PREVIEW: New DSLR Camera for Taking Pictures and High-Def Video: Nikon D3300 and Two Lens Kits

Raw Samples

Most of these sample shots were made with the 18 - 55 mm lens, but with no lighting or adjusting these pictures, you can check out the quality of some of our first "macro" samples:

http://www.thespottedwalrus.com/outdoor-and-nature-new-photos-with-our-new-nikon-d3300/

Nikon D3300 Overview

For the price, this DSLR camera from Nikon packs quite a punch.  It has a few limitations that you sacrifice by saving the money buying a higher priced model -- enough to buy another NIKKOR lens with!  Though this model has the same sensors and most features of the D5300, Nikon left a few features out of the D3300, but it's hard to notice.  GPS tagging and the capability of wi-fi may not be built in, but you are still able to add these features later if you wish.  I'd suggest saving the money on the body and buy nice lenses to give you a great range of capabilities.

The D3300 is lightweight and very easy to use.  We bought one with the NIKKOR 18 - 55mm lens and then a NIKKOR 55 - 200mm telephoto lens to give us more range.

Another great feature is that it can shoot in full HD at 60 frames per second (fps)!  I would have asked for a few more video features and controls, but overall the quality of video is stunning for the price.  For instance, for some strange reason, you cannot control the aperture when in "live video mode", though you have full manual control over the camera if you wish in video mode, it is difficult in outdoor conditions to be sure your picture is in focus.  Something you have to get used to and find other ways to overcome -- it'd be terrible to shoot video to only find out things weren't in focus.

More photo samples, videos and a full review to come!  For more information, visit the product page on Nikon's website at http://www.nikonusa.com/en/Nikon-Products/Product/Digital-SLR-Cameras/D3300.html.

So far, we are very pleased with the 3300, it's ease of use, light weight, advanced features, and professional quality.

Smashwords.com: A great place to get your book or screenplay published.

Smashwords, a self-publishing platform for authors of all kinds, is at the forefront of the exploding self-publishing revolution.  Blogging has made thousands of people millionaires by simply sharing their opinions in a forum they control online, earning income from ad revenue and endorsements, fueling the ability to reach the masses.  The irony is that many of these people who make money blogging would do it for free -- they just want to express themselves and be heard, so much so, there are people who would be happy to even pay to blog!

Web publishing has empowered millions of people to express themselves and Smashwords makes it easy to self-publish, it's so easy you could have your own ISBN and your book on Amazon and iTunes in the less than a day.  Pretty powerful!  The web, and its ability to deliver content at little cost has supplemented the income of millions of people in the form of blogs, websites, self-publishing, and self distribution.  The ability to self-publish and self distribute high resolution video content and reach a potential world audience with little distribution costs, little physical labor or material costs, and no costs in energy has already transformed many lives and revolutionized the publishing and entertainment industry.

I felt empowered when I published a short story I wrote for a writing contest and decided to publish it on Smashwords.  I haven't exceeded my goal of 10,000 downloads, but it get closer to that every day.  Not exactly Stephen King, but it was a great feeling that people actually took the time to download it on their e-reader and perhaps read the whole story, all 2,340 words of it!  Here's a snapshot and link to my short story if you would like to learn more about Smashwords and how explore how it works, no better place to start than a word-of-mouth recommendation!

https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/353705

If you want to learn more, feel free to contact me through the contact form at my website or Google +.  I had such a great experience I decided to publish a screenplay I wrote back in 2008 called "Fine English".  You can visit the landing page for this full 27,000 word screenplay.  Smashwords help you market and distributes your book to a network of over 100 million subscribers throughout the world.  Here's the cover and link to the screenplay:

https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/432465

I unfortunately encountered a few formatting errors, which Smashwords is very good at helping authors rectify.  They don't want your work showing up on iTunes and other digital libraries looking wonky.  You can even set a "sample" portion to "tease" readers and allow them to read a little bit of your book to help them decide if they want to download it.  Revenue sharing is a pretty fair arrangement, and the options for different readers to download your work in multiple formats for Kindles, iPads, etc are thorough and pretty reliable.

No more "middle-men" and publishing "gatekeepers"

Information and stories used to take so long to reach people because they had to be in physical forms and be physically distributed so they could be read.  All that energy and time to put into making copies then packing them on horseback or put in ships that sailed across the vast oceans.  It's amazing we humans ever bothered to leave the caves we lived in.  Now, we complain when our Internet connection is slow so the latest movie we're streaming pauses to fill the buffer.  Good grief, we're all such wusses now.

The Internet has unleashed the individual, it has empowered them to bypass the "middle man".  If you had enough creativity and guts, you not only can publish your book without dealing with an agent OR a pedantic publisher, you can produce your own movies and distribute them yourself without being beholden to distributors and agents and the other self-serving industry insiders who like to think their club is just too exclusive for the masses.  Likewise, a book author no longer has to go through a publisher, they can just post their writing online.  Many literary agents and book publishers are self-proclaimed experts and most of them, like all of us, are only human and subject to perceptions that are skewed, distorted and often too self-serving so they may think they're experts but in actuality they've lived too long in a bubble and aren't really in tune with what the plethora of markets ripe for paying readers.  One more thing about publishers, they always say they're looking for specific topics, genres and material, so they don't bother accepting or reading anything out of their own comfort zone.  Does this sound like a good business model?  Doesn't it cost the same to print 320 pages of novel X as it does novel Y?!

J.K. Rowling was rejected over 6 times before a publisher accepted her work, enough said about the "wisdom" of the publishing industry.  No longer do individuals and groups have to produce their creative vision to please these gatekeepers!  It's been a revolution in the making that will soon reach its apex the first time a complete unknown, perhaps the next Thomas Payne, breaks the 10 million book download threshold for his (or her) masterpiece that will shape America's future and mold its destiny much like Thomas Payne's Common Sense did centuries ago.  The miracle here will not just be the feat of obscurity beaten merely by the pure quality of one's writing, but the very fact not a single book will be physically printed and the book will manage to reach and impact so many people.  Possible?  You bet.  Will it happen?  I believe so, eventually.

Speed up your Wordpress website quickly at no cost

Please check out my latest review of "WP Fastest Cache", a Wordpress plug-in that I have been using this past year.  I hope it helps speed up your website.  In some cases, I have seen a 10 fold decrease in load times!

http://tools.belchamber.us/wordpress-caching-accelerating-your-website-reliably-with-wp-fastest-cache/

Filing Taxes Last Minute? H & R Block Tax Preparation Easy and Fast

If you are looking for a last minute recommendation to filing your taxes, I haven't experienced a better service than H & R Block.  In less than 30 minutes, you can file your taxes at www.HRBlock.com and it's free unless you have some crazy deductions or need to file a Schedule C for a small business.  If you have a couple of businesses, you will only be charged once for one or more Schedule C's.

It's well worth the $34.99 they charge for those extra business write-offs.  H & R Block has continuously improved their website useability and overall cover almost every dreaded IRS income tax detail to the very last stone which they do not leave unturned.  It has been a very good service, it's just, well.... unfortunate that we Americans do it to ourselves and have voted for politicians and created such a monstrous machine.

Why do we subject ourselves to the torture of having to file taxes?   Seriously.

...It's just unfortunate and a waste of our country's resources and collective time that we have this silly annual filing fest in the first place

Why can't it just be a simple pay-as-you-go and WHY, someone please tell me, WHY do we tax peoples' income of all things?!  Taxing income is the most counter-productive, idiotic, self-destructive scam ever invented.  There's no surer way to hold back a nation's potential, burden the poor, and encourage waste, fraud, and sloth.  Why do we punish people for working to put food on the table?  Why do we discourage industry and productivity so directly?  Why don't we just come out and say it -- "If you work you will have to pay for the privilege."  How stupid can you get?

I know what you're going to say, it's because we need to pay taxes for all the government provides us.  Do you really think the government provides us?  Is taxing income really the only way a government can get money from its citizens?  Really?!  Think about this -- your taxes are providing for the government and in return you get to categorize, file, claim, mail, vouch, record, stamp, sign, seal, file (again), notarize, pay, deposit, dispute, amend, stand in line like some paralegal clerk on endless fools errands.  Yes, all these fun things for us all to do, enacted by us all.

