America’s liability charts look like the immigration charts, lots of red ink. The US government cannot pay for what it has already promised to current citizens, which is why you are starting to hear about raising the retirement age, etc. Don’t believe me, look at the US debt clock site below. Look at the bottom at the total UNFUNDED liability number of 110 TRILLION dollars, up another 4 TRILLION. Spend a few minutes looking at the numbers on this site; they are eye-opening.
I have been getting so much grief from people concerning the fact that I have not signed up and participated with the well known Face Book community. Face Book seems to be every where you turn these days. So this week end I’ll take a look around and see if it is anything that I can get a handle one.
I can remember when I was a teenager, it was so easy to go to a party where there were drugs and/or alcohol being served to anyone who asked for it.
Even the parents of the teenagers often looked the other way when their kids were partying, saying that they’d rather have them doing it at home where they are safe. Because of that, I have had a difficult time letting my own kids go out to parties; I can remember how wild and crazy they can get!
Teenage drinking is no joke; teen addiction statistics are very scary. They seem to be getting worse than ever. In many ways we think that teens have a better life than we do, and maybe that is part of the problem. Maybe they have too much leisure time!
Fortunately, teen rehab info is an up and coming service that can help address the special needs of a teenager who is addicted to drugs or alcohol. But it truly is a sad statement of the times that we even have a need for teen rehab in the first place!
I have to admit that I am really envious of today’s youthful students. When I was in high school, the only way to get the right Math answers was to figure it out for yourself, ask your parents for help, or call the smartest kid in the class and ask for help over the phone. Fortunately for me, the smartest kid in the class was a nice kid who didn’t mind helping me out from time to time.
Since the age of the personal computer, and the Internet have arrived on the scene, there are so many advantages in life for today’s young folks. It doesn’t take very long for them to find out about the many different Online tutoring services that can be used to help kids to understand their homework problems.
Free math tutoring online is available with just a few clicks of the mouse to any Internet-savvy student. I find it amazing what the Internet can do to enrich all of our lives!
It really does pay to know some one who can help with your PC issues. I have become spoiled by our ITs at work that are at our beck and call when ever a computer problem rears its ugly head. They aren’t always as quick about it as I’d like but at least they do what they can, with what they have. Budget cutbacks have made their department a nightmare to work for, so I have to cut them some slack in that area.
I enjoy picking their brains when I have the chance to. They know all about dedicated server issues, the best managed hosting information and colocation particulars that most people, like me, know little or nothing about. We have a few people in our family that are pretty good with computers but they are always busy or have an attitude (this family is always having an attitude with somebody) and can’t always be counted on.
I wish that I had had the insight, back in the days of choosing a profession/occupation to have gone to computer school. There will always be a need for computer help, just like there will always be a need for an Undertaker, depressing but so true.
I think that I have a pretty good idea why so many young adults feel entitled to start at the very top of everything that they do. In addition to being spoiled rotten by their parents, the electronic age we are in makes it amazingly easy to get instant gratification in so many ways. When I was in school, for example, if I needed Statistics help I would have had to ask my teacher in school to recommend a Statistics tutor to study with after school. Then most of the time, I’d have to pay some real money for the service!
But now, with the Internet such an embedded part of our lives, it is easy to get free Statistics help online in the comfort of your own home. No longer will the Statistics problems the students are struggling with need to wait until the next day; just a few mouse clicks and the students get all the help they need! Yes, today’s children certainly live the life of Riley!
If it’s one thing I’ve learned in the past couple of decades, is that there really is no such thing as financial security. So many of my elderly relatives went to work for companies that had absolutely no retirement plan whatsoever, and now that they have retired they are dismayed to learn that they can’t survive on Social Security alone. That is why my wife and I have started to get involved in saving our money in various ways in preparation for retirement.
To start out with, we each have IRA Accounts that we try to contribute to every year. That’s a lot harder to do than you can imagine! My wife has learned a little bit about Stock Trading and takes advantage of the companies that you can buy stocks from directly and then reinvest the dividends from them. She’s bought into a few companies using Online Trading services as well. We don’t have much money to invest, but we are trying hard to divest it so that we don’t have all of our eggs in one basket.
One of the things that bothers me a lot is how many solicitations I receive from different organizations to donate money to their cause. Sometimes I get suspicious about the organization and ask for information about the organization. One of the reasons for that is I often get phone calls from organizations that say they support the local police department, but when I contact the local police about the solicitation they deny any knowledge of the organization. That puts a bit of a sour taste in my mouth when it comes to responding to requests for donations.
So when I was asked to donate money to the Orchid Recovery Center Charities, I was suspicious. I had never heard of The Orchid Recovery Charities. So I spent a little bit of time online to check out the Orchid Recovery Center and see what they are about. I found that the Center is a rehab center for women, located in Florida. So far the only charity I found that is involved with them is a charity named Kiva. Kiva lends money to poverty stricken entrepreneurs, to help them pull themselves out of poverty. That sounds like a good cause, don’t you think?
