DaveBarousse.com

I have been a loyal customer to ING Direct since the day I opened an account with them. Since that day, several other online savings accounts offering a higher APY have surfaced. Although the rates are higher elsewhere, I have stuck with ING Direct because I am comfortable with them and I am expecting them to raise their rates soon in order to keep up with the competition. It has been a while since ING Direct has raised their rates, so I’m starting to consider making a move to one of the other, higher paying, services.

The E*Trade Complete Savings Account is looking the most attractive to me at this point. It offers a 5.05% APY and I already have a brokerage account with them. That may be the quickest and easiest way for me to increase my rate of return, but definitely not the highest rate that I could possibly earn.

If I do decide to move away from ING Direct, I will document my experience here and compare it to my experience with ING Direct.

Will ING Direct raise their rates soon? I’d prefer not to move away from them if I don’t have to, but I’m beginning to get the feeling that they are holding out on us. What are your thoughts? Leave a comment.

It can be a challenge to fight off cravings for stuff we think we want but know we should not have. In a time of weakness, it seems that we can easily think of hundreds of ways to convince ourselves that it’s OK just this one time and that next time you will be stronger. I personally do it quite often. However, it usually frustrates me after knowing that I caved in. And most of the time, the end result is not even worth it.

I like to enjoy myself by eating food that taste good, having dessert, drinking coffee and doing other things that probably aren’t the most healthiest of decisions. However, I know I have a problem when I become abusive or over indulge in any type of food, drink or activity that can decrease my health or keep me from reaching personal goals that I have set for myself. When I find that I am having a hard time controlling myself, I use a little technique that I call The 15 Minute Rule.

Much like the The 10 Minute Rule and the The 2 Minute Rule, the 15 Minute Rule also involves a time interval. Although it sounds the similar, it is different because it promotes self-discipline and not productivity. The 15 Minute Rule works like this:

If you get a craving for something that you want and know you should not have, wait 15 minutes before you commit yourself to having it. After 15 minutes, if you still want it, then have it.

What usually happens is the craving will go away before 15 minutes is up and you will no longer feel such a desire to have it. Therefore, it will be much easier to say no. And sometimes, you will simply forget about it and move on without even remembering what you were craving so badly in the first place.

I used this technique a lot when I quit smoking. It worked well for me and allowed me to start off small by controlling my cigarette cravings one at a time for short periods of time. Eventually, the 15 minutes grew to hours, days and moths before I no longer had the cravings. Today I use the 15 Minute Rule to help me reach my fitness goals. I have not been doing a very good job with it, but it does help and keeps me from eating those late night snacks that I do out of habit.

One thing to keep in mind is that these are not hard and fast rules that you should execute to perfection every day of your life. They are just simple techniques to help you when you are in a rut or need a boost. It is simply taking a larger task and breaking it down into smaller, more manageable, steps. The more you do them and practice them, the less you will have to think about it or even realize you are using them.

If you use the MyBlogLog Recent Readers widget on your blog, you may have noticed some interesting visitors to your site recently. The two main characters that I have been seeing on numerous blogs that I read are vote4cleo and litllolita. They appear to be two young females soliciting votes to become famous models, but when you dig a little deeper, these girls aren’t who they say they are.

So who is the wizard behind the curtain? My guess would be DeluxeOnlineRewards.com, or some affiliate of theirs, trying to scam your vistors. How are they scamming my visitors, you ask, they seem like two young attractive females simply trying to get a little exposure. That’s exactly what most people think, but lets go through the process so you can see exactly what they are up to.

You start off by finding a photo of MyBlogLog user named vote4cloe on the front page of this site. Among all the normal readers that usually show up there, she seems a bit eccentric, so you click on her photo or name to see her MyBlogLog profile.

Once landing on vote4cloe’s MyBlogLog profile page, you have to click through to her site that is listed in the “Sites And Blogs That I Author” section. That’s pretty common as bloggers often check out the blogs of visitors who show up in their MyBlogLog widget (I often do). Plus, they entice the desire to click through with this little bit of text, “Help Cleo become a Victoria’s Secret Model!” I think that would grab the attention of most men and a lot of women.

As you’ll see after clicking through, you land on vote4cleo’s Myspace profile. Notice her bio is all about her trying to be a Victoria Secret model and some drama about it being her lifetime dream. Also notice the huge bold link that reads, “Click Here To Vote For Me!” After clicking on that link is when the fun really begins.

