My Walk With The Startup World

On this Halloween night, I walked the streets with my husband and three tween girls. We live in an old neighborhood, the neighborhood I grew up in in fact. It was a beautiful night with just a cool nip in the air, perfect for trick-or-treating. 

Something was wrong. Hardly any kids on the candy quest. These three beautiful girls were among only ten other teams out participating in a timeless tradition. Most of the blocks we walked had no one on it but us. This would be the norm if if was snowing, wet and cold. Yet it was not. It was a clean night to collect candy.

It proved to be a benefit to the girls, as the candy givers had stockpiles ready to hand out. Soon the candy givers realized that hardly any ghost and goblins were out, they realized that they had a ton of candy and decided to tell the girls "take all you want" Hmmm, what a treat the night was, until the pillow cases they held became too heavy. 

Oh my' can you carry our bags they asked? Uhh, no way, this is your job, we only walk with you to make sure no one will hurt you (but they don't know that) For sure they thought we were the pillowcase carriers of their fort knox sugar surplus! We were not. : - )

As we walked I had one thing on my mind. My walk with the startup world.

I am like these girls as I seek not candy but traction. I seek one very special thing from other humans, for them to want our service, and for them to give their email address without hesitation. Not as easy as getting candy.

I am mystified by the startup stories I hear that this company or that company easily grabs up this very gift with ease. Nabbing hundreds of thousands of follows with ease. I can tell you, Passdown is not a scam company, and we don't want your money. What we are building for you is a free service. Sure we have to make money to survive and we are developing ways to do that without having to charge the customer one cent. Seems like a an easy shoe in,yet maybe that's the wrong way to do it. Maybe we should charge. Maybe free is just to hard for people to believe.

My mind is constantly swirling with thoughts of this build and how to get the product into the hands of users. It is no easy feet. It is a hard road of rejection. A brutal place of being the scorned. Often times you feel like you are the biggest loser in the world, and everyone is laughing at you, or laughing behind your back. A world where goblins taunt your mind, and ghost are success stories that never really happened. Yeah this is the the walk in the startup world. 

If I could conquer traction as easy as it is to get candy from strangers, then I will have achieved putting my team on the startup roadmap. In all my darkness and despair I somehow think I can do it. I somehow think when I'm at the end of the road, I'm really just taking the next street and I'll find my way to you. To your heart, to your believing in Passdown, like I and my team does. 

However this walk may be, I'm walking it. I'm no dead man down. I may appear battered, torn and shredded with despair, but I'm walking the path with my team. Yeah if I have to carry their pillowcases I will, but I kind of think they will never ask. 

With blistered feet we walk the startup road ~

Free Traction Book Give Away

Passdown is giving away a limited number of copies of the Traction book, written by Gabriel Weinberg and Justin Mares. This is a must have for any startup. We cannot tell you how important mastering traction is, but this book can. This is the hardcover version and retails from $10.87 to $14.99 

Sorry, only open to continental US residents, unless you want to pay for shipping. To get your free copy you must visit passdownapp.com and sign up for the beta. After you do that, send an email with your shipping address to: jana@passdownapp.com

If you really, really want a book but don't want to sign the beta list, email Jana.

We cannot guarantee everyone will get a book.  For those who do not get a book, we have some other Treats we will send you. And yes we have more than four copies!

Happy Halloween From Passdown

Shayla is standing inside the Great Pumpkin we grew. Her brother Simon is behind her.

Hell Showed Up Instead Of Y Combinator: Not Really

Okay, just kidding,hell did not show up. So my team did not get picked as one of the "most promising teams" to be invited to Y Combinator, it doesn't mean we are not. It was interesting this year to find that it took me three hours longer to get over my sorrow. Last year it only took an hour. I think the reason for that is because this year I have a team, and it bothered me that I let them down.

I accept full responsibility for my team, and it hurt me to think about them not getting this opportunity. 

Sunrise On Day Of Not Making It In

The thing is, no startup needs an accelerator. No startup needs funding. Don't get me wrong, those two things could come in handy and surly bless a young startup, it's just that the finest companies in the world didn't have funding or accelerators, they did it without those things. One can say that when you run out of money your company is dead. Mostly that is true, but it's not an absolute. I would have to say the biggest thing to put a company out of business is not getting traction. If you cannot grow your users or customers, well, then you are dead. That is an absolute.

