All Good Things....

It's probably no surprise to you that this was coming. Thirteen Thoughts was a lot of fun for me when I had the time to keep it up. The fact of the matter is that my new job simply does not afford me the time to blog. So - the time has come to say goodbye for a while. I appreciate all who visited and the archives will remain for you to use if there's ever a need.

Maybe I'll be back at some point - when my schedule becomes a bit more manageable. In the meantime, thanks for stopping by over the last 6 months.

BB

What a Week

Man what a week. Sorry for the slowness around here but this new job has been VERY demanding and I honestly have had no time to post (much less sleep, spend time with family, etc.).

I'll do better next week after I recover this weekend!!

I'll Never Pay for Long Distance Again

I did a post a couple of weeks ago recommending Google's latest acquisition - GrandCentral.com. If you didn't read that post, you can take a look at it HERE.

I've been thinking about GrandCentral since then - trying to figure out what, if anything, I could do with this kind of service. As a refresher, they give you a phone number and you can give that number out and your calls to that number will automatically be forwarded to any number you designate. Well - after a couple of weeks of thinking about it - I've figured out how that I can use a service like this.

Here's my plan. Anytime I need to call someone long distance, I simply go to GrandCentral first and enter the long distance phone I'm trying to call there. Then - when I call my OWN GrandCentral number (the number that got assigned to me when I signed up) my call will auto-forward to the long distance number of the person I'm trying to call. I've called a local number (my GrandCentral phone number is a local Charlotte number) and the service does the forwarding - so no long distance fees for me!

Give it a try! You can still sign up with the link in my earlier post.

Get 12% Off on All of Your Gas Purchases

I don't know about you, but my gas purchases are starting to get ridiculous. I filled up yesterday and it cost me nearly $48.00!?!? If prices go up much more (which they're predicting will happen), we could be talking about $60.00 fill ups - not to mention what the increase in gas prices does to your food costs, etc.

There is a card on the market that can help take the sting out of what you're paying at the pump. The Citi Driver's Edge MasterCard has some pretty unique features that make it attractive (especially for the first 12 months). The card offers a 6% rebate for the first 12 months on all gas, supermarket, and drug store purchases. It lowers to 3% after 12 months. The 6% deal is great, 3% is average.

Here's where the extra benefits kick in that make this a great card to get while gas prices are high. This card ALSO pays you a rebate of $.01 for every mile you drive in a year. If you drive 10,000 miles per year (pretty average mileage), that's an additional $100 rebate. The caveat is that mileage rebates have to be used for either a new/used car purchase OR auto maintenance costs. That shouldn't be hard however given that you're likely to do some type of oil change, tire rotation, air filter, etc. during the year that will add up to $100.

Crunch all the numbers out and you're getting roughly 12% back on this offer for the first year that you have the card. I'm not factoring in the money you'll get back from grocery and drugstore purchases either. Now - granted my tag line was a little misleading since you can really only apply the rebate to auto costs - not necessarily gas - but if you're saving one place, that's money that can be applied somewhere else - so it is a legit 12%. This is a great deal. I'm going to get the card, keep it for 12 months and then reevaluate! Please make sure to read the terms and conditions - it details what you have to do to get your mileage credits (fax/mail in receipts from car service places so they can verify mileage).

Website Recommendation: JetEye.com

JetEye.com is nothing like it sounds. When I first heard about it, I thought it was something to do with travel - and it's not at all. This is a cool site that can save you a lot of time - especially if you are a teacher, a researcher, or need help