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It was a very sad day in our household June 2, 2006. A few weeks before then our family cat “Millie”, a five year old Siamese mix had been acting strange. She had been more withdrawn, irritable, consuming large amounts of water and unable to "find" her cat box when nature called.

We hadn’t taken much notice that anything was wrong, with exception to the constant need to clean-up after her. That is until, that morning in June when she exhibited pronounced swelling and a vaginal discharge. Then we knew without a doubt that she was ill.

Then we found ourselves in the midst of yet another dilemma. Because I had been out of work since the end of April, that meant that every penny had to count. So, I set out to try to fix our situation with some internet research. After about an hour of researching, I was sure our cat was exhibiting symptoms of what veterinarians would refer to as PY-O-MET-RA. And the prognosis didn’t look good. According to what I had read, without surgery our cat would slowly continue to die of a serious bacterial infection.

After several phone calls to animal shelters and animal hospitals, I had concluded two things. First, if I tried to get our cat into a shelter, she would die long before she would get any help, and second, we needed to get her into a vet to verify my diagnosis. No one would discuss it over the phone. My wife and I finally decided on Hesperia Animal Hospital, mostly because the examination fee at the time was $19.50, which also happened to be the cheapest I could find in the High Desert area. It was 5:20 PM when I called and set up the appointment, they closed at 6 PM but told me that they would see her that evening. We silently prayed for God's will in our crisis.

So it was settled, the whole family rushed over to the animal hospital to have her checked out. My wife and children waited anxiously in the van as I brought our cat in. I must tell you that the Hesperia Animal Hospital is an impressive facility. It was spacious, clean, and well planned out.

We waited in the exam room for a very short time, and then Millie and I met Veterinarian Shafeeq Ahmed. After a brief examination, he confirmed that Millie was indeed suffering from Pyometra. He explained that surgery would be the only solution, and without it she would die. The cost would be close to $300.00. I explained to him that we were in a financial bind and technically, I couldn’t even afford the visit. I then inquired about putting her down, as I didn’t want her to suffer. It seemed like the only course of action left open to us. And it would cost an additional $70.00.

The Doctor to our surprise waived the examination fee, and so I carried Millie out to the van, and my waiting family to consult my wife on what course of action to pursue. In tears she decided that we should have Millie euthanized, to minimize her suffering. So, sadly we all said goodbye to our cat, and I brought her back inside to have the doctor end her suffering. I paid the fee and signed over the consent form then slowly trudged out to the car.

All the way home we prayed for the Lord to minister to our needs in the face of this loss. It wasn't until that day that I realized the amount of love we had all developed for our family pet. Apparently I had taken her for granted. We continued to grieve on and off over the next few days, and decided that we wouldn’t bring another animal into our home for quite some time.

Then unexpectedly five days later on June 7th, we received a call from Dr. Ahmed. He informed me that he had performed the necessary surgery and treatment for our cat and that she was recovering well, and could be picked up that morning. From the kindness of his heart he had chosen to try to save our cat. And he did it at no cost to us. When asked, the Doctor had said “He could see in my eyes that I truly cared for our cat, and he assumed that we had children at home who would also suffer from losing her.” My wife and our son, brought home Millie that morning, and set an appointment to have her stitches removed later that month. We thanked the Lord and Dr. Ahmed repeatedly for the gift of love and kindness he bestowed upon our family. Dr. Ahmed asked only that we share our story with others and so, we have.

~We praise the Lord for His miracle, and the kind soul who helped work it!

If you have pets, our family would like to recommend Hesperia Animal Hospital and Dr. S. Ahmed to handle all of your pet care needs. Hesperia Animal Hospital features:
• Dr. S. Ahmed - Over 20 Years of Experience
• An Attentive Staff of Over 15 Members
• 70 Kennels
• Puppy & Kitten Packages Available
• Complete Pet Care Facility
• One Stop Quality Care Facility
• Affordable Price With Quality
• Temperature Controlled Indoor Boarding
• Premium Food & Supplies
• Dog & Cat Grooming
• Groomer - 21 Years Experience
• Professional Pet Boarding

You can find out more at: WWW.HesperiaAnimalHospital.Com

Shafeeq Ahmed:
Here is a picture of Millie after her surgery with Dr. S. Ahmed.

