The Jeffrey And Tracey Info Emporium

Albert Einstein once said, “You can’t solve a problem with the
same mind that created it.”

To solve a problem you’ve obviously helped to create, you need
to start with a new and fresh mind. For example, a woman thinks,
“If I can change my job, my life will be better.” Possibly. But
life doesn’t usually work that way. That woman is likely doing
and thinking the same thoughts as always. Nothing new or fresh
gets in. If you want to effect a change, get outside yourself
and look at the situation with fresh eyes. See how you might
assess your problem using a different mindset.

Try these six ways to think with a different mind–and nudge
your genius into action:

1. Break patterns. You find yourself walking or driving home
only to jolt alert and wonder how you got there. The road is so
familiar you followed it automatically. The same thing happens
in your mind.

Your mind’s neural pathways are like roads connecting bits of
information. You learn something by connecting the bits. Then
you do it over and over until following that pathway becomes
automatic, which enables you to effectively give a speech or
swing a golf club.

Patterns are rarely easy to break, yet breaking a pattern is a
splendid way to find a new solution to a recurring problem.
Grocers entice us to overspend by stocking their stores in a
pattern designed by shrewd marketing executives. But smart
shoppers impose their own buying patterns, purchasing
nonperishables first so their frozen foods won’t melt on the way
home.

Break old thought patterns by trying new ways of doing a
familiar task. Go to an unfamiliar coffee shop to brainstorm
ideas, and you may discover fresh solutions.

2. Seek new patterns. The concept for today’s computers
originated with hole-punch patterns used to weave ornate
jacquard fabrics. On the huge early looms, holes punched in a
paper pattern allowed hooks to penetrate and grab the thread at
assigned positions, creating the intricate weave. Early census
takers tweaked this pattern to create hole-punched cards, which
recorded details about immigrants entering the United States.
Later, IBM expanded this pattern to extraordinary levels.

Likewise, I use my nurse’s diagnosing pattern
(assessment-diagnosis-intervention-evaluation) to successfully
tackle issues in my business. This process of incorporating
techniques and patterns from one discipline to creatively solve
problems in another can result in ingenious solutions that might
otherwise never occur.

3. Change a small action or behavior. Instead of going
immediately to your computer when you get to the office, if
that’s your habit, stop instead to write out a short list of
what you want to accomplish. Then power up. Changing an action,
even a small one, will often change your thought process. Shake
up your internal genius and discover sensational new
possibilities.

4. Challenge your obstacles. Let go of the notion that you don’t
have enough time, energy, money or discipline to do what it
takes to succeed. Ask yourself frequently, “What beliefs, ideas
and activities are obstructing my progress? What must I change
to abolish these obstacles?” My biggest obstacle is believing I
don’t have enough time. When I challenge that thought I
magically make more things happen.

5. Become your own other voice. Law school taught me to think of
both sides of a problem, like boxers who anticipate an
opponent’s every punch. The more you anticipate opposing ideas
and their impact, the better you can strategize for success and
avoid tactical blows. Successful attorneys spend as much time in
the mind of their opponent as they do in their own. Whether it’s
a career issue or a personal problem you’re resolving, practice
being your own other voice.

6. Question every assumption. Another Einstein quote I like is,
“The important thing is not to stop questioning.” Being the most
computer-illiterate person in my office, I have no preconceived
notions about what software can and cannot do. I think with an
entirely different mind than our techs. Many times I ask them to
make the software perform a certain way. After they tell me all
their preconceived assumptions for why it can’t, I shrug and
tell them to do it anyway. Two days later the software is
usually working exactly as I envisioned. A questioning mind is
more likely to get answers.

Beginning today, think about which mind you have working before
you tackle a challenge. Your problems won’t disappear, and you
may not find a solution instantly, but by keeping the
possibilities in play, you allow your brain to easily hit upon a
solution later. I’ve had to slip out of my yoga class to jot
down ideas because I’ve had “Eureka!” moments in the middle of a
pose. You may never think like Albert Einstein, but new
patterns, new thinking and new behaviors will nudge the genius
within you.

