Digi-Journal

I used to think it was silly to travel just to participate in a sport. That’s probably because I was never much of an athlete. After dating several guys who were really into different sports, I came to see that there are some places that are simply ideal for certain sports. Now it makes sense to me that people travel to enjoy their favorite sports there.

Skiing is the best example of this that I can think of. There are certain conditions that make it easy to ski. The altitude, the terrain and the weather of a location will all create different skiing conditions. When you find the perfect conditions, your ski experience becomes much better. That’s why people go on vacations to ski Canadian Rockies and other perfect mountains.

Most sports can probably be done in most locations. You can pick up a baseball bat and swing it just about anywhere. Unless you’re at a pro level where you get to play at amazing ball parks, the parks that you play at are all pretty much the same. But that’s not true for all sports. When it comes to sports where the external conditions matter, it may be worth it to travel to better locations to play your games.

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My first job out of college was truly horrible.  On the surface it was what I wanted to do — writing.  But though my title was “Technical Writer,” it should have been “Glorified Secretary” or perhaps “Trained Monkey,” because that’s what I really was.

Basically, I was doing technical “writing” (there was very little actual writing involved, mostly copy/pasting) for an out-of-state firm that had a contract in my city.  They had been flying their people in every week and having them stay three nights or so at the Sleep Inn in the Denver Tech Center, but of course that was more expensive.  By hiring local writers they saved a lot of money on travel expenses.

I never questioned why they were so quick to hire a liberal arts major straight out of college — I was too excited about the job.  Well, it turned out the owner of the small company was kind of a jerk, and hired only young women fresh out of college with liberal arts degrees — a demographic that really had no expectations for high-paying jobs, and therefore would be relatively easy to control because they genuinely didn’t think they could find anything better.

The job sucked, to say the least.  The boss was a complete control freak.  But it did give me the experience that I needed to launch a career as a freelance writer — on paper, anyway, even if I know all I did was type what our boss transcribed, and then copied and pasted that into a new document.  (And good heavens, his writing was atrocious!)

But it was here that I got my first taste of how nice it would be to work from home.  One day I forgot a jump drive that contained work I had done from home.  (This was before I was totally disillusioned with the job — when I was still motivated enough to work from home.)  I had to drive back and get it.  While I was gone, my boss called the office, and my co-workers lied for me and said I was in the bathroom and wasn’t feeling well.

When I finally got in, my boss called again and sent me home, thinking I was really sick.  I felt rather bad about that, and took my work home with me again.  (Like I said, this was when I was motivated…)

That day turned out to be a pretty good day.  I took my laptop over to the cafe at Barnes & Noble and worked there for a while.  It was my first experience in how nice it is to work from any location I please, rather than being stuck in the same boring office day after day.

I’ve been freelancing full-time for more than three years now, and I have to say I still love it now as much as I did then.  And I’m once again motivated to put in the extra hours needed to get something done, which is a great feeling!

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My best friend recently got a dog for the first time. You would think that the dog was his child since he spoils it so much. The puppy certainly has more toys than most babies that I know! He’s even having a party to celebrate the new addition to the family.

I’m trying to figure out what to get for the puppy to take to the party. I’ve discovered that there are actually a lot of cool gifts for pets. I’ve narrowed down my choices to these few:

• Puppy body spray. It sounds ridiculous, I know. However, it seems like a great way to keep the dog smelling fresh which will benefit everyone at the party!
• Puppy treats. There are so many fun gourmet treats that they sell at pet stores these days. There is even a puppy bakery in my town!
• Puppy toys. I know, the dog has so many toys already that this seems senseless. I’m sure it could always use one more though.
• Puppy gift basket. Pet gift baskets offer the perfect opportunity to put a bunch of smaller gifts together to make one big gift.

What do you think I should go with for this puppy? What would you choose as a great gift for a pet lover?

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Someone who is thinking about taking a trip to an island destination like Fiji will need to think about the accommodations that they desire. Although you may not know it, there can be a big difference between staying at a Fiji hotel and staying at a Fiji resort. You may want to splurge for the resort in order to get the benefits that the resort will offer.

The main difference between the resort and the hotel is that the resort will have many more amenities available to you. It will offer on-site amenities such as a gym and a spa. A hotel may offer this as well. However, a resort will offer additional types of amenities that a hotel doesn’t offer. For example, a resort may have a golf course on the grounds. As a bonus, resorts also tend to be located in places with better views and better access to attractions like beaches.

Most people don’t get to travel to luxurious island destinations very often. It’s a once-in-a-lifetime experience for a lot of people. Although it’s tempting to stay in a less expensive place, you’ll probably find that it’s worth it to spend more to stay in a nice resort.

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So many people go through life worrying about what others will think of them. They hold themselves back because of this. It’s sad to see.

I’m not the most outgoing person that you’ll ever meet. I don’t do things that shock a lot of people. Nevertheless, I know how to be just a little bit bold.

This boldness comes out in ways that are socially acceptable. For example, I found this great pair of ridiculous cowgirl boots in a thrift store a few months back. Now I wear them everywhere. They’re funky and they don’t always go with my outfit. I don’t care.