We're all a bunch of foolish chumps getting fleeced, out to turn hard working Americans into pencil pushing, paper filing, tie-wearing, accountant and attorney supporting misguided, misallocating sissies our predecessors, ancestors, forefathers, past titans of industry, previous philosophers and other real people who helped build this country with their blood and sweat would shake their head in disgust at.  We have lost our way, America.

For those who would also appreciate the absurdity of carrying a typewriter into a battlefield, I hope one day we regain our common sense and find a better way and lean our government to the size and scope the Constitution is meant to restrict it to -- before it's too late.

Until then, be a chump like me and file your taxes on time then go to work and earn the right to do it again.  Aren't we lucky.  ... or start voting Libertarian!

Disaster Restoration, Home Remediation, and Home Service Companies have an experienced advertising ally with RestorationAdvertising.com

Television advertising is still the strongest and most effective form of advertising.  If you own a disaster restoration company in the U.S. or Canada, I bet competition for market share is high.  Often, the tactics of some of the bigger restoration/remediation companies means to attack or mock the smaller companies.

"They only have 3 trucks and 6 employees, they can't handle bigger jobs," they will clamor, omitting the fact that they themselves often need to resort to using subcontractors or share resources for bigger restoration jobs.  What your smaller restoration company needs is a solid plan -- a business AND marketing plan.  Then, you need to assess your budgets and align them with your expectations.

If you can afford to invest enough advertising dollars to reach 100 GRPs of your market (that's gross rating points) every month and sustain that for a whole year, if that won't break your advertising budget, do it.  Why?  You need to advertise consistently to build your name awareness and be top-of-mind.

No one plans on a disaster

No one ever wants to make a call to your company, but if they come home to a flooded home, chances are if you're in Richmond Virginia you will remember to call "MA Williams Heating and Air" over someone else.  Why?  They advertise.  They stand out, they air memorable TV spots that break through the local clutter and catch the viewers' attention.

Many companies out there strive to accomplish raising their market profile but without a cohesive plan in place, a budget and a commitment to let advertising work for them, they fall short.  They resort to all sorts of ploys, radio, email campaigns, mailers, newspaper ads.  Still, all advertising studies prove that as effective as an advertising mix is, you're still much better off -- 20 to 1 in many cases when measuring your ROI, to invest your advertising into television first and augment with the rest.

TV leaves a bigger imprint on the brain

This is a fact that people who view video recall the content much more frequently and longer than any other form of advertising.  Since TV is so effective, if your company is spending money on other forms of advertising and your fleet vehicles are decked out, your company office building and warehouse(s) are clean and marked with excellent signage, your website is SMART PHONE FRIENDLY, and you already have a sales manager to build relationships within the community, focus on your budget and expectations to see if you shouldn't allocate any remaining advertising dollars to a persistent, consistent, and memorable television ad campaign so you can STAY TOP OF MIND.

For more information, visit RestorationAdvertising.com.

Tortoise SVN & CollabNet Subversion Edge: A great document versioning repository starter kit and a simple and fast way to manage your code projects for free

About two years ago I was introduced to Tortoise SVN.  I confess I heard of it before but never looked into it.  Revision control is very important in managing many of your code projects, but it can even be used for many other types of digital projects and be very useful for any activity where you have a team of people contributing parts of digital assets used towards the compilation of a larger project.  It can store almost any type of file, including text, images, and special documents like PDF and .doc files.

It's a big undo time machine.  It's like a gatekeeper, bookkeeper, filing cabinet, secretary, note taker, and more.  As a matter of fact, the only thing it needs is about a 20 minute installation and plenty of disk space somewhere on your network.  It does most of the work, but if you ever made a change to the website and needed to restore it quickly back to a version that was more stable, you can do all that with a click of a button.

Worry free tracing and tracking as the puzzle gets built

Though I'll focus on the benefits of managing your web code for websites using Tortoise SVN with CollabNet's SubersionEdge SVN server, I can't help but look back and wonder how I worked at so many large corporate companies and they did not take advantage of document versioning and how much easier everyone's lives would have been, how much time we all would have saved had we been using revision control!  It streamlines many things and becomes more useful and vital as the size of your organization and the number of contributors to any digital projects grow.  I am not exaggerating, it will make your company more productive and save countless hours reassembling, hunting down, recreating documents and other digital assets.

The systems that control revisions are called different names, according to its Wiki page, it's known as "revision control", "version control", and "source control".  A VCS is a common acronym for a stand-alone program that accomplishes multiple versioning and document repository tasks.

20 minutes to having a professional code environment

You first need to install and run an SVN server.  There are plenty of different systems out there, some you can install on an existing server, of course, but some come with a server built in.  If this is your first time setting things up, your fastest solution isn't a bad choice at all -- even for large projects.

Install Subversion Edge

Go to www.collab.net/downloads/subversion and download and install the proper Subversion Edge file for your computer.  As of this article, it's free, unless you need the Enterprise version.  If you already have a server running on your computer, keep in mind that Subversion Edge should have its own IP address to work properly or you will have to do some deeper configuration and possibly change the port addresses as well.

Once you install Subversion Edge, there are some basic settings, just follow what they recommend, this should work 90% of the time and won't take you long.  Subversion Edge operates in the background, it's very efficient with your Windows resources.  I'm no Windows expert, but I believe Subversion Edge runs as a service, not a program, so it's not something you click and launch, it's just on until you stop the service in the computer's manage menu.

Getting to the SVN server is as easy as opening a web browser and typing in the computer's IP:3343, the number after the colon being the port.  The actual address will be provided to you upon set up, by the way.  It's simple, now you have a server, it's ready to accept any kind of document.  You have to set up your first repository, but that's easy, this is just like setting up a bank account -- you're setting up a place and some credentials so there's an understanding that things will be deposited or withdrawn in the form of digital information (unfortunately not money!)  I like to use the standard SVN folder structure where all the code gets stored in the /trunk -- just in case you are wondering when you install, your files don't have to mirror this and you can put them anywhere or not even in a sub folder.

Tortoise SVN

Now you need a way to tell your SVN what files and the location of files belong to a designated repository.  That's where Tortoise comes in, it's a simple program that operates on the Windows system level that will then piggy back onto Windows Explorer and add a contextual menu interface to allow you to do all sorts of things with a single file, group of files, or even a collection folders.  Keep in mind that Tortoise SVN isn't a program you double click and run, it's installed and running along with Windows Explorer that you call on mostly by right-clicking  to get to the menu to control things.

Here is a screenshot of Tortoise in action.  By the way, you don't need to install an SVN server like CollabNet, Tortoise does have its own built-in repository system, but this is local file based and really only recommended if your repository locations are kept on your local computer and not somewhere on a shared network drive.

Screenshot of Tortoise SVN contextual menu in Windows

Install Tortoise SVN

Just go to http://tortoisesvn.net/downloads.html and download the proper version for your computer.  There's a lot to learn about revision control and we've just touched the surface.  Knowing your previous code is safe and you can quickly restore code will empower you to not have to worry about keeping versions and multiple versions of files any more so you can focus on being more effective.

The first two commands you will learn is to "Add" files and "Commit" them.  Committing not only sends the files to the server and timestamps them, it allows you to type a quick note so you can reference the phase of the project at that particular time so you can easily reference and find those files later.

Another useful command you will probably use is "Clean Up", though it is unclear the background processes this involves, this usually helps keep your files in order before sending to the repository.  There are plenty of other very useful and more advanced features that you should experiment with when you get more comfortable using revisioning, especially if you work with multiple developers in collaborative team environment -- it's essential to learn how to branch and merge documents.  Also, never again will you have to just wonder how to compare two different versions of the same file and comb through line by line, Tortoise an highlight changes using a very straightforward file comparison tool.

Other uses for revision control

Revision control can also help manage and maintain creative projects such as video production or animations

I highly recommend using revision control for projects outside of web development!  For instance, if you are a 3D animator like me, you will tend to create a lot of versions of the same project and name each file with a sequential number and possibly a small note after it.  Being in the video production business for over 20 years, I know revision control could also help manage video projects, too.  Not only could you keep back ups of your video files automatically, you could version your animations, designs, and video editing projects in Adobe Premiere Pro or Apple Final Cut Pro without resorting to some crazy naming convention.  Whenever you reach a new phase of your project, you simply "Commit" the files to the repository.

Writing a novel?  Break it up into different sections and save them in their own repository so you can later have trackable notes and a history of your writing!

The other nice benefit of using document versioning is that all your past files aren't laying around in your main project folders, they're simply stored in the cloud, waiting for you if you need them!