What is a blog, you ask? Short for “Web Log,” it’s an increasingly popular way to self-publish online. You can actually syndicate your articles, making this a great way for experts to showcase their specialized knowledge.

Think of a blog as a form of an online journal, with frequent postings and observations on items of interest. Most blogs focus on a narrow subject area, which is ideal for experts. Hyperlinks to articles, websites and other blogs make this a very interactive medium that encourages audience participation.

The Pew Internet Study estimates that about 11% of Internet users - translating to 50 million people - are regular blog readers. Technorati, which claims to be the authority on what’s going on in the world of weblogs, tracks almost 42 million blogs.

Lawyers are active bloggers. According to an online survey conducted by Blogads.com late last year, 6.1% of bloggers work in the legal profession. The Litigation Section of the American Bar Association discovered that the majority of section members surveyed read at least one blog regularly and almost 20% publish their own blog.

The best way to understand a blog is to look at a few. The Google Blog has a very simple appearance. By contrast, some blogs in the legal market can be very sophisticated, like E-Discovery Law offered by Preston Gates & Ellis LLP or the ERISA Blog maintained by The Law Office of B. Janell Grenier. Law Professor Blogs offers a rich network of links to law blogs maintained by legal academics.

Three reasons to start a blog

1. Blog software is frequently free or nominally priced

2. Blogs increase your search engine rankings

3. Postings get widespread distribution through syndication

If you like to write and have information to share about your area of expertise, a blog can be a great marketing tool.

Three cautions before you start blogging

Look before you leap into a blog. Launching a professional looking blog requires careful advance planning. Here are some pointers to keep in mind:

1. Create a strategic framework for the type of information you intend to publish

2. Post new content frequently to keep your blog fresh

3. Take advantage of syndication features to maximize the reach of your blog

Basically, make sure you have the time to maintain your blog with high quality and timely information. Just because you get named as an expert on a big case is no excuse to neglect or abandon your blog.

Blog publishing services

Now, let’s say you are interested and want to find out more about launching a blog. One place to start is with your website hosting service. Chances are you can link a blog to your website for a small additional monthly fee. I host with GoDaddy for example, and they offer blog software for as little as $2.99 per month.

Leading blog services include Blogger (owned by Google), TypePad and Moveable Type (both owned by Six Apart Ltd.), and WordPress. LexBlog, owned by Lexis-Nexis, targets the legal market with a full-service offering that includes strategic design, implementation and training.

Blog features encourage interaction

The beauty of the blog is the way it allows you to organize, archive and syndicate your articles. Here are a few features you should consider:

.Archives A calendar on the front page of your blog can link readers to articles posted on a certain date. You can also organize articles by author or alphabetically.

.Blogrolls Present your readers with a sidebar list of other blogs on related topics that you recommend.

.Email a friend Add a button to your blog for easy emailing.
News Feeds. RSS (”Really Simple Syndication”) is a blog technique that allows you to easily distribute your postings to other blogs. Interested parties can also come to your blog and quickly set up an automatic feed of your news for publication on their site. Read more about feeds at Wikipedia.

.Reader Feedback Allow your readers to comment on your blog postings to maximize audience interest. Some of the techniques used for this purpose include trackbacks, pingbacks or comment moderation.

.Permalinks Give your postings a static URL so that readers can easily share links or revisit a favorite posting.

The Internet is in a constant state of evolution, with blogs being the latest example. Have fun and happy blogging! Write us if you have any questions or comments.

The struggle for customer share is as intense as ever, and
companies need to shore up their corporate message in anyway
they can. Corporate weblogs, or “blogs”, are a great,
cost-effective way to engage customers, fellow professionals, or
merely the curious. This opportunity to reach thousands of
interested people requires no hefty advertising budget, yet can
significantly strengthen your client-customer relationship.
Taking dialogue online means added and valuable interaction with
your customers.