I learned a ton by applying to Y Combinator again. Not making the cut, well that hurt me the least. Two things hurt me the most. People wrinkling they're eyebrows and saying "You have no way in hell of getting into Y Combinator" that hurt. Such a harsh judgment without hope. What hurt the most is what my lawyer said. He said "recognize that it will come down to whether they want to take a chance on you given that your background is a bit different than many of the other applicants." Yeah, I don't know why that one hurt so much. I guess because I know I am way different than many of the founders of startups. It saddens me to think an accelerator would judge on that. I don't know if they do, but my lawyer seemed to think so. 

For me, I'd like to think I would never judge someone on their background, after all it shapes us as humans and we are not totally in control of it's path. Sure if your background is a serial killer, well, you should be judged, but not by me to hire you. 

The judgement business, we all have to do it. It must be exceedingly hard to not group people into your biases and toss them into the gutter based on that. My lawyer must have believed that when he read my part of the application, well, it frightened him, it appalled him, it disturbed him, who knows, but whatever it did, it made him think I was not a candidate. That saddens me. Yes, it hurt me the most.

You don't know how much I love people. Yes I have some serious wounds from the people who are closest to me, and yes, it's super hard to love them, but I do. They might not know it. I struggle with my bias "if you hurt me deeply, it's going to be hard for me to show you love" 

Whatever my sordid insane background is, it's mine, it's me. It's also my people, the people who sign up for apps and new social networks, the people who got bullied, who purchase songs, the people who's hardships were endless, who try out the products and services new startups offer,the people who never give up because they love to explore. Yes these are my people, I like to call them ~ humanity.

Gettin My Ears Cleaned In China.
Now That's Humanity In Action!

To the teams who eventually get selected for Y Combinator W15, may you bless the world with your gifts, we await them.

Standing Up For The Idea

In the November print issue of Entrepreneur magazine The Editor In Chief Amy C.Cosper writes a lovely editor's note titled: The Idea Machine. I really like this editorial note Ms Cosper has written, as so often I seem to run into people who like to slam your "idea" as worthless, just because it's "only an idea" and after all ideas are worthless without execution. Everyone has idea's, who cares about your crazy idea? Ms Cosper and I do.

I find Ms Cospers short little piece to be ever inspiring and to take a stand for ideas. I myself get aggravated at people who like to toss others into the street because they don't care about your idea's. They go around spewing out judgemental speak about your billion dollar idea. All businesses started with an idea. As Ms Cosper points out that companies have to constantly use ideas To "take your company in a new direction:product lines, marketing-whatever." 

A Cardboard Cutout. My Brothers Idea To Help Our
Blind Mother Find The Buttons On
Her Kindle. 

Even a man I hire to help me with wordpress told me "You're not getting into Y Combinator, because you have, just an idea" as if ideas are worthless to accelerators. If my team had no idea we certainly would not get in. I would think because we do have an idea, and we are executing it, we possible could get in. 

Ideas are everything to me, I have them everyday. It's a normal thought process for me to constantly think of ideas. When I come across a person who shares an idea with me, I do something other than toss them into the street. I encourage them to pursue it. Or I give feedback to help them shape it. For me every idea has worth. It's the starting place of change. 

Here is an idea that I had years ago called PenTags. The idea was that instead

of tapeing fake flowers to pens, people could attach a PenTag, and get some advertising all the while keeping the pen around longer. I actually auditioned for the T.V. show American Inventor, which only aired for one season I believe. The producer liked my idea. 

Keep building your startups and coming up with ideas! 

The entire November 2014 issue of Entrepreneur Print magazine is devoted to Ideas, looking forward to reading it! 

Birth And Death Rate Research Is Iteresting

I am doing research for Passdown, my current startup. We need to know the death rate in the US and the World. the only current info the Center for Disease and Prevention has is from 2011. What about the two years in between then and now? Of course 2014 is not over so we can't count it. Where is the current info, for 2012 and 2013? 

Here are some interesting snippets I took.

 and this was also old data from 2011 from some random site. I found it interesting to think that 107 people die per minute worldwide. WOW, have you even thought that every minute someone was passing away? I never think about that, sometimes I have wondered how many people were having sex at any given moment, but I have never thought about death. Do any of us? 

Can you imagine that 150 thousand people die each day worldwide? Yeah, that's pretty easy to imagine for me. But 150 people die each minute is hard to picture. 

Ahh Damn, The Grammar Police Busted This Founder

Yep, got arrested, and taken in for bad grammar, with a special emphasis on poor communication! Yikes! As I sneaked around the world spewing out my grammar ills, making someone sick, so sick they confronted me and had to tell me what a terrible person I was, because of the professional deficiency I have, hmm.

