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!

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.

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?

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 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……

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!

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.

Post Regarding Zenni

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 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 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!