Another bit of boldness in me can be seen when you walk into my living room. I have a crazy rug with an Andy Warhol style design on it. It sits in the middle of my room and is topped with bean bag chairs. I am probably too old to have these things but I love them anyway.

Being bold doesn’t have to mean being loud or obnoxious or overly noticeable. Being bold can simply mean finding things that you love and loving them even if it’s a little bit silly sometimes. As far as I’m concerned, that’s the only way to really live.

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I have been working full time as a freelance writer for a number of years now. I like what I do. I do well for myself. But I don’t plan on doing this type of work for the rest of my life. Many people think it’s ridiculous that I don’t want to keep growing my career until retirement. However, I think it’s a lot better to keep life interesting by having more than one career. I want to have at least one dozen careers before I die!

There are just so many things that I want to do. I want to own and operate a bed-and-breakfast. I want to be a tour guide for river rafting tours or hiking tours. I want to launch a small business selling homemade crafts online. I want to have a garden and to grow things to sell at farmer’s markets. I want to get involved in some aspect of health, working as a cookie doctor or a yoga instructor or a fitness coach.

Of course, I probably won’t turn all of these things into careers. I’ll probably just pick a few of them to really develop. Perhaps I’ll sign up for that yoga certification course and do that job next. I can see making a career out of that for four or five years before moving on to something else. Don’t you want more than just one job for the rest of your life?!

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Recently, my girlfriend and I were talking about where we might want to go on vacation. It has been a number of years since we’d actually gone further than 50 miles away from home for any real fun and relaxation, so we thought now might be the time.

It wasn’t until she mentioned an advertisement she saw about Canada tour packages did I actually have the strange, but ultimately sort of cool, flashback to childhood.

Some of my very earliest memories have to do with time that my parents and I spent with my Aunt and Uncle, on my Mother’s side. They were Canadian, and growing up, we lived in Chicago. At least once a year we would pack up and make the day long drive from our home to theirs, just outside of Toronto.

The drive was always a fun time, even after Mom and Dad produced my little Sister. Well, that first trip with her as a baby wasn’t quite so much fun, but she got used to car travel.

My girlfriend showed me some information regarding a holiday in Lake Louise, Canada and the memories of the loveliness of getting to Canada and back, along with the fun we’d have at my Aunt and Uncle’s place made me want to jump in the car and head directly to a Canada vacation right away.

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If you find that your company is being overrun with papers and documents everywhere than I suggest you look at some alternative data storage solutions to help you out. Storing documents electronically not only saves on space and the cost of paper, but it also protects your important documents by storing them offsite digitally.  If you keep hard copies of everything and a fire were to break out at your business, you would lose valuable documents.

Companies specializing in data and document storage solutions have document management software that can help you organize and store all of your company’s important documentation.  Besides security reasons, storing papers electronically also makes searching for certain documents that you need much easier than looking through filing cabinets.  Also, files are a lot harder to misplace if stored electronically.  And if they happen to be misplaced, they are a lot easier to find!

I was a bit skeptical at first, but I called up a local company to talk to them about how digital data storage could help me and my business and was convinced after about 10 minutes. Now I certainly believe that changing my company’s document storage system was the smart way to go.

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I will have to say that I thought my life was about perfect. I was married to the most wonderful man in the world and we had the two greatest kids. We lived in a big, beautiful house, had the perfect jobs. We were certainly doing as well, if not better than most people we knew. Then it all fell apart.

It was in the fall and I had not been feeling good for quite awhile. I had been getting constant headaches that would just not go away. After several tests, the doctors discovered that I had a brain tumor. We decided to go ahead with treatment, which was very expensive.

We ended up having to sell our house and put all of our things in self service storage, just so we could try to keep up with the medical bills. It was hard on the whole family. The kids started having behavior problems and my husband became distant. We were falling apart and I knew something would have to be done.

When I was given permission to go back to work, I worked long and hard hours, but in the end it paid off. For Christmas, I gave my family all some moving supplies. When they questioned it, I told them that I had managed to buy our house back. We were going to go home and be a family again.

It is not always easy, but we are slowly picking up the pieces and I know that we are exactly where we belong.

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As is customary, my husband and I are spending part of Memorial Day weekend with his family.  His brother is getting our oldest nephew for the summer, and tomorrow we are going down to their house to visit.  We’ll probably barbeque on their Fire Magic BBQ island, which is always fun at their house because they have such an impressive selection off Fire Magic outdoor kitchen accessories.

This is different than previous years because my in-laws now live in the same state as we do.  They used to live two states over, so we’d drive out to visit them over the long weekend.  It was on our first of such trips that I experienced one of the biggest life-changing events in my life.

We had just gotten over to my brother-in-law’s house, and were getting ready to barbeque when we saw that their neighbor had an unfamiliar injured horse in his pasture.  It turned out he was buying the horse and her yearling colt from a backyard breeder, and he had loaded them up in a trailer with a hole in the floor.  Unsurprisingly, both mare and colt were injured.

We were unable to do anything for the mother, but a week or two later, we were able to rescue the colt by paying his vet bill in exchange for ownership.  So Memorial Day is important to me for more than one reason — as the anniversary of when we first found my horse, as well as an important U.S. holiday.

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