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I just got back in to town yesterday for the fall semester and I am feeling very welcome here in town. Though we still have a few days until all of the campus really fills up, there are still plenty of my old friends here to see and hang out with while we still have town all to ourselves. I have been trying my best to catch up with these friends for now until we all get sort of swamped in the first couple weeks of class. After that we'll sort of be adjusted and then we can get back together but it is rough to try and hang out for those first couple of weeks unless you have a really loose or easy schedule. Tomorrow I think that I am going to get back in to my old routine of getting up at six and going for a nice long ride around campus before class begins. I did this all last year and I think that this was a huge part of my academic success since I got that oxygen flowing through my veins and my brains before I sat all day in the classroom.

One of my best friends came home yesterday as well and we have been helping each other move in. We talked a bunch about our summer and we drank a little bit last night. After a little while we got in to our jobs for the summer and I told him about the farm I was working at back home. He told me about his job as a freelance writer. Basically right now he is maintaining three blogs which are an eco-friendly blog, an online gambling blog, and a technology blog. He showed me the web sites and they were all really cool and if you want to see them they're at www.mind-body-planet.com, and www.technologicalthoughts.com. Anyway, he's inspired me to look around for a new job and I think that he's going to get me a job working for the same company. Hopefully I will be living in style this fall and not having to work in a hot kitchen or over a stinky sink somewhere in town.

For some reason years ago, my family planned on going on a trip to Baltimore. We had all of these events planned, like going to the art museums and shopping and visiting our family who lives just outside. But what I remember the most about planning the trip was that my dad had to make sure that everywhere we went his blackberry would work. I remember thinking how silly it was because it's not like the Baltimore internet service is any different from the rest of the countries or ours for that matter. Everywhere he called people assured him that the internet would work fine.

It is weird though how much we depend on the internet for things though. Yesterday I spent almost an hour and forty minutes on the phone with the internet company just trying to get the internet connection to work because it was such a high priority. You feel so alone almost when the internet isn't working. Of course I have my cell phone, but I feel cut off when I can't check my email or even face book (I know how pathetic is that?) It seems like now a day's though everything is done by computer. Even to apply for my summer job this past year I had to fill out an online application and survey. I check my email at least twice a day and the weather to see what it will be like for the next week. I look up peoples and businesses phone numbers on yellowpages.com and I even read the news online. It is crazy how much you depend on for the internet, so when it isn't working you really freak out.

It is funny to think about how things were before the internet. Like since I have been away from college I have kept in contact with my high school friends via face book or email. Or even driving places, I use map quest and I don't think I could ever learn how to just follow a map somewhere (as pathetic as that may sound I think that is becoming the case for more and more people). It sounds funny to say, but I am so glad that this is the time I was born in. I can even imagine living without the internet and it is so funny to see my dad so dependent on it because he grew up in a time where TV was just coming out (well he's 45 so I'm not sure) but now he has his blackberry everywhere he goes. I just can't wait to see what the future holds for us and our kids and grandkids.

People are so different, it is no wonder that the internet contains so much information about everything and nothing all at the same time. People just used to look to the internet for factual information, but with the addition of bloggers to the web, the information you get can be misleading and confusing at times. It is hard to imagine that anyone would deliberately put up misinformation, but with some of the things that I have read on there, I know that some of these people are just spouting nonsense and on some level they know it. Maybe they are just the type of people who like to hear themselves rant or the types who believe they are truly an authority on everything. Sometimes, while I am online I will look at the news or look up information about a topic that is on my mind. I do also use it for factual information, but usually when I am doing this, I will double check a few different sites to see if they concur about the best way to proceed on a particular issue.

Don't get me wrong, I enjoy reading blogs and obviously writing them, but I read them more for people's opinions and information that they have unearthed in their daily lives. For instance I like to read a good home improvement blog like the one at www.homeimprovementthoughts.com. I find it a lot of fun to get tips about things I can actually do myself. I also am extremely interested in education which is my field and there is a great education blog at www.educationthoughts.com. This blog seems to really hit on some of the latest information about education and new things that are going on. I find it very interesting and can't wait to read more. Then since my mother has had some issues with drugs and alcohol I have read a rehab blog or two, but one that has particularly caught my attention at www.drugaddictionthoughts.com.