A corporate blog can be used in any number of ways, from an
informational hub to an online diary for a sales rep. They tend
to be no less varied than personal blogs are. They deliver
on-point messages to anyone who reads it. Since blog entries
often have a personal touch, they tend to reach readers in ways
a company homepage can’t. This is where creative and well
written blogs can really count; quality keeps people coming
back. A blog isn’t a venue for the hard sale but instead a
resource where resource where readers can stay informed or sign
up for newsletters and emailings.

Just because lemonade stands can afford to blog doesn’t mean
it’s not something for the big guys, either. One well known
corporate blogger, Bob Lutz, Vice Chairman of General Motors,
has found tremendous success with his “Fast Lane” blog.
Thousands of daily readers get his thoughts daily on all things
automotive, with a decided emphasis on GM. What’s more, these
daily readers are usually car buffs and industry and not a
motley cross-section. His blog’s success lends influence to his
opinion and GM’s corporate message. Just as many readers of
Lutz’s blog are in the car industry, those who’d read your
corporate blog would most likely be in your field, too. It’s
targeted readership, just what the blogger wants.

2005 marks the year that blogs finally got hot, probably because
people are realizing how valuable targeted Internet flow is. In
an advertising sense, sure, that’s value in search marketing.
It’s somewhat similar for a corporate blog, especially
considering the high interest level of writer and readership.
It’s high quality interaction where a person and a company can
do themselves good amongst some people who really count: their
peers and interested customers. Blogs do not generate
smorgasbords of readership that resemble radio listening
audiences. This is new media, where quality trumps quantity.

Our CEO at ICMediaDirect.com, Vladimir Khomenko, has gotten the
chance to implement corporate blogs for many clients. It’s his
belief that in the matter of less than a year multitudes of
companies have identified blogging as a viable means of
corporate messaging, whereas it was once a wee minority. He
says, “In the corporate world a blog gets a controlled message
delivered to interested parties in real time. Readers will see
it either when prompted to or when just “checking in”. Simple as
it may seem, it still represents incredible innovation because
readers of a blog are usually receptive to their message.”
Strategists unfamiliar with blogging should visit blog search
sites, like Technorati, and gauge the impact of the blogosphere.
Technorati keeps a running tab for visitors on the number of
blogs in network they advertise. They are up to 27.4 million
blogs and this number ticks up, practically on a daily basis.

These numbers underscore the importance of blogs today. The blog
is a mainstream phenomenon, not a fad. Corporate blogs are
growing in number and importance right there with personal
blogs, too. Our consulting team at ICMediaDirect.com is
approached by more and more companies who wish to blog
themselves and we’ve noticed that companies are increasingly
approving of employee blogs, if not encouraging them.

Employees on blogs communicate with customers, with business
partners and anyone else about a wide array of business topics.
The topics of such blogs are as varied as imagination will
permit. Understandably, these corporate tools tend to focus on
the company and industry, but general chit-chat makes for good
blog fodder, too. Because comment boxes make the blog
interactive, general industry issues are often discussed.

Good blogs often have valuable perspective on business issues.
None of this is to say that a corporate blog is a safe place to
say anything, far from it. It would be a foolish place to gossip
about your workspace or give away proprietary information (yes,
people have been fired for this). Whatever content of a business
blog is posted should be done with the idea that a corporate
blog represents the company. It’s a fine line, sure, but not a
difficult one to navigate with proper consideration. Just as the
workplace has become irreversibly entwined with the Internet, so
too will the blog become a part of the company message. We’ll
continue to see it grow in corporate importance in upcoming
months and years and as it does, look to start one of own. And
let me know, I’d like to check it out.

The recent spurt of interest in blogging has begun to ignite the hope that people can make a full-time income from blogging.

