Todd Murphy's (zerocommission) Blog

In the infamous words of an old friend,Chris Hamler, the truth only hurts when it should.  The truth is that I did have some regret after writing The Sunday Grump a few days ago.  I don't regret writing it, I regret writing something that didn't have a happy ending.  A close friend pointed out to...

I've never much cared for Sundays.  In fact, I've fought depression every Sunday morning since I can remember. I'm a grump on Sunday.  Yep, I just shared one of my dirty little secrets - the kind your family is well aware of, but the outside world never suspects. There's usually an explanation fo...

I ran into a friend yesterday morning.  He was sitting with one of his business colleagues and I walked up to say hello.  "Hey, Todd," he said, and turned to his colleague and introduced me, "this is my insurance salesman." I'm not sure I was comfortable with this introduction.  It didn't really ...

The older I get, the more I like simple.  I just returned from a trip to Hawaii.  It was nice, but not simple.  Simple is getting in the car, driving four and a half hours to Destin, Florida, unpacking, and sitting on the beautiful white sand beaches watching the waves roll in. Simple is recogniz...

So you've probably heard the story. If you put a frog into boiling water it will not stay there long.  It will jump out. On the other hand, if you put a frog into lukewarm water and then gradually turn up the heat, the frog will boil to death once the water is boiling.  He preferred not to change...

 I don't remember the date, exactly, but I was standing outside Barnes and Noble, on the phone with my friend Mike.  We both had been talking about writing a book, but really, I was talking about it, he was doing it. "Just get off your #@@ and do it," he said, "I'm gonna keep asking you about it....

Some people give their GPS a name (for you non-techies that's global positioning system, i.e., navigation).  Since it talks to you, I guess it's kind of like having a friend in the car. Maybe that's why some of us give it a name. I gave my GPS a name just the other day.  But it wasn't an endearin...

I've been broke before.  In fact, if I'm really being honest, I'm broke now.  I've got more money going out than coming in. That's what broke is. I've never been poor.  I've never had to worry about whether I was going to be able to eat on a given day.  I've never had to be concerned about having...

I've only been to Vegas two times in my life.  I've never lost more than twenty dollars in Vegas.  I've also never risked more than twenty dollars. I've never been one to take risks where the other guy is guaranteed to win most of the time. On the other hand, I've lost hundreds of thousands of do...

Sometimes, when I'm telling a story to one of my clients, I'll try to make a point about how we often "stick our heads in the sand" whenever we don't want to face a certain reality.  In fact, I usually start out my story with, "You know how an Ostrich sticks its head in the sand, blah, blah, blah...