Looking for an affordable email campaign service? The free version of this one is better than paid versions of most.

Talking eblasts: If it comes down to MyEmma or Mail Chimp, go with the monkey.  I've used both systems pretty extensively for different clients/employers in the past.  I know there are others, but I'm only reviewing what I know.  Constant Contact I hear is good, I know MyEmma is acceptable, Campaigner's a bit clunky, but when it comes to simple, fast, easy to use, yet very powerful, on top of performing best, being more reliable, and has by far the best interface, dashboard, campaign list manager, flexible ways to import your email addresses and other business contacts, it's no contest.

MyEmma?  Yo Emma

MyEmma claims it is designed by designers for designers.  I believe it, there's just something behind the scenes and under the hood that feels like the website was written by designers instead of industry-leading web developers.  Don't get people who mostly write code for a living to design websites, that's a good rule of thumb, but it also goes the other way.  Designers, leave the coding to the coders!

MyEmma's import functions are often clunky and I found them downright unreliable.  In the past, our graphic designer had to upload an Excel spreadsheet sometimes over the course of a couple days.  I found their customer support was slow and unresponsive, but I'll give them credit for following up and correcting the issues... eventually.  It came down to a few services and MyEmma came highly recommended.  They changed their pricing, yet for almost a year, a client of mine was not notified so they kept paying per email sent instead of the unlimited emails sent and pricing structure based on the total list of email recipients.  Not too happy with the fact they were not forthcoming and proactive with their customers.  One client was paying over $400 more each month than if they knew they qualified for the other plan!

Mail Chimp doesn't monkey around

Mail Chimp, on the other hand, I find is not only much easier to use, but for very small businesses with less than a thousand email addresses, you can run email campaigns at absolutely no cost as of this post.  Not only that, I found Mail Chimp's website to be the best in reliability, speed, performance, and interface design.  If you don't know HTML, there are plenty of great templates and a very easy and intuitive editor that will help you compose an email campaign that is fully scalable to mobile devices.  It's also very easy to clone and existing campaign so you don't have to start from scratch.  Before you send the email, or schedule it to be emailed, you can preview it on different devices.  Having tested it on my phone and other devices, it is a very reliable WYSIWYG.

Don't let their playful, goofy name fool you.  Mail Chimp's free service is pretty robust, going pro will unlock many other useful features that will allow you to optimize your campaigns.  As popular and powerful as email is becoming as the premier digital marketing medium, increasing your click through and conversion ratse by a half a percent could yield an amazing increase in profitable results.  Like many of the other email campaigner services, Mail Chimp has all the major features including merging certain data to customize each outgoing email, say, with the recipient's actual name or other useful data that will enable you to optimize your messaging and increase your email marketing effectiveness.

Split A/B Testing and more

Mail Chimp offers an easy way to manage split testing of your emails, it's amazing how small variances to your email design can often yield a 20% improvement.  This is an invaluable research tool that will allow you to increase your email campaigns while also providing you data that can help you determine the most effective marketing calls to action.  What appeals more?  What words inspire action in the market place?  The web is a great source of marketing research that will give you data to help make better and more informed marketing decisions later in other mediums and advertising, such as long form videos, TV commercials, radio ads, print ads, and even billboards.  Regional analytics, if your company has a wide service area, can help you rebalance your store inventory based on regional preferences and what is trending up and down in certain areas.  The web is your front line to experiment and run surveys and test sample your products and services.

A great free introduction

Mail Chimp has a great introductory program so if you have a small business and you don't know where to start, or you don't have much of a budget, you will thank me later by having learned about Mail Chimp here.  It's free to sign up, the website is excellent, its services are extremely powerful, I could go on with my praise.  I've been very impressed.  It's the easiest service to upload or import your client contact data.  They have a great feature where you can select a table from a customer list and copy it to your computer clipboard with Ctrl-C, then just paste it into the import text box.  No clicking "Browse" and having to find the Excel file to only find out it's not formatted right.  That was the problem Riddle's Jewelry was having with MyEmma, it plagued our Advertising Department for over a year.

I've saved a lot of time and also money using Mail Chimp.  It's also a great service for you to learn how to leverage your emails, they make it really easy, but it also has a lot of more powerful features I hope your company will grow and need to take advantage of.


Aaron Belchamber is the former GM of Random Art House advertising agency, former Advertising Director and Lead Web Developer for Riddle's Jewelry, and is currently a Business Consultant and Web Developer in Jacksonville, Florida.

Know someone in the home restoration or home recovery business? They can enter their business in a free directory that gets top search engine rankings.

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RestorationAdvertising.com has decided to lend their great search engine rankings for "restoration advertising" to these companies as a gesture to the millions of dollars of business these companies have given to RestorationAdvertising.com over the past 10 years.  So if you're a home restoration, remediation, recovery, or service business, please sign up, have your friends sign up, if they get more phone calls and referrals and we can help, that's good news for everybody!

Just pass on this link:  http://www.restorationadvertising.com/directory/

Thank you again for letting us partner with so many incredible small businesses across the U.S. and Canada!

- Aaron Belchamber

NBC's 'Hannibal' Returns for Another Season. Mads Mikkelson & Hugh Dancy Outstanding, If You Can Stomach the Weekly Gore Fest

I'll admit that I enjoy horror movies, they're fun.  NBC's "Hannibal" is a one hour horror movie each week.  It's more like a blend of horror, suspense and crime.  What does that say about our society and myself for that matter that we enjoy watching shows that are so careless with human life?  Well, I don't speak for everyone, but if the ratings of the show were good enough to get picked up another season, the data speaks for itself.  Such disparagement and degradation of humanity unfolding visually in such a civilized and creepy way.  Is it a sign our society is crumbling or has horror like "The Walking Dead" and "Hannibal" become more accessible and mainstream since they're weekly shows and not bundled up in two hour Hollywood vehicles?  After all, horror movies have always been popular since the advent of movies, right?

"Hannibal" is riddled with many ironic gems, combined with the excellent psychotic symbiotic team of Hugh Dancy and Mads Mikkelson, all mixed together the ingredients really makes this show work.  I used "ingredients" kind of as a pun for what the show is centered around and that's food.  Human food.  Just kidding, but really, if this show is popular enough and it portrays such evil in such a civilized manner on prime time national television, what is the world coming to?

It's entertainment.

I mean, there are real sickos out there but yet, as entertainment, Hannibal features the worst mutilations, murders, sick, psychotic, grotesque, disfigurement and abuse of other humans and twists the souls of the victims and to some extent, the souls of viewers. There's a mild tone and always hints of cannibalism in each episode.  The audience knows Hannibal Lector is a sick man.  We know the gourmet meals he is preparing for himself and guests during an episode are actually human flesh.  We're kind of bystanders to his sick joke of introducing human flesh to the unsuspecting, violating their trust and friendship -- perhaps this is the most sinister actions after the actual murders of his victims?!  Yet, Mads Mikkelson is such a sympathetic character, despite his slightly porcelain rigidity and social awkwardness.  He is sometimes childlike -- perhaps he knows not what he's actually doing.  Yes, he is a brilliant doctor.  Yes, he likes to eat parts of people that he keeps in his freezer.  He's still a likable cannibal who has managed to live fairly normally in modern society and became a renowned psychologist.  He's adjusted much like vampires have adapted to blend into our society in other fictional stories.

Are we all really that desensitized?!  Okay, some may argue, it parallels the moral decay of our society.  Blah blah blah.  Lighten up, when Anthony Hopkins jumped off the screen as Hannibal and slowly sauteed Ray Liotta's brains in the second Hannibal, sure we cringed, but unlike vampires, sophisticated cannibals could be real and that's what makes cannibals like Lector really scary.  It makes you think if you meet someone too refined that perhaps they are a cannibal.  I mean, there must be something wrong with them, right?  No one's perfect.  You might even question the roast beef the next time you're over a "friend's" house.  Ask yourself -- do you really know them?!  :-)

"Hannibal" is not perfect, but it's a good dish... if you have the stomach for it.  I better end this review because I can just write until my hand literally falls off with bad puns about "Hannibal".  I'll put you out your misery by ending it now.

Where do YOU stand politically? Take "The World's Smallest Political Quiz" to find out!