As I said before, anything that you are truly interested in you can find information about on the web. Just type it in as your search on any engine, and you will be surprised at how much information you can uncover. It is truly incredible.

I got some mixed news this weeks from some of my friends back home. Where I grew up in California, we were sort of out of the way in the northern area of the state. We didn't have too much to do in high school and in a lot of ways it was what I imagine small towns around the country to be like. The typical weekend consisted of binge drinking at night and recovering in the afternoons. Those of us that managed to do well in school got out and have gone off to college. Those of us that did not do so well have found themselves stuck in a situation that is very hard to get out of without some sort of outside motivator. Sadly, a lot of times that motivator is nearly losing your life or going to jail. It is a hard path but like everything in life, it is for some and now for others.

One of my best friends in high school was always a bad drinker and she was always really in to taking a lot of diet pills. She wasn't from a broken home or a bad family at all, but she just felt like there was nothing else in her life but keeping thin and getting drunk to impress people. To this end she never did much in school and stayed right where we left her for the last two years. The phone call I got the other day was from another of my friends from that period who had gone home to visit before school starts next month. He had found that her mother had checked her in to a California treatment center. The reasons were for alcohol abuse and immediate eating disorder treatment. She had gotten a little bit more lonely since we had all left and her mother had watched her sort of drift away in the arms of her two vices. The news I got was mixed because apparently she was doing very well then two weeks in to an eleven week program, and she said that she was done with it all. She sounds to me like a different and happier person, but it is sad that it had to come about this way.

One of my friend's moms is an HGTV addict. Every time I am over there I see her watching home décor shows or deciding how to redo their own home. I used to think some of those shows were boring and kind of pointless for me to watch (considering I won't be decorating my own home for years and years to come). But now I think they are interesting. I catch myself sometimes flipping through the channels when I am at home and ending up on the home décor channel. I'm hooked now, I love watching them flip houses or even watching trading spaces. It's funny to me when they set guidelines in trading spaces shows and they always break them. Like one family will say that don't care what color they paint their living room as long as it isn't green (or some other color) and then the designers and the other family on the show that they switched with paint the wall green and get green accent pillows for the couches and what not. It's crazy to see the reactions of the different families when they come back to their homes that were decorated by strangers, or even worse, their friends.

I used to laugh at her when she was always watching or Tivoing these shows, but my friend's mom has gotten me addicted to them. If I go to his house to watch a movie and his mom is watching one of these shows, I always say, “oh no go ahead and finish you show (even though it is being tivoed) we can wait to watch the movie”, even though she offers over and over to let us have the TV. I secretly want to watch all of the home décor and the different ways they go about buying homes and rebuilding. Its amazing for me to watch them take a completely outdated home and in like a week or even 3 days something (or so they say), they completely transform it. I can't even believe how they do the extreme home make over show. All of those families are so deserving and they completely knock down their homes in a week and build these amazing houses in their places. You secretly want them to bust through your door and make your home or your bedroom look spa like or like it came straight from a magazine.

I used to work for a Chiropractor when I first got out of high school and was still looking to "find myself". I really enjoyed the job. There were lots of nice people there, patients and staff and it made the job a lot of fun. I really liked the work, and it was simple work, but it kept me busy. Another great perk about this job was there were all kinds of promotional products. You know the kind with the company logo on them. It seemed that we were always giving cool gifts out to the patients and we always got rewarded for our hard work with some really nice gifts as well. For instance, when I was voted employee of the month, I got a jacket, which was a really great gift because it went great with the uniform that I had to wear. Then for Christmas we all got a bonus and we got spine key rings with the office name down the back. We were always using and giving out promotional pens and they were really nice pens, you know the ones that write really well, not the ones that skip, I can't stand those. Patients of the practice would get promotional travel mugs for referring a friend or family member, and whenever we did a trade show we would give out stop watches to the first 50 people to make and keep their appointments with us.

