I was only referring to your bad "pair programming" experience, in that you felt it held you up from actually getting stuff done, that's just wasted effort.

However, my experience is that pair programming would work well in a senior/not as senior pairing, with the caveat, you need to have capacity on your projects to roll with this also technique.

regarding you choosing to sweat on your startup, fair play thats your choice, and possibly a good one if that's what you are passionate about. hopefully your end goal/mission is not just to make loads of money though!