This is a very interesting and probably pretty accurate test that also helps explain where you stand on personal and fiscal political issues.  Are you more of a freedom-loving Libertarian or do you think Socialism or Communism is the way to go?  Personally, no personal issues belong in politics, but unfortunately many people in the U.S. think politics should command every aspect of our lives.  Often, people are all for a centralized big brother but are for making exceptions for themselves, their companies, families, and peers.

Are you a political hypocrite?  Maybe you are and just don't know it, maybe you know someone who would refuse to take this quiz because they're so opinionated they will never have an open mind.  Well, how about challenging them to take it?!  Or better yet, share this link with your family and friends, if nothing else, it's a great conversation starter.  Who else doesn't want to get into a political argument with friends and family?!  It could be better than board game night, at least after the kids go to bed...

http://theadvocates.org/quiz/quiz.php

Incidentally, I scored heavy on both personal and financial freedom.  I'm a Libertarian and proud of it.  So where are you on the political map?!  Find out now!

“ The Quiz has gained respect as a valid measure of a person’s political leanings. ” - The Washington Post “ The World’s Smallest Political Quiz stands ready to help you determine your political identity. Quick and relatively painless. ” - USA Today

“ The World’s Smallest Political Quiz is savvy and willing to tell you the truth. ” - YAHOO! Magazine “ Give this quiz a try. It’s fun, and who knows, you may be surprised at what you find. ” - Politics on the Net by Bill Mann

Show Review: "House of Cards" on Netflix a "Must See" If You Can Tolererate Headline-Paralleling Government Corruption Dramas (HPGCD)

That's right, we're starting a new genre with Netflix introducing Kevin Spacey in "House of Cards".    Headline-Paralleling Government Corruption Dramas (HPGCD).  He and Robin Wright are excellent as the calculating and ruthless politically ambitious couple a la Clintons.  The only difference is their names are Frank and Claire Underwood.  As a matter of fact, I believe after looking back to season two that there are more similarities of "House of Cards" to the Clintons than many who put the Clintons on a pedestal believe, but that's for the political pundits and not a reviewer of things.

Headline Paralleling

Indeed, looking back through headlines and political theater of the Clintons and other politicians, I wonder if the Underwoods aren't a composite of the Clintons and the Kennedys -- both left a destruction of lives and sometimes even murder (Ted Kennedy) and rape (Clinton), behind them in their wake of rising to the top.  "House of Cards" captures this effect very evenhandedly and present it almost as a natural reality and reaction as the political exploit, use, then discard people and whole organizations for the expediency of accomplishing their own ends. Ingredients to political success like barley, hops and water is to making beer -- it just can't be made any other way and work.

Lies, broken promises, set ups, blackmail, pushing people to suicide, murders, extortion.  Just another day in Washington (Democrat or Republican).  It's all happened and these stories are lurking in the shadows of some very prominent politicians from Kennedy, through Bush, and all the way to Obama.  Way before our modern day politicians, political intrigue almost seems as commonplace as the very corruption of government on display everyday.  It's just a part of our history.  The men in power get there almost by very questionable means.  It's funny and scary how we public have tolerated this.  We hear a lot of, let's say BS coming out of the mouths of politicians everyday and we, the public, know and can hear the disingenuous politicians preach values and morality when we all know many of them are the worst offenders.  As if hypocrisy and a large helping of condescension along with a superiority complex are the other ingredients to political success.  Without these ingredients, we don't get those effective bubbles in our beer.

I don't think I'm going out on a limb to say that every major event that unfolds (or one would argue Kevin Spacey's character forces through his own acts and ability to manipulate people) in House of Cards parallel past headlines related to the politically elite.  Someone's chief of staff was probably found dead with his head battered in and another rape victim who was propped up for media points probably turned into a drug-induced zombie.

The Truth is Sometimes Hard to Swallow 

Besides the disturbing realities that happen behind closed doors, the sets that portray the White House are very convincing.  The actor who plays the incumbent President seems to grow in power and being a convincing president as Season Two unfolds.  Kevin Spacey as Frank Underwood is so good, though.  At times, he breaks the scene and deadpans into the camera and speaks his deepest thoughts to us, the audience.  A la "Ferris Bueller's Day Off", which also used this device to engage the audience, Kevin Spacey takes his darkness and includes the audience in on sharing his philosophy of life, which is often logical but as warped as many of the politicians who unfortunately have been, and will continue to get elected.  Sometimes, he's self critical and there's a glint of shame in his actions, but it takes strength to overlook ones' weaknesses and vices as long as the ends are justified.

As a political soap opera,  House of Cards is excellent, there are some shifting-in-time moments where what would take years of bureaucratic red tape typical of the federal leviathan only takes an episode.  I am so thankful our beloved potential felons in Washington can't move as swiftly, usually, it's a reminder why we need a limited government.  No matter how you feel politically, no one can dispute the fact our government is probably even more corrupt and morally bankrupt than this show portrays Washington.  It's a reminder to us all that we need a limited government if for nothing else to limit the cancerous corruption that will probably always be part of the federal government.

The fact that Frank Underwood is a Democrat and Hollywood is so liberal makes me wonder, even hope, that even liberals see this reality.  After watching this show, I'm not more cynical than I was towards government, and I know it's just "fiction" -- you decide if many episodes don't parallel our reality.  Some episodes are a bit unbelievable and contrived, but Kevin Spacey makes this show work so well.

"House of Cards" is different, it's unapologetically honest, it's brutal in its portrayal of mostly Democrats in office, and it's creepy because you know it happens, that people are this calculating and ruthless, and the worst part -- a majority are morally corrupt and are beholden to granting favors at us tax payers' expense. They are in Washington to stay in power, to ensure we the people serve their self interests.  It's their job to spin this reality to make it look like they're there "working hard for the people."

We're simply pawns in their game of leverage, manipulation, and sometimes just a game to show off their power out of pride.  It's only just a $500 million bridge project, who cares where the money has to come from, I want a Casino in my state.  It's a great country we live in, I recommend watching House of Cards if nothing else to scare you into wanting what's best for our country -- limit government, you limit its stench of corruption.  It's the only way our country will survive in the end else they will take us down to stay on top.  These are people who will turn on themselves, they would eat others' young to stay in power.  Like the audience that knows this is really the way of the political world, we also know this is true.

Papa Murphy's: Kramer from Seinfeld was onto something

Do you remember the episode of Seinfeld where Kramer had the brilliant idea of opening a restaurant where people had to cook their own food? Well, as silly as that sounds, there's a relatively new company with basically the same concept as a business model.   I believe it is a profitable one, however, because it is soooo good. The dough is fresh, the toppings are packed on. That's right, if you haven't gone to a Papa Murphy's to pick up a pizza, you won't wait for them to bake it, but you will have to take the pizza home then bake it yourself.

Set oven to 425 degrees and 20 minutes later, take it out of the oven and wait 5 savory minutes.  Our favorite right now is the Mediterranean Chicken.  We get the large, and yes, I'm a convert from just all meat and a few standard veggies on pizza to trying these crazy, hippy-dippy new fandangled pizzas and I won't go back.  I'll be more adventurous from now on!

Visit Papa Murphy's and try it!  We usually get two larges for our family and we have enough slices left over for a few lunches the following couple of days, all for under 20 bucks.  I'm a big fan of Little Ceasar's, too, but Papa Murphy's has the edge in flavor, variety and quality of ingredients.  You just can't go wrong, and there's nothing better than heating your home with the smell of pizza wafting from the kitchen.

They have normal and thin crust, but my whole take on paper thin crust pizza is pretty logical -- why not just order toppings on cheese if you don't like dough?  It makes no sense to me -- kind of like Kramer's idea, but who knew that something so crazy could taste so good.  I can't wait to try the stuff crust...

Incidentally, I am not paid to endorse any products, there are some companies that would probably prefer I didn't mention them, but if the good folks are Papa Murphy's would like to send me a few special coupons, I won't turn them down.  :-)

Movie Review: "The Pact" -- No Stars, but Packs A Punch

"The Pact" is an excellent horror movie written and directed by Nicholas McCarthy.  I'd tell you more back story about him and the actors, but I never heard of any of them until I watched the end credits and realized Casper Van Dien, the guy from that flop of an alien bug movie, appeared minor role as a cop / detective.  In their defense, I'm sure they never heard of me and they've accomplished a heck of a lot more in the movie business and not spending any of their spare time reviewing movies in a blog barely anyone reads.