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Last night we created a new breed of grilled cheese. (New in this house anyway.) A grilled cheese to make all others hang their crispy corners in shame. These things were so tasty I just have to share what we did. So, maybe you could make some too. Sadly I only managed to save one of the three pictures I took of it. The blurry one :(

For this "gourmet" sandwich recipe you will need the following ingredients:
2 Slices of Bread
Several Slices PepperJack Cheese
Mayonnaise
Yellow Onion
Tomato
Mezzeta Pepperoncini
Butter

Butter the outside of the bread, then apply mayo to the inside of the bread. Dice onion, Slice Tomato, slice the block of Pepper Jack cheese, pull out your jar of shredded pepperoncini. I prefer Mezzeta but most any will do.

Stack up in even proportions, pan fry until crispy and melty, then enjoy!
This sandwich packs in so much taste you just won't believe it!!

Ciao

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Okay,

Ready for a mind blowing business idea. How about a "I can't believe this was just staring me in the face all this time, and I never ever thought of it." idea?

Maybe a; "I am not that desperate yet, but I will file that away under, (WHAT IF)." idea. Yeah, that is what it is for me since I thought of it. Yes I love business, and yes I need more money than what I currently make in order to better support and provide for my family. But, I am not this desperate yet, this idea falls farther down on my list of things to do to make extra money.

Alright enough reading the hook paragraph. Let us get down to the business, of starting a business on a broken shoe string from scratch! What you will need for this endeavor:

1) A Pick-up Truck
2) A Flat-bed Trailer
(if you have one it helps, if not get one later.)
3) 12 Plastic Open Top 55 Gallon Drums
(You can start with less)
4) A computer
(You better have one if your reading this, but if not read my other article "Getting Free Stuff 101 here: http://www.xomba.com/getting_free_stuff_101 )
5) Miscellaneous; Spray Paint, Work Gloves, Work Clothes, Clipboard, Bungee Cords, Roto-Zip, Tarp, and more (read below).

To begin with you will need to acquire a few plastic drums either with removable tops or just cut the tops off of them with a roto-zip. Now would be a good time to attach a couple of Rope handles to the top lips of the barrel, or you may opt to cut out a couple of hand holds. It will take the same amount of time either way, but rope costs more money so you decide. Barrels around me cost around $15 each. But, I did have an opportunity one time where I advertised in the free paper, looking for barrels, and I had a company call me offering all I could haul away. Three problems though. I didn't have the ability to pick up more than 4 or 6 at a time. They were located over 40 miles away. And they contained chemicals that would probably not be friendly to my ground, my pets, my kids, my garden, or myself. No way to detox them safely. Make good choices or you'll pay for it later.

Now the business plan is this. You are going to offer a small neighborhood recycling program. How can you implement this? First you had better make sure that there is not one already in place offered by your city. If there is you are probably S.O.L. and you can stop reading this article here.

Good your still here, so you must be ready to strike out on your own in this little business venture? Take your plastic drums and spray paint and your hand-cut cardboard stencil (which you can make by tracing a simple recycle design from your computer, or you can buy custom vinyl stickers....) and mark your drums, with your official sounding program name. You may want to put more info on the side of the drum than your name, you might want to also put:

1)Plastic and Aluminum only.
2)Your contact Number
3)The Collection Day of the week.
4)Your slogan...

The idea of marking the barrels is 4 fold. You want them to look as official as possible. You want them to remind the clients of what to recycle, and when to put out the can.
And most importantly you want them to be an advertisement to the rest of the neighborhood and cars that drive by enticing them to call and request their own.

Type up and print out a simple recycling contract that basically says you are lending the plastic barrels to the customer and that you own them. That they agree to recycle only the following items I.E.(Plastic No.1 containers and Aluminum Items). You may opt to request a deposit on each barrel for the value of the barrel. But this may be a hard selling point. You may also opt to bill them once per month, for some nominal amount if they fail to put out the barrel at least once per month. You may also want to bill them if they request a replacement barrel if they have damaged or lost it, other than normal wear and tear.

