Share Your Million Dollar Ideas Here

Every parent can relate to this one: Meatsicles - all the nutrition of a hearty meat stew... in a Popsicle! Cha-ching, right?!

How about the boil-bouy (sounds kinda like "boy, oh boy!"). A small floating device (buoy-like) with a thermometer and a whistle (or bell, or foghorn, or a whinny, or a couple bars from 1812 overture, whatever). The target market is me and older. You plop it in the pot with whatever it is you are reheating, go back to whatever it was you were doing, and promptly forget that you have anything on the stove. (Actually, that part happens already - you don't need the boil-bouy for that part). The amazing boil buoy let's you know that your pot has reached a boil well before the smoke alarm gets wind of it...

I think it is infomercial-ready, don't you?

I've had a million:

* The Arm Girdle - sort of like a piece of control top pantyhose for your upper arm...great for holding in that arm jiggle you swore you'd never get when you noticed it on your grandma.

* The Remote Finder - push a button on your cable/satellite TV box and the remote beeps so you can find it under the chair cushion - sort of like the handset finder for the cordless phone.

* Colic Camp - this one was a joke for my sister who suffered miserably with a horribly colicky baby for 4 months. I suggested we start a camp for these kids, staffed with people wearing those headphones that the airport runway workers wear. Drop them off for a day or two so you can peel yourself off the ceiling.

*Teflon coated kids' socks - because no matter how much you scrub, they're always dirty. So repel the dirt before it sinks in...

OK, here are a few more of my ideas:

The Positive Reinforcement Telephone Service. Every day you get a phone call from someone with an adorable voice (you'd get to chose the accent you prefer) saying things like, "You are such a fascinating woman," and "Brilliant idea you just had," and "I can't believe how well you're handling things, and -- a favorite compliment I got recently -- "You are a rock star!"

This idea is translatable to other media, email, for example. Or even Magic 8 Balls.

The Total Care Spa. You check in and regress. You get to eat all your childhood comfort foods -- mac and cheese, somemore's -- you have sing-alongs around a campfire, someone reads you a bedtime story. For rejuvenation purposes, doesn't that sound better than going to five exercise classes in a day, even with a massage thrown in.

When my daughter was small, we used to put her in overalls almost all the time because she was always taking off and we'd have to grab her by the overall straps to pull her back.

My husband and I thought of a line of kids' clothes that had sturdy cloth handles on the back. We thought it should be called "Handle with Care."

Here's another one: The Grandchild Escort and Lecture Bureau. Most retirement communities bring in outside lecturers to talk about subjects of interest. Why not include kids of grandchildren age among these experts? The surrogate grandkids could talk about how they're doing in school and why the younger generation has such outlandish opinions. The retirees could ask all they intrusive questions they want -- i.e. what, exactly, does "hooking up" mean -- without fear of driving their actual grandchildren away.

Another idea, inspired by spending some time around a harbor: What about a catamaran that you can somehow unbuckle in the middle, turning one hull into a runabout, while leaving the other at anchor? Unlike the refrigerator hat, I don’t have a clear idea of how this would work, but I’m sure that a clever marine architect could iron out the details.

Here's a true story of a million dollar idea on its way to becoming a reality. Last year a colleague took early retirement to chase a dream of being a cookie baker. Her cookies are terrific, but most people in the office were wondering whether she could make her cookies different enough, and special enough, to have commercial appeal.

No one was surprised on her last day when she showed up with a stack of pizza boxes -- it was just like her, we thought, to pitch in with extra food for the goodbye party we had prepared. The surprise came when we opened the pizza boxes to find -- pizza-sized chocolate chip and oatmeal raisin and cinnamon cookies! The giant cookies were delicious and disappeared even faster than pizzas would have.

Move over, Mrs. Fields.

How about the "perfectly timed phone call when you're in a really awkward situation" idea? You know, when you're talking to that relative you haven't seen in years, and you really, really need to get away or when you're the last man standing with that weirdo co-worker. You know what I'm talking about?!?

Here's something I wish somebody would invent: a two-part combination handbag/briefcase. I hate carrying two bags. I want to carry one bag (the briefcase) with a smaller breakaway segment (the handbag) that I can take to lunch or whatever without having to schlep the whole thing. If you invent it, I'll buy it.

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Ann,

In regards to the transforming shoes name, how about "Hans & Frans, we want to pump you up...shoes"?

My Million Dollar idea.......I always threatened to provide a service to remove the larnyx out of Pomeranians and other small yappy high strung bitches. Pomeranians are beautiful dogs that look 100% better after they return from the taxidermist.

Nicotine lolipops instead of the gum to occupy a new nonsmokers hands.

Maybe they already have this, but I'd like something to help me remember where I parked my car at the grocery store, Costco, etc. hooked up to my car keys. It would keep me from going up and down the parking aisles with a full load in my cart trying to act like I know exactly where I'm going.

Maybe I need a homing pigeon.

Hello. I have a million dollar idea, appropriately enough named share a million. You can find out more by visiting the website I created http://www.shareamillion.com

About those million dollar ideas, or knowing someone who became famous before they became famous and perhaps wishing we had hung out with the person more often. Maybe they never would have been as successful if we had hung out with them more often.

I know it sounds brutal but it's really meant as Woody Allenesq type of humor. Maybe we did the brave and right thing by letting them fly the way they needed to fly and be successful.

Or maybe not.

When I was in New Orleans recently I had a fantasy of a dancing teacher/escort service, that would let you practice dancing in public without having to tread all over the shoes of unsuspecting partners. Name for the business: Gentlemen Dancers. Slogan: “Husband won’t dance? Call Gentlemen Dancers.”

Like many TBDers, I suspect, I spend more time than I would like on the treadmill (I mean treadmill literally, not figuratively, though I guess that too). I am commited to getting my recommended weekly quota of aerobic exercise. But it is really boring and the displays on the machines don't help. Who cares if I'm running at 16 METs? What's a MET? Who cares if I can watch myself as dot circlling a simulated track on the display?

What I would like is a machine that rewards me by showing delicious junk food equivalents to the calories I burn. Run 10 minutes and see a cupcake start to materialize, or a Milky Way bar, or a Krispy Kreme. I know, I know, you'd have to be Carl Lewis or Meb Keflezighi for 10 minutes of running to burn that many calories. But you get the idea.