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Dan Hunter
Dan Hunter
14 years ago

Being from Missouri i just wonder how long its going to be before we get a lawsuit thrown at us.Oh and i voted yes on prop c the white house said it didnt mean anything were they blowing smoke.

Dene Brock
14 years ago

We actually have some sweet potatoes growing in the shade of an oak tree that do quite well, and we’ve planted yellow squash in a shady area that did fair. It never hurts to try with a small bed and just see what happens.

I liked your advice on marriage and compromise– my husband was way ahead of me on the journey to self-sufficiency, but once I came on board, I was ALL-IN. There’s usually some “trigger” that ignites the partner to get involved, and if you’ve been a good example along the way, it’s an easy transition. ..and it really creates a great bond when the entire family is on board.

VERY jealous that you are moving to Arkansas.. I love Texas, but the area you are moving to is one of my favorite places to visit.

Kenneth
Kenneth
14 years ago

Just a thought on the Oak Trees. Maybe you can find a business that could sell it for you. I’ve seen those trucks that come in dig up and transport fairly large trees.

Jake
Jake
14 years ago

Great advice on identity theft, Jack.

I give my social security number to absolutely no one. Period, end of story, they don’t need it unless I’m establishing more credit. Which is a bad idea in most cases.

After losing everything due to a job loss (wish I’d been a better prepper then) I re-established my credit by paying back every cent owed.

Concerned about ID theft, I simply froze my credit per Clark Howard’s suggestion on his radio show. It cost me $10 per reporting agency for a one time total of $30.

If I ever want to apply for more credit it costs me $10 per agency to unlock it for the time period I specify.

Because I’m so frickin cheap there is no way I’d pay any ongoing fees to anybody. It also makes me think real hard about applying for credit because it’s gonna cost 10 – 30 bucks to unlock.

I’ve got no use for more credit anyway and just pay cash now. Any company doing business with me at the time of the freeze still has access to my reports. It’s a great way to get out of the “Would you like to apply for a store card and get 10% off?” questions too – simple answer “No thanks, my credit is frozen”.

After freezing it I tried applying online for a credit card. No dice because they couldn’t see my reports. It did get unlocked for 30 days during a mortgage application period, but was locked again no problem.

Freezing is a great option, and this cheapskate’s 2 cents on the subject.

Cesar
Cesar
14 years ago

What show number is “the one” to win over spouse?

Archer
Archer
14 years ago

Another tool for wiping hard disks to DOD specifications is DBAN.
DBAN gives you a bootable CD that is booted off of and used wipe the hard disks you specify. DBAN is at:
http://www.dban.org/

A.H.A.
14 years ago

Regarding id theft, these guys are the experts and also buddies of mine: http://www.social-engineer.org/

Regarding business advice, here are some things I follow, mostly snake oil free:
http://personalmba.com/
http://www.copyblogger.com/
http://internetbusinessmastery.com/
http://entrepreneurs-journey.com/

There’s also tons of audiobooks and seminars and stuff that a person can get their hands on (and I’ll leave it at that). Am currently listening to Brian Tracy’s “The psychology of selling” and Jeffrey Gitomer’s “Sales Bible”. While I frankly find this area to be boring as hell, I’m still learning a lot from it and re-evaluating my view of what sales actually is. Eben Pagan’s “Get Altitude” seminar is FANTASTIC if you have the time sit through it (it’s something like 20+ hours). It covers all aspects of business pretty much.

I recently interviewed Danish angel investor and entrepreneur Morten Lund (most famous for Skype) and his advice on business basically boiled down to: work harder, sales is extremely important, believe in yourself, network with people. The interview will be in Interesting Times #5, stay tuned for that.

I know Jack says “follow your passion”, while I think this is true I think it can also be a bit simplistic. Often passions can be grown, not found, by just doing something new and going at it. Marty Nemko talks about a guy who started working in a factory gluing silocone dashboards into tractors. This was boring as hell, but he started learning all about it and googling stuff about the process and soon he was passionate about silicone dashboards and became the go-to guy in that area, where there was not a lot of competition. The idea that everyone has a passion, they just need to uneart it, can be frustrating to a lot of people who ask themselves “what’s wrong with me since I can’t find my passion?”

Read more on the finding vs constructing passions debate here:
http://calnewport.com/blog/2010/01/23/beyond-passion-the-science-of-loving-what-you-do/
http://calnewport.com/blog/2009/11/24/are-passions-serendipitously-discovered-or-painstakingly-constructed/

I hope this helped 🙂 I spend inhuman amounts of time just reading this kind of stuff so always feel free to ask me for directions, I might just be able to point you in the right direction.