SO, you printed out a contract, had it proof read, maybe even brought it to a local paralegal to make it appropriately legal to your area. So print up some copies and grab your clipboard. Load your barrels into your pick-up and head on down the road. Door-to-door.

Let's be smart about this now. Don't go haphazardly down the streets. Pick one street, not necessarily your own and go house to house, drop off one barrel to each resident that wants to join your program. Collect their name, phone number, address, and make sure you assign them a collection day that does not fall on the same day as their trash day! And also make sure it is a day you will without a doubt pick up their trash, one slip up here and your screwed. Also document which addresses decline, and which do not answer. (If you have more resources, you could have some flyers printed up and you could drop them off at the homes that do not answer. If you have a business partner all the better, this won't be a cake walk just yet.)

Once you have a dozen people or (however many barrels you have) signed up for service. Your past the hard part. The next part is to go out as promised on "Collection Day" and pick up the recyclables. This shouldn't take long driving down one street to collect about 12 barrels worth in your truck bed. Once you have finished the collection, it is off to the local recycle center to cash in. Once per week you can make this run, and start a simple small cash flow. Saving up to build to your program shouldn't take too long.

Buy more barrels, get a trailer, put signs on it, hire an answering service, make flyers, send out invoices, etc.

You are in business. What did it take to start. Well that all depends on what you really had to purchase to get started. Many things are available free. I believe that $1000 would easily start and float this business.

Want to go legit? That's easy too. Apply for a business license, open a business checking account, set up a small office at home, make plans to expand. You have 7 different days a week to serve your area. Pick a different day for each neighborhood. You may even be able to garner public, or charitable support.

I plan to revise this article few times, so bear with me on that part please. Hopefully it isn't too "messy" to get some good ideas out of it.

Plan well, do your homework and reach for success.

Collecting recyclables isn't exactly a glamor business but a lot of people are not thinking about doing it either.

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The more things change the more they stay the same. Our government continues to flood our economy with more dollars. And folks, it just doesn't make sense.

FED continues to cut the rates! Dollar losing ground on all fronts! America up for sale! Euro trading at record high!

I remember when I first tried to learn to really forgive. About 6 years ago I began my walk with Christ. I came across a situation where I really needed to forgive and I stopped and prayed alone in my room. I asked Christ to show me how to forgive.

I waited contemplating how I could forgive. And it hit me right out of the blue. (Sometimes God answers quickly, other times not so fast, but always right by His timing.) I remembered a situation in my life when I had given my uncle some control arm bushings to get them pressed into the control arms on my old 73 Nova. Unfortunately it didn't get done right away, and I ended up with the control arms back. The car sat some more and when we finally were going to get it done. I couldn't find the bushings. I had thought that my uncle still had them, and so my father asked his brother for them, and he said he gave them back. We looked again, and didn't find them, and we swore up and down, that he must have had them or lost them.

My uncle bought some replacements and brought them down to us. He told me he didn't know where they were, and he didn't lose them.

Well, time passed by and the car finally got back on the road. Then one day in the cluttered garage, I came across a bag of bushings. The bushings. It didn't take but a micro second to feel like a complete heel. I wrongly accused my uncle of losing these parts, and it was really on me. And then he went out of his way to replace them.

The next time I saw him (he lived about an hour away, and we didn't see him often.) I tried to apologize to him for the whole thing. He didn't want me to apologize, he forgave me and let it go.

After that memory had replayed to me, my prayer was answered. I knew how to forgive. I just had to feel it. I just had to be on the recieving end of it to fully understand. The impact my uncle's action had on me was immeasurable. I have been able to forgive those that have wronged me, without dwelling on it for a good while now.

It has made the biggest difference in my life, and has helped me to take a big step closer to God.

God Bless!

FreeCracker4Jack
Your friendly neighborhood Crafts Man.

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These are a great snack for poker night, or most any party gathering.