Yes, I am aware of it. Yet people who are good at grammar cannot put themselves in my position. They cannot live my life, and see what happened in third grade. They cannot see the book on my desk (A Writer's Reference by Diana Hacker) They cannot see all the grammar apps I have and use. They cannot know the struggle it is for me to write every blog post, and fill out accelerator applications with a child's skill as an adult. They don't know the anguish that I have as being the leader of my startup team, and my team can out grammar me, and that I might shame them. They cannot walk in my shoes and feel the shame they shame me with, when even I, do not feel shame, I only feel sad that my communication is limited because of my education and skills, and that may lead to people not understanding me and my team. Yes I have tears. 

I have so much to offer the world, and I will not let the judgement of my grammar stop me. Should I be a certain education level to impact the world? I think not. Even small children impact the world. Why do I have to have a highly qualified education to be acknowledged as human or intelligent? What if you found me on some remote island and I was from an ancient tribe that shot down airplanes with arrows, and then you taught me your knowledge, yet I could only do it so well? Would you still persecute me for my lack of educational skills? Most likely you'd admire me.

The grammar police do not walk in my shoes, they do not know how much I struggle. They do not know because it's easy for them. It's not easy for me, and it probably never will be. The wires in my head for grammar are tangled. It could be impossible to untangle them. I don't care, I have to go on writing poorly, I have to write, because I can impact others, even if my writing is that of a child. It's me, and that's what I will be.

What seems simple to you, take note not to judge others on it. I struggle every day, I work hard to get the correct spelling and grammar and everything needed to look like an educated woman. It cost me time each day, but I do it. Yep, I still suck, but I am working on it always, yet I will never guarantee I'll be so great as you. I can only be me. I can only write my words with my poor grammar and spelling. That's me, and I'll never attack others for their lack of skills. 

All Humans Deserve Respect

I cherish all humanity, and everyones gift no matter what level you are at. If you're an adult with a child level or a child with an adult level, or just like most of us, average, we are all humans on this earth and we all deserve to be respected for who we are. Not judged and condemned by the education police. 

Y Combinator Anxiety Has Passed

As my team and I await the answer coming up on October 28th, as to the decision if Y Combinator will invite Passdown to be interviewed for a potential spot in the winter 2015 program, somehow I'm finally at peace with it.

My soul as flip flopped back and forth between "We're gettin the invite" or "We have no chance in hell". It's been an agonizing pressure on my spirit. 

For some reason today, I feel complete at peace with it, no matter what the answer is come next Tuesday. I woke up to find Wael's email saying he had a dream last night of being in San Francisco. That was a nice morning email. I would not tell him my dreams, as I had a few this week with people getting shot in the head. Ugg, nightmares that make no sense. Disturbing that they were in my head in the first place. I do need a dream of walking the streets of China Town at the minimum. Even the Golden Gate Bridge would be a pleasant image in my sleeping brain.

Back to work, doing all I can to build Passdown into something grand!

Finding Your Workforce On WhisperApp ; - )

It's been awhile since I blogged about one of my most favorite apps, Whisper. Of course one of my post about Whisper has been number one on my top ten most popular post on this blog. Not picked by me, but by how many readers hit on that one. There is virtually no chance that anyone of my other post will ever be able to beat it, except my current rising star on my blog, my daughter Shayla. She got on the top ten in days, and no one has done that, except Whisper. 

When I had first discovered Whisper I was immediately addicted to it. As the months went by and life hit some hardships for me, I stopped Whispering. Then every once in a while I get on it, and the most amazing things happen. I meet great people. Funny people. Good people. 

Just this week alone I have met two perfect candidates to hire for my startup Passdown. Yep, I think I could hire my entire workforce from Whisper App. I can't tell you how many developers I've met on Whisper, and of course you can find Venture Capitalist and Angel investors too if you so seek. As an employer I'm not interested in posting an ad in Craigslist or some other form and getting ninety applicants to read though. I kind of like, just bumping into people randomly. Discovering who they are in real life. 

As earlier this week Shayla and I were at the mall and I found a potential great sales woman, who surely could sell Passdown. I saw her in action and I hope she will be a future employee.

Now you may wonder how I find people to hire on WhisperApp, if it's anonymous. I talk to them in the chat area. It's so funny cause often times the chat room conversations are not about seeking employment. Shhh, can't tell you what they are about. I find that people are actually pretty damn honest, since it is anonymous, unless you choose to share more. 

If you take away all the nerves a person would feel when interviewing for a job, well, than you get the real person. Of course I did find a few people I hired from Whisper for my last startup, and well, they didn't work out. I had to fire them. Good practice for me. They both were good people, but not good workers. 

