Thursday, September 10, 2009

Thursday Notes - Making a $10K Difference

Lots going on in the brain tonight (no jokes please), so I'll touch on a number of topics in no particular order.

First, my thanks to the three Jellies who penned the guest posts that you've seen here in recent weeks, including yesterday's. Each of them pursued them on their own, and it was a win-win in terms of their being able to share some thoughts while giving me a few nights off from blogging. Like many things in my life over the last few years, I didn't expect it, but appreciate it.

Second, I had a wonderful conversation with the Boston office of the American Diabetes Association yesterday, as I explained the Jellie effort to them and informed them that they could expect to receive a fairly significant check in a few weeks. As most hopefully know by now, I'm donating 15% of all Jellie Webinar proceeds to the ADA, and expect to present them with a check of at least $10,000 when the final tally is made in a few weeks. And if we don't reach $10,000, I'm going to personally make up the difference.

In a day and age where charitable organizations are hurting for capital, all I can say was that my call put a huge smile on the Executive Director's face, and I'll keep you posted as we get ready to deliver the funds. To all who have participated in the Webinars (which are recorded and downloadable for those still interested), you have my greatest thanks, and I trust the effort has been a win-win all around. Based on your feedback, it seems we've indeed done the right thing by delivering something with strong value at minimal cost, while benefiting a worthy cause and making a difference. In my view, that's what life is about.

Lastly, and on the topic of the Webinars, several of the attendees have expressed significant interest in participating in a Jellie-like effort in the future. And while I hadn't planned on duplicating the current effort for a number of reasons, I've decided -- based on the interest and feedback from current Jellies -- to respond by doing one more with a very limited number of participants who have previously participated in the Webinars or had contacted me in the past, and Webinar attendees will be able to apply the full cost of the Webinars to the effort.

The upcoming effort will be for four weeks beginning on September 28, at which time the current Jellies will continue to trade together in a separate "tank" (as I suspected and have mentioned previously, we've all indeed decided to trade together over the long haul ... more on that in future posts as we continue to build one of the top trading teams in the industry). After the four weeks have been completed, I'll then rejoin the Jellies -- along with interested folks from the new group -- simply as one of the trading team. In the interim, they'll also be able to "listen in" to the dialogue with the second group, so we'll still remain linked.

Please understand that the second, smaller effort will be with a limited group, and thus I don't plan on again rifling through hundreds of resumes and requests. As I've said before, this isn't about the money. If you're seriously interested and committed -- and yes, there is a tuition commitment -- please email me. As always, this is a serious effort for professional, mature individuals only, and this will likely be the only mention of the effort in my blog posts.

Now it's off to poker night where I've moved up to second place and am trailing #1 by a score of 1,850 to 1,825 with three weeks to go. I'll need to maintain the strong focus that we had in the tank today, if only for a few more hours.