Chapter 6

The beta test was a resounding success. Except for a few minor changes in the user interface, all 10 users were very pleased with the program and found that it did exactly what it was supposed to do. I gave the CD to each of the testers to pay them for their efforts, but I did command them not to pass the program along to anyone else.

OK, I had a marketable program, but how was I going to handle the distribution? I really was not interested in posting it as shareware, but the only alternatives were to sell it to an existing software publisher or to try to market it myself. It was going to take a lot of money up front to market the program myself, so I guess that there was really not much choice.

I contacted several software publishers about selling them the program, but my pleas fell on deaf ears. Shit! Now what? Here I had a perfectly good and useful program, but nobody wanted to pay me for it. I guessed that I had no choice, after all; it just wasn't the choice that I had expected.

I contacted several magazine publishers about advertising costs. I was talking about full and half-page spreads, not the back of the magazine classifieds. Sheesh! That was thousands of dollars that I didn't have. OK, I'll try a different tack. I sent copies of the program to 20 respected software reviewers asking them to take a look at the program.

Meanwhile, I did contact a lawyer and form a corporation, Winning Software, to be my publishing arm. I had Mary, Nancy, and Tami officially listed as officers of the company, since Susan and I were not old enough to be a legal officer. The next step was to build a web site on one of the low cost hosting sites. For the time being, I would just have to market the program through the web. That was going to be the hard way to do it, but I simply could not think of another way to do it. While I waited for the orders to "pour" in, I looked around for another programming idea.

I waited for three months without hearing a word from any of the reviewers, but, finally, my break came. One of the big name reviewers liked the program and decided to feature it in his newsletter and on his web site. I had done some careful cost accounting and worked out that I could sell the program for $39.95. I set up a PayPal account to handle the money and damned if I didn't get a few orders right off the bat!

The orders came in slowly, but they did come in. Then the word started to spread on the grapevine about this classy new program that provided an interface between Linux and drivers written for Windows. This sparked more orders, and I got two more favorable reviews. Now, the orders picked up, and I started to move enough copies of the program to make it a real money maker instead of a pipe dream. Finally, the order rate rose to the neighborhood of 100 orders per month. That was more like what I was looking for!

My big problem, now, was that I simply could not come up with a good follow up program. I had drawn a complete blank as I tried to pull another idea out of thin air. Then I had a flash one day. I wanted to print the screen from an old DOS program, but Microsoft had, in their wisdom, decided that nobody would ever want to do that, so the capability was dropped from Windows. Compared to the interface program, that was a trivial problem.

I was able to whip out this program in only a couple of weeks, working around my other commitments. My first program had been called Wonderface, short for Wonderful Interface. Well, I decided to be just as poetic with this program and called it Printold. Yeah, I know, but I had to call it something, and all of the sexy names had been taken.

I did the same routine of testing with the beta of this program as I did with Wonderface. It needed a bit more tweaking of the user interface, but the basic program ran as advertised. I sent out copies of the program to the reviewers and got a lot better response this time. Some businesses were still running DOS programs and wanting to print the screen, but were not able to do so. I got seven reviews, ranging from WARM to HOT, but with an admission that the program was great, it just did not cover enough possibilities to satisfy everybody. I priced this one at $29.95, or the pair of programs on one CD for $64.95. The orders really did pour in for this one, I even got one order for 350 copies of the combo disk from an insurance company. At last, I was now making money. I even had to buy a CD duplicator to keep up with the orders! Winning Software really was!

One morning as I was getting out of bed, I discovered another ability. By this time, I was trying to be as independent as possible, so I was doing my best to get to the bathroom on my own. I needed a cane for help in balancing as I walked, so I reached for the cane and knocked it to the floor. For some reason, this really pissed me off. I guess that it was because I was sick of being so clumsy.

Anyway, I thought, "You God Damned cane, get back up here where I can reach you!" Low and behold, I felt a terrible pain in my head. It was like something was tearing loose, and it scared the shit out of me, almost literally. That's when I discovered that the cane was in my hand! Hot dog! Had I developed some form of TK (telekinesis)? If it would work on me, maybe I could fly!

I wasn't so foolish as to try flying without a lot of experimentation first, but I was anxious to get on with it. I called everybody to tell them the wonderful news, and they came running to my room to congratulate me and see a demonstration.

I told them what had happened, and I tried demonstrating by dropping the cane. I focused my attention on it, and it rose very quickly back to my hand. A couple of more successful experiments made me pretty cocky, so I tried to fly. Well, that was going to take some practice, since I slammed against the ceiling hard enough to hurt. I was so startled that I fell back toward the floor, but was able to catch myself before I landed. I tried again, but didn't put so much force into the command. This time, I hovered a few inches off the floor and stayed there as long as I didn't let my attention wander.

At a few inches off the floor, I willed myself into the bathroom. Susan ran ahead to open the door for me so that I wouldn't crash into it. I reached the bathroom and settled to the floor. I went ahead and emptied my bladder, since that was the original reason for me getting up at the time I did. After that, I flew into the shower for a quick rinse. As was her habit, Nancy had already adjusted the water temperature for me, so I was able to concentrate on my flying. At this point, I could not fly and do much of anything else. I was going to need a lot of practice to perfect the art.

I brushed my teeth before kissing everybody good morning, and we all traipsed down to breakfast. Susan was the only one who had any clothes on, since she was getting ready for school. The rest of us were nude as was now our practice around home, unless we had guests. It wasn't until I had sat down at the table that I realized that I had flown down the stairs, and I had not needed any support along the way. By God, maybe we did not need that elevator after all!

After breakfast, Susan finished getting ready and went out to catch the bus for school. Mary dressed quickly and left for work. Nancy and Tami did some necessary housework while I watched. I loved to watch those titties bounce around as they did things like bend over to load the dishwasher. If I was not hard before, I had a flaming erection by the time the kitchen chores were finished.

We adjourned to my bedroom, I flew there, for a morning quickie with each of them before Nancy started my morning therapy. After an hour of that, Tami and I moved into the "study" for a couple of hours of school. The three of us spent an hour in the pool, and it was time for lunch. That was a typical morning for the three of us.