I will have to have some other checks in place to hire these future employees, one of them will be to be interviewed by my co-founder Wael. As a startup builder, I like to be creative and do things the non traditional way. I do not want to hire the traditional way, that's boring. There are great potential workers all around us, we just have to stumble upon them in ways neither side expected. 

Enjoy your Whispering and keep your mind open for the unexpected! 

So Many Topics, So Much Growth For This Founder

I was looking back at some of my early blog post and I was happily surprised to see how much I have grown with my grammar and my blogging. 

Yes, I was pretty bad at it a little over a year ago. It's improved greatly, still I have a long way to go. I do not think people who are proficient in grammar realize the struggle it is for those of us who struggle with it. Yep, I learned it in school, in third grade I believe. Yet whatever I learned so long ago was never practiced or used, so I became the person the grammar police love to persecute. I know I need to re-study it and take a class or hire a professional person to help me, yet it's not on the top of my list as I build startups, and those are ever consuming in so many ways. I brush off grammar learning as something not so important, as I can communicate, even if it's shakie at best, it's still my words struggling to get out of me, to you. 

My lack of skills are improving. Someday I may even be considered a great writer. Who knows. Maybe I'll even be considered a great startup builder. All I know is, I don't care how many handicaps, shortcomings or lack of knowledge I may have, I'm going to do what I see in my mind to do. I'm going to build. Even if others judge me as lacking in skills. Even my very fine lawyer said "It might be hard for you to get into Y Combinator considering your job experience" Yep, my resume is just as horrible looking as my grammar. But it's my life path, and I wouldn't be in this place if I hadn't lived that life. I would not be able to build gifts for humanity, if I had not lived with humanity in the trenches of life. 

Keep building no matter your shortcomings ~ You are exactly the person to do it.

The Odd Way This Tech Girl Eats

Since I posted a few articles about my daughter Shayla, the response has been overwhelming. I'm so happy you love to hear my stories about her. I am hoping she will be a developer when she grows up, but at this point it's looking like some type of writer. Maybe novels as she writes many stories on WattPad and has more hits than I do on my articles.

Shayla was so happy that she made it to my top ten most popular post list within a few days, as no person or company I have blogged about has done that. The top ten list on this blog is not me picking it, it's you. So thank you for having the desire to learn about Shayla, I think she is going to write some incredible words for the world. Her gifts will impact others I'm sure of it.

Shayla And Her Friend At School
With There Prized Penguin Caramel Apples

For now I have to 'out' her about her very unique way of eating food. I am positive her way is genetic. So here it is. 

To the future man who will marry my daughter, she eats Pad Thai with her fingers. If you are not familiar with Pad Thai, it is an Asian noodle dish. Today I saw her eating cup-o-noodles with her fingers. Yep, I've even seen her eat oatmeal with her fingers. At first when I saw her eating this way as a young child, I thought it was some sort of struggle to hold utensils and figured she would grow out of it. She never did.

Just the other day we were out shopping and we became so hungry that we stopped at Noodles And Company, she got Pad Thai, I ordered Beef Stroganoff. The restaurant was so busy that there were no seats, so we had to get it to go. As we drove home, she reached into her dish and ate it with her fingers, as I stopped at stop lights I dove into my dish with a plastic fork. She told me that many times she starts out with utensils, but somehow it just changes into fingers and she has no idea why. I find this unique gift of hers to be inspiring, and oddly cool.

In many parts of the world, eating with your fingers is just a part of the culture. It's normal for them. I do believe her birth parents ate this way, and it is in her genetic code. Sometimes I think she may enjoy food more than I, as she gets to not only savor it's taste, but to savor it's feel. I try to imagine myself eating this way, and maybe I ought to try it, after all there are many foods we eat with the hand, like apples, bananas, and oranges, hamburgers,and french fries. What if we ate all foods that we think needs a fork, chopsticks or a spoon with our bare hands? How would it affect our enjoyment of the food. I think one day I will do it.
But not today. : - )

For now, know that it's okay to eat your food with your method. If you have hands that work, than dive in, and enjoy! Who needs utensils!

Suffering The Wait For Y Combinator

Each day I push the thoughts out of my mind. There is nothing I can do now for my team. We can only wait for the answer, and it's a constant torment of the mind, mixed with, going forward and doing what a startup must do - Continue on.

It's such a weird place to be, as strange and odd things present themselves to me, daily. It's as if almost a negative reason followed by a positive reason continually dances before us, telling us why were getting in, or why we are not. This is an unusual place in the mind reality lands on.Oh yeah, just like a person waiting to see if they get accepted into Harvard or Stanford, sure they may suffer this anxiety of the soul, but they do not seek to get in because of one lone idea, they only seek to get in upon excellent grades and reputation. 