Although there are a few people actually doing this, there aren’t too many business models yet that can support someone making a full-time income from their blogs.

I believe that blogs should be an important part of any traffic-generation plan for a website, but don’t depend on the blog itself to do much selling.

Blogs are best viewed as an addition to site content, in reality, a very simple content management system that helps you update your site more frequently, so your search engine listings and traffic increase.

Email campaigns are still the best way to produce sales on demand and to announce specials and time-limited offers, because blogs do not yet have the immediacy and reach of email.

Blogs are not about selling anyway. As an internet marketer and publisher, I find that blogs can be an excellent tool to support your main business, to provide value, build relationships with prospective customers and to build your personal brand and image.

For corporates and small businesses, blogs can help put a human face on an otherwise bland business site. In the corporate world, blogs are being for internal communication and knowledge management, and for brand building and public relations campaigns.

Nike’s Art of Speed blog is an excellent example of subtle brand building using blogs.
http://www.gawker.com/artofspeed

As an internet marketer and publisher, here are some ways you can use blogs to support your business.

1. Write reviews of products in your field

Writing reviews not only allows you to benefit from improved search engine listings for the product you are reviewing, but allows you to provide your subscribers with information that contributes to their purchase decisions. That makes it an ideal way to earn affiliate income.

2. Direct traffic to your articles

If you’ve written an article and published it online, use your blog to post a teaser, perhaps describing what made you write that particular article, and then link to it so you get your readers to also visit your website and check out your other offerings.

3. Direct traffic to your ezine archives

Post a few paragraphs or the editorial of your ezine or newsletter issues on your blog and link to the archived issue on your website so that your readers can read the rest of the issue there.

4. Talk about what’s going on in your life

People buy from those they like and trust. As an online journal or diary, a blog is the ideal medium to share details of your holiday, the things that made you laugh (or not), your own humorous take on life, anything to let your prospective customers get to know the person behind the website better.

5. Comment on developments in your industry

A blog is an ideal place to post your personal opinions, favourable or not, about the developments in your industry. If you are not happy with someone’s customer service, or have been defrauded, they are also a good way of warning other potential victims. Becoming a source of industry information is part of the process of branding yourself as an expert.

There are many more ways that you can promote yourself, your products and services using a blog, but the ones above should get you started for now.

Just remember to use your blog for the purpose it was meant to be used. To brand, to communicate, to connect.

Leave the selling to your sales letter.

Priya Shah is a partner in the search engine marketing firm, SEO & More and writes an online marketing blog. Request the detailed version of this whitepaper Boost Your Search Engine Visibility With Blogs And RSS here.

This article may be reprinted as long as the resource box is left intact and all links are hyperlinked.

A blog is an online diary or as some people call them a weblog. They can be about
any topic you would like to comment on.

Setting up a blog can seem to be a very difficult task for the non techie type
out there. They(the techie types) talk about MYSQL, PHP and you need a reader to
read a blog in. Then they say u gotta ping the blog.

Is that a new mixed drink or something ?

We talk to our children and they look at us as if we come from another planet.

All I want to do is blog.

My Dad being basically computer illiterate a short time ago. HMM I still think he
is but I wont say it to often in this house.

I wrote these instructions for him and he had had no major problems setting up a
blog.

The easiest way to start a blog in my opinion and you may wish to differ are
detaled in the following steps:

You will need a reader to read the blog you make or someone elses that you
subscribe to.

The 1st step is an easy way to get a reader that allows rss feeds to be pulled to
your My page.

1. Go to www.yahoo.com and create a my yahoo page. If you have one already go to
step 2.

2. Find a free blogging service. I reccomend www.blogger.com. They have simple and
easy to follow instructions, even Dad could follow them ). Now follow the

instructions on the start page. Take your time and make sure you read the
instructions. Do Not speed read them like Dad usually will do .

WOW Great job!!! Pat your self on the back.

Congratulations you have now created a blog.

