Frequency of Sinkhole Activity Increasing

...according to this NY Times article:

"Local and state officials across the country say thousands of miles of century-old underground water and sewer lines are springing leaks, eroding and — in extreme cases — causing the ground above them to collapse. Though there is no master tally of sinkholes, there is consensus among civil engineers and water experts that things are getting worse."

Another thing that's been increasing is my ability to dream up brilliant entrepreneurial ideas. Here is my latest: a small, reusable synthetic substance that smells like freshly-baked cookies when you heat it in the oven. It will come in three flavors: chocolate chip, oatmeal raisin, and pumpkin spice.

I’m currently selling my house and I leave a freshly-baked batch of cookies on the stove before each prospective housing-buyer walk-through. I want the house to smell nice, or at least less like my thrice-used workout clothes.

Unfortunately, the house has been on the market for over a year now. I used to give my cookies away, but by now everyone I know is so sick of them that I’ve been mailing them to cousins in Ireland that I’ve never met.

It occurred to me that it’d be nice to have some sort of item to place in the oven that would give off the cookie smell without having to go through the trouble of actually having to bake cookies. In my head, when imagine this futuristic cookie-smelling gizmo, I picture a play-dough-like substance that is the size of a chicken nugget.

Upon hearing this idea, a friend of mine laughed and asked why I didn’t just buy that pre-made cookie dough at my local grocery store and then cook one small sliver of dough each time someone came to look at the house. My friend argued that for a tiny amount of money, I'd quickly get the cookie smell without the surplus of cookies.

Entrepreneurial-wise, my friend's idea stinks, but I've been doing it until I can patent my idea and find a scientist to make my reusable cookie-smelling nugget-sized life-changer.

Oh, and I've already got a name for my invention: Cook-Ease.