As much as every accelerator says they pick people before ideas, hmm, well, if you have a shitty idea, they will hardly look at you cause what would be the point? It's a nice gesture, but truly, you have to have an idea and a personality. If your idea is to invent dirt, well, I hardly think they would accept you into their program even if they loved your personality, but maybe they would, cause maybe they would be the people to chase you away from making dirt, as they know every entrepreneur always has more ideas! than dirt!

My team is anxious, twisting of our souls each day. Until October 28th, we suffer the wait with hearts, head and fate playing with us endlessly. What will the answer be?

The Road To Life

Enter Here

Feeling Inadequate For Y Combinator

Just read a lovely article about Y Combinator by Susan Johnson on Medium. Susan talks about being a mom, and being in Y Combinator. She also mentions the fact that she "didn't think she was a candidate for the world class accelerator." She said she thought she didn't look like a YC founder. Well me either Susan! 

Here are my reason's why.
1. I'm too old.
2. I'm too crazy.

If I wanted to get super detailed about my reason's that I think I'm no candidate for YC, I add in the fact my grammar and math skills suck. I curse a bit, and sometimes I chew tobacco. But those are little things they could let slide. The too old and crazy,for sure those things could keep my team out. At least that's what I think. 

Others in my life think the reason I'll be kept out is is the fact my idea is still an idea and not something with some substance. Hmmm, well it does have substance. I've taken it four hundred miles ahead of just an idea in the head in a few short months. Hell, I even have t-shirts and bookmarks, that should count for ground work. ; - ) I also know that my idea hits spoton, on something I read once in a book that some venture capitalist looked for in startups. 

1. A big ass idea.
2. With a big ass market.
3. And big ass founders. (okay our asses are not big.) But we could do squats for you! 

Passdown's is a big ass idea, with the biggest market that exist, every connected person. As for us founders, well were good people who like to be funny and laugh as much as possible.

Eight more days till Wael and I, either get a happy email or a sad email. I got the sad email last year when I applied as a solo founder with a sort of good startup,with an okay market. This year I applied with an entire new startup with my cofounder, Wael. I see Wael as a total YC candidate. With a software engineering masters and a desire to build startups, he's all young tech talent! He is way over one hundred percent in. I sure hope I did my part on the application. I hope we do not get the "sorry we did not pick you email."

As often as us applicants call that email the rejection email. It's not rejection, it's just that other teams had better applications, and ideas. It's a sad place to be in, but I do have experience, so I know I will recover. 

Even still the build goes on. I met a wonderful possible new addition to the Passdown team, Arvin. He is a developer with ton of experience and I'm going to meet him this week. One of the first things he told me is, we don't need YC, we can still build it. Now that's what I like to here. This startup will face many detours, disappointments, and hardships, but if the people building see the vision as a whole, they can take it as far as they want to go. This would be Arvin! I think I'm going to like him when I meet him in person. 

A T-Shirt Printing Factory In Denver

May Passdown Become The

Humanitarian

Factory.

The Place All People Will Live On ~ Forever ~

Beautiful Tech Girl Growing Up

We adopted her from China in 2004, she was nine months old. She was a victim of her country's laws. One child per family! 

When we arrived in China in 2004 to pick her up. The Chinese orphanages were swelling with unwanted children. (They were never unwanted) Her orphanage had a reported four hundred children. When we arrived we were only allowed to see fifty children. Two rooms, with twenty five kids a room. Of course those two rooms were perfect, and all the children were bundled in endless layers of clothes. Our group was only taking nine children from that orphanage. When seeing fifty, nine months old, all I could think of was "why can't you give us another one right now, there are so many children who need loving homes, come on, paperwork is useless right now, give us a two for one price, at least! That was my thought. As I held onto Little Shayla I felt sad for the children who would grow up possible with no parents. No family. When we could offer that to another easy as a yes.
Here she is now. 

What a great human being she is. So beautiful. Little Shayla is filled with technology desire and overuse of it. Ahhh, she will have the pc going, the ipad going and her headset on, all at the same time. It's like she is running a airport flight system. She is an all technology obsessed girl. 

Please adopt children from other countries or your country. There are children all around the world who need good parents like you. Hint: You don't have to be that good, that perfect, cause we are not, and Little Shayla loves us. Yeah, you're not perfect, neither are we, but you can offer a kid a chance at a better life, yes, you! You can do this. 

Look at 'Little' Shayla, a beautiful American girl. Her fate, if we did not adopt her: Grow up in the orphanage and become a prostitute if pretty, or a house cleaner if ugly. Well, that's crazy. But True. 