3. Now open up the create new post in your new blog and write new post. Now
publish it.

Now your a blogger

4. Now go back to www.yahoo.com and sign in to your “MY” account.

5. Now go to add content to your front page, upper left corner of your start
page.Now click on RSS Headlines.
Now copy this and paste this url in The Add New Sources box on this page.

http://making-money-online.blogspot.com/

6. Now check Sources to add. This will ad the feed to your MY page.

7. Now repeat steps 4 and 5 with your blog URL.

Happy Blogging

Sean Felker is the publisher of the very successful and popular Work at Home and
Making Money on the Internet blog: http://making-money-online.blogspot.com

This morning, the Internet connected me to my friends, although today the News was mostly bad. Firstly, some friends of mine and I are planning to get together tomorrow and I was figuring out what time to meet. I emailed my friends at ten twenty two am, to say ‘Let’s meet at six pm’. At ten thirty five am, one of them emailed me back that he’d been downsized, and so could make it as early as we liked. I emailed my condolences, glad for the speed and ease when connecting with my friends via the Internet. His email at quarter to nine am said nothing about being downsized so he must only have found out about it this morning, less than two hours before he told us.

Before telephones and computers came to be, swift communication would have been reserved for only those who could afford to send letters to each other and employ messenger boys. Although on the other hand, before England had telephones I gather the mail service was so efficient that you could send an invitation at breakfast, and expect a letter in response the same day. Even that doesn’t compare with getting an answer in thirteen minutes, and learning about major events in a friend’s life in less than two hours.

After receiving that bad News, and then my small consolation of joy at being so connected to my friends, I read more bad News in another friend’s blog and discovered that I’m less connected than I thought. My blogger friend is worried he suffers from depression and might be an alcoholic. According to his blog he can’t talk to his friends about it, including me. I wonder if he knows that some of his friends read his blog. Like most blog pages this one allows comments so I anonymously offered some advice and encouraged him to talk to his friends. I’m curious if what I said will give away who I am. Later on I had a discussion about him and his blog with another friend over a messenger program.

Sadly the world is both kind and cruel, filled with both joy and sorrow. So, if you can connect with anyone, anywhere, anytime, you will get bad News as quickly and clearly as you get good News. Although you will, I hope, always get good News more often.

By Allan T. Price
http://www.m6.net
Allan T. Price is a creative writer who is bothered that his friend apparently can’t talk to him.
Allan T. Price is a creative writer working at M6.Net: “The web-hosting company for humans.” M6.Net is working hard to help humanity experience the power and freedom to develop their own part of the Internet, to share their information and connect with anyone, anywhere, anytime.

Like large companies, small business and home business owners
need to advertise. When it comes to advertising dollars, small
businesses don’t have the budgets of large companies. They must
be more careful about how and where dollars are spent.

Because small businesses and home businesses typically don’t
have the budgets to hire search engine marketers to optimize
their websites for first page ranking, the best way to get found
on the internet is to use Pay Per Click Advertising.

Pay Per Click Advertising is an online advertising format that
enables you to place your advertisements at or near the top of
search engines for your keywords based on the amount you bid.

Google Adwords and Yahoo! Overture are the largest and best
known PPC search engines. To get your keywords placed on the
first pages of these first tier search engines costs two, three,
or many times more than getting highly placed on second tier
search engines. Of course, the first tier search engines get
about 70% of the market. But that means that the other search
engines get 30% of the traffic (about a billion searches per
month). Most small businesses don’t know about or think about
this rich resource for inexpensive advertising.

Here is a list of search engines that require a deposit of
$25.00 or less and have low (as little as $0.00) per click
rates: (I have included the Alexa Ranking (a low number of 1 is
wonderful - a high number of 5 million is not good.)

7Search www.7search.com Alexa Rank 4,332

7Search licenses its technology to other search engines. Your
site will appear in hundreds of other search engines increasing
your reach dramatically.

