Wasted Years

Having run one website or another for the past nine years, more than once I’ve found myself in a situation where I’ve needed to find a web hosting solution. Typically, this meant scouring the internet in search of the best deal, switching between browser windows while comparing two different company’s offerings. My job would’ve been a little easier had webhostingchoice.com been around. You can use their quick search, located right on the homepage, to quickly find a list of hosting providers that match a set of basic criteria or use their advanced search page to find hosts that will meet all of your specific needs. You can also view their plans directory to see hosts listed by specific plan features.

One downside – at the time of this writing, their host submission and host rating features were unavailable due to a PHP error. Truthfully this isn’t a big deal to me and doesn’t impact the search functionality of the site, but it does keep people from adding new webhosting providers and providing ratings and reviews.

Overall, if you’re looking for a hosting provider, webhostingchoice.com looks like a good place to start. Give them a try and avoid the hassle of finding your next hosting provider.

When I was younger I received my first credit card. I promised myself I'd never charge more than I could afford to repay in a month. After making my first purchase with the card, I was enthralled by the ability to hand a small piece of plastic to a cashier and walk out of the store with cool stuff. My promise forgotten, I splurged on bigger and better stuff until I maxed out the card. When the bills came, I happily paid the minimum, not concerning myself with things like interest rates and finance charges.

Well, not content with one card I went out and got more credit cards. I'd fill out every credit card offer that came in the mail, still not concerning myself with interest rates and finance charges. One day I sat down and figured out how much money I owed to my credit cards. When I was done, I went through my wallet and cut every single one of them up.

When the offers came in, I started to compare credit cards looking for better deals. When I would find a low interest credit card, I would pick the card or cards that were hurting me for the highest interest rate and dump their balances onto the lower rate card. I did a lot of juggling, but finally managed to get myself on track and save a boatload of money in finance charges at the same time.

It's taken me six years to undo the damage I did in three - let that be a warning to everyone who isn't keeping their spending habits in check! But at least I'm almost at the finish line.

Are you experiencing any of the following conditions?:

- Excessive daytime sleepiness
- Morning headaches
- Leg cramps or continuous uncontrollable urge to move your legs
- Restlessness while sleeping
- Trouble falling or staying asleep

You might be suffering from a sleeping disorder such as apnea, a pause in breathing. Lack of a good night's sleep can impair your ability to function during your waking hours and if you think you are suffering from a sleeping disorder, you should seriously consider scheduling a sleep study to determine your sleeping behavior. A sleep disorder center would be able to assist you with a sleep study as well as provide detailed information about the causes for sleep disordered breathing and potential solutions. Advanced Sleep Diagnostics has a series of videos on their site that could be helpful in explaining sleep disordered breathing in detail.

I know someone who had apnea - for a while he looked tired all the time and wasn't full of his usual vim and vigor. After having a sleep study done, he was diagnosed and put on the path to recovery, which in this case was a good night's sleep.

If you're suffering from a lack of sleep, think about scheduling a professional consultation at a sleep disorder center - a good night's sleep is worth it.

I've been checking out Cellfish a media sharing site that centers around your cell phone. Using the site, you can send media from your cell phone to your "digital locker" and from there share it with other people and post it on webpages. For example, here's a picture I took out back of The Seventh Level Of Hell last month:

Before I found Cellfish, I would've had to suck all the pictures off of the card in my phone to my laptop, scaled the image down, and then upload the final image to my web space and include a link to the image. Using Cellfish, I sent the pic to my digital locker and used the provided embed code to slap the pic up there. Definitely a time saver! In addition to pictures, you can also upload videos and ringtones (no copyright infringement allowed!).

Not only can you upload media to share, you can also download a variety of free pictures, free videos, and free ringtones directly to your cell phone. Try it right now - by clicking on the phone icon in my pic above, you should be able to enter your cell number and send it to your phone (be aware - messaging charges apply!). Not all phones support these features obviously - a list of supported carriers and phones is available on the Cellfish site.

You also have the option to purchase credits to use for premium content such as ringtones from popular music. Your purchase will be charged to your phone like most other media add-ons are. I'm generally not big on that kind of thing, but have been going through some of the ringtone offerings and might spring for one or two at some point in time.

With the Cellfish site being laid out as a community you have the option to add favorites and friends, although adding favorites seems a bit clunky right now - every favorite I added created a whole new panel... not sure if there's a preference I overlooked or what, but it was easy enough to fix by dragging all of my favorites into one panel and deleting the extras.

If you're looking for a way to share media from your cellphone with the world or just looking for another repository of free pics, free videos, and free ringtones give Cellfish a try. I'm planning on using it a lot more for all the pics I take with my phone but am usually too lazy to pull off the card. Stop by my Cellfish page and say hi!