Now she has parents, a brother, and numerous animals. Plus technology galore! Yeah, she's happy, and we are blessed.

Just Chill

Just Chill
And
Please
Rub My Tummy

Starting My Broken Heart For Y Combinator Early : - /

I'm starting my broken heart for not getting into Y Combinator today. Even though the day to receive the news from Y Combinator is not until October 28th. Ugg, had a good talk with a marketing expert today and he point blunt said "You have no chance in hell of getting into Y Combinator" of course he didn't say it that bluntly, he said it in the kindest way possible. 

He could be correct. I told him but Y Combinator says they take startups at all stages and Greg says "but you're not at a stage, you still have only ideology" Wait, what? Maybe true, yet the ideology stage is a stage to me. It takes a ton of work to get it out of your head and start taking the idea somewhere. Wael and I are doing that. You still have to do that part to get it to the place where the industry can call it a STAGE. 

Hope is not lost, it just may be delayed until the spring application process opens up, by then I expect to be at a industry acceptable stage, if that is what is needed, then that is what my team is going to do. 

I love Greg. He is a brilliant marketing man and also a entrepreneur. He is working on a smoking killer hardware wearable tech idea himself. In fact, I said, why don't you apply to Techstars? and he said I attempted to fill out the application and I could not even answer half the questions. Hmm, well that doesn't stop me. With his idea, I don't think he needs answers to all the questions. It doesn't take perfection or having all the answers to dangle a brilliant idea to an accelerator, or does it?

Update: I just looked at the Techstars application. No wonder Greg could not answer half the questions, there are fortyeight of them! I can't remember how many Y Combinator has, but I think its less than twenty. I'm never applying for Techstars, I'd probably be able to answer about ten of them. That application looks like a CIA investigation. I like the Y Combinator application. It seemingly ask exactly what they need to know and nothing more. Sure there was few question my team can not answer at this time, and maybe that will keep us out, for now. 

Greg did say that they invest in people first. Wael and I are good people, I do know that. So maybe this whole 'you have to be in a stage' thing is just Greg's thoughts. Hmmm. 

Entrepreneurs are in the idea business. It's our ideas that fuel the startup world. Yes we have to keep taking steps to get it further down that road. We don't have to have all the answers, it's not possible. That's why we seek out help from accelerators, we need them, just as much as they need us. Maybe these unanswered questions we leave on the applications, are the part the accelerators can help us to achieve?

If anyone knows of a hardware engineer who would like to talk to Greg about his wearable tech idea, please contact me. I'm telling you I don't have to be a rocket scientist or a venture capitalist to know his idea is KILLER GOOD. It's not like anything on the market. It's one of those ideas, where the users didn't know they needed it, until they used it found out how useful it is. Truly Greg needs to apply to Y Combinator. Anyone who walks away from his idea would be kicking themselves down the road. I'm happy to know a future millionaire, maybe I can talk him into funding me. ; - ) Of course I'd have to answer all his questions on the application! 

The Waiting For October 28th

Here I am working hard at forcing my brain not to think about it. I have endless work to do on Passdown, so I fill up a ton of time with that, yet, no matter how hard I try not to let my mind wonder what Y Combinator's answer is going to be on October 28th, it still does.

Endless flip flopping of thoughts run through my brain. If you pump your team up and say "We're getting invited" then you seemingly set yourself up for a big heartbreak if the "sorry you didn't make it email shows up".

If you tamp down your wonder with the negative, and keep repeating "you have no chance in hell" well that's just destructive thoughts that no one in life needs. So you are trapped in a waiting hell, some sort of world you don't want to be in, yet you do, cause you want what Y Combinator offers, HELP, and more importantly an environment for your startup to thrive in.

As most of us entrepreneurs know most startups FAIL. So we ought to all be applying for every accelerator we can. Just apply to them all and don't stop. You may never get into any of them, but you certainly won't if you don't apply. 

Suffering I am in this waiting period, but I'm not stopping building, testing, seeking out answers to see if Passdown is worth building. I've had a ton of ideas that never made it past my thoughts. I've also built my last startup without testing. A mistake I had to learn. The thing about Passdown is that, Wael and I kind of don't have to test to see if there is market, as others have already done that for us, like Box and Dropbox. We know people want and desire data storage. We also kind of do not need to test auction services as Ebay did that for us too. The thing about Passdown is, our data storage and auction service is for reason's people have not thought they needed it for. It's the great uncertainty about a startup idea. Do people need it? Do they want it? Will they pay for it? Can't say, but we can see what people have already done and the answer is yes to those. 