This movie feels indy, seems like it's an indy, but it's shot and lit like the real thing.  It's a good story, has very good and convincing acting, and excellent lighting/cinematography.  It feels bleak and it's lit with a jaundice discomfort.

By the way, who cares if it IS an indy, anyway?  I'd like to see more movies made completely out of the mainstream, I can't wait for the day someone makes a movie and not a single corporation can touch them so the profits actually go to those who deserve them -- the writers and production company (and the actors, too -- but who needs to stick up for them when they have an awards show every week and gloat about how awesome they are?!)

The Pact's special effects weren't over the top, modest, but convincing.  Not once did I feel like once again I was watching another "almost" totally professional film where it didn't quite make it because the budget was so low the "crew" (the director's two buddies and some guy named Jay whose dad is a doctor so indulges his son with fancy video equipment) had to use an office chair for a camera dolly.  I believe I didn't see any dolly shots in this movie, the camera tilts and pans, but who says every movie needs a sweeping camera shot to immerse the audience?  Apparently, no fancy hollywood camera rigs mattered as the action, suspense, and supernatural action unfolded.  It's seamlessly edited and each moment purposeful.  I have no doubt Nicholas McCarthy knows how to squeeze every last ounce of production value out of his shoots, that's for sure!

If you like a bit of suspense ala Hitchcock with a darker twist, perhaps more "Psycho" and less "Rope", with a bit more gore and actual supernatural interventions, watch it.  It's a good two hour ride!

The creepy twist at the end ties everything neatly together.  I recommend "The Pact" on Netflix, it has tension, suspense, and some mystery -- along with some excellent acting.

Movie Review: "Red Lights" with Sigourney Weaver, Robert De Niro & Cillian Murphy. Save Your Bandwidth.

All three of these stars could not save a very weak story from imploding and falling on its own weight.  Do not bother watching "Red Lights" -- I wish I could have gone back in time and told myself what I'm telling you now.  Cillian Murphy shows he has range as an actor, he's the "Scarecrow" from Batman.  He can play a very sympathetic protagonist, too.  Despite some excellent acting, I found myself trying to figure out how many rewrites this thing went through to limp its way through production and on to distribution.  When De Niro floats in the air on stage and there's a terrible camera shake that's supposed to be an earthquake, I felt sorry for the movie.  I just wanted it to end, for the sake of the actors.... and for me.

Red Lights?  FahGetAboutIt!

Movie Review: "Flight" with Denzel Washington a Total Waste of His Talent

I'm not sure why I watched this entire movie, but did so I could write about it, I guess.  In "Flight" (2012), Denzel Washington plays a rake of an airline pilot who has more vices than a plane full of people have virtues.  Having seen the preview, I thought it would be interesting, especially in the wake of the real-life airline heroics by the fearless captain of a flight in real life by Chesley Burnett "Sully" Sullenberger, III.

Something you need to know:  Denzel's character, and the entire movie have nothing in common with Captain Sully.  That much is very, very clear. Oh, I wish it was...

Was there a purpose to this story?  Possibly, but to get to final minutes where (spoiler alert) the main character finally stands for something besides his own selfish interests, you are dragged through enough painful and awkward moments of his waning life all rolled into one tragic, selfish, misguided alcoholic.  He probably also contracted AIDS from the heroine-addicted girlfriend he met, but the writers probably just forgot to add that out of sheer clutter of the screenplay. 

I can hear all the Hollywood writers sitting around the table, working on the redraft before the execs would approve production:  "Let's make Denzel's character one unsaviory dude where nothing goes right for him -- American audiences want to see people worse off than them in these hard economic times."

Despite all his shortcomings, Denzel still manages to snort cocaine on screen while drunk and beseech his few friends with not-so-surprising self-destructive behavior.  You hope more for the character, I felt sorry for him and have to admit that I felt sorry for Denzel even though he probably made millions acting out such a travesty of human indignity and debauchery.  I added that last word "debauchery" just to round out my disdain of this movie and to hopefully impress upon the viewer that I'm so bored writing this review after being even more bored having watched this movie that I'm throwing out terms from another era that were once used to express my half-hearted outrage.

Don Cheadle, John Goodman, Bruce Greenwood all have one thing in common with Denzel Washington -- they all gave excellent character performances in an aimless movie so void of authenticity it's as if you are watching bad adult behavior before your eyes for the sake of pushing this meandering script to an "R" rating so it would simply have an excuse to have done poorly in the theaters.  "Oh, if it was toned down to PG-13, it would have done better."  This entire movie just seems to be written to reach the very same goal of Denzel's main character:  No where

Are you rooting for vindication or hoping Denzel's main character learns his lesson?  Perhaps, I was just rooting for the end credits to arrive as soon as possible -- like a flight that catches the right tailwind and you arrive 40 minutes earlier to your destination.  Believe me, I was hoping for a tailwind.  I'd suggest passing this up for Disney's "Frozen", even if you don't have kids.

Beware of Moving Company Scams: All My Sons Moving, Jacksonville Florida Practicing Deceptive Bidding & Switch and Bait Pricing

If you are moving to Jacksonville, I suggest getting multiple quotes and AVOID at all costs "All My Sons Moving" in Jacksonville.

I was quoted one price and they showed up and wanted to charge me double, including charging me a "fuel surcharge" on all three hours -- they only stayed for less than two!  What does fuel have to do with the two hours they were at my house, anyway?  They failed to mention any of this in my phone quote, even after I explicitly asked them if there were any extra charges, fees or taxes.

Simply put, this organization is a rip off and their treatment of me has already cost them THREE other  moves by friends of ours.  I will take it a step further and NEVER use this franchise no matter where I go.  "All My Sons" you have made a big mistake, so go waste money on your advertising I'll be happy to always recommend a company with scruples and share my experience with you to the world.  Business 101:  Stealing and deception will always bite you in the end.  People aren't as dumb as you think they are, they know when they're being fleeced.

Movie Review: "Planes" Works -- Family Fun Despite Familiar Plot Line

From the maker's of "Cars", Pixar has released "Planes," which are talking planes in the "cars world," as the opening title of the movie explains before the "Planes" title comes to rest in the opening scene.  We took our kids to see it -- it's fast-paced and definitely entertaining enough.  There are plenty of visual stunts and playful banter, but not nearly as much charm or humor as the original "Cars" movie.  Still, like almost anything made by Pixar, the strengths of this movie definitely carries much more weight than its few perceived weaknesses.

Who can ever argue that Pixar doesn't know how to make visually stunning and entertaining movies?  Seldom, if ever have I thought, "that movie was just too long" when it comes to Pixar.  My children would wholeheartedly agree and "Planes" was no exception.

There are a lot of similarities between the first "Cars" movie and "Planes".  You'd think with the millions pored into the production that Disney would focus first more on coming up with more original plots and giving the movie the depth and quality Hollywood's best is capable of providing, but as a story goes it all works.  It just feels like it could have been even better.  So, did they use the same screenplay and insert "plane" where it said "car" from the original "Cars" movie?  Not quite, but at some points in the movie, I thought I had seen some of the same action and dialog before....

Again, it's about racing, this time it's a plane race around the world, and, like Lightning McQueen, the main character is an underdog (by the name of Dusty Crophopper) who befriends an old, washed up  old veteran with a mysterious past who becomes his trainer to help him become a better racer.  Surprisingly, the quality of animation is excellent, of course, but it's hard to believe in the four years since "Cars" that there wasn't much noticeable improvement visually despite the accelerated advancements of technology.  Perhaps the advancements of technology made Pixar produce this movie with less people and more computers, which might be the reason behind its lack of depth and humanity compared to "Cars".  Not that Pixar needs any improvement to the quality of their productions, it just seems like they used the same computers to render the same type of effects from the original "Cars" movie.

The voices lent to the characters come off a little flat compared to other Pixar blockbusters, but that may be due to the fact that not a lot of character development or side stories are developed -- squeezed out probably by all the racing and flying scenes.  Plenty of action, but unlike other Pixars, you really feel like you're watching it all from afar, you aren't as involved in the action like most other Pixar classics where you're more absorbed in the characters so you're less of a sideline audience and more into the characters so you feel more involved.

None of that matters, however.  What does matter is our two young ones were glued the whole time and we all enjoyed it as a family.  Our youngest kept asking when Lightning McQueen and Mater were going to make a cameo.  We were expecting them to.