Have you ever been asked by a friend or relative to lend/give them money to help them pay a bill? I think that most of us have had that experience, haven’t we? I always have mixed feelings about lending money; I remember some advice my father gave me a long time ago about lending money. He said “never lend any money that you can’t afford to lose.” I think that is good advice.
There have been a few times when I lent money to someone to help them out of a jam and then found them squandering money on something totally unnecessary. That has always bugged me to no end. If they have enough money to squander money on something totally unnecessary, then why haven’t they paid me back the money they owe me? When I ask them what’s going on, why are they throwing money away on “stuff” when they owe me money, I get the “gee you’re a big jerk” reaction. I think Ben Franklin gave some really good advice back in his time “Neither a lender, nor a borrower be.”
I understand why kids want to learn how to ride a skateboard, I really do. When I was a kid I wanted a skateboard as a gift and my parents insisted that I couldn’t have one (as a gift) so I raided my piggy bank and bought one with my own money. Boy were my parents angry! The told me that I couldn’t ride it in the street or on the sidewalks. Well, we had a nice long paved driveway so it really didn’t bother me much. Back then, though, helmets weren’t even available to buy for someone riding a bike or a skateboard!
I never even saw anyone doing any kinds of tricks on television, so I never had any inspiration or guidance on how to ride one. Obviously, I never developed any real skill, I just enjoyed it. And although my parents were so worried that I’d fall and skin my knee, or crack my head, they preferred that I ride my bike in the street (again with no helmet or padding) than skateboard anywhere. Where’s the sense in that? I think riding a bike is just as risky! Oh well……
As I think back to years past, listening to stories of my grandparents and parents about the daily life that they led, I find myself thinking about how much life has changed since I was born back in the 1950′s. I marvel at how we have taken for granted such miraculous technological advances such as internet broadband satellite. I can remember as a child being so excited when my parents brought our first television into the house – a black and white tube monstrosity that we loved to sit in front of and watch the Mickey Mouse club and Jackie Gleason.
I remember learning how to type with a manual typewriter – we only had one electric typewriter in our class! To have progressed this far in our lifetime alone is mind boggling!
In today’s world, we use the Internet for so many things that we used to do manually. We use it for shopping, for communication, paying bills, doing research, playing bames, watching television and movies. We love watching videos from youtube, and buying great bargains from Ebay! Whenever we lose electricity at our house the entire house is “up in arms” because the Internet goes out too! It’s amazing how the Internet can be accessed from almost anywhere in the world – isn’t technology wonderful!
It is good to know that there are options out there for folks that are “in the know” or take time to look around a bit online to find products and services at good prices. I don’t know what I’d do without the Internet. Hard to imagine life back in the 70′s and 80′s without the World Wide Web incorporated into our daily lives, as it is for so many of us these days.
The economy has been making life way too stressful for way too many of us. It is all about the money these days (or the lack there of) and how to make the best out of a bad situation. Having Internet access puts a lot of power at our finger tips and the paper version of the “Yellow Pages” will be out of business in the next decade do to the Internet. It is so much easier to Google “eyeglasses” then to find the Yellow Pages, find the correct section and then try and find a local place that sells good quality, but affordable, eyeglasses to check out.
Zenni Optical is a well known online retailer of low cost eye wear. They have complete eyeglasses that start at $8 and shipping is always $4.95 each order. Every pair of glasses that are sent out are fully UV protected, come with a hard case and a cleaning cloth as well. That is a great deal that would be hard to beat anywhere, check them out if you have the need for some new glasses.
I think that young adults have a harder time finding housing then when I was a kid. Nowadays the landlords want a lot more in the way of security deposits and and rent and references than they used to! I can remember when I was fresh out of high school and I was looking for a house for rent. Naturally my parents were ambivalent about my leaving the nest! I went to the local college and looked on the bulletin boards to see if anyone was looking for room-mates.
I ended up living in a two bedroom house with one other guy and two girls. There wasn’t much privacy there, that is for sure! Pete had a pet snake that he kept in an aquarium in the living room. He used to feed it gerbils, which upset the girls a lot! I can remember one day when we discovered that the snake was missing! The girls were extremely upset! We couldn’t calm them down for love nor money! Fortunately we found the snake before bedtime that night, curled up in a corner of the laundry room. It wasn’t long after that Pete moved out of the house!
I was really surprised this morning when Brad walked into the Market today. Jerry, Shane, Bob and I were drinking our coffee and talking about the latest gossip (I mean man talk) as we usually do every morning when Brad came in. I hadn’t seen Brad all winter long! I thought he had moved to warmer climates!
