I want to start this off by asking a question:  why does everyone like to go shopping at the mall?

Because everything is in one place.

That is why I like it when I find a website online that has everything in one place.  Not only is it more convenient, but I don’t have to waste my time "traveling" between websites to find what I am looking for – most things would be only a click or two away.

That is why I was so excited to find ratingzone – it was a site that had everything that I was looking for.  First off, I am a big reader of net gossip – who doesn’t want to know what the celebrities are doing right now?  Okay, so maybe everyone doesn’t want to know – but for me and my interests that is what I want to read.

Not to mention my need to read the entertainment reviews about upcoming movies.  As an avid movie goer and with the high prices, you want to make sure you spend your money appropriately and only go to those movies that are worth going to.

Lastly, I like to read music reviews.  Though I don’t buy a whole lot of CDs anymore, I still like to know if an album is worth buying before I buy it – if most people say it sucks, I keep my money in my pocket.

So do I like everything in one place?  You bet – it makes my life easier.

It seems like forever since I bought furniture.  I was just out of college, starting my career, and I used my second paycheck to buy my current couch and bedroom set.  Years later, the age of my furniture is starting to show, and I am so tired of sitting on this old stuff.  I’ve decided that it is time for a change of surroundings: it is time to get some modern furniture.

So, this morning I went out to some furniture stores to find some new, contemporary furniture to spruce up my place.  Money was really not a concern, as I had set aside a little fund to pay for my purchases today – besides the money in my bank account was rotting away where it was.

I had no problems picking out a new sofa, but while looking at the contemporary bedroom furniture, I had a little more difficulty.  There were some options that were amazing in terms of their look, but others were just plain ugly.  I think it took over two hours to finally make up my mind on the bedroom set to go with, but I finally figured it out.

They should be delivering the furniture before the end of the week, so I need to round up some friends to help me take out my current furniture and take it down to the Salvation Army.  I am sure that someone else could use my old furniture and I would hate to just throw it out.

It is not everyday that you get compliments on your outfit or how you look.  For one thing, people don’t usually go around complimenting one another, and most people would point out the bad things.  But today was sure different.  Not only was everyone’s eyes drawn to me, but I had many strangers compliment my attire.

How did that happen?

Well, I went for a little shopping trip.  I picked out an amazing suit, shirt and boots.  I opted out on the tie as I didn’t feel that it would fit.  Looking in the mirror at the store, I couldn’t help but think that something was missing…. 

It came to me: I needed one of those Rolex watches to complete the outfit.

Having spent quite a bit of money already, I was a little shocked when I went to the watch store in the mall – a Rolex was going to be out of my reach.  But, just a few doors down was a store that sold replica watches.  I went to check it out.

Inside the store, the sales clerk was instrumental in helping me choose a winner from their many Rolex replicas.  It was the icing on the cake for my outfit – from all the compliments, it was worth it.

In my line of work, I deal with a lot of FHA loans. I deal with a lot of first time buyers and this type of loan comes up often. I have learned so much about them and I wish that they taught more about them when I was taking classes.

Approving mortgage loans was not always what I had planned to do, but the job kind of fell into my lap, when I was still attending school. I do find it a bit boring, but the pay and the benefits are better than I could get anywhere else.

My friend, Chris, took the same classes with me and he finds mortgage leads, rather than approving loans. His job is a lot more hands on and a lot less sitting in an office chair. He does seem to have more fun than me, but I make more than him.

We both took our schooling from the same real estate place and they taught us well. I do not mean to complain and really, the only thing I would change is to have more information about FHA loans. But, if I had learned everything I needed in school, there would be no challenge at work, right?

I don’t really value the news and opinions of the people around me any more. I am such a sucker. People can get me to buy anything because I will believe anything that someone I trust tells me. I own so much jewelry and makeup because of wanting to help out my friends that I could start my own business.

I have been suckered in by believing that I am just doing some product reviews, and I end up spending a fortune to get my voice heard. It is such a scam and I fall for it every time. I wouldn’t say that I am naive, just a little too trusting.

I decided that if anyone wanted any more consumer reviews from me, they would have to give me samples and I would give them my opinions from this. I am standing firm to this decision and some of the people I know are not happy about it.

I have one friend who asked me to do some website reviews and I asked him what that was going to cost me. He took offense to that and it ended up costing me a lot; a friend. So, I am about done with it all. Please, do not ask my opinion on anything or try to sell me something because I am not interested.

I have always been a big fan of the phrase ‘If I want your opinion, I will ask you’. The reason for this is that my whole family is very opinionated and I have always been a little bit more timid and withdrawn. I had opinions thrown at me left and right every day of my existence and I really got tired of it all.

When I moved out my mom thought I seemed a little bit happier than I should have been. She thought I should be pining for home and suggested that I didn’t seem to miss it one bit. She was right on the mark there. I was completely happy to be free and devoid of anyone’s opinion but my own.

It was really nice not to hear views and opinions on everything under the sun. There was no arguing and I could even watch the news in peace. This had never happened before. I had to chuckle to myself when there was an advertisement on the TV one night, looking to pay people for opinions and reviews. This, I thought, could have been a multi-million dollar business for my family.

Tomorrow night I am volunteering my time to teach a class about iPods at our community center in town.  I was asked a few months ago if I would teach the class as I was the computer consultant for most of the people in town.

The last class I taught went okay, but I missed a few of the newer iPods in my presentation.  So, I have been working on adding to my presentation and I have been making a few more slides.

Most of the new slides have been added to the section on video conversion.  I had some slides on how to convert iPod Classic video, but now I have expanded the presentation to include iPod Nano conversion, and the iPod Touch video converter.

I didn’t have a chance to find out how many people have the new iPods, but I thought it would be better to be safe than sorry.

I have a few more slides to make, so I better quit writing here and work on the slides instead.  I hope the presentation goes well – I might just have to practice before tomorrow night.

My parents are getting a little older now, and are considering retiring.  They have worked for many years now and have saved up a large nest egg.  They also recently had their home appraised and it is worth a lot more than the $40,000 that they originally paid for it (they have had the house for over 25 years).  So, with the money available to buy something that they want, they are looking for a home to cater to their lifestyle.

They are both avid skiers and love the outdoors.  They do a lot of hiking, and camping as well.  I offered to help them find somewhere to retire that would let them do their outdoor activities without having to go to far from their home.

I did a search for areas that had access to many outdoor activities nearby and I found the perfect little place in South Carolina.  In fact, the homes in Greenville, SC were close to the mountains, plenty of hiking trails and many golf courses.  Price wise, the homes were very reasonable and they would be able to get a large home for the budget they had decided on.

I found a couple of homes that would be perfect for them and I will be showing these houses to them when I go over there on Saturday.  I think they will like it- maybe they will buy me a home there too… I would sure love that!

Our company hasn’t been doing so well lately.  You see, we had a manager that really didn’t know what he was doing, and did nothing to direct our sales department.  He was more concerned about having SIM applications designed to make his phonebook bigger instead of increasing our sales of chip card readers.

Now, we are trying to regain the market share that we once had.  We have been trying to regain some of our old customers, but we haven’t had much luck.

So, instead of just pushing one product, the new sales manager had decided that our company will offer card encoding services to our clients as well.  This is a great opportunity for our company to upsell the chip card readers when we sell the encoding service.

This will be a make it or break it decision – the future of our company depends on it.  I am sure it will be okay, but sometimes, you just get worried that your job won’t be there when you go to work – we will just have to wait and see…