Going on a short break, so will leave you with a nice picture to look at while I’m gone! I took this in summer of 2006, when we had gone on a family vacation. It was really a wonderful trip and we got to travel all along the northeastern United States, from Virginia to Maine. Would love to do similar trips in other parts of the States as well, and hopefully those times will not be too far ahead!
Enjoy the view!
Setting up a home theater system
It seems that just about everyone is getting a plasma TV these days. The kind of technology that has become available now, and the fact that one format is getting preference over another, is leading to customers to redo their entire home entertainment systems. Manufacturers of accessories such as plasma mounts and other such items have seen a rise in demand already, which is likely to continue to grow. One of the best parts of these new technologies is that they are getting more and more streamlined as time passes and the benefits are passed on the consumers who are able to fit in much more equipment in smaller rooms. Just by mounting a TV on a wall, one saves so much space and along with wall mounted speakers and surround sound systems, one can easily create a great home theater system in even a small home.
Taking photographs is getting pretty addictive! For someone who got interested in this area only recently, I have been taking lots of pictures and posting them to my Flickr page. Once you have a decent contacts base, you can get some pretty good critiques of your work, if you’re interested or just have a look at the amazing variety of photographs posted on the site every minute or so. The Explore pages are the ones to get on….so far I’ve had one photograph on Explore and I didn’t even find out about it until a week later, since I wasn’t checking emails and my stats page. It certainly does inspire you to take better photographs and get ideas from others as well.
Is there anything you can’t find on the Internet?
I am no longer surprised at the kind of things one can find on the Internet, everything from antique cars to psoriasis treatment centers and creams can be found on it. It really has changed the way almost everyone lives their lives now. I look up restaurants online to find their number, check flight status sites for latest updates on arrival and departure times for flights, see what the local theaters are playing and book my tickets online, the list really is endless. I serious wonder how we all lived our lives without the convenience of the Internet and mobile phones. I know we did, and happily did so, but once one gets used to it, it is hard to imagine life without it.
Book stores: big chain or quaint local store?
Just back from some time at Borders, one of my favorite hangouts. I love to sit at the Starbucks there, eat something, sip a hot chocolate and browse through books and magazines. There are not many places, besides your own home that you can do that. Yes, you can take your own book and sit at a cafe, but the choice and endless variety that is available at Borders is unmatched. I have loved both Borders and Barnes & Noble right from the first time I went there, and even though I like to vary it and go to some of the smaller and more quaint local book stores, it is fun going to a chain and being familiar with the set up, no matter where in the world you are. These companies have certainly done a good job and creating their own niche in the market, one that did not exist before they arrived on the scene.
I recently tried out for the first time a jar of wrinkle cream, or rather one that removes wrinkles! Since it was the first time I was buying one of these products, I looked for wrinkle cream reviews before deciding which one to buy. There are lots of tests on which one works best, so why should I go in for something that has proven to not be very effective. It just makes sense to take advantage of the knowledge that is available on the Internet and use it to ones benefit. When it comes to cosmetic products, there are a lot of variables that affect the testing so one does have to keep that in mind as well, but if one selects well, then half the battle is won.
Found another funny one at bLaugh, and this one really is something for everyone. Just too many people forward things to one another without using the Bcc, often leading to spam and other stuff that happens when your email gets out in the open. C’mon people, it’s a very simple thing to do, just add everyone’s name to the Bcc list instead of the send list, it’s really as simple as that. In the meanwhile, enjoy this cartoon from bLaugh!
Discovering a whole new world of wine
Our neighbors recently got invited to a wine club and have become complete wine aficionados in the past fortnight. Interestingly, they never even thought of joining one, until a wine event took place in the office and they were invited for it. It just goes to show how limited one gets by the things that take place in our lives, mostly by routine, that we don’t even stop to consider the joy that life is supposed to bring. Just by joining a wine club, they have discovered a whole new world and are thrilled by it. Look forward to going over to their house and tasting some of their new collection of wines.
Since I had taken time off from work while my family was visiting, I’ve also managed to read quite a bit of my book, which had earlier been getting severely ignored. Ever since I started working at home, my reading has really got sidetracked, since I used to keep my travel time for reading, which usually gave me a good hour and a half to two hours of reading time everyday. Now, I don’t need to commute, so my reading had all but disappeared. I have started reading again and also started doing the daily crossword and sudoku, to which I used to be simply addicted at one time.
Ever since we did our first investment in an apartment, we have become quite interested in the concept of flipping apartments or property’s to increase one’s investment. I happened to see an advertisement for Alabama land for sale and was immediately intrigued and wondered if we should investigate further to see if we could go in for another property investment so soon after our earlier one. Well, it still remains to be seen whether it will be financially feasible for us, but the whole concept of buying property and selling it sooner than what one would keep it earlier has made this kind of investment much more interesting.
