Be strong!
We are not here to play—to dream, to drift.
We have hard work to do and loads to lift.
Shun not the struggle—face it; ’tis God’s gift.

     Be strong!
Say not the days are evil. Who’s to blame?
And fold the hands and acquiesce—O shame!
Stand up, speak out, and bravely, in God’s name.

     Be strong!
It matters not how deep intrenched the wrong.
How hard the battle goes, the day how long;
Faint not—fight on! Tomorrow comes the song.

~ Maltbie D. Babcock, D.D.

Oh, no. The space balloons are all gone.

But, it is okay. You can click on this handy time machine and see them again.

Whew!

Ba da ding ding ding da ding ding ding ding, ba da ding ding ding ding ding. Ba da ding ding ding ding ding ding ding, ba da ding ding ding ding ding.

Oh, da ding ding, see the space balloons today. Ba da ding ding ding ding ding ding ding, ba da ding ding ding ding do.

Turn on the TV. See the space balloons. Ba da ding ding ding ding ding ding ding, ba da ding ding ding ding do.

Oh, how happy, the space balloons are to see. Ba da ding ding ding da dooh da ding, ba da ding ding ding da ding!

So get yourself some space balloons and da ding ding ding da do! All for you, da ding ding do, the space balloons love you!

A picture says a thousand words so I don’t have too.

For more wordless posts today, visit Wordless Wednesday.

The Assassin bug (shown above) and the Wheel bug (shown yesterday), while looking perhaps a bit scary, are actually beneficial insects.

The Assassin and Wheel bugs are true bugs. However, unlike many other bugs which feed on plants, these bugs eat other insects, many of which may be damaging to plants and crops.

They feed on soft insects, such as caterpillars, and are a good, natural way to reduce and control insect pests in the garden.

Of course, they are also aggressive creatures and may feed on each other. And, like the female praying mantis, the females have been known to eat the males after mating.

And, humans should beware too. While they are not known to attack people, they may bite out of self-defense or curiosity, and their bites are painful, so that is definitely something you want to avoid.

In other words, don’t squash them, but don’t get too friendly either!

On this cold winter day, let’s remember the warm days of summer love with our friends the Wheel Bugs.

I know what I did this weekend. How about you?

I spent Saturday building a Squidoo lens, “Learn How to Sing.” It shouldn’t have taken me all day, especially considering how little work was actually involved, but it did. Well, I did do a couple other things, such as yesterday’s “Finding Sold-Out Concert Tickets Online” post.

The lens has some tips and information on learning how to sing. So, please check it out if you’re so inclined.

Today, after putting away the last of the Christmas decorations aside from a few stragglers that belong in boxes that have already been put away, I spent promoting the site. From which I’ve gotten half a dozen hits already, which probably includes my visit to the page, so, really, I probably haven’t had any visitors at all. But, it’s a Sunday and everyone is watching football, so I’ll go with that.

Also today, thanks to @TiffanyDow, I learned about TwttrStrm, which is Squidoo’s new Twitter viral web page doohickey thingamabob. I already set one up with the question “Have you ever wanted to learn how to sing, or sing better?” I’ve already gotten half a dozen visits, and with less work then the 6 visits to my lens. But, being integrated somewhat with Twitter, you’re more likely, I’m thinking, to get immediate clicks while the bookmarks I set up for the lens will build over time. At least, I hope so!

What I did not do this weekend is finish the name change and new design on The Thrifty Entrepreneur dot Com. I forgot that I need to contact one of my ad networks and make sure I don’t need to do anything special before the switch. I don’t think I will, but better safe than sorry. Hopefully I will hear from them soon (as in tomorrow as I don’t suspect they work over the weekend) and be able to get that switched over.

As you may recall from my Blast from the Past series of music posts a few months ago, music often plays an important role in our lives. Listening to our favorite tunes, old or new, can bring back treasured memories. Of course, listening to those tunes live in concert can bring back old memories as well as help to create new ones, and that is the subject of this paid review.

TicketFeeder offers an online premium event ticket sales services and provides sold out and premium tickets online. They offer more than just Concert Tickets, such as sports and theater tickets, but concerts are the focus of this review.

When you visit the site, the nice thing is that they have Upcoming Events for your area listed on the right side of the page. If your area isn’t shown, don’t worry. You can easily change the location with a link right below the currently listed location. You can enter your city and state or just your zip code, and the information will change to show you what’s coming up soon in your area.