Movie Review: "The Tall Man" with Jessica Biel a Refreshingly Original Mind-Bender

Two things about movies that make me shut it off or leave -- exploiting children and degrading or violent scenes.  I catch enough national and local news headlines to make me wish most days I didn't have a television -- or radio, for that matter.  For instance, James Marsden was in a movie recently, whose title I won't even name, with a terribly violent rape scene thrown into a pretty interesting thriller -- up to the point a brutal scene ensued.

Violence for the sake of violence in a movie -- there's just no need for that, with all of Hollywood's pool of "best in the world" creative talent, these ploys are cheap and shows a lack of basic creativity in our screenplay writers and Hollywood's leadership in general.  It's insulting to the public to think we wouldn't appreciate higher quality from them -- sometimes, do you have a feeling they just see us all as ticket stubs?  I believe that such a cavalier attitude towards senseless violence and elevating the degradation of all forms of life cloaked in "art" has contributed to lowering many people's sense of respect for others, empathy, and basic human dignity.

In "Shindler's List," the violence is appropriate, especially when placed in the context of the purpose of that movie and the audience's expectations.  There's too much "shock factor" in a lot of TV shows and movies Hollywood churns out, but violence for the sake of showing violence is symptomatic of a much larger problem in today's society.  Hollywood is not to blame, but I sure wish they'd hold themselves to some standards, it would be difficult to argue that it would do damage if they did.  For all their chastising and scolding of the public to benefit certain social agendas they obviously cherish, would their "causes" be better served and paid more attention to if they showed us all more respect?

Anyway, back to the "The Tall Man" with Jessica Biel.  It's not too scary, and though yes, children are put at risk, nothing is what you imagine.  As a matter of fact, the writers of this movie do a great job pulling away just in time before you think "Oh, great, it's just another serial killer plot."  I won't give much away, but the twist, then ANOTHER twist on top makes you wonder throughout the movie. 

I'm not in the movie business, but usually when there's a parade of five different studio logo animations before a movie starts, I wonder.  Then, the opening titles reveal "Produced by..." and lists I believe six different studio names.  The next title reveals this movie was "Co-Produced By...." then lists these same studio names again.  Then, it was also "Produced in cooperation with..." I'm thinking, oh, boy, this movie is a salvage operation, passed along different studios like a hot potato.  It does really look silly when the big Hollywood production houses have to claim their cooperation so prominently in the opening sequence.  Does anyone really care?  I think it looks petty, but what do I know.  The opening titles looked like something I've thrown together in 3D Max in a day.  I thought, oooh, budget constraints.  It just made me wonder some more when I saw that Jessica Biel was one of the co-producers.  Uh oh, did she have to step in and help just to make sure this movie got distributed?

But alas, I gave the movie a chance -- and I'm glad I put my reservations aside!  Jessica Biel put on a great performance as the lead.  I won't go into many details, but there's a part near the end where she explains it all, there's a great sorrow, helplessness, and conflicted sincerity in her delivery.  Overall, Jessica Biel really shows great range in "The Tall Man."

It ties up nicely in the end where it all actually makes sense.  You're rooting for the bad guy, or is he/she the good guy?  Nothing is really what it seems on the surface, even after another dramatic revelation about the town, or Jessica Biel's character is revealed.

I think most will enjoy "The Tall Man" and I recommend it.  I don't know the circumstances behind its production, how well it did in theaters or if it went straight to DVD, but maybe this is the way more movies outside of the mainstream are seeing daylight now.  I hope to see more movies like "The Tall Man" where certain factions in Hollywood are throwing out the typical "shock" playbook and are valuing more potential screenplays based on the merits of originality and creativity.  This will be the new way to get more revenue for a longer period from their investments and by keeping their eye on quality of content, the ticket stubs will follow because these movies will have a much longer shelf life than the movies that follow the same old, predictable Hollywood formula.  Be prepared to be surprised, pleasantly, in "The Tall Man."

- Aaron Belchamber

Filing Taxes? H&R Block's Website Simple, Secure, and Affordable.

I don't know why it's affordable, and in most instances, it's absolutely free.  How do these tax prepare companies make any money if the majority of people who use them can file their taxes for less than $25?  It's probably too much of a good thing and it won't last, but I recommend filing your taxes online at hrblock.com.  I know tax time is over, thankfully, for another year, at least.  But perhaps you are filing late because of an extension, or you just weren't happy with the services you paid for last time.

The website and interface are secure and it guides you through all the mundane and just plain boring steps to file your taxes probably in less than an hour if you have all your tax forms already gathered.  Then, you can even file your taxes electronically and send it all to the IRS at the same time.  Job finished.  Go back to raking leaves or doing those other weekend tasks -- almost anything would be more fun, I'm sure you will agree!

If only taxes were pay-as-you-go and the income tax form was a simple post card with a basic mathematical formula.  I guess that would be too predictable and help us all be more productive.  Wouldn't that be the real American way?  One can only dream that we will stop oppressing ourselves with a growing 19 million words of tax code and counting.  Such lunacy, idiocy, complacency, bureaucracy -- and a lot of other words I could use that don't end in "cy".  Good luck, my fellow Americans, we're all going to need it....

Movie Review: "We Bought A Zoo" Fun & Heartfelt Family Movie, Matt Damon is Fantastic

I finally got around to see "We Bought A Zoo" starring Matt Damon & Scarlett Johansson.  I like to read movie reviews from sources I trust, because, let's face it, time is valuable.  You don't have enough time in your average lifespan to watch every movie and TV show, so you have to discriminate.  Such an ugly term for so reasonable of a means to manage one's life, isn't it?

"We Bought A Zoo" is not a waste of your time to rent.  It's heartfelt and you can enjoy it with youngsters, even, who will be thrilled to see such likeable characters interact with real, live animals.  I don't believe there's any CG in this film, they don't need any.  Matt Damon is such a likeable protagonist, he lost his wife and is stuck in his life so he takes a chance and moves his family -- his son and daughter, to a small town and buys a house, a house that happened to not have been a zoo, but still kind of is one.  I say kind of, because, as the head of the meagerly-supported zoo's veterinary clinic, Scarlett Johansson puts it, it's the love of animals that keeps her there, if she loved money more or at least a dependable paycheck, she wouldn't be there any longer.  The place is broke and in disrepair, the animals need a savior. 

Strangely, it's not an evil capitalist who's about to bulldoze the zoo down that's a threat.  As goes the  usual, common, boring, nonsensical Hollywood plot that all business endeavors are evil because making money is bad.  No, it's a lack of capital, of investment, of human entrepreneurship that's the problem and an average Joe who can see a profit opportunity that, in the end, can save the zoo and the animals is what is needed -- no eco terrorists are heroes in this film.  A refreshing perspective of the American spirit embodies the movie, if not by accident, the script seems to lead the audience to root for an honest business success story!  Go Hollywood!  Thank you for not ramming down your anti-capitalism agenda down our throats this time.  After all, I'm sure they're hoping to profit from the films they make, aren't they?!  Maybe they're coming around -- making money can be good...

Needless to say, Damon's character has depth and fits the reality of the recession era.  He's not Jason Bourne in this film, he's humble, he's lost, he's -- dare I say, very human.  He struggles with doubt, with renovating his house, the zoo, keeping his family together, and searches for answers.  As he transforms this property where he risked his life savings, he realizes this labor of love, of doing work above his own self, is transforming him, and his family.  There are some great, funny moments then, you are thrown back into the reality of life, in a particularly memorable scene, Damon is fantastic reliving a memory of when he met his wife and the details of that joyous moment, as he shares it with his children at the very café it all happened where he met their mother.  The timing, editing, flashback sequences are very effective and heartfelt, I wanted to cry right along with Matt, who just embraced this scene with such a great delivery of being in the moment again.

An excellent screenplay with plot twists, fun humor, and rich characters, you see a boy and girl grow up, and their father finds peace and a new start in life.  I say rent this movie, watch this with your whole family, especially if you have kids from 5 - 18, you'll be glad you did.  Along with the bowl of popcorn, do keep some napkins nearby (don't make it obvious and bring down tissues), someone is bound to have a good cry. 

After his excellent performance in "True Grit", I'm amazed how easily and comfortable Matt Damon is slipping into very diverse roles.  He doesn't seem to have such a big ego where he can't play the bumbling failure, the frustrated dandy, the silly side kick, along with playing the lead hero who can do no wrong.  In "We Bought A Zoo", the whole cast is great, but Matt Damon does an excellent job kind of playing a little bit of all those personalities and carries this movie in this two hour gem.  Oh yeah, Thomas Hayden Church and Scarlett Johannson's in it too.