When you click through vote4cleo’s Myspace profile, you’ll land on a page that looks like a page owned and operated by Victoria’s Secret (notice how they call it Victoria Secrets). The text says that if you participate in their offer you’ll earn a $500.00 gift card. To kick off the process, there is a form in the middle of the page for you to enter your zip code. Since vote4cloe is trying to be a Victoria’s Secret model and the web page appears to be legit, this all seems normal.

You are excited about getting $500.00 so you enter your zip code. You are then taken to another form asking you to enter more personal information. Of course you want to get your $500.00 gift card, and you trust Victoria’s Secret, so why not fill this out? Before doing that you may want to have a look at the fine print back on the page with the zip code form.

DeluxeOnlineRewards.com IS NOT AFFILIATED OR ASSOCIATED WITH AND HAS NOT RECEIVED ANY CONSIDERATION FROM ANY OF THE ABOVE ENTITIES

THIS IS AN ADVERTISEMENT*Notice: To claim your reward you must participate in our program and meet all of the offer eligibility requirements as outlined in the Terms & Conditions before you can receive your FREE reward. Eligibility requirements include signing up for at least 2 Silver, 2 Gold and 2 Platinum offers. Available offers will vary and some offers may require a purchase to qualify. Those qualifying for Gift Card rewards will have the option of receiving a Visa gift card or a retailer’s gift card where available.

If you haven’t figured it out by now, vote4cleo is NOT a young attractive female trying to become a Victoria’s Secret model. She is an online marketer trying to get your information to sell. If you’ve made it to the page with the form asking for your email address, city, state, age, etc. then you are only a few keystrokes away from making vote4cleo a good bit of cash and increasing the amount of spam in your inbox.

After entering your information and submitting the form, you are taken to a page where you have to select at least 6 of the “offers” that are mentioned in the fine print above. Those offers include subscriptions to services such as Dish Network, Columbia House, Bad Credit Loans, etc. What happens here is the marketer will be getting paid for each lead they generate with your information. If you finally make it this far, congratulations, you’ll get your $500.00 gift card. You’ll then need to use it to pay for the 6 or more subscriptions you just signed up for.

This entire process may seem a bit strenuous, but it is obviously working for these marketers as we see these types of campaigns all over the internet. They wouldn’t be putting forth so much effort to dupe people into their offers if it wasn’t making them money. You can also see this technique used in combination with display advertisements such as the classic punch the monkey ads.

Although MyBlogLog has had their share of problems recently, I’m not convinced that this case is a flaw in their system. But isn’t it their responsibility to weed this kind of stuff out? Perhaps. But aren’t most blogs using MyBlogLog to generate traffic to ultimately sell something? Directly or indirectly, yeah, probably so.

I personally don’t want to see MyBlogLog infested with spammers, so I hope they do make it a priority to keep these kind of scams out of their community. It is fun to browse the blogs of those who visit my site. When most of the users who appear in the recent readers widget are “fakes,” I’ll be removing it from my blog.

After going through this process, one of the most interesting things to me are the comments that bloggers are leaving on vote4cleo’s MyBlogLog profile. Most were thanking her for visiting their blog, but I read several where the commenter was sincerely wishing her luck in pursuing her modeling career. That tells me that these people don’t have a clue to what is actually going on.

My wonderful and talented wife is a Registered Nurse that specializes in Emergency Medicine. Naturally, I get to hear a lot of crazy ER stories when she vents to me about things that happen on her shift. She has to follow strict rules to protect patient’s privacy, so I don’t get all the info, just a general idea about all the drama that goes on. You would think it would be a lot like the television show “ER”, but unfortunately, it isn’t that glamorous.

At any rate, I’ll be the first to admit that I could never do my wife’s job. I have the utmost respect for her and the things that she is able to accomplish in a days work. She, and the rest of her team, are simply amazing.

Now that I have all of the introductions out of the way, lets get to the juicy stuff….

Since I’ve been hearing about all the crazy things that happen out in the real world for several years now, I don’t get surprised much any more. However, recently, there were two (yes, two!) cases of women who went to the ER with “stomach pains” and left with a baby in their arms, unexpected. Wow! Can someone please explain to me how a women can go nine months without realizing she is pregnant.

