WASHINGTON - Freelance sports and soccer writer Desmond Hughes notated and submitted his accrued “brand exposure” from various blogs for whom he wrote for free over the past year to his rental company as his monthly deadline to pay rent lurched ever closer towards a late fee, on Wednesday.
Hughes tabulated all the different websites that utilized his content and paid him in exposure before submitting an email full of press clippings, analytics and click-through statistics to Metro Property Rental with the notation, “payment for rent,” before calling it a day and heading off to celebrate with a bowl of instant ramen noodles.
“I finally made it,” stated Hughes to The Nutmeg News. “I’m utilizing all the tools that I generated over the past 10 years to be able to make a living where I can pay my rent and my groceries by virtue of my writing career.”
Hughes, a veteran Lyft driver, stated that his long term goal to make a living by writing about sports was finally realized when he got some great exposure from a 2300 word column he wrote on Landon Donovan for a blog on the United States Men’s National Team during the 2017 hexagonal tournament.
“I was paid so much in exposure that I treated myself to some tic-tacs,” stated Hughes. “I was just rolling in exposure. I gained about 150 followers on Twitter within a few hours and my engagement statistics were off the charts!”
According to friends and family, most are unaware of the expansive fortune in exposure amassed by Mr. Hughes as they continually asked whether he was considering going back to college for teaching, business or maybe even welding.
However, an exuberant Hughes screenshot his latest income of exposure as he lined up a way to pay for his upcoming gas purchase with all the exposure he recently received for an expansive and heavily researched SB Nation article on the coaching search for the United States Men’s team.
“I’m just going to show the store owner all the plaudits I got,” stated Hughes. “That should be good for a full tank at least.”
The Nutmeg News will have more on this as an emotional Hughes pulls the last working credit card from his wallet to buy $10 worth of gas and a sandwich for lunch.