We here at Candy Smokes run a few websites (SellMyDNA.com, TheHillaryTheyKnow.com, to name a couple) on the side, and while I was taking care of a bit of maintenance on one of them, I began to think about some of the other things I could be doing with my time. We built the sites for fun and profit, but lately they’ve been a bit short on fun, and virtually nonexistent on profit.

It’s a good thing our sites are based on laughs, because if they were based on commerce, I’d have to go curl up in the corner and cry. Okay, fine, I do that anyway, but you know what I mean. So if anyone tells you that you can make some money online by setting up a site or a blog, just slap them in the face and walk away. Unless you’re incredibly good or incredibly lucky, you can’t.

I’m a pretty smart guy, I’m a web professional (and I used the term quite loosely) in my day job, and I’ve been doing this on the side for about 9 months now. You want to know how much money I’ve made? Well, I’m not gonna give you a number, but I started a list of some other things that I could be doing with my time, all of which would make me more money than I’ve made with the sites. Here it is:

• My job
• Your job
• Any job
• Mowing lawns
• Raking leaves
• Shoveling snow (especially this winter)
• Babysitting

You may have noticed that of the few things I’ve listed so far, most of them are things that children regularly do to earn pocket money. This fact has not escaped me.

• Panhandling
• Prostitution
• Painting
• Plumbing
• Plastering
• Drawing caricatures of people on the beach
• Learning an instrument, starting a garage band, and playing one gig in the 9th month
• Dog walking
• Lifeguarding
• Miming
• Bucking hay
• Hair washing (Others, not my own. Well, my own too, but not for money. Whatever.)
• Bagging groceries
• Being a mascot at Six Flags
• Working a help desk (in India)
• Pool cleaning
• Pig farming
• Housekeeping
• Butchering
• Stopping to pick up a dime a day
• Hell, stopping to pick up a dime, ever

And there are many, many more. So the lesson of the day, kids, is that if you’re starting to think about building a website to earn a few bucks, please take into consideration the fact that you could have worked an extra half hour at your job instead, and made more money there than in your first year of web entrepreneurship.

Now, if you’ll excuse me, one of our sites needs my attention.