So after all my ranting about not doing this blogging thing to make money, I signed up for PayPerPost. Now, part of the reason I haven't really focused on trying to make money here has been the lack of results from other web money makers. Google AdSense hasn't brought me one single cent, that ReviewMe site I found a while back hasn't done anything for me, and I have yet to see success with the Project Wonderful ads that have been running. In all fairness to Project Wonderful, though, I've kept my minimum bids low since if there's a bright center to the blogosphere, you're at the blog it's furthest from. I figure if someone wants to drop a couple of cents here to run an ad, more power to 'em.

So my attempts at earning enough money off of here to cover hosting costs haven't really panned out. Kind of disheartening, but there it is.

Enter PayPerPost. I first heard about PayPerPost from the lovely Venomous Kate. PayPerPost's objective is to drive traffic to advertiser's sites by having bloggers blog about the products and services the advertisers offer. It's similar to ReviewMe, but better - you don't sit around waiting for an email to come in telling you about a review opportunity that's available to you. Instead, you log into your PayPerPost account and scan the opportunities that are available to you. And so far, it seems like there's always an opportunity. Some of them are only for $5, but seriously - $5 is $5. Especially when you're like me and trying to save up every little penny you can to funnel into a house.

I mulled it over for awhile, going back and forth with myself over whether or not to give it a try. And then Kate shared her earnings for the past two months. She's made over $1700 in two months utilizing PayPerPost!

If you're looking to try and monetize your blog, check out PayPerPost. I'm going to give it a go. Will I make $1700 in two months? Maybe. But at least I know it's possible.

I've always loved scary movies but it's been awhile since I've seen one that's actually scared me. I always enjoyed the Friday The 13th series as well as the Halloween series, but as I've gotten older these movies have gone from leaving me feeling twitchy to just amusing me.

I think that's all about to change. I just discovered what could possibly be the best news ever. On August 31st, Rob Zombie's re-imagining of Halloween the movie hits theaters. With Rob Zombie (of White Zombie, The Devil's Rejects, and House of 1000 Corpses fame - yeah... that guy) at the wheel, I expect this movie to rock!

I'm betting on heart-stopping thrills... you know the kind I'm talking about... you're sitting in the theater enjoying the movie, the action hits a lull, the next victim opens a closet door and nothing comes out to kill him/her. Then they turn around and *BAM!* there's Michael Meyers just standing there. The victim is screaming, the audience is screaming, and you're screaming while climbing into the lap of the guy next to you. Never happened to me, but I've heard stories.

Here's the latest trailer for Halloween the movie... just watching it gave me the creeps. It's a wonderful taste of the frightful feast to come!

After watching that trailer I'm ready for August 31st... I get to see a new Halloween movie and I might be creeped out enough to want to sleep with the lights on. And if that happens, you know it's a damn good scary movie!

(This review sponsored by ReviewMe)

For quite a while I've struggled with a way to make this site self-sufficient. I've tried a PayPal tip jar, the Amazon affiliate program, the iTunes affiliate program, Google ads, and selling stuff through Cafepress.

None of it has worked.

While I don't mind the minimal cost of keeping this site running, it would be nice to have it pay for itself. So I was very interested when I saw this post at Electric Venom about ReviewMe, a new site that gives advertisers access to bloggers willing to review their products for a reasonable fee.

Once you complete the easy sign up process, you submit your blog for addition to the ReviewMe marketplace. Not all blogs will be accepted. According to the ReviewMe FAQ, acceptance is based on "a minimum number of citations, subscribers, and traffic." If you're accepted, advertisers can purchase a review from you at which time you decide whether or not you wish to review the product or service. Reviews have to be at least 200 words and payment for reviews can range from as low as $20 to as high as $200.

One definite plus for ReviewMe is that advertisers cannot require a positive review from you. If product XYZ is lacking in several areas and should go back to the drawing board, I don't have to write a review that says product XYZ is the greatest thing since sliced bread. Having control over what I put in my review is important to me, especially if I'm sharing these reviews with you, the readers.

Another advantage is the frequency of payouts. When using Cafepress, for example, you're required to select a payment threshold, a dollar amount that you have to reach in sales, before they mail your check out. The minimum dollar amount is $25... if you've made $24, you're out of luck. And even if you reach your threshold, there's still a 45 day wait, due to the nature of the business.

ReviewMe pays out once a month, usually by the 4th day. That's it. No waiting for a certain period of time, no waiting to hit a payment threshold. Write a review and get paid for it in the next payment cycle. Not quite instantaneous, but it's probably the best you're going to get.

Overall, I'm excited about ReviewMe. If I accept and write one review, I'll be able to cover all of my site-related expenses for a year, without having to dig into my own pocket. For me that's huge. And it could be for other bloggers as well.