Brainfox www.brainfox.com Alexa Rank 4,911

The minimum bids and entry fee are low. It opens up the pay per
click to companies on a very limited budget.

Findology www.findology.com Alexa Rank 11,634

Findology has a minimum bid of $.03. It provides for fixed or
recurring payment methods, traffic reporting, keyword
statistics, and has auto or fixed bidding capabilities.

Pageseeker www.pageseeker.com Alexa Rank 100,068

Pageseeker provides extensive information about your keywords,
clickthroughs, and your current funds. You can choose to be
notified if your keywords are outbid and when your funds reach a
certain level.

Search123 www.search123.com Alexa Rank 20,194

Search123 lets you set limits on the amount of money you want to
spend in your account by the hour, day, week or by the month.

Search123 also has a proxy-bidding tool that guarantees you will
never be knocked out of the top spot.

Searchgalore www.searchgalore.com Alexa Rank 334,003

SearchGalore has an account management area that is easy to
navigate and easy to add, remove and edit keywords and URLs.
It’s reporting feature shows all of the your keywords and
categories as well as the costs of your keyword bids.

Win4Win www.win4win.com Alexa Rank 337,255

Advertisers set the price for keyword searches and can set a
total limit on the amount spent for searches.

Once you have started to make money using the second tier PPC
search engines, part of the profits could be leveraged to invest
in the first tier search engines to increase your traffic and
profits even further.

Blogs are being used on a more consistent basis due to their simplicity and accessibility to the public.

A Blog is defined as a recurrent, chronological journal of personal thoughts and web links. Blogs are originally known as weblogs. The word “blog” is a slang term that causes less confusion among web users. Weblogs can be seen as a journal of the web site that it originates from. There are about as many blog types as there are web sites.

Prescription drug blogs offer consumers an easy way to share information and experiences associated with prescription drugs. A medical blog can offer many perspectives on one issue while educating consumers. Many people are turning to blogs for valuable information, while others say much of the content on blogs are worthless.

The best source for prescription and medical blogs are the ones run by doctors and health professionals. Doctors are likely to reveal more due to the anonymity of blogs. Scientists can also be found blogging prescription weblogs and sharing information on drug development and future technology.

For additional information on prescription blogs and other male enhancement drugs, contact your local physician or look to an online pharmacy.

About us

We are an online pharmacy specializing in pharmaceutical information of all kinds. We provide people with critical information needed to understand and diagnose most medical problems.

William Wrigley, public relations consultant
The Online Pharmacy
480-961-9337
http://www.the-online-pharmacy.ws

In November of 2005, I read that a Roman Catholic high school in Sparta had ordered its students to remove personal blogs from the Internet, in the name of protecting them from cyberpredators. Which brings me to an important question, just how can you keep your child safe online?

The Internet is a “gateway” which leads the adult predator to your child. Parents need to recognize the need to better monitor their children’s online activity. I believe that websites like xanga, myspace, and livejournal, make it all too easy for sexual predators to prey on our children.

Children are vulnerable and they don’t realize that anyone can and most likely is reading their blog entries. Both my children have blogs, however they are under moderation by both my husband and I. Frankly, as a parent of two teenagers I believe that it is up to us as parents to educate our children about the online dangers.

Children’s blogs are a pedophile’s playground, because of the easy ability to look into a child’s world. As parents we can help our children stay safe while using a blog. For information about blogging safety please visit http://BlogSafety.com and http://SafeTeens.com

Regarding sites like hi5: I’ve received several invitations from hi5, but I never signed up until November 2005. It wasn’t long before I was removing my account. I should have read the privacy policy before I registered.

It reads: hi5 collects personal information when you register, when you use hi5, when you visit hi5 pages or the pages of certain hi5 partners. hi5 may combine information about you that we have with information we obtain from business partners or other companies. Once you register with hi5 and sign in to our services, you are not anonymous to us. hi5 collects information about your transactions with us and with some of our business partners. hi5 automatically receives and records information on our server logs from your browser.