Ingredients: 6 potatoes, sour cream, butter/margarine, bacon bits, salt/pepper, chives, cheddar or pepper jack cheese

These taste great and are easy to make. Take 6 potatoes and thoroughly wash the skins, then poke with a fork five or six times, drop into a microwave safe bowl and pop them into the microwave for about 8-12 minutes (or until tender as microwaves vary). Once baked, pull the spuds out of the microwave. On a clean cutting surface, slice them all in to halves. Next with a table spoon or an ice cream scoop, scrape the insides into a mixing bowl leaving just a husk of skin with a small amount of potato inside. Place the husks on a baking tray and set them aside for now. Next add some butter, chives, bacon bits, salt, pepper, shredded cheese and sour cream to the mixing bowl and using your mixer blend the ingredients until smooth, just like mashed potatoes. Now spoon the mixture back into the potato skins, top with a little more shredded cheese and pop in the oven until warm and melty. Now they're ready to serve!

Ciao

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FreeCracker4Jack
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ATTN: Reader

This is not an advertisement. This is not an offer. This is not a promise.

"You too can be a millionaire just like me, all you have to do is purchase my eBook for $29.95 and I will not only tell you everything you will ever need to know to be successful at marketing and selling, I will even throw in over 200 eBooks on the latest and hottest topics guaranteed to sell like hot cakes. If you will employ my simple, methods, you will be at home spending quality, leisure time, with your family. Do what you want to do, while your computer is literally force feeding hundreds of dollars per minute into your bank account. Even while you sleep.... yack, yack, yack"

I am someone just like you. Tired of the daily grind, tired of running after the rainbow, and I am disgusted with the articles and advertisements that are little more than an enticement to separate you from your hard earned money by purchasing eBooks on how to sell eBooks. How to make "easy money", with "little/no effort". This borderline scam has been around for quite some time. Longer than the internet as a matter of fact.

You can probably still read newspaper ads asking for a small amount of cash for 10 easy stay at home business ideas. Worst case you send your money and get nothing. Best case you send your money and get the same thing. NOTHING. Sure they send you a couple sheets of paper with a few ideas on them, but it is still nothing of value.

The only reason I can conceive that these things work is because indeed there is a fresh crop of young and hopeful people, who are in a dire situation, scrambling to try to understand what exactly they have gotten themselves into with their boyfriends/girlfriends and the new apartment they just rented and the 50hr work weeks grinding away on them, oh and the baby that is coming in a few short months. I can see how someone might welcome these nearly impossible offers. Offers that are cashing in on the hopes and dreams of another victim of life’s grind.

At one time or another, most of us have been there. I was there. It was nearly 10-12 years ago and maybe not under the exact circumstance I described above. I believed that anything could be possible, and that all I needed was the right information, a plan and a willingness to work hard.

Thousands have been legally cheated out of their hard earned savings by charlatans and cheats. Albeit, it is often by a small margin that it is legal, but there seems to be no shortage of those that are ready to offer up their shine’ola and those that are clamoring to buy it.

Look, don’t beat yourselves up thinking about when you were last taken advantage of. It happens a lot. They take your hopes and dreams, ignite your ambition just enough to commit to buying in and then they leave you with a semi finished system of how to do things that have been hashed up and resold to “everyone”.

It is nearly the same for the weight loss industry if you think about it. They play on your low self esteem and make you promises. You get your hopes up and rely on their product. You never read the fine print, RESULTS NOT TYPICALyou try it for awhile, at worst it makes you sick and fatter, and at best it works but you find out later that it was more about diet and exercise than it was about “magic beans”.

The same thing holds true for your “Millionaire Future”. If you really want to be a millionaire it takes hard work and planning every single day. There is absolutely no guaranteed way to easily become of millionaire. It does not come over night. Apply your passion and desire to drive you into learning more about how to build a business or other investment. Set goals and assess yourself often. Just like working hard to write articles everyday you need to make a commitment to yourself and your endeavors. NEVER PAY TO MAKE MONEY, you can invest to make money, but you never buy in to a system, or MLM to "Make Money". The only ones making money are the ones selling the system.

Until next time, keep your guard up and your wallet shut.

CJ

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