Dolly Parton's Imagination Library -- Don't Miss Registering Your Kids!

This isn't really a review, but if you stumble upon this article and help spread the word about the "Imagination Library," well, it was well worth my writing about it.  I hope your family, friends and neighbors benefit from learning about a way to get free children's books mailed directly to your house.  Yes, it's true -- free books delivered to your kids through a national literacy advocacy program.



Just a few of the books our kids have received from Dolly Parton's Imagination Library this past year.

Strewn within a pile of magazines, bills, junk mail, and cryptic statements regarding health insurance arrives a wrapped package with your child's name officially printed on the mailing label, adding some excitement and pleasure to the otherwise blah business of life's daily postal encounter.  Alas, a diverse collection of many different books to enlighten your kids awaits -- many of these titles you may find in the library, or in book stores, others you may never find on public shelves.  Either way, you and your kids will be glad you registered -- classics and new stories, hand-drawn and photographed storybooks of all themes ready to encourage them to read more while you guide them through the stories.

If you have children, you really should go onto Dolly Parton's Imagination Library website  (http://www.imaginationlibrary.com/) and register them to receive free children's books.  The United Way of the Black Hills out here in South Dakota is an affiliate partner that we encountered in a public Rapid City event who gave us some literature about the program.  What a great cause -- and story.  Way back in 1996, America's own sweetheart, Dolly Parton, launched this literacy program to help kids in East Tennessee.  It has now grown to over 679,000 registered kids.  A heartfelt success story in a way that mirrors Dolly's own story of humble beginnings.

You can also visit their online store, they're always looking for businesses to sponsor them and their website also features Dolly's latest book, "Dream More", along with T-shirts and other paraphernalia they sell to help support the cause.  Please spread the word, and this link www.imaginationlibrary.com, to your friends and circles.

The more children read early on, the more prepared they will be later for life's challenges.  As a country, we all benefit when kids can read, so anytime we can encourage literacy, the better off we will all be.  Early reading skills lead to children being more capable to learn on their own, which empowers them to teach themselves.  It's also true that strong reading skills keep teenagers out of more trouble and they perform better in school.  Let's face it, kids are America's future, we need them to be smarter than we are.  In light of recent events, that might not be too hard, so let's encourage them to be A LOT smarter than we collectively as a country are now.  The more they can read for themselves, the more they can learn for themselves later and be more self-sufficient, skilled, dynamic, productive, marketable, innovative, and capable.  That's real progress.

UPDATE:   I think the database the Imagination Library uses could use some fixing up -- it seems sometimes people are receiving the same books at the same household if they have multiple children.  This could be an easy system update and save a lot of money in the future.  Please consider asking for some help -- I would be happy to look into this at no charge.

Side note:  Dolly, if you happen to be reading this article, we'd really love for you to sing our company's jingle....  I'm being serious.

- Aaron Belchamber

Need to Launch An Ecommerce Site Fast That Looks Clean and Professional? This Shopping Cart System Is Amazing at the Price of FREE!

Everyone wants to make money online.  Selling things is probably the easiest and clear-cut way to do this.  To sell effectively, you need a website that not only looks great, it must be reliable and secure.   I manage a few websites that net over $1 million in annual sales.  We are looking to fully redesign these ecommerce sites with the newest adaptive design and other technologies.  Being an "old-school" web programmer, the frameworks, templates and CMS's that have cropped up to assist businesses to launch a full-out web presence faster while looking better and being more reliable than ever, is quickly reaching its apex.  So much technology and innovation happen on the web so quickly, it's a bit overwhelming trying to live your life, do your job, and just keep up with all the changes and improvements.  The cycles of innovation are shortening and the lifespan of websites and designs are shortening even faster.

Your websites need to adapt to new devices.  If your website is not fully integrated to accommodate touch screens and tablets, you might as well start thinking about redesigning your website now.  More than 50% of your website visitors won't be using a mouse come late summer 2014.  The time to think about adapting and redesigning your web assets to improve your customer experience with your brand and increase your sales has long past.  It's better to react late than to stay the course with your outdated website with the small pull down buttons that most people on a tablet either won't be able to read or won't be able to click on.

Our team did some extensive research and decided to go with a shopping cart system and an easily-customizable theme.  We looked at all the options, including a bunch of free shopping cart systems.  The features in some communities are lacking, but we found Magento, www.magento.com, offered a "community" version that was full of features and affordable add-ons (or "plug-ins") that would reduce the SLDC (software development life cycle) from 3-4 months to less than a month.  We went with Magento and bought a theme pack from Envato.com that gave us the ground work already built within the Magento framework, saving us weeks of conceptual design phases.  Even though the customizable theme was less than $100, we still needed it to be adaptive so our website would look good on any device.  By the way, there are plenty of basic themes that look amazing on any device for the very low price of ..... free, you just have to look. 

We wanted some extra features with a particular design and style so we opted for a gorgeous template (I don't believe I'm saying this -- remember when "templates" looked so gaudy?  You could spot a template right when the page loaded?  Not any more.  Web developers, beware, if you're more of a web designer, you best refine your programming and database skills, because you will be going the way of graphic design for the print industry if you don't adapt....)  Anyway, it only took about 20 minutes to download the theme and install it into Magento.  It integrated seamlessly as you would hope, but probably not expect.  (I say "not expect" because that's when you usually get some cryptic error to only find out your web host doesn't allow you to change file permissions for certain directories in which case you should look for a new host.)  Speaking from experience, please make sure your web host accommodates Magento and ask for them to provide any guidelines in the case their server requires some changes to some files or settings before you go full bore into an install only to find out later you have to changes hosts or upgrade to a different server.

Magento's back end can be a little daunting, but there are tools that you can install to make life a little easier, including to help you automate the uploading of your products, images, and information in case you have a lot of SKUs and different product lines.  Depending on the size and scope of your online store, and the type of merchandise you have to offer, I would highly recommend saving the time and limited resources in the development process by setting up this free system instead of insisting your development team write it all from scratch.  I have developed plenty of websites from scratch -- the shopping cart, their back end and product databases, to the front end and full design from the ground up.  There is no need to reinvent the wheel when the open-source community has fully taken on the upkeep of these more labor and code-intensive (not to mention mundane) functions.  Imagine what you can accomplish by freeing up your business resources and the web talent around you to focus on more effective design, marketing, and performance!  You could treat your web development team to breakfast and boost morale instead.  (Sorry, subliminal message there, please ignore.)

Speaking of marketing, Magento is fully integrated with the big players in the industry.  Your website will end up high on searches very quickly, it's SEO performance index is astounding.  More people will find you faster because search engines trust sites that use Magento.  Setting up payments is as easy as plugging in your Pay Pal merchant account information, your Authorize.net, or whatever you use within minutes.  Magento handles many other tasks as well, such as customer log-ins, wish lists, customer reviews.  There are modules to help you "recover" abandoned carts.  Sales reports and everything you need to keep you up with accounting and tax records are built right in.

All these tools are managed through Magento's back end as an administrator and require very little actual web coding knowledge, though it would help tremendously if you had someone who could write PHP and knew CSS and HTML to refine pages and fix any issues that may arise.  There's so much to Magento, I couldn't begin to cover anything but the basics here.  I highly recommend visiting its website at www.Magento.com and learning more about the "Community" edition.  It's amazing what open source gives the masses access to.  Come to think of it, "open source" is the masses -- it's true empowerment for all, worldwide.  Long live open source code, the engine of innovation, the "Libertarians" of the web.

Need Trees? Lots of Trees?! Try the Arbor Day Foundation!

Once you buy a pass to any national park, you will start getting some interesting mailers.  Greenpeace.  No thanks, their approach towards environmentalism by demonizing capitalism is kind of disturbing to me.  The Smithsonian Institute.  We subscribed to their magazine, a very interesting read.

We then received some literature from the Arbor Day Foundation.  We learned you can become a member for only $20.  Another $15 and we bought ten saplings, baby trees, that were proper for our region of the country.  They arrived inside a single plastic bag in the mail a few months later.  The instructions were kind of vague, but they're trees.  You plant them in the ground.  Though there were 5 different trees in our package, they were color-coded but there was no print out explaining what each color meant.  Only later did I find this link that explained on their website what the colors meant.

