Thank You, Mr Kevin Smith

For a few years now, I have been listening to SModcast and a lot of the other Kevin Smith or Smith affiliated podcasts (Tell ’em Steve-Dave, Hollywood Babble-On, FEaB, SMorning Show, Jay & Silent Bob Get Old and many many more) and I kept wishing I could be like the man himself.  He stated on numerous occasions that you just gotta make it happen.  It doesn’t come to you, you have to create the opportunity yourself.  A self-made content generator if you will.

For a number of years I wanted to do my own podcast, discuss ideas and ultimately, like Kev…turn those ideas into reality (look at Tusk for example).  That never happened.  Then I wanted to turn my mind back to writing – a few comic book ideas are there but I’ve been unable to complete a script – my lack of artistic ability hinders me somewhat because I’d like to see my words form the imagery as I go along to allow me to find more words.

To date, no comic script has been finished and it’s been months since I added a single word to my main one that I so wanted to make happen.

I turn 30 this year. I become older than Bruce Wayne.  Considering he’s been around longer than me and will live on longer than me also, this is a rather scary notion.  My idol becomes younger than me.  In an unchanging, Benjamin Button-esque manner, my hero that I revered stays the same while I grow older.

So, myself and a colleague jokingly said we need to start a business.  Get out of our current jobs and work for ourselves.  No more being the employees, we can do what we want.  Like any daft idea Messrs Smith and Mosier (and Jason Mewes), the reality can be there.  With graft, dedication and the will to make it happen.

I’m at a stage in my life where I need to change.  If I don’t now, then I never will.  “Getting too old for this shit”, springs to mind.  I read Kevin Smith’s book: “Tough Shit: Life Advice From A Fat Lazy Slob Who Did Good”.  Three times so far and will no doubt read it again.  The first time I read it, it made me continue writing my comic.  The second I did nothing because I tried to think of other projects.  The third made me think of this.

The business isn’t a business yet.  The foundations need to be laid first.  But the ball IS rolling.  So that’s more than ever before.  I have set up the website.  A Facebook page and a Twitter account.  

I’ve been toying with social media marketing for a little while – doing what Kev does (to a degree) – just plug, plug, plug.  The majority of the plugging has been aimed at my eBay items which has worked.  I’ve sold a number of items that received a huge number of hits as a result of posting regularly about them.  OK, so there was a huge amount of hits but they didn’t sell for crazy prices, but so what? I got more than I asked for in the Buy It Now and it gave me the idea of selling this stuff for a living.  

I looked at the idea of setting up an eBay shop (I may do in the future) but then I figured, why pay them the fees when I could just do it myself?  Set up our own little website.  Build a store, when some money trickles in, put it back into the business to keep it going.  Adding as we go along with the available funds.  

This, my friends, is exactly what we’re doing.  It may not work.  It may work.  We’ll never know unless we try.  And that is what Kevin Smith has made me believe.  What’s the point being miserable where we are.  As he kept saying in is adoration of Wayne Gretzky, don’t go where the puck is…be where it is going.  Sometimes, the puck needs a sneaky hit from us to then get in place to intercept it and own it.

Kevin Smith’s movies, podcast network, books, comics and life in general gave me the inspiration I needed.  He was and is the Batman to my Gotham City.  

Thank you S.I.R.