I have saved up to go for a trip for a long time.  Working at McDonalds doesn’t pay a whole lot, but I had been putting money away for over a year.  I had bought my tickets to Mexico and booked the trip.  A week before I left, my dad had some advice to share with me.  He said: 

“Son, get some travel medical insurance.” 

I was a little confused, so I asked him about why I should purchase travel medical insurance when we had family health coverage. Dad said that even though our family medical insurance covered us throughout the United States, they don’t cover any of us outside of the U.S. He offered to pay the small premium for me to have coverage while on my trip. 

We visited an insurance broker and he explained that travel medical insurance is just like regular health insurance, but the policy takes car of you while you are outside the country.  These policies cover everything from supplemental insurance (covering you against some procedures abroad not covered by your standard health insurance) to full hospitalization. 

I feel better now that I know if I run into any medical difficulties while in Mexico, I will be covered.  My parents feel better about it too.

I really hate being told what to do.

“Come on, I am old enough to make my own decisions with respect to what sites to visit.  I am not twelve, so don’t treat me like that.”

(The above is an excerpt of my little encounter with a computer lab tech at school.)

It seems that no matter where you work, or go to school, people treat you like a child.  Just like your parents watched over your actions at home, your school or work makes sure you do what they want you to do.  Do you run into situations like this:

“I went to check my Facebook page at lunch, but I was blocked… guess I cannot do what I want on my break.”

“After school I went to the computer lab to check out some of my friends pages on Bebo… but after trying for half an hour, I found out from the person next to me that we cannot visit the site at school… what is the point of this stupid computer account anyways.”

If you feel like either of these two comments, you are not alone.  More and more computers do not have free reign of the internet…. Until now…

Set your browser free.

How?  By using a free proxy server, you can visit all the sites you would like without being bothered by the control imposed by your school or employer.  By using the services provided by FreeProxyServer.ca you can do the following:

• Unblock MySpace
• Unblock Bebo
• Unblock Facebook
• Unblock Friendster
• Unblock Hi5
• … and more.

If you need to unblock some sites and take control of your web browser, give this free proxy a try.

I was looking online today to find some free places to promote my blog.  This is mostly a daily thing I do, the more I promote, the more traffic my site receives.  I found these three free websites that allow you to list a backlink from your site for free.

Tower Promote Free Link Directory is a free link directory on an older domain.  Links on older domains tend to have more value associated with them.  You can list your site free or pay to get a featured link.

4169 - Free Link Directory  is an SEO friendly link directory.  This one was started earlier this year, and shows much promise.  Again they offer free listings and very reasonably priced paid listings.

The Best Damn Links Page is another human edited link directory.  This one is fresh, but built on an established domain.  You can get a free listing or pay to feature your link and get more exposure.

That is all the sites for today.  If I find any other sites that will help you to promote your site or blog, I will let you all know.

If you are like many house owners, you may have some problems selling your home.  Whether it is bad timing, a poor real estate market, or lack of interest, you just are having no luck.  Have you tried listing your home online?

If you have not heard of anyone who has tried, you really need to give it a try.  In fact, you can sell your home quick online -  sometimes faster than you can sell it by listing it in the paper.  The reason is that by listing your home online, you can connect with thousands of home investors that are looking to buy a house like yours.  They are looking to buy houses to rent out and yours could be perfect.

So, if you want to sell your house now you should be online.  There are many websites that will connect you to buyers eager to purchase your house - for free.  What are you waiting for?

My son bought his first car last week and when we went to insure it, we were certainly surprised at what it was going to cost us.

I have been with the same auto insurance company my whole driving life and have never questioned the rates that I pay. However, I was shocked enough when they gave us a quote for my sons’ insurance to check out what else was available.

I started my search online with a simple query in a search engine: “Auto Insurance Discounts.” Checking out some of the sites I found I was able to get many different quotes, most of which were much lower than my current insurance company quoted us. We chose a company that was reasonably cheap and gave really good coverage.

I then decided to see what kind of online auto insurance quote I could get since I have been an accident free driver for over thirty years. It was much lower than I had thought - so low that I could have saved myself thousands of dollars over the past thirty years. I promptly switched and am thus far very happy with my new insurance provider.

I recently had the chance to try out a Motorizr Z8 from Motorola.  This mobile phone is new offering that is a smart phone with some unique characteristics.  This phone has some good unique features compared to other mobile phones on the market.

The Good:

• A unique contoured shape that conforms to your head when the slide is open.
• Vibrant, easy to read display second to no other phone.
• Unique iTap text input system.  The phone will remember common phrases that you type into it automatically as well as automatically correct any spelling errors that you make.
• Excellent music player that can start instantly after the phone is turned on (via Instant On technology).

The Bad:

• They keypad, screen and mirror like back are all magnets for the grease on your hands (be sure to bring a wipe or two).
• Becomes sluggish when running third party apps.
• 2 Megapixel camera with average performance.

The Not Ugly:

Though the phone is not perfect, its’ unique shape, look and plentiful features make this phone from Motorola a good buy.

I was checking out car websites today as my car is on its’ last legs and probably won’t make it through the winter coming up.  So, I was on a quest to find the perfect car to get me to work and to travel.

I decided to look at forums.  You see forums are full of people willing to share advice and opinions for free.  The first forum I came across was a Ford Mustang forum.  I quickly scanned for a Ford Mustang for sale section of the forums and quickly perused the listings.  I found some used Mustangs for sale, as well as a large availability of parts.  This makes me feel more at ease - if I need to fix the car, I know where to get the parts.

I eventually got tired and moved onto the main website.  This Ford Mustang site is cool - you can read the current Ford Mustang news, and learn what models are now available.  Aimed at enthusiasts, this site has a lot of cool stuff on it.  I think I am going to quit blogging for today and visit the site.  It rocks!

If you live in Baltimore or you are thinking about moving to Maryland and you need to secure a great deal on a mortgage loan, then your best opportunity to get a low rate is to compare 3 or 4 lenders quotes. Shopping for a mortgage loan can be very complex.  We found that there are a number of sites that offer comparison shopping and used a service offered by LoanNetwork.com where they actually had lenders contact us with there mortgage quotes. It was super easy to shop for a mortgage and helped us save a ton of time in trying to compare offers. Comparing refinance and purchase home loans for closing costs, interest rates and programs has never been easier. The site offers free mortgage calculators, a forum to ask their expert response team and offers mortgage loan quotes for all 50 states including: Maryland Mortgage loans, second mortgages, equity loans, interest only and deferred interest mortgage programs.