Basically, they have spyware.

Hi5 collects your Hotmail or yahoo address lists and contacts. Once you register there is an e-mail that is sent to everyone in your address book. This e-mail is sent without your permission.

The website also requests, your hotmail and yahoo password. I never gave my password, I was not that gullible. However hi5 was still able to gather my information and contact those listed in my address book. I finally was able to delete my account, through the instructions in their help file.

In my opinion, hi5 is even worse than xanga and myspace.

I encourage all parents, whose children have an account on hi5, to log into hi5 and delete their children’s account.

Too much personal information is being revealed on these websites, making it a haven for sexual predators. Parents need to wake up.

I for one, am very concerned with websites like hi5, MySpace, Xanga, DeadJournal, Blurty, etc that encourage children to post their photos and personal information.

I strongly suggest that if your child uses the computer and you have not been monitoring their activity, it is time that you found out just what they are doing.

A report aired Dateline Friday, Jan. 27, at 9 p.m. by Rob Stafford, a Correspondent of NBC News, tells parents why they should mind MySpace. If you have not seen this report, I suggest you take a moment to view it at: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/11064451/

You owe it to your children.

Which brings me to my next concern, the Internet is a scary place, filled with all kind of strange people. I believe that when you post your child’s picture on the net, you put them at risk.

Did you know that your personal information, such as your home phone number and address can easily be found on the internet?

If this isn’t one reason to make you reconsider posting your child’s picture on the internet, how about that in this day and age, photos can be digitally altered and appear on porn sites.

According to the National Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children more than 20,000 images of child pornography are posted on the internet every week.

Donna Rice Hughes of http://Protectkids.com states, “… the demand for pornographic images of babies and toddlers on the internet is soaring.” (Prof. Max Taylor, Combating Paedophile Information Networks in Europe, March 2003). More babies and toddlers are appearing on the net and the abuse is getting worse. Images are more torturous and sadistic than they were was before.
The typical age of children found on pornography sites is between 6 and 12, but the profile is getting younger (Prof. Max Taylor, Combating Paedophile Information Networks in Europe, March 2003).
The U.S. Customs Service estimates that there are more than 100,000 web sites offering child pornography - which is illegal worldwide. Red Herring Magazine, 1/18/02)”

I don’t consider myself paranoid, but I don’t post my children’s pictures on the internet and I believe that you shouldn’t either. We all have cute children and are proud of them. But parents, please use some common sense. Keep your child safe and out of the arms of child predators. A good website to check out is: http://members.tripod.com/~Seadooer/sayno-contests.html

Say no to children’s pictures on the web and for goodness sake, monitor your child’s internet activity. Our children are our most valuable asset, love them and protect them.

Rose DesRochers is a published poet and freelance writer. Rose has been writing poetry for more than 20 years. She is also the founder of www.todays-woman.net, a supportive online writing community for men and women over 18. She is also the Assistant Administrator of www.invision-graphics.com. This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 2.5 License.

I had always thought I was a failure around kids. I feared I
would either spoil them rotten or choke them to death. The first
one was more probable though.

Then one day I was stuck into an outreach program where I was
assigned to handle three kids. The first time I heard about it I
was mortified…er…close to panicking to be exact. Instantly I
imagined toddlers running around and ducking from my every
grasp, pulling at my clothes and ruining my hair. My little sis
gave me the phobia when she reached four and I was nine. (If she
reads this she’s going to kill me.)

Yet the havoc the little ones could cause was not really the
problem. I feared they would hate me. What was I to do with
them? I was never good at babysitting and most people thought I
was too serious and boring.

Still I showed up at Family Park. A sense of responsibility made
me. I could not resist it. I just hoped the lessons I learned in
the Educational Psychology classes I took back in college would
work.