We paid for 10 trees but only 9 arrived in the package.  Despite these few flaws, I think these trees will be an excellent value.  I say I think, only because it's only been six months since we followed the directions and planted them -- just in time for winter to come.  I want to share this information because no one else I've spoken with knew they could get baby trees from a respectable source for such an excellent value. 

I found the Arbor Day Foundation website was a plethora of interesting information all things regarding trees.  We all know trees are important, they also help property values. Trees aren't just good for the environment, they enhance your yard.  They provide shade, they prevent the ground eroding, they also attract and provide shelter for all sorts of wildlife.  Not to knock your local tree nursery, but if you have the patience to wait 3 or 4 years to watch a small sapling grow into the pretty picture in the Arbor Day Foundation brochure, remember that you paid only about $3 for that tree which has matured to fetch $30, $50, maybe even over $100 for each 5 to 10 gallon tree it has grown into.

Try to get that kind of return on ANY investment!  From the perspective of a sound financial investment, investing in a membership and some trees from the Arbor Day Foundation outperforms any stock value or investment most people will ever see in their lifetime.  Provided you are willing to be patient and invest in some water and a little fertilizer.

If only making your investments in your 401K grow that quickly would be that easy, and that straight-forward.  The best part is you don't have to wait 30 years until you retire to enjoy the many tangible benefits each and everyday from owning trees that, unlike your investments, will continue to grow well into the future.

Don't Envy Me for My Envi Electric Heater

The Envi heater, centrally mounted at the bottom level of our home.
Sure, it puts out heat, but so does our toaster.

This is a short review on the Envi electric heater, but first, I cant' help but provide a quick commentary on the state of our nation's energy infrastructure and the ridiculous, economic ironies it operates within and how it affects our pocketbooks.  No "smart grid" will be able to fix this fundamental flaw.

To generate electricity, we burn coal and oil in order to boil water that builds enough pressure to spin generator turbines that produce electricity that eventually is drawn to our home to operate our countless appliances to serve our needs, including generating heat to keep us warm.  Sound efficient?  Times that by 100 million homes.  You'd think there'd be a more efficient way we all could heat our homes in the 21st century.

Natural gas eliminates a lot of these physio/logistical inefficiencies since we capture the heat by burning it where it is needed and we don't lose energy by converting the energy into something else first (electricity) then convert it back into heat in order to stay warm those cold winter nights.  Using more natural gas is inherently much more efficient because of this incomparable advantage over electricity where heat is generated on demand as heat into heat and not first converted into electricity, to heat our homes.  That said, natural gas needs almost as much infrastructure as electricity to deliver its energy to the masses through millions of feet of pipes, containers, valves, etc.

Just a thought, now I'm really digressing from a boring product interview:  If only we could buy something at the supermarket with our food -- a "Box of Heat" which only we would buy as needed or in bulk like at Costco's, as we choose, eliminating the need of building and maintaining a separate distribution system and infrastructure.  I guess the closest thing out there is kerosene or propane tanks -- if only they weren't so heavy and dangerous (and more efficient).  Something that is completely safe to transport that weighed about the same as a gallon of milk that could heat a home for a couple of weeks.  Imagine, supermarket priced competition to heat our homes.

Still, lugging the "Box of Heat" to the house and inserting it into the centralized home heating unit still wouldn't be as convenient as just plugging a heater to an electric outlet and just turning a dial -- kind of like the many portable electric heaters available on the market today.  (Well, there's Culligan for water delivery, so why not a "Box of Heat" delivery service, then?  Since there would be no infrastructure needed to maintain and you were willing to pay a convenience fee for delivery, the cost of the "Box of Heat" would still deliver heat to consumers at much lower prices.  Okay, back to the product review....)  One of the electric heaters you may choose to look into is the Envi electric heater, which is sold online and advertises heavily in magazines, like "Popular Science" and the web.  It's a radiator with no moving parts, which ensures that most of the electricity it consumes goes to producing a slow and steady heat.  I like that efficiency model, it makes sense.

.... but I say "slow and steady heat", because without a fan to circulate the heat, it takes a long time to heat up an area compared to a normal space heater with a fan.  You basically need to keep it on most of the time you want a room kept warm, but without a thermostat, the cryptic control dial up top doesn't make it very practical if you leave it unattended, like to go to sleep, or if you have anything more useful to do with your time than stare at your new wall-mounted heater.  More than once I walked into the room the Envi was heating and the room was sweltering hot, so hot I had to open a window.  So much for the money saved in less moving parts.

You can mount the Envi heater easily enough on a wall, but the cord dangles, even when using the clips at the bottom that are supposed to hold the power cord, you almost have to fold the cord and snake it awkwardly to fit it underneath.  Then, it's hard to see the clips to fasten the cord in the clips to begin with.  It doesn't detract and hide the power cord well -- not ideal if little kids are around, who will inevitably pull the cord out and be exposed to a bare electric plug because they pulled the cord out of the socket.

Speaking of children around the heater, there is a single on/off button in the top front right side with a red LED light, inviting kids to push it on and off.  Since it's not better hidden up top like the dial and it's more clear what its function is than the dial, they're bound to notice it sooner or later.  The heater may be able to be mounted on any wall, low and out of sight, but it lacks basic tamper-proof measures for children.  You think you had shut the heater off because it's a warm day?  Think again!  More than once, we found the Envi heater on, pumping out heat, while the A/C was running, trying to keep our home cool.  In South Dakota, it's not atypical for the weather to vary 60 degrees in a single day, just in case you're wondering.

It all makes as much sense as our country's energy infrastructure, or buying a heater without a thermostat.  In short, the Envi heater is good for one thing -- augmenting heating your home on the coldest nights in that room that never seems to get enough heat.  Instead of installing a heater in that area, however, might I suggest you put in better insulation, or use that cooler room as your wine cellar/workout room?

VAX-D for Back Pain - What I Learned From Making An Infomercial & TV Commercials for a Chiropractor

My ad agency team was once hired to produce a 30 minute infomercial, TV commercial ad campaign, and new website for the Back Pain Institute in Florida.  Their specialty was VAX-D treatments for back pain.  Skeptical of the claims, I was given a tour of their facility.

I saw two patients lying on their stomachs on these tables, harnessed and holding onto bars above their heads.  The client had lined up some happy patients who would provide testimonials.  Hearing first hand from so many people how VAX-D changed their lives was impressive.  Nothing beats word of mouth, and there were plenty of people making claims that it changed their lives.  Seriously, no spin.

They could walk up stairs again.  A fireman could return fully to work and carry hoses up the training towers.  A mother could pick up her child again without wincing in pain.  All these activities many of us take for granted were a nightmare for these people.  One, a die-hard marathon runner, was able to overcome his backpain and run again.

Remember, these are unsolicited reviews, I get paid nothing for espousing these opinions.  I urge that if you are having back pain to at least look into the options of VAX-D treatments instead of invasive surgery.  After all, you can always get some disks welded together or get metal plates screwed to your spine later if VAX-D doesn't improve your condition!

The premise behind VAX-D is that it stretches and realigns your spine so slowly, unlike traction, your back muscles do not counter the pulling and allows your discs to open and draw in the nutrients from the body and slowly heal your discs.  That's the gist in super layman's terms, anyway.

If you are suffering from back pain, here are some of the commercials, snippets from the 30 minute infomercial at my YouTube channel:  http://www.youtube.com/aaronbelchamber.

VAX-D might not be for everyone, but I ran into A LOT of people who opted for VAX-D over surgery and were so glad they did.  VAX-D actually cures a lot of spinal and disk issues that I am not qualified medically to discuss or even understand.  If it worked for these genuine people, it might be a treatment option worth looking at more closely.  I have personally recommended it to a few of my friends and have had friends who have gone through VAX-D that would recommend it as a serious option.

The cost of these VAX-D treatments are definitely less than surgery, not to mention the minimized risks involved.  It may even be virtually a "free" back pain solution since it is accepted by many health insurance policies (as long as those are still around and not gobbled up by the government's upcoming and inevitable single-payer health payer system -- go post office-style health care!  Sorry, I digress....)   Look it up and consider it as a serious option if you have back pain.

The other bonus will be if you're in Southwest Florida, look up the Woottons.  Dr. Wootton and Barbara Wootton, who own and operate The Back Pain Institute, were great clients and wonderful people, you'll be glad to have met them.  Your back might thank you, too.