank’s fault. That would be the responsibility of the better looking half of this dynamic duo. My name is Don, Frank’s elder brother and cohort in crime. I’m a recently unemployed web developer with an interest in stinging insects, front-end development and small business. Since my recent departure from full time employment I have decided to strike it out on my own. The only thing better than becoming your own boss is doing it several times over! I bring a slightly different perspective to this project; I’m raising a family in addition to a multi-headed lizard. Being married with children means that my needs are immediate in terms of both income and benefits. We’ll be covering those topics and more in the weeks, months and (hopefully) years to come.

What will you write about?

While my intrepid sibling and I go about our day creating and running multiple small businesses we’ll keep you up to speed on our progress. Both our successes and failures will be documented here for our readership to consume and use to their own benefit. Utilizing diversified income streams to make a living raises unique problems in terms of administration, accounting and sales. It’s our hope that you can learn with us and some day start a pet hydra of your very own!

- Don

Jun
20

Welcome to My Pet Hydra: A Brief Introduction

Hello there! Pay no attention to the constantly shifting layout and post format, as we are just getting started here at My Pet Hydra. I would like to introduce myself first, and then we can get on to the other guy who will run the blog along with me. My name is Frank, a pseudo-veteran of the Financial Services industry who graduated college, got a 9-5 job, jumped around between financial organizations for a number of years to earn a living. I had little direction but a lot of heart, and finally ended up striking out on my own  after the mutual fund I worked for decided to outsource their shareholder services to another firm.  I now work for myself, and the experience of being self-employed for a full year has been as terrifying as it is rewarding. I have manage to compartmentalize my income amongst a number of small businesses, earning the lion’s share from freelance writing gigs and a rewarding job working from home for a technology firm based in San Francisco. I am on a personal quest of sorts,  working toward increasing my earnings power while keeping my income sources diversified out amongst as many microbusinesses as possible.

So What’s With the Hydra?

While our official hydra-esque logo is in the works by my intrepid partner in crime, allow me to elaborate on how this fearsome mythical beast fits into our plans and our site. Often times, when working on a new project, my brother and I like to assign a symbol to the work, something that enshrines our efforts and provides the additional benefit of being incredibly fun to refer back to. In this case, the hydra serves our purposes perfectly. The hydra’s ability to grow multiple heads and, if one is struck down, to be reborn anew, stronger and more formidable than before, is ultimately our goal in earning our livelyhoods. We have come across a great number of businesses ideas in our time together, some bordering on the edge of stupidity and some just pragmatic enough to get off the ground. These tiny business ideas form our own hydra of income, with each head providing the body with life sustaining monies. Some provide a lot, some provide an almost insignificant amount, but all of them come together to allow me  (my brother is still in transition) to do what I do from home everyday. As we grow, we hope to add additional heads to the hydra, with some being joint efforts and others being independent pushes. We hope you can learn to create a pet hydra of your own, too.

Posting Schedule

As we are in official launch mode now, the posting times are going to be as straightforward as possible. More specifically, I am going to be adding my post each Monday, with Don posting each Friday. That means two times a week for new hydra goodness, so mark your calendars!

As new visitors begin to trickle into our little outpost of the Internet, I’d just like to say welcome and make yourself at home. It is going to be a long ride.