Makin' Money

No, I haven't given up on my travel plans just yet. I've been busy trying to find ways to make a little bit of money online, and yesterday I made my first $17 towards my vacation! So here's what I'm doing so far:

1. Online money: I've signed up on ehow and started writing a few how-to articles. It's not big money at all, but the community there is really great. So far I've earned a whopping $0.49! It seems that the way it works is that you write a bunch of articles, then send links out to all your friends, who then glance over them, write a comment, and give the article 5 stars. Within an hour of joining, I had 70+ friend requests, and about a dozen links to their articles. I sent out a link to my first article, and had 13 comments and 10 5 star ratings in just the first 48 hours. Plus it's really easy to write an article. For example, here's my first one: How to make a White Siberian cocktail. (Triple V readers: note link is no longer active)

2. I've also been watching out for mystery shop opportunities. Many of them are for restaurants, so they pay for your meal and also have a small payment that comes with them (usually $5-$10). So I'm doing a few of them right now to make a little money ahead of time, and hopefully I'll be able to get a few on the road as well so that I don't starve to death. And I can make a little bit o'cash that way as well.

3. I'm starting to build up some couchsurfing cred. This weekend I am hosting this really cool guy who definitely embodies the CS lifestyle and has been WWOOFing/couchsurfing/TRAIN-HOPPING his way across the country. He's heading out to Carrollton, GA tomorrow, and then wants to see Washington state before heading down to Mexico (yeah that's kind of a roundabout route). Then this Thursday I'm going to host a girl, her friend, and the puppy he's training to be a medical alert dog. She's coming to check out Georgia Tech and he's keeping her company on the road trip. I figure that'll be a little bit of an adventure, and my hope is that I can get a few references up on my CS profile before I start out across the country asking folks to let me crash with them.

In the next few days I would also really like to start putting together a map of all the places that I know people already and could find a place to stay for a day or two. I haven't at all figured out logistics of whether I should try to talk Stephen into letting me take the car, which would be nice because I could sleep in it on nights that I didn't want to set up a tent, I would be able to get around places easier (obviously), and I wouldn't have to carry a backpack full of camping gear. But it would also take some of the adventure out of it and would be more expensive than walking/rideshares (obviously). If I did take the car, I don't think I'd want to drive it more than necessary, so I'd like to leave it in place while I'm camped out in one area, and only use it to get from city to city, and furthermore I think I'd like to have a limit of not driving more than about 50 miles on any given day, which would add to the adventure I think.
Walking though, most people average 15-20 miles per day, so maybe that would still be pretty doable, although things like finding couches, internet, and mystery shops would be much more limited, and I would also be much more smelly (anyone else ever shower in a truck stop before? Because I have, and it's luxurious compared to not showering). If I'm even going to consider walking, though, I'll have to start doing regular walking day trips, and see if it's even feasible or if I'm too flat-footed.

Well anyway, those are all things to think about.

Until next time, this is the neo-vagabond-wannabe, signing off!

First Post

Today I officially didn't get picked as a Live Off Groupon Finalist. So that sucks, but the whole contest thing still inspired me to get off my ass and do something fun. Plus since I'm not going with them, I don't have to follow their rules, which seems like a good thing.

However, the appeal for the Live Off Groupon contest was that I would actually have to *pay* for anything while I traveled around the country. That's where this whole thing gets tricky, because usually in order to make money to do stuff you have to have a job, but usually a job restricts you from being able to do things. Classic Catch-whatever....

But today we have the internet, that thing that allows everyone to be connected to everyone else, no matter where they are. I'm hoping that this "internet" thing is going to be the solution to my problem. There are a whole host of websites that allow you to work from "home" for a pitiful wage, but pitiful amounts are all I really need in order to attempt my adventure. And that adventure begins here. I'm going to try to find some work at home jobs and begin my travel fund, blogging about it all the way, of course, to make my way across the country. Sound craxy? I thought so...

I'm about to become a neo-vagabond!