I wonder what the statistic is for how many media messages are directed at us every day? Then again, maybe I don’t want to know. When you think about it, at their least innocuous we have TV and radio commercials coming at us every 6 or 7 minutes for up to 3 minutes at a time.

On a car trip from, say, Oregon to Baja, you would see upwards of 10,000 billboards and more subtle forms of advertising (like gas, food and lodging signs), from “Free Oregon travel coupons at Hospitality Center” to “Complimentary California Life Insurance quote” to “Last RV Campground before border.”

Then there are online visual assaults. Come on, people. “Less is more!” When I encounter a website with 16 flashing banners and icons, I need a reason to stay long enough to find what I came for. You’ve got me there. Don’t chase me away with excess bling-bling.

For as long as I can remember, I have always dreamed of having the perfect wedding.  I would even play out how I wanted it when I was a little girl with my dolls.  I knew that someday, I would hope to marry the perfect guy on my perfect day.

Years later that did indeed come true.  I met the man of my dreams, we fell in love, and had the perfect wedding on the beach.  It was better than I had imagined, and I thought that since I had such great luck planning my own wedding, that I could share my talents with others.

I started to offer a wedding planning service in our small town as there was no one doing it at the time.  Sure, we only had half a dozen weddings per year, but I helped them have the best day possible.

There is just something about new love that makes my job so rewarding - each wedding that I attend makes me feel young again.

My cousin and I email back and forth quite frequently. We live a good distance from each other, so this is basically how we stay in touch with each other. She owns an import company and so she spends a lot of time overseas. It is nice to have the email and know that we can still keep each other up to date, even though she is a half a world away.

Recently, she was on a buying trip in China. I kept up with the daily emails and I even found free website translation so I could learn how to sign off my emails in Chinese. This impressed her and I think it was a really cool idea. I decided that I was going to use this next time she goes to Italy as well.

She and I are very close because of these daily emails. I can’t wait until next month when I actually get to go and see her. We are taking a trip down to where she lives so she can meet our new baby. It will be a nice break.

For many years I have dabbled in the stock market.  I had set aside a bit of play money for me to use to invest in the market so if I lost any money, it would really not affect our finances.

So far, the stock picks that I have made have been good.  Though I am not up as much as I would like, the fact that I have gained ground makes me happy.  But I know that I could do better if I had some professional advice.

Looking online, I found an investment club that offered stock research as part of the membership.  According to the testimonials on their site, the investors that used their advice had portfolios that performed better than the market.

So I have joined the club and I think I will take their advice into consideration for the next three months.  If my returns have been better after following their advice, I will stay in the club, if not, I will have to find another club to join.

I have a friend that went through a horrible divorce three years ago.  Since she was burned so bad, she has been scared to try and date, for fear of being hurt again.  I can’t really blame her - once you lose that faith that people are inherently good, it is hard to trust them again.

So, I suggested to her that she should check out the free dating services online - it would let her meet these people on her own terms as well as weed out the questionable ones.  I helped her to find a couple and we spent a fun night coming up with her profile.

Then we took a look at her potential suitors one day later.  There were a few good potential suitors (provided they weren’t lying, and a few weirdos - but most of the people seemed to be normal.  She has decided that she is going to start a discussion with some of them and get to know them, then decide if she has the courage to meet them in person, but she is in no rush.

Maybe the online dating scene will be the perfect way for her to ease back into a relationship - she is just too amazing to live the rest of her life alone.

I’ve gained a fashionable disability label. I am an adult with Attention Deficit Disorder or ADD. For me this means

• I usually have about 20 tabs open on my Browser at any given time. Today my tabs are: webmail (1), Internet marketing-related sites (3), writing (2), blogs that focus on topics I write about (10), Indian food and Indian recipes (1), my writing blog dashboard, and the “write a post” admin page - one tab each. Oh, and another whole Firefox page with sites I searched from bloggers in my state (12) and Google (2).
• I am missing all DNA paired sequences related to organization.
• I can’t break down a task into steps, and suffer easily from overwhelm. Everything looks important.
• When someone points out a system, I am awed by how simple it sounds, yet know I struggle just with what label to put on a file folder.

I share these characteristics with tens of thousands of other people, and those who are women, live as I do, ashamed that we don’t have it “all together.”

Since I am just starting out my web empire, I really don’t have much of a budget for marketing and search engine optimization (SEO).  So, I have been looking for a way to outsource my SEO needs without having to spend a lot of money.

When I decided to outsource my marketing, I went online to see if I could find a company to do it when I searched for "SEO company UK".  When many results came up, I thought it was great and that I would be able to find what I was looking for.

Turns out that the results that came up linked to SEO companies that charged more than I could afford for their services.

I decided to try searching for "budget SEO UK" instead of my previous search in an effort to find a better deal.  After a bit of hunting, I did find a good company that could provide what I needed at the price I could afford.

A while back, our town announced that they were going to start paying people who had solar powered homes to put power back into the grid. I had never thought too much about solar power before that point and it got me to do a lot of thinking and a lot of research as to the benefits and drawbacks of solar power.

When I realized that the benefits far outweighed any drawbacks, I decided that I would try to find a solar system wholesaler and start converting my home. I found a very reputable company and had them come and do the installation. It went very smoothly and I am very happy with the results.

I remember the first check I got form the power company. It was such a nice change to receive a check from them rather than get a bill in the mail. I wish that I had done this years ago, but am happy in the fact that it is better late than never and I am looking at other ways to make my home more earth friendly.

I think I have to be more careful about what I read.  You see, I was reading some Las Vegas Reviews online late last night and I fell asleep at the computer.  At least that is what I would guess, as that is where I woke up.

But needless to say, I had a strange dream about becoming a travel reporter who was doing a story on the many Las Vegas Hotels.  I guess that it was my first assignment, so I was given the “hard” task of checking them out.

During the work, I was able to try out all the restaurants, shows, and venues the city had to offer.  Even though most of it was amazing, there were some that were kind of nasty.  You see, my assignment was to checkout every hotel in the city.

I was rudely awakened to my head on the keyboard - I think that I might just have to plan a trip to Vegas now.

I have been looking for a new motorcycle for a long time, and I have been shopping in my hometown.  Sure, there have been a couple of good deals, but most people were asking too much for what they were offering.

So, I decided to take my search online to see what I could find.  I really didn’t know how buying and selling motorcycles worked online, but I thought that I would take care of that detail later.

It turned out that there was a much better selection online, and I found a cycle trader website that had the types of motorcycles that I had been looking for.  The site also had information that explained how buying a motorcycle online worked.

So, I have found the bike that I have been looking for, so I have contacted the seller.  Hopefully the transaction will go smoothly - if not, it will be a good learning experience.