Below that, you can sign up for event alerts to receive notice by eMail of exclusive events, tickets and discounts. You can choose alerts for just concerts, or sports or theater tickets, or any combination thereof. It’s all a matter of your preferences!

Of course, you may not be visiting a site to see what’s coming up, but instead are looking for a particular concert you want to attend. Maybe a concert is sold out—and you forgot to buy tickets!—and are looking to redeem yourself. Since TicketFeeder offers sold out Concert Tickets, you may be able to find just the ticket you are looking for.

You can start in the upper right corner by doing a “Find Ticket” search. Or, you can just go through the listings in the middle of the page. There’s a box that shows different genres, such as Rock, Pop, Jazz & Blues and so on. Further down, there’s an alphabetical listing, by genre and then broken down by performer(s), that you can go through.

If no tickets are available, it’ll tell you. If tickets are available, you’ll see a listing showing the date(s) and location(s). It will also show you a price range. Click the “View” button, and it’ll take you to a page showing you the available tickets, the quantity available, and their seating location. To the right, you’ll also see a map (where available) which will show you the seating sections to give you an idea of where your seats will be. Once you find the tickets you want, you just click the “Buy” button and check out.

Be sure to check out their FAQ for any questions about their service. They also have a toll-free customer service number listed on their site if you have any problems or special requests.

The next time you want to create some new memories listening to your favorite music act, TicketFeeder may be the place to go to get sold out or premium Concert Tickets you might not be able to find elsewhere.

As I mentioned last month, I would be deprecating some old sites and blogs, while keeping others. Well, that time has come…

Yesterday, LocoChihuahua.com got a bit of a makeover. On the downside, the new look no longer matches the business cards, Twitter background and other materials I have for the site, but maybe I’ll change those as well. The new look may have a familiar feel to you. LOL!

On the flip side, Thrifty Net Marketing dot Com is going to get the ax. The Thrifty Entrepreneur dot Com will be changing as well. It is going to be getting a new look and a new name. I’ll have an announcement for that soon. It will cover the same types of topics as well as Internet marketing topics. Since most businesses these days have some sort of online presence, it just makes sense to have those types of articles as well as standard business articles all in one place.

Thursday afternoon, I asked my followers what they thought of “businessman” versus “businessperson” to determine whether it would be better to have a “businessman’s blog” or a “businessperson’s blog.”

The responses were mixed, even among women. I’d like to thank those that took the time to respond:

@drspectrum
@phyllismufson
@BillRomer
@edelatorre
@techfun
@snorkelman37
@GrahamGudgin
@katieblair
@TheSCICoach
@fogfish
@problogdesign
@Ramona_W
@davemunger
@curiousmorpheme
@csmasal
@caitlinmcgill
@theWild1
@BawldGuy
@CoachM
@jterlecki
@peggyhornick
@CitiGalMelanie
@Kelapp
@Miragi

Special thanks has to go to @TheSCICoach who mentioned in a DM the obvious choice that should have been staring me right in the face, especially considering the old materials of mine I have been reviewing the past couple days. Painfully obvious.

So, at this point, she’s the only one that knows the name of the new-ish blog.

I’m still working on the new design, so, once that’s done along with a couple other things, I’ll be ready to announce the new-ish business blog!

This ought to be interesting. A year ago today, I selected a winner of my blog description contest. In turning down Terence’s wonderful submission, I wrote:

First, there was “Dreams Come Real” by Terence Chang. I really liked this one. A lot. I like how Terence used my initials and created something with them that really identified the blog. I really, really like it. But, I wouldn’t feel comfortable using it yet. If I had achieved my goal or a significant benchmark thereof, I would feel a lot more comfortable using it. Maybe a year from now, we can revisit this contest and see if Terence can be redeclared a winner then!

Well, here it is a year later. So, where are we now? Actually, I don’t know. I am writing this in the past. Yes, it is still January 15th of 2008 as I write this. (Actually, it’s the 14th that I started composing it, but being so close to midnight, it will be the 15th by the time I finish it.) So, here we are (hopefully!) in 2009.

Can I now use “Dreams Come Real” as my blog description, or maybe just the subheader? It’ll be interesting to hear what I think too. Hi me, this is you!

At any rate, what I’m doing here is bringing this post back into memory and seeing how things have progressed. On the one hand, this is sort of strange, as I am writing a full year ahead of time, and I have absolutely no idea how things will be a year from now. It’s both exciting and a little scary.