One Golden Idea

Since George was paying this month, the two brothers were at a good restaurant for lunch. As usual, while his brother was playing, Liam ordered a lot of food. As the waitress walked away George sat back in his chair. “So, any luck finding a job?”

Liam shook his head.

“Anyway, working for other people is useless.” He paused.

“No offence intended.” George waved away the latest in a string of insults to his lifestyle and industrious nature.

“No matter how much money you make for them you will never make millions for yourself.”

“That is unless you work for nine years at a hundred and twenty thousand a year.”

“Even two more years will only get you a single million. One million eight thousand isn’t millions, plural.”

“Eighty thousand. One million and…” George realized his brother wasn’t listening.

Liam stretched. “No, the thing to do is to have one brilliant idea, and then never give up until you succeed.”

“Have you ever stuck to anything in your life?”

“Yes. I stuck to…Well, maybe not yet. I have yet to find my golden idea. If I had that, I’d stick to it like a wolverine.”

A month later when it was Liam’s turn, they met at a diner called ‘Tom’s Restaurant’.

“How is the golden idea coming along?”

“I have it narrowed down now. It has to be on the Internet, but not on someone else’s website. Or they’ll take the idea and the money for themselves.”

“Something on the Internet eh? So something outrageous like the ‘Million Dollar Homepage?’”Liam turned away from the list of burgers. “What’s that?”“You haven’t heard…Some British student came up with your golden idea to pay for his university tuition. He set up a webpage called the ‘Million Dollar Homepage’ (www.milliondollarhomepage.com), and sold the million pixels on that page for a dollar each. He was so successful he auctioned the last thousand pixels for forty thousand dollars. He made more than a million in five months.”

“See, that’s what I’m talking about.”

George paused, ordering a burger with the lot and a milkshake, “Still don’t have your own golden idea?”Liam shook his head and ordered a burger with bacon and a coke.

Two and half weeks later George got a surprising message on his voicemail. His impoverished brother was inviting him to lunch on Tuesday, and it was a week early plus not his turn to pay. Liam met him outside his office building, “I couldn’t wait to tell you. It came to me last night…my golden idea, and it is brilliant.”

George just nodded, more interested in where they were going for lunch. Talking excitedly about his golden idea Liam led the way towards the park, stopping at a hotdog vendor.

The next day Liam rang his brother. “I’m not going to be a millionaire, not this week anyway.”

“Why not?” George asked calmly.

“My website name was bought by someone else, yesterday afternoon actually.”

“Couldn’t you use a different-?”

Liam cut him off. “No point. Someone obviously had the same idea, plus they planted their flag first so I’d be playing catch up. Second place doesn’t get you millions.”

George sighed. He’d expected his brother to give up on his ‘Golden Idea’ at the first obstacle. It was a pity, since Liam’s idea was quite brilliant and would probably require little work. After saying goodbye to Liam George felt bad all afternoon. It was because of the hotdog. Being bought just a hotdog had left him hungry, and making him pay for his own mustard was simply annoying. “What I did was even worse though. I think every time the website makes a hundred thousand dollars, I’ll ‘loan’ him ten thousand without explaining where the money came from.” He leaned back in his chair. “If he ever pays me back, even ten dollars, I’ll tell him the truth.”