Now being in school I really miss getting full time work paychecks, but I am really glad to be furthering my education. I miss my friends and the patients at the chiropractic office, but I know that I am doing what I need to do. Although, the pay wasn't bad for right now, I don't really see a future there and I need to start my life heading a direction, before I get too old.

I know that one day I will have my own business. Probably not a chiropractic one, but I will find a good way to use promotional products for both advertising and employee and client retention. Giving people stuff does make them feel that they are a valuable part of your business and I know first hand that it works. I believe there is a learning lesson everywhere you look, and I learned that promotional items are worth the investment.

I was born and raised in Maryland and I have always loved it here. I guess wherever you are raised will always be home. I tried going away to school when I was just a freshman, and I really thought I was going to love being off on my own. More so than anything I really wanted my freedom and to spread my wings a little bit. I met some nice people and made a few friends, but by the end of the semester, I knew that I had made a big mistake. I felt that I was so homesick that I couldn't breathe. I missed my family, my friends, and the local hangout in town. I grew up there, in a place where everyone knew everyone and where I was a known entity and a familiar face. I wanted to return there, not as a child, but as the adult I had become. I didn't want to tell my family of my plans to transfer to a local school, because first of all I didn't want to get there hopes up, and secondly, I wanted to tell them after I had secured my own place to live. I really did want to be closer to my family, however, I did not want to return to living under my parents roof. I saved up money over the semester and got the paperwork in for my transfer. I went home for a visit and found myself an apartment that was reasonably priced and I called the Baltimore phone service and got my phone and internet in an inexpensive package deal. When the semester ended, I packed up all my things and went home. I left the car packed up and pulled it around the side of the house so that no one would get suspicious. I invited my two best friends to dinner at my parents house and of course invited the whole family and made steaks on the grill. I told everyone that I had an announcement to make, that I would be staying home for school in the spring and needless to say they were thrilled. My mom said that she would have to get my room ready for me, and I told her and everyone else about my new place. Everyone was happy for me, everyone that is except Mom. I think she would probably let me live there forever if I wanted to, but I don't think either of us would survive it. Just remember you don't have to move far away from home to gain your independence, you just have to claim it.

This summer my job has been working for a student run and owned painting crew. It is an all girls crew so it has been really fun to just work as this fun little team and we have gotten to be pretty good friends in the past three months. Most of our business has been fixing up the nicer houses around town. Despite the fact that student houses off campus usually don't look the best, they probably don't want to spend the money for the house to just get dirty again in the fall. The higher end home-owners come to us because they know that we are a locally owned business of all female students who are trying to understand how to run a business while supporting themselves. They pretty much pay us better than any other job in town during the summer to get burnt in the sun and get all dirty on the sides of their houses.

One thing that I have really been intrigued by has been the various forms of home security systems that these people have around their homes. Now when I say that these are the well-off homes I really mean it. I mean for some of these houses I have actually thought that there might be attack dogs hidden away somewhere in the trees and like snipers on the roof. I was wrong of course but I definitely saw some pretty high tech stuff in these places. Most of them had some kind of security cameras outside. The nicest of all of these homes actually has security cameras systems in each section of the house which all connected to a room where they had a room full of televisions. We have been lucky enough to have not set off a single one in the entirety of the summer so far but I have a feeling that we have it in us.

As of now the summer is sort of winding down and we can feel it on our little crew. We are all sort of trying our best to enjoy every day now because we have just around three weeks until the school year starts and I will have to stop working then. It has been really fun so far and I really hope to do it again next summer.

To make a little extra money this fall I have gotten a new job working online. I have always wanted to be a professional writer and now I will actually be getting paid for my work as a writer. The work will be a lot like writing ads in that I will be working for an online marketing firm. The only difference is that I will be part of a larger search marketing operation that works to flood a particular way of searching for certain products out on to the internet. I have only been doing the job for a couple of weeks now but it has been a real blast to see all pf the freedom that I can hold when I am in control of the writing process.