When the banner was hung and chairs were positioned in the
field, the children came bounding in. Children of different
colors and sizes. Right away I spied two of them knocking down
two chairs. I thought, oh boy, this would be one forgettable day.

Soon the children fell in line like cherubs as my colleagues and
I handed them their nametags. I searched for my adopted kids
Joely (age six), Jeimes (four) and Beam (14).

As I walked to and fro I saw this little slim, tan girl with
long tresses and bangs watching me. Suddenly a little hand
grabbed my shirtsleeve. It belonged to another little girl with
shoulder-length hair.

She pulled me closer as she accused a grinning chubby boy of
pushing her.

Somehow I got the boy to behave and pacified the girl with mere
words, words that came out of nowhere. I then asked them if they
knew Joely and they pointed at the girl with the bangs.

Getting along with Joely was easy. She was sweet and gentle. She
even gave her mineral water to another girl who was thirsty. I
was so proud of her I could not bear not to show it, and it was
easy to tell she was pleased. Though she seemed to want to shy
away out of embarrassment at my outright admiration, the
flushing of her cheeks could not hide the fact that her eyes
were dancing.

Unlike Joely, I had quite a hard time with Jeimes. I had to keep
an eye on him and make sure he would not run off, which he
managed to do every once in a while. I could not blame him. It
was getting hotter by the minute. Other kids got restless too,
and the demand for water was fast rising. I had to go up and
down the stage for the supply.

Then there was Beam - a tight-lipped loner. He was taller than
I, with a skin a hue darker than Joely’s. I kept encouraging him
to join the games so he would not get bored and be another
runaway Jeimes.

I was surprised I was having fun with the sack race though my
only role was to scream. And yes, there was the job of picking
up a kid or two at every stumble. I had to hold their IDs and
nametags so they could move freely and enjoy the game without
being distracted.

Jeimes shunned away from me even at lunchtime. I thought he
would grow up as a man with his own mind. I told him to roam
around and help me find Beam. Instead, he stayed put. Reverse
Psychology…of course! I eventually won the cute one over.

Beam, on the other hand, would lower his head every time I would
speak to him. He was, however, a gentleman. He helped in
carrying boxes of Zesto and other stuff.

All of a sudden I became everybody’s sis. Kids took turns in
pulling me to their side. They huddled close to me and they
didn’t even touch my hair! They would lean to me and ask me
questions such as what grade I was in (kids don’t know much
about high school and especially college).

I answered that I was already working. Joely looked shocked. To
make sure I was telling the truth she asked me if I finished
grade one, grade two…and so on. When another kid declared that
I would soon get married, Joely verified it to me again with
sullen expression on her face. I couldn’t help but laugh. I was
in Pluto where marriage is concerned.

Then came Jollibee and the angels around me, who were hanging on
my every word, morphed into mobsters. I had to help my fellows
keep the kids at bay. They were murdering the poor mascot. It
was a nightmare on Jollibee’s poor butt. Only when he had gone
back to his truck did the kids become human at last. They asked
me if Jollibee was a man and not really a mutated oversized bee
that could dance. I looked at their expectant faces, and replied
in a manner they could understand, laugh at, yet always
remember. I told them that Jollibee was also human and that he
could also get hurt. Kamo bay tabangag sumbag di ba mo mabun-og,
I told them. If you were the one being punched to death,
wouldn’t you be all black and blue? They laughed, but their
faces gentled with a new light.

I actually enjoyed being with the kids. I got lots of hugs. I
never felt so alive and so young for such a long time.

Before leaving, Joely asked if she would see me again. I told
her yes, if she would be a good girl and that, she promised. She
gave me a great big hug though she only managed to wrap her
hands around my waist. But this she told me: Ate She, you’re a
very good person. I wish you were my sister.

Does a six-year-old lie? I wondered. Why did I ever say I hate
kids? Perhaps it was because I was scared of the
responsibilities and commitment but then, I’m no longer a
nine-year-old.