Let’s go through a quick checklist for any females out there who may suspect something is not normal, but can’t quite put their finger on it:

1. Missed period…after missing 9 or so, you’d think they would be concerned
2. Unusual or abnormal period…see #1
3. Nausea and Vomiting…could have been from the beer and/or wine
4. Changes in libido…probably didn’t notice
5. Soreness of the Breasts…didn’t set off any alarms
6. Enlargement of the Breasts…thought that was cool, bought low cut shirt
7. Increased Urination…thought that was due to drinking a lot of water that they have strangely been craving
8. Strange Cravings…see # 7
9. Fatigue…what else is new
10. Skin Changes…didn’t notice
11. Stretch Marks…already had them from compulsive over eating
12. Quickening (Fetal Movement)…thought it was from the burrito eaten 8 months ago
13. Colostrum from Breasts…thought that’s what happens after you have sex with several different partners
14. Enlarged Abdomen…already previously enlarged
15. Positive Pregnancy Test…obviously didn’t take one

So, the moral of this story is, if you are experiencing any of the previously 15 listed items (especially a combination of them) please go see your doctor immediately.

Marcus Frind is the guy behind the ultra successful dating site, Plentyoffish.com. In a recent blog post about his current plan of action, he laid it on the line for any aspiring entrepreneurs or business owners. Marcus had this to say:

Burn this into your brain, Success doesn’t happen, its created.

Now I know most of the people reading this are aspiring to create a business of some kind. Many will just day dream all day but never actually do anything. I was like that a few years ago, then I finally sat down and did something, and kept forcing myself to do it till it became a pattern and it turned out hugely successful. Now i’m going to repeat that and you can as well. Now when you read this, I’ll be on a beach in Mexico on my big bed watching thousands of girls stream by, and in between the time it takes you to read this and my next drink arrives I’ll have made your weekly salary. Now that is either going to make you angry, or it’s going to inspire you to go create something. The choice is yours.

That is the level I want to be operating on. Thanks for the motivation Marcus.

I often think back to my younger years and wonder why I was never given any formal training in personal finance. The message that was conveyed to me throughout those years was to work hard, get good grades, do well in school and get a good job. I guess, because all of the elders in my life were promoting this same idea to me, I thought that was just the way it worked out in the real world.

I never had the opportunity to take any personal finance classes in high school. They simply were not offered. It would have been great to have a class back then that taught me how to deal with credit cards, start investing at a young age, buy appreciating assets instead of depreciating, compounding interest, etc. A lot of those ideas were taught in my college classes, but it was straight out of the textbook with no guidance into how we could apply it to our own finances.

Luckily for me, I have parents who taught me about money. They taught me how to manage a checkbook, how to save for my future, how to earn interest and how to enjoy the finer things when I think I deserved them. My parents did a great job educating me about personal finance, especially about how to avoid getting into credit card debt at a young age. The biggest lesson of all was putting myself through college.

The one thing that always stuck out to me, and made me really think hard about the information they were passing along, is when they started off by saying: “if I would have done this at your age…” I feel that I was lucky to have parents who were able to teach me.

So the question is, who’s responsibility is it to teach kids about personal finance? Is it the parent’s sole responsibility? Is it the schools responsibility? Do credit card companies and big box stores even want kids to be more financially savvy? Do kids even care enough about personal finance to teach them?

Often times when I am thinking back on my younger years, I wonder if the financial information and techniques that I seek out now were being taught to me, but I was not interested enough in it at the time to care. I know the lessons my parents taught me stuck, but was there a lot more that I simply ignored? Was I just not paying attention? And what if my high school offered a personal finance class, would I have even taken it? I’d like to think so, but I’m sure if I were interested enough, I could have found the information myself.

Did you have any formal personal financial training in high school? Did it help? If not, would you be better off today if had that knowledge at a younger age?

Is Twitter simply misunderstood or really worthless?

While reading some of the live blogging going on at the 2007 SXSW conference last week, it was apparent that Twitter was the darling company of the event. I was told by my good friend, Patrick McCarthy (who spoke at the event), that there were two large plasma TV’s set up that scrolled Twitter messages all day long. There were also reports from other bloggers that panelist were Twittering while up on the panel. I find that disturbing.

