[and they did reluctantly admit that it was indeed Amway]
Shelly did ask 'em why they thought we'd wanna sell dishwasher soap for 'em given that we both have engineering degrees, and why I wasn't told that this wasn't a technical opportunity despite their suggestion that it was. She was boorishly told that "we've got people like IBM and Dell doing our computer stuff, so why would we want people like you for that?"
Class acts, those Amway folks, eh?
In any case, it does appear that our friendship was indeed as deep as our willingness to sell soap and franchises for 'em. I doubt we'll ever hear from 'em again, which I don't consider to be a bad thing.
Interestingly, I learned that this amazing "internet mall" that they're selling isn't even online yet. I got to thinking about it, and I realized that it's not even required for it to exist at all! All they've gotta do is promise that it'll someday exist, bandy about the biggest computer names you can think of (i.e. IBM and Dell) and let potential sellers (aka "suckers") buy into the franchise. The corporation makes money selling training materials and seminars, and the folks up the chain make money selling franchises. Everybody makes money. . .except for the poor dumb suckers who buy into the concept at the bottom, but that's how pyramid schemes work --a few folks make a lot of money while a lot of folks lose theirs.
