I hate debt. I am deep in debt. Each day of my life does not pass by without one reference to the piles of debt I have. However much I try to be rid of it, I will never be free of debt. Every day something comes up, either another electricity bill, a mortgage payment or a credit card.

Not everyone can live a debt free life, you have to be super savvy at spending, or to be just plain lucky to win the lottery to be able to pay off your debts and enjoy your life. But again, millions of us in the world still have debts to pay, big or small, they are still debts.

But I have wondered, what would it be like to be debt free for just one day? Just one day, without the irk of having to pay someone money, a world where we can do what we like with money without having to worry about it later, a world where independent financial advisers didn’t exist. Everyone could be happy, not necessarily be totally rich with gold houses, holidays every day and space shuttles for cars, but there would be lower stress levels, we’d all be more carefree and happy, regardless of the amount of money we have.

But that is a world that may never exist. Debt being wiped off the planet will never happen, someone somewhere likes to see us squirm to pay off our monthly debts, but it doesn’t cost anything to think about the perfect world where credit card bills and mortgage repayments do not exist.

Now, I am well aware this is a tech kind of blog (I was going to talk about presentation skills training, but that can wait for now.) But sometimes you need to cut loose, you know? So that is what I am doing with this post here:

The other day I witnessed something that made me feel both elated and like a terrible human being: the worst kind of emotion in a way, but also the best, and now I shall explain myself.

I had been walking along the street, past the shops, when I heard laughter. It was that animal-pack, fanatical kind of laughter you only get when something truly cataclysmically bad / tragically funny happens. Up ahead I saw the source of it. It was a woman driver (I could see her woman’s hair through the glass, before you start; I didn’t just assume this bad parking was attributable to a woman driver); she had managed to park up on the pavement and wedge her Volvo in between two signs.

And it was funny. It was quite brilliant, because the more she tried to get herself free, the more wedged-in she became. Then I noticed some youths standing there trying to help. They were pointing at her car, telling her what she should do. Although their instructions sounded helpful, the fact that they all had their hands over their mouths and were splitting sides told me they were actually trying to get her more in trouble, and being pretty successful at it.

I interjected: “excuse me, leave her alone would you?”

They said they would, and then they did. As they walked off down the road baggy jeans swaggering, they swore at me and called me an idiot. It was hard to hear what else they were saying. I too had started laughing maniacally at the misfortune of the woman, and that was when the woman broke down in tears, sobbing, face against wheel.

“I’m sorry,” I said, weakly. “now let’s try and get you out of this mess shall we?”

Ten minutes later the fire brigade arrived and they started laughing too, so I didn’t feel so bad.

You know how some people are naturally good looking? Naturally charismatic? Naturally photogenic? Well, I am naturally good-looking-ugly.

I know, it makes no sense whatsoever. But that is what I am. According to a woman with great presentation skill who stopped me in the street last week. Her name is Maggie, and she works for a modeling agency who are “currently recruiting those with fascinating, sort of non-orthodox features”. She was a bit older than me, barely able to walk in her fashionable pencil-skirt, and wearing dark, sinister glasses.

Maggie could see she’d put her foot in it immediately (I turned away and called her a “stupid fashion moron”) and started up a speech to regain my interest. “But Iggy Pop is good-looking-ugly!” she said, “and don’t you want to be like him?”

“What?” I replied. “On TV selling car insurance and with the skin of a three-thousand year old lizard?”

Maggie couldn’t really dispute the lizard thing, so she just sort of smiled.

“No,” I went on, “I really don’t.”

Then I started walking.

“But there’s money!” screamed Maggie, and I stopped dead. My pockets were empty, so this was a reflex action.

I walked back and asked how much. Maggie said “More than some regular good looking models make, there’s really a demand right now for good-looking-ugly."

Ten minutes later I had joined the ranks of Iggy Pop and Mick Jagger. I’m still yet to see the money, but here’s hoping anyway. And besides, I know where Maggie lives so there had better be some.

In the eighties, our family thought the internet was amazing. Our computer (more a two foot x two foot block compared to today’s flat-screen technology) lived in what used to be our dad’s study, and we’d all crowd around the machine and watch in fascination as bar after horizontal bar appeared slowly on the screen–eventually (and it was a long eventually that took about ten minutes) forming what we’d now consider to be an appalling picture.

Those days are long gone. Everyone has a computer, and most people have a blog. The saying about rats always being nearby can now be applied to marketing and social networking: if you work in the city, there is probably someone who knows about both these things within five feet of you right now–

The future being already here is the topic of discussion at the following blog.

This got me thinking. If blogs and social networking are now here, what does the future hold? It’s hard to imagine. But one thing is for sure: most of our guesses have been wrong in the past, and I don’t see Back To The Future style hover boards appearing in the shops any time soon.

You could do far worse than look to an Enigin blog for inspiration about how to do the whole social networking thing. The company know their stuff and each blog has a load of buttons which venture off in to many different areas, exploring lots of different themes and asking many important questions.

Sold, signed and transferred. Stay tuned for new posts soon, and can I just take this opportunity to say, so glad to be back!

About 2 weeks ago, I anounced that the site had been sold to “John”. It appears that I posted that post a bit too hastily. It would seem that I have been scammed.

Yesterday while randomly checking a few account, I noticed that my PayPal balance had gone into the negatives, something that has never happened to me before. After a little bit of investigation I realised that “John” had sent a chargeback for the amount he sent to me a few weeks earlier.

Luckily I have been on the losing end for so long, I had only sent “John” a copy of the sites code and the database, the domain was still firmly in my control. The original plan was for John to set up the site on his server and I would transfer the domain when he was ready. I guess he got a little trigger happy.

So once again, the site is up for sale. With a Pagerank of 4 and a ton of quality backlinks, I have rather high hopes for it’s sale.

I

At what point, in their blogging careers, do successful bloggers decide to go full-time? This is a question that I have been asking myself lately. While my blogging income still does not equal my regular salary, I have no doubt that if I made the transition from part-time to full-time blogger, my income would shoot up exponentially.

Is it wise to put all ones eggs in the blogging basket? I know there are some very successful bloggers, the likes or Darren Rowse and some others who rely completely on income from their blogging efforts. Other successful bloggers diversify into other sectors. John Chow runs an Affiliate network, Jeremy Shoemaker owns a few successful forums and niche sites.

Over the past few months, I have been adding sites to my portfolio. These sites are in various industries and niches that I hope one day will be successful. While I

Any of you who have been following my blog for a while, probably remember the issues I had with my Failing ThinkPad about a week back. Well IBM

Having a good domain name can often mean the difference between a successful blog and one that never gets any visitors. It will most likely be the first thing that your visitors will encounter, and remember your blog by if they ever find your blog online. Many bloggers still use their internet provider’s domain name or a free blogging service to get their messages online.

With good domain names getting scarcer and scarcer, some people are willing to pay top dollar to get hold of one. I’m proud to say that I paid just $10 for my one, well actually $7 as I used a GoDaddy discount code. While I’m cheap when it comes to running my blog, many people shell out vast sums of cash to buy a domain. You