Toying With Curiosity. (Expand The Possibilities, Solopreneur):

During World War II, Naval engineer Richard James was trying to design a device that would stabilize equipment and supplies on ships as they rocked back and forth on the ocean.

He accidentally dropped some coiled wires he was working with, and watched with fascination as they tumbled end-over-end across the floor.

Instead of getting frustrated at himself, he got curious.

What if this could make a good toy?

Upon returning home, he told his wife Betty about his idea.

She got curious. What would be a fun, catchy name for it?

She scoured the dictionary, landed on a great word,

And the “Slinky” was born.

They sold out their first batch of Slinkys in less than an hour; success ensued.

But as simple as the toy itself was, this story had a lot of, ahem, twists and turns (sorry, can't resist).

Richard James gave away all of their earnings and joined a religious cult in 1960, leaving Betty a single mother with 6(!) children to care for.

She didn't panic; she got curious. What to do?

After slogging through a low-paying job and barely getting by, she gambled everything she had, mortgaging the house to make enough Slinkys to revive the brand at a toy show in 1963.

It worked. Multiple generations of children grew up with the toys, and with the jingle “Ev’ryone knows it’s Slinky/ It’s Slinky, it’s Slinky/ For fun, it’s a wonderful toy/ It’s fun for a girl and a boy" burned into their brains.

(Betty's son later said in an interview that everyone knew the jingle because “we were too broke to buy a new one," so they kept repeating the same song over and over).

During the Vietnam War, soldiers often found themselves in the jungle without radio contact. They got curious. How to extend their reach?

You guessed it. Soldiers used Slinkys as portable, extendable radio antennae, attaching one end to their radios and throwing the other end over nearby tree branches.

The Slinky was introduced to the National Toy Hall of Fame in 2000, and by the time Betty died in 2008, over 300 million had sold.

Problems will happen. Business (and life) is at times difficult, and even downright weird.

Don't get down, get curious.

You never know what you can, ahem, spring back from, until you try ;).