I am looking for an online source of individual software development
consultants that are available for short projects and to answer
detailed questions. I imagine this to be similar to www.elance.com but
more oriented to making connections with individuals instead of
companies.

Here's an example of what I would use this for. Let's say I'm trying
to do something in Visual Basic.Net and I can't figure it out. I would
like to be able to present the problem to the consultant and get a
solution. I would of course pay the consultant for their time on
either an hourly or a project basis.

The types of questions / problems are more complicated then what you
find in a typical forum or online question and answer source like
www.experts-exchange.com.

Please let me know if I can clarify what I'm looking for in any way.
Please feel free to present creative ways of handling this. I am open
to suggestions!

That's an interesting concept, but they are primarily focused on open
source technologies. I am looking for something that would cover open
source as well as non open source technologies such as Microsoft's
tool set.

Thanks.