I almost didn’t recognize him at first – he looked a lot more muscular than I’ve ever seen him before! Jerry asked what he had been up to and Brad replied “Power 90.” Apparently Brad got involved in an Insanity Workout program in an attempt to build up his physique! I’d have to say that it looks like it worked! He grinned and told us that we should try it too! Well, I’m not inclined to be interested in anything that has the word “Insanity” in it! I think a Slim in 6 workout program is much more my speed!
I’m thinking about taking some courses at the local community college. I’d like to learn more about the technology of the Internet. I’ve noticed that I feel rather out-of-place among many of the folks around here lately. I need to learn how to geek-speak! Apparently more and more geeks are moving out here because their jobs do not require that they live in a specific city. So they move out to a rural area where they can live a really nice quiet life and yet make enough money to do it in style.
I noticed a few weeks ago when I attended a dinner party at one of my customer’s houses that a lot of people were talking about computers. They were using terms like dedicated hosting and network servers and bots and I realized that I was falling behind on my knowledge of the technology that is running the world. I think I’d like to keep up with it all, so as not to fall behind and feel totally technologically challenged!
Besides dealing with all kinds of extreme weather issues, we have papers to gather up and income taxes that need to be filed. Paperwork is not one of my strong points but it is worth the time and the effort to keep up with all the necessary documents in order to get the most out of what the IRS requires out of each one of us this time of the year. There are so many things involved with taxes, it just boggles my brain and I’m thankful that I have a good friend who does my taxes for me each year for a very decent and reasonable price. He has been preparing taxes since coming out of high school and really knows his stuff and always does well by me.
It’s very helpful to have acess to the Internet at times like this. There is a lot of information out there and it is (the Internet) a good tool to take advantage of. I spent a little bit of time online the other day, found an interesting site by Coldwell Banker that had the following video concerning the extended Home Buyer Tax Credit that over 2 million people have taken advantage of so far. There is a lot involved with these Real Estate Tax Benefit options that they have out right now. The more you know about these types of things the better prepared we can be in order to get the most for our hard earned money come April 15th each year.
I can remember when I was younger and needed Math help with my homework, the only option was to stay after school and meet a Math Tutor in the library. I was lucky in that the school provided the tutor for free. Sometimes it was the teacher that stayed after school, and sometimes it was one of the teacher’s star pupils. I was very grateful either way; without their help I never would have passed math!
Nowadays, kids don’t have to stay after school anymore to get homework assistance. If they have access to the Internet, then they can get an Online Math Tutor to help them out. This is a great convenience to the parents and students because the student can get the help at their own schedule convenience, and they don’t have to worry about trying to ride a late bus home. That’s even better news since due to budget cuts the late buses were all cancelled a few years ago and parents had to drive all the way into town to the school to pick up their kids!
Living in the country makes getting Homework help a big challenge! Especially now that the schools have cut back on their funding. No more late buses to take the kids home, so they can’t stay after school to get help with their Math they way that they used to be able to do. That also makes it a lot more difficult for kids to participate in after school sports and music and clubs. Many parents are very disappointed in these kinds of cut-backs for a variety of reasons. These kinds of after school activities certainly enrich the lives of the children on a social level that is important to the overall development of their character!
Fortunately there is help in educational subjects such as Algebra and English online. Many of the services charge a fee, but some offer their services for free. So folks that live way out in the country can help their kids get the kind of scholastic tutoring they need right at home without worrying about how the kids will get home after staying late at school!
I think that it is wonderful that there are so many baby proofing products on the market today. I don’t remember most of these products being available when my kids were babies/toddlers. I’m sure that if they had been available we would have used every single one of them! Our kids were into everything imagineable, and they wore us out chasing after them! That’s probably why our parents used playpens when we were little – so they wouldn’t have to chase us around!
But our kids absolutely would not tolerate playpens once they learned how to crawl. So we went the route of baby gates, outlet covers and child safety locks instead. It was a struggle, keeping the children away from so many things that could harm them. I know my wife misses the kids being little, but it is a big relief that we don’t have to chase them all over the house anymore! That is at least until we have grandchildren!
In a mobile society such as ours, having the Internet is more than a convenience, and more than entertainment. The Internet has become a valuable resource in many ways. Many people are able to research topics for their school assignments. Many people can use it to find demographic information about an area that they are interested in moving to. With just a few clicks of a button, you can find out just about anything you want to know about Miami, FL; the demographics, the crime rate, and where the local businesses are.
Although I can remember a time in my life when I depended solely on paper telephone books, and had to go to the Public Library for research, it is amazingly simple to research almost any city. My brother told me that he is thinking about moving to either Pittsburgh, PA or Charlotte, NC because of a job opportunity. Within moments we can find a lot of different local businesses in either city. And I think that knowing what the local businesses are will tell you a lot about a place, don’t you?