We also have some unique 'potential users' responses, and they have been so overwhelming positive. Filled with amazingly great comments about the desire for what we are building. Just wish we had the beta ready for use, so we could put the meat into the fire people are expressing about Passdown. Yes,we'd like to see if they want some dessert with the great dish we are serving. 

Yes my team is going to be heartbroken for a period of time if we do not get invited. I've experienced it a few times already, but my cofounder Wael has not ever. Wael is so excited, pumped and positive. I will be so heartbroken for him. I will be heartbroken for humanity too, cause I know my team needs an accelerator to bring this good to the world. We need the environment to thrive in as so many other applicants do. The competition right now is all the other teams. As much as I wish them the best of luck. I hope my team smokes them! 

Strange Places Startup Ideas Come From

Today is my twin brothers birthday. We are not literal twins. We grew up close. I am the last person in the family to have seen him physically, the last one to talk to him on the phone, and the very last contact was a text. I had deleted it to clean up my cell data, but I think he said "yes" to a question I had asked him asked him.

Three Years Old

This is his first 'rest in peace' birthday. As I have mentioned in other post, that we are still waiting for the Mesa County coroner's office to receive test back as to the cause of death. He was found in his apartment decomposed. No one had missed him in life, and it's pretty much due to the fact he withdrew from all of us as he had so much trouble living with the shame he put on himself for wasting his life on alcohol. 

In High School

He had not spoken to his two beautiful grown children in four years. He just couldn't,even though they held not one shred of resentment or anger towards him. He slowly let go of every person in his life, except me. I was the last. I had not recognized the game. He had asked for personal space as he needed to heal he said. I honored his request, forgetting about suicide thoughts tricky little maneuvers. (Make everyone think you are fine, when you are not) These last six months of waiting for the coroner's office to call and give us something to rest our ever flip flopping thoughts on has been tough. 

I do not know why it's so important to know the answer, yet it is. The one answer I dread is that the lab results will be inconclusive, and they will never know why he died on his bathroom floor with the sink water running. I just don't want that answer.

One Of The Few Photo's Found On His PC

Because of his death, I created Passdown, the startup Wael my cofounder and I have applied to Y Combinator for. When you visit the Passdown website you will find a video of his actual apartment exactly the way it was when they found his body. It would be great if you would wish him Happy Birthday,and sign the beta list in his honor today, tomorrow, and as soon as you can. Passdown is going to be a service you and your loved one's are going to be grateful for,one day. 

Passdown is super COOL and it has a SUPER cool bonus factor to it. Wael and I do believe you are going to love it. In some twisted way, my brother gave me a gift, to build for you. The strange places great startup ideas come from.

~ Happy Birthday Mark ~

 Love You

Ebola Is Not My Startup:A Founders Circumstance

Being my "day job" is working at the local hospital, while my "real job" is building startups, yeah, I punch the clock always wondering when my last day of ever doing that again will come. I know it will, I just don't know when.

With Ebola being ever so scary,us hospital workers are a bit terrified. We work with sick people all the time, that's our job. We have hearts filled with compassion to take care of the those who need help. Yeah, we have precaution standards, and let me tell you, we comply! Do we want to get a fatal illness in the care of someone else? Certainly not! Do we want to take care of those with life threatening illnesses, certainly yes! That's what we do. We love people and we want to help them. 

Just as everyone in the world is super worried about Ebola, so too am I. I found myself thinking about how this nurse in Dallas contracted the illness, as I know for a fact that all us hospital workers take precautions very serious. There is a ton of illnesses that will not kill us, yet make us very sick and we don't want those. Then there are the illnesses that will kill us slowly over the years, we don't want those either. Then there is Ebola, dead in three weeks flat! 

I can tell you this, that every single person who works in healthcare is more scared than you. We are the ones this crazy virus is staring at. It puts our jobs in an uncomfortable place. Just last night I was talking to a nurse and she said "she would quit her job if Ebola comes to our hospital" she is a awesome nurse, who gives the best of care, and she want's to save her own life more than help an Ebola patient. Sad, yet understandable. I too am worried. The first thing that crossed my mind was "NO, I have to build Passdown" I don't want that crazy virus to take me from this startup. I can't die, cause I have to build Passdown!

Of course my kids and husband were in my mind too, yet right now my passion is to build something great for humanity, and that dirty little bug, could stand in my way. I feel threatened by that virus, as if it's going to swoop in and spoil my dreams and maybe end my life.

Well, maybe that's a bit self centered, yet, it's just like the nurse who said she would quit her job. Yes, us health care workers want to take care of you, but maybe some of us will draw the line when it comes to our own lives. Yet even that would be no guarantee. 

