Going Coastal - Spring Break
Well spring break is about over and with my new position as an Internet Sales Manger at Carl Gregory in Brunswick we had to sacrifice our customary trip to Wild Adventures in exchange for a trip to the beach. While a trip to the beach for many is a once in a lifetime event we are fortunate to live “Coastal”, so it is always available to us.
Sometimes we take these things for granted. Living in the middle of so many natural resources we overlook obvious inexpensive family outings. This was Preston’s first visit while Tyler and Alex have been to the beach a few times it was a great inexpensive family outing.
This trip reminded me why I chose to stay in this area and not take advantage of opportunities in other parts of the country. We have a
moderate winter climate and I just love the water. After moving inland a few years ago I had forgotten how much I actually love the beach and all of the things that it entails living close to it. So now we have decided to buy a new home within walking distance of the water while the real estate market is getting hammered down in Brunswick, Georgia.
We found a nice property today that needs some repairs and are going to make an offer on it tomorrow. I hope we they take our offer, because it will allow us to casually sell our current home and not worry about being in a financial bind as we make the transition to “Going Coastal” and having the freedom to casually stroll the beaches at the end of a long day.
Everywhere I go things are happening…
Since returning to the work force as an Internet Sales Manger I meet new interesting people daily and am enriched from the experience. You get to learn the dynamics of other peoples lives in their family life and business life and open yours up to them. It is a give and take and how you adapt to these interactions can enrich you or cause you to lose faith in many things.
I am a perpetual optimist who happens to be a bit too pragmatic at times. An oxymoron to say the least, but that is who I am. I find it humorous when people try to hide their weaknesses by attacking others. We have all seen it in our daily lives and am not going to delve into examples here. On the other side of that is when people realize their mistakes and use those as stepping stones to improve themselves and contributions to society, mistakes are the best learning tool we have.
Some of the things that have been going on around me lately in my life has caused me to reexamine some of my long term goals and it is due to interactions with others. In the near term I do plan on maintaining my position as an Internet Sales Manager and keep my options open. The rising cost of my son’s health care is casing me to realize the importance low cost health insurance, which spawned my return to the automobile industry and the networking opportunities that have resulted in this reentry into the regular workforce have proven bountiful.
My long term goal is to take the knowledge that I am developing and transform it into a niche business inside of a very lucrative marketplace as an Automotive Online Marketing Consultant and it is coming to fruition a lot faster than I had planned and has placed me at a crossroads and now must make a decision to move forward with that goal or happily do what I am doing and enjoy the comfortable success I have found.
I have the opportunity to partner with a leading automotive training firm as a consultant to develop some core products and to provide hands on training in dealerships across the country and the fears that are associated with entering the arena of the unknown or to remain in a position of omnipotence and answering only to myself.
Decisions, decisions, both roads are less traveled either way I am in for a bumpy ride, hopefully though it will not be in a circle like this blog post..
The Net Can Be Fun - At Least I Have a Sense of Humor
It is well known I am a very vocal person and do not hide behind masks in my dealings online. It is funny though when people try to take unfounded potshots at me. Sometimes they don’t like the return of the favor.
I was pretty vocal about the launch of the PayPerPlay network and the revival of the NetAudioAds Affiliate program and even dedicate a site to it. What is funny is that they resorted to attempted character assasionation in an effort to downplay the truths of their organization. A person who is basically anonymous started a site geared towards me that talks about me filing bankruptcy multiple times. While I did file in the EARLY 90’s, due to becoming an adult too early in life it is comical that all the rest of the stuff she puts out there is just a mere attempt to take credibility away from me.
She takes shots about being the father of a child with a cleft lip and palate, my rant here about a troll leaving threating comments on this blog and claims I filed bankruptcy two times this year, which did not happen, she even claims I was born near Monroe, LA. (Brunswick, GA is where I was born).
What is nice though is that they try to use the content here as a way to denigrate me and send me a bunch of traffic. The thing is this is my only site that has no level of online “monetization” on it but I still like the free traffic. Too bad I took the time to even post on this but tons of traffic is coming from her diatribe and I thought I would let people know the truth, as that is not in the cards from NetAudioAds and PayPerPlay and never will be.
It is all fun and games now………
The love of a child and redemption
To often is it easy to forget that our children love us unconditionally. They love us no matter what just as we love them for being our children, unconditionally. Tonight I had an experience that happens all to often. The kids were not following instructions and dad was loosing his cool. Only to be reminded that I too was a child once. Without boring you with the details the kids were showing out in a restaurant and I wanted no part of it and felt trapped, completely helpless and I am the one in the family that they look to for leadership. I responded instead of reacting and made it an unpleasant evening for all.