Taken directly from the Twitter home page, they explain their service as:

A global community of friends and strangers answering one simple question: What are you doing? Answer on your phone, IM, or right here on the web!

I’ll admit that the technology behind this whole thing sounds pretty cool. However, I do not understand why everyone is raving so much about the application. I know my friends don’t really care about what I’m doing, and I surely don’t have the time to worry about what all my friends are doing. Are people really that bored?

What I really think is wild is the statement made by Jason Calacanis in his recent Twitter Is On Fire blog post. Jason said:

Yes, this is the start of something big. Soon Twitter will carry video, audio, and photos… when that happens Twitter replaces IM and email and flickr 50% of the time

That is a pretty bold statement and I personally don’t see it happening. At least for me it won’t because I don’t think I’ll be creating a Twitter account any time soon. Unless otherwise convinced that Twitter is worth my time, I’d rather focus my energy on something useful and fun.

I totally understand how Twitter can be used for more than just letting your friends know what you are doing, but there are already several services currently in place that everyone already uses and are comfortable using. There is definitely room for more efficient and streamlined processes to deliver content to your friends, but I don’t think Twitter is the answer. At least not in it’s current form.

Twitter sounds like it would be fun for about 10 minutes, then would annoy the hell out of me. I also hate the name. I’m not the only one who feels this way about Twitter.

I do respect the idea and the technology driving the application. I just don’t think that the application, especially the way it is currently pitched, is worth all of the hype it has been receiving lately.

The good news is that Twitter has proven that people are ready to interact more with web applications through other channels such as IM and cell phones. That is going to be a space to watch as it will only become more popular riding on the success that Twitter has seen.

In addition to The 10 Minute Rule, I give you one more tidbit to help you become more productive and decrease your stress levels.

Much like The 10 Minute Rule, the 2 Minute Rule is very simple to implement into your daily life. The 2 Minute Rule works like this: If you know that a simple task will take you 2 minutes or less to complete, do that task right now. Don’t procrastinate it any longer, just get it done.

How does that reduce your stress levels? The answer is that you know longer have to worry about remembering to complete that task since it is now done and over with. Getting that small bit of information out of your mental to-do list can feel like lifting a huge weight off of your shoulders.

Don’t take my word for it, give it a try. If you notice a difference in your productivity and stress (good or bad) leave me a comment.

Offtheisland.com kept me laughing this week. First there was the I’m Blogging video and now this hilarious White Men Can’t Jump video.

The blogging video has become popular around the office since a lot of the guys I work with have blogs. In fact, multiple times this week, I’ve heard someone put all of their calls on hold because they were busy blogging. We put the “B” in blogging.

Update: OTI just topped them all with, Hammer And Coop. That is some funny stuff. My action name: Decker Ball Bearings.

Since discovering John Chow’s blog several months ago, I’ve been hooked. The great advice, secrets of the pros, openess and transparency has keep me coming back on a daily basis. I’ve learned a lot in the short time that I’ve been reading JohnChow.com and it was actually a post that he made that motivated me to create a blog of my own.

JohnChow.com easily became a favorite of mine for several reasons. The main one being that I simply enjoy the web and the opportunities that are available online. It is obvious that John has the same passion, but he takes it to a whole new level. He documents the way he takes advantage of these opportunities and then shares that information with all of us. It also seems that John genuinely enjoys helping others who share the same passion as him. He does so by setting the example and by giving back valuable information to other bloggers.

John’s blog became popular due to his original content and the way he openly shares his tips and tricks. Since becoming one of the most popular personal blogs on the internet, John has been able to leverage his traffic and come up with creative ways to make his blog more profitable. This is the ultimate dream for a lot bloggers out there, so reading a live journal of how John is making this happen is like blogger crack for those trying to make blogging a steady revenue stream.

Watching John in action, it is really genius how he is able to take ideas like ReviewMe and turn them into an opportunity for all of his visitors. By putting in a little bit of work reviewing John’s blog, he is willing to give me an inbound link from his site. That is a great opportunity for someone like me, trying to increase traffic to a new blog. He also gives away neat little prizes to top commenter’s on his articles. Cool right?

Bottom line, if you are interested in blogging, web publishing, making money online or want some fresh new ideas on how to improve your website, pay close attention to Johnchow.com. You never know what may show up next.