Love in the time of Cholera

You may remember that I am involved in the domain name business, which has broadened my knowledge of human failings and quirks considerably.
One of the more annoying things are the emails from people saying they want a domain we own, but they have no money, and would we be really kind and just give it to them.Or say they used to own it and demand we give it back to them - again for free.I wonder if they would let me have their England fubaw shirt for free... no hang about, they well might.
Anyway, one of the things we do is dating sites - I know, tacky and sleazy - but there are something like 20 million ( yes that's MILLION) people registered with dating sites in the UK alone.
For some reason South Africa has not that many less, but of course the holy grail is North America, where there are well over 50 million men and women of every sexual orientation looking for the One - or even just a one-night stand.
In amongst these are the poor souls who have a serious problem, like an STD (HIV,herpes, aids etc).They have no fewer yearnings and needs than the rest of us, and of course there are actually quite a lot of them out there.
So it wasn't a total shock when I got a request to add to the dating sites we have one domain that has good traffic for related medication (might earn 50p per day) and
which,when translated into an STD dating site, appears to be earning USD 10-15 per day.
I do not in any way suggest, dear reader, that you have such a problem, but I can only say my eyes have been opened to another area where help is desperately needed.
Click here to find out more.
PS The title of this post refer to a rather good book by Gabriel García Márquez

Lunchtime with two Bunnies.

So there I was the other day having lunch with an ex-Playboy Bunny, when a friend of hers ( a slightly younger version of same) dropped by the table to say Hi.
Nothing would do but that she should join us and was fascinated to hear I was an Internet entrepreneur and had a domain name business.
" Gee," she said, " That's real great! Are you one of these people who sit on people's names?"
I opined I wasn't but she then told me all about how herownname.com had already been registered, and ,gosh, she just had no idea how to find out who owned it ( sticks chest out, bats eyelashes, puts finger to mouth...), and she would just be soooo grateful...
By now I was really embarrassed by all the stares I was getting from everyone in the restaurant at the two outrageously blond beauties I was clearly getting along so well with, and as the coffees had just about been drunk, I paid the bill and nipped off.
When I got back to the office I checked out herownname.com and lo and behold it was me who owned it. We had bought a bundle of names at an all in price a few weeks ago, and her name was amongst them.
So I phoned her up ( you didn't think I didn't ask for her phone number did you?) and told her I owned it and would happily transfer it to her.
At a reasonable price.
In dollars.
Not in kind.
**
The names have been changed to protect the innocent.
It wasn't me either, it was a chap called Rick Latona who is the biggest domain name owner in the world.