On our ride home I was reminded several times by the children that they were sorry for misbehaving and my wife gave a scornful look. It makes a long ride home longer. Only to find that there are other issues when we return home. Homework not done, kids not wanting to bathe and a wife who is getting more frustrated with me and the children. I had a decision to make and make fast to save the evening from being completely ruined. So I did as any studios husband, father does. I let selective listening take over and started to tune out the noise around me. Another bad choice.
Through no great effort of mine the homework got done, the children were bathed and put to bed and my bride was still not very cheerful. Lost for words I could only do what I could and hugged and held her like we were giddy teenagers again only to be interrupted buy a child not feeling well. Sigh..
I took the time to tend to the child and get them back asleep only to find my wife sleeping soundly for me to deliver a kiss from the falsely ailing child, helped her get into bed only to find myself telling the world about it.
The silent house, sleeping children and bride and no interruptions cause me to reflect on how to redeem this day and allow kids to be kids, and to keep that unconditional love coming in.
Happy New Year - 2008
Well nothing to really say but wishing you and yours a very Happy New Year. Not going to bore you with a list of resolutions or stuff like that. My goals for ‘08 have been shared with those that need to know the most. Pressing issues may require me to do some things that I may not be looking forward to but hey that is part of life and time will keep marching on.
I have had the opportunity to network with interesting people all over the country and world in 2007 and have formed some valuable bonds and made many friends and a few enemies. None of this would of been possible without the World Wide Web and the exposure you can receive through it. Networking possibilities are endless and formations of partnerships are priceless not just in the realm of making money but also in friendship and comradery.
Some people who have influenced my decisions for the up coming year are:
Without the direct input each of these people have made upon my life I would not have the plans in place to make 2008 the best year possible for my family via the World Wide Web.
Good luck to all for the upcoming year!!
Anonymity - Trolls and Blogging
It is great when you get a spike in traffic for various terms. This site has started to get a lot of traffic because people are searching for my name. Granted that is not the only traffic I get here but I think the recent surge in name searches for “Paul Rushing” has spiked because of how vocal I have been about a couple of different Internet Marketing issues.
One thing I have never done is hide behind aliases, masked who I am or how to contact me. It is all out there for the world to see. So it is comical when I get troll comments where people use fake email addresses and aliases to post comments on my blogs. I can understand why people may want to be anonymous online and definitely respect peoples right to privacy. I have been a victim of Identity Theft in the past and even after after that I really do not go out of my way to hide who I am. I do subscribe to Life Lock and that does take away my fear of Identity Theft happening again.
On another note though no amount of Identity Theft Protection protects personal safety and when you see troll comments from an IP range within driving distance of your home it does make you wonder especially when I have been recently threatened by someone running a fraudulent marketing campaign. Even then though I know someone really out to do harm to me would not leave a troll comment, they would just do what they set out to do. Threats are for cowards. Especially when they infer things that they do not intend to do.
Granted I do get many spam comments on this site and many others that I own but I do have effective spam comment controls in place, but that does not stop trolls who use email addresses like bob@yahoo.com from showing up in my moderation cue. So I have now set up a membership requirement to post comments. That is unfortunate for people who like to comment and ads a few steps but it does cause the “Bobs” of the world to verify an email address before they can submit a comment so if they want to troll they at least must use a real email address.
Back to personal safety and being a highly vocal person when people do things that you do not agree with. I have several publication style sites that I am testing my journalistic skills on and they do concentrate on subjects that are controversial. Kind of like the news reporters that call out companies that take advantage of consumers. Instead of showing up with a camera in their face I just put it on the web. I thought about my personal safety when I started sites like that and realized that I am not going to live under a rock because I call a spade a spade no more than reporters that you see on television.
One thing I like about living in Rural Coastal Georgia is owning a gun does not carry the stigma that it does in other parts of the country. Nor is it considered unusual behavior. Since childhood I have been a collector of sorts for guns. My wife calls it my arsenal. I have pistols, shot guns, hunting rifles, although I am not a hunter, and assault rifles. High end and low end. So as far as my personal safty goes I have never really been worried and never really will be. My family is another story.
My wife and adult children are more than capable of defending themselves as I have spent countless hours out plinking with them. My wife and adult daughter both carry .25 pistols in their purse and know how to use them. My adult son loves to look at guns as much as I do and there is no telling what he owns now but I am positive that he is more than capable of defending himself as well. That just leaves my primary concern with my small school age children. They know not to let strangers approach them and how to conduct themselves if they are approached and am confident that they would seek an adult that they know if they were approached. That does not change the fact that they must to be overly cautious and requires me to spend more time with them teaching them how to protect themselves in a bad spot.