So what do you do? Keep Living ~

My Teams Y Combinator Stomach Ache

As I went through the anxiety last year when I applied to Y Combinator as a solo founder with my last startup, I had to suffer the waiting period alone. This year I have a new startup Passdown and a super brilliant technical cofounder Mr.Mohamed Wael Thabet @med_wael_thabet 

Right now he is living the good life in Paris! How lucky he is. Actually he is very busy at an internship. Yet he is still lucky to be in one of the worlds grand cities.  

It's been eight days since we submitted our application, so I asked Wael if he was having any feelings of anxiety or thoughts about it. 

This is his reply:Well actually, i'm starting to get worried too. In french there's an expression "j'ai la boule au ventre" which literally means "i'm feeling a balloon on my stomach" and it's used to express the extreme worry and stress. 

Lol, I thought that was so funny and also so cool he wrote it out in French!  Yep me too. My stomach aches! Here I thought since I suffered last year and the final outcome was, you did not get selected. I thought maybe I'd be free from the anxiety, butterflies in the stomach, the endless yo yo thoughts of "Yes, were invited! and No we didn't make it! plague my brain, and this makes my stomach hurt.

I've am keeping myself as busy as I can building, creating, learning, doing all things startup, and yet I cannot suppress these thoughts of wonder. Not only are Wael and myself going through this, but every team who applied for the Winter program are most likely suffering some type of wanting to know anxiety.

Truly, you cannot push it out of your mind. An opportunity so grand to help us build a company that will affect the lives of perhaps every connected person, dances in the head. Yes, there are many, many accelerators, but this is the one we applied to right now, so this is the one giving us stomach aches.

I like how the Eiffel tower looks golden, and it also looks to be an upside down Y. Hmmm, maybe that's a Good Luck wish from Paris. 

To all the other teams that applied, Wael and I hope to meeting at least some of you soon, in another grand city, San Francisco! Yes, I like it when the yo yo effect lands on the side of, HAPPY. As the  Hunger Games movie quote says "May The Odds Be Ever In Your Favor" 

Fire, Fire, She Screamed!

I was getting ready to take Jenny the dog on a walk, when all of sudden my daughter screams, fire! fire! and runs to me. Yet I'm not believing it, as it seemed so odd. Then as she is running she finally screams, Fire In The Microwave! Then I believed it. As I know my daughter cooks in the microwave often.

I ran out to kitchen and was amazed to see a fire in the microwave. "What do we do?!" she ask in a panicked voice. We had told her about cooking with grease on the stove top and one should never put water on grease as that would make the fire explode and become even worse. So she had thought that a paper fire in the microwave might have some sort of condition too. 

I grabbed the hot pads and patted it out! Smother it I told her, you want to smother this kind of fire!

Left Over Fire

She Just Wanted Her Pizza Hut

The box comes with a warning!

Lesson Learned!
Funny, her most popular story on Wattpad is titled: Wings Of Fire

Beautiful day here in Denver, Colorado! Took Jenny on the walk and did not find the homeless person, yet again. The park is way to busy on the weekend. I bet the homeless person has another home somewhere.

My Little Beautiful Technology Girl Rocks!

My daughter Leah is an amazing writer. She is eleven years old and she types faster than anyone I have ever seen. In fact even though she learned how to type the correct way, she chose not to. She only uses the first two fingers and her thumb on both hands. Mostly she uses the index finger on both hands, and she types furiously with the one finger hit method. She can out type anyone.(I'm not kidding) It's like an unhandicapped person typing with a handicap, and she blows everyone away!

She has all her fingers, yet she found it's faster if she uses less fingers. Why she chooses to type this way, as she has learned the correct way is, well her way. It's fast! I'm okay with it.

She can type faster than almost anyone. As I hear her type it's almost annoying, I remember yelling at her on our summer vacation. When everyone went to sleep, there she was pounding the keyboard like a freight train out of control, keeping us awake. I had to tell her to type quietly or go to bed. She complied.

If her typing is not amazing, her ability to get traction is. She is in in the WATTpad.com world and she shines. She posted an article in May and right now she has 6K reads on it, and many other stories of hers has reads in the thousands, WOW. I'm a struggling entrepreneur and I would die to have 6K hits in as many months. I'm blown away. These young kids of the internet age, rock the world like it's easy. It's nothing to get 6K reads to them. Well, yeah it is. It's something, and she just types away. My little beautiful technology girl, well, she rocks! She knows how to lay it down with meaning. All her furiously typing, has lead to good things. Yep, if her startup mother fails, well, she'll come behind me and make the world a better place. I have no doubt! 

: - ) Love her!