Each week my boss will send me a grouping of emails and from that pool there will be individual assignments. In each email will be a particular assignment with a certain number of articles due. Within each article my only objective is to insert a few key words that will be linked to websites that people will commonly be searching for under these terms. The effectiveness of my articles is what I really get to have fun with. Each assignment I have to try my best to create a new character and create a new way of looking at a particular topic. This is especially difficult when I am looking at ten articles due the next day with very specific key words. This is where it really pays off to have a love of reading and individuality. I look at these assignments as good opportunities for me to really branch out and tap in to new characters. From these characters I do actually try to create side stories in my own work.

I have been blessed to get a job like this. Though it may seem like something rather arbitrary and even a bit boring to most, for me it is a great way to find my own voice within a job. I don't know of many people who have jobs that allow them to look inside themselves and pull out something fresh. Every day when I sit down to work I build up so much energy that by the time I have finished my work I am ready to write all night. Sadly though, in the fall I will need to sleep and study so this may become a problem.

To function in today's world we all must have some sort of a connection to the internet. As with the real world we also must learn some level of skills in order to function at some level on the internet. The level of ability that each of us has varies greatly and seems to really reflect a new sort of street smarts within the world of the internet. As many of us know, the internet is not the safe haven that it was once thought to be. It is also not simply a means of gathering information and trading goods very easily. The internet is a direct representation of the world around us. The difference here is that we can access any culture and any part of the world with relative ease and never move more than a few inches at any one time. The advantages of this system are huge and as students we see this in our ability to network and research at the same time while we never once set foot in to the library or the lab. The digital world is quite amazing for this fact alone. In the same instance though, the internet is not simply for the benefit of everyone. Some users of the system are there simply to take advantage of others as playing the role of criminal in cyberspace.

Each and every day when we use the internet, we all function within a world that we cannot necessarily understand all at once. Most of us function at the base level and can only understand what is on the screen in bold print. We all unknowingly pass over IIS security flaws and Apache security flaws, which are the most used internet search engines. These web application vulnerabilities are what many of us don't ever think about until it is too late. We have all heard of the problem of identity theft and understand the danger, but we don't understand where it lies exactly. Within spaces thought to be safe, we often find the most sought after breeches in security and the most instances of information loss. All of us need to become as savvy at our view of the internet as we would when we enter a large city with cash in our pockets.

Weight loss tips are everywhere it seems. Every person you meet thinks either they know the secret for weight loss, or they are searching desperately for it. Weight loss is on everyone's mind. So what really works? You read everywhere about extreme diets that stars are on and hours of time in the gym. There are stories about weird weight loss methods like body wraps that sweat out off the fat, patches you put on your arm and are supposed to magically lose 20 pounds in like 5 days and even hundreds of different kinds of weight loss pills. With so many different ads and ‘doctor's representing these ads, it is hard to find a product that is tried and true. The only thing that we know for sure that works is diet and exercise. It just makes sense that you have to burn more calories than you are taking in to lose weight. Not only is dieting healthy and exercising the key to weight loss, but it also helps to prevent a ton of diseases like diabetes or joint problems.

America is getting fatter and fatter, it's just a fact. With all of the fast food chains and peoples busy schedules it isn't hard to believe that so many people are overweight. The problem is, they see in the media all of these fad diets and crazy new weight loss tips that seems to be working for stars, like drinking some concoction for a week straight. It probably will cause you to lose weight, but that is because you aren't eating and it is extremely unhealthy.

We need someone in the media to stand up and say, “This is the right way to lose weight and be healthy at the same time”. Or people need to take control of their own lives and health instead of looking up to celebrities. Not only are adults taking fad diets seriously, but they are teaching their children that starving yourself and not eating healthy is the right way to lose weight.

The only proven way (and also a lot cheaper than the other ways out there) is to eat a balanced meal with lean protein and fruits and vegetables and exercise frequently. The new food guide pyramid should really influence people. Not only is there food on it, but there is a man on the side of it climbing up to the top. This represents the exercise portion of the equation.