Being a father of five children and the oldest of five brothers it does instill a strong sense of family that coupled with standing up for what you believe in does give emotion to retribution if someone harms those that you love. Everyday the news is polluted where children have died due to drunk drivers, abuse, not being in seat belts and mean hate crimes. I consider myself very fortunate that I have never had to bury a child, I have had to bury a brother, he died in a car wreck driving way to fast. If I were to ever have a child harmed, hurt or scared by the hands or actions of someone trying get at me or through careless behavior hell hath no fury compared to what I would rain down on them not to mention that there would be no need for a trail if they are identified. I would be the one on trial like Samuel Jackson in the movie “A Time to Kill”.
So bob@yahoo.com be aware that I have pinpointed your location within a very targeted geographical area. If you wish to post a comment you will have to register an account. I am apologize to my regular readers for this and Troy when you come back around I like the idea of JedBuilt drop a note and say hello.
Some Internet Marketers Refuse to Grow Up
My 6 year old son Alexander, who is in kindergarten, was assigned the task of learning the four seasons. As good parents should we help our children with their school work. When he was asked what the four seasons are his first answer was HUNTING SEASON. We died laughing. One thing I must let people know is that I am not a hunter never have been one and really have no intention of taking it up. The only place he could have gotten that from is school. That is ok. It is one of the benefits of living in Rural Coastal GA. Your children are exposed to thing such as shucking oysters, wearing shorts in December and the barrage of hunters driving into the woods every morning prior to and during hunting season.
I have recently entered a strong debate in a niche that I am not really a part of. The make money niche of online marketing. There has been a lot of hoopla about downline integrity and the formation of the Downline Integrity Brigade and usually a debate like that I would extricate myself, but I could not refuse. Hindsight being 20/20 I may not of reacted in an such an overly verbose stance but I do believe in standing up for what is right and cannot stand it when people take shots at others because they disagree with their opinion.
The bad thing is it caused me to lose some focus on other projects and now I must play catch up. Sigh…
Online Marketing Kicking into High Gear!!
Well my online empire is growing by leaps and bound. Everyday the income is increasing and task are getting easier. I have partnered up with another online marketer to help bring both of our careers to the next level. Our relationship has a built in synergy that allows our skill sets to complement each other.
On another note I have some semi fun personal issues going on. For those that don’t know me well prior to 9-11-01 my income was at a level that I will not see again in the near future. My lifestyle at the time was such that I was making 300K a year and spending 300k not a good place to be in. Then the chair ws kicked out from under neath us and my income plummeted.
In the personal financial recovery I have made I have had to deal with collection agencies and learned some amazing thing about how they operate. The biggest ting is that for the most part they break laws.
I had received a dunning notice for a credit card from a collection agency that has been paid off from Federal Bond and Collection Services recently. I was calling them to get a fax number to send them a copy of the the receipt and settlement letter but knew from prior dealing with collection agencies that I need to record the conversation. Before I could get a word in edgewise the debt collector at FBCS Collection Agency proceeded to violate the Fair Debt Collection Practices Act several times and repeatedly.
So one of my new online “niches” is educating consumers on how to deal with collection agencies. This may be one of my more profitable niches all by accident. Thank you FBCS Collection.
Personal Online Properties Starting to Suffer
Some of my personal affiliate sites are starting to suffer because of my new job. It is ok for now. The decrease in online income is offset by my employment income by 10 fold. So for now I am not complaining. It still does not offset my resolve to get online income to over 100K per year. I do feel I can accomplish that in 2008.
The kids seem to being doing good. I have spent a lot of time away from them with my new position. The hours are tremendous. I do still get the morning drive to school with them so we do get those few minutes of quality time in the morning, but for the last week they have been in bed when I got home. Tomorrow I am making up for that. We have a guys day out planned.
Preston’s surgery is coming up on Friday and that will probably be my next post here, I have many projects that I am working on online that generate income so I have to really concentrate my time there.
Cheers…
I need more hours in a day
Between family and work I have little time to work on my other online passions. I have been a full time affiliate marketer up until two weeks ago. Now my affiliate income is suffering because I am running out of time to maintain everything and develop new niches.
Ok enough ranting. Other than watching income streams level off life is good. The kids had a fairly uneventful second day of school. Alex even came home with a 
on his daily report. Alex is adamant on riding the bus to school instead of us taking him. Tyler on the other had does not want to make that commitment as the bus arrives around 7:00 and school does not start until 8:00. he enjoys the extra shut eye.
Work was rather uneventful too. I did not get a lot accomplished but that is ok too. I will make up for it tomorrow.
I am gonna keep this one brief so I can work on other online task.
“Good Day” - Paul Harvey
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Other "Stuff"
