Karen Hetzer Artworks

This morning I've been spending time online researching articles on making a living as an artist.....looking for new inspiration or approaches I hadn't considered.
One suggestion was to go to ebay and look at the self representing artist paintings that have sold, kind of see what people are buying and what they're willing to pay.
So, I went to ebay and pulled up the listings of paintings that have sold....starting with the highest priced (we all want to make as much as we can ;-)
Well, after looking at several that had sold, I'm still sitting here an hour later with this crinkled perplexed look on my face. Some of the first few that I found......I thought, is this some kind of joke??? Of all the gorgeous paintings and/or inspirational, thought provoking works of art for sale these are what had sold?
These two are by the same artist, listed as Brenden McVeigh who I could find no information on......maybe its a child whose grandparents bought them? Or maybe they were part of a charity auction or something? An old folk art painting?.....no they're acrylic, and acrylic isn't that old. I'm certainly no educated art critic, but come on..... These are listed as selling for $2500. each. (see a larger image on the ebay site...when you get to the page just click on the 'ended' icon/picture and it'll come up larger)
OK.......well maybe there's hope for me yet, I mean if these can sell for $2500...I'm not that bad of an artist, am I?
So.......... curious...........I continue looking.
Awwww no.......really?
This sold for $1721.00
OK.....this can't be right, let me look some more.
What???
This one sold for $1100. Alright who the hell is this guy, this artist?. His name is Mikey Teutul......anybody ever heard of him? Wait...wait....here's another one......rush to ebay cause there are more for sale and this one is just $5000. This one is called Three Little Birds. (must be those three little dots down in the left quarter)
OK give up? Never heard of him?....then you don't watch American Chopper, you know, the show where they build those hot, sexy, gorgeous custom bikes and fight a lot, Mikey is one of the sons. You may recognize the father, that's a portrait of him above, the green blobby thing. To see more of Mikey's ummm art?, you can go to his website.
I don't know whether to just finally give up, or hook up to a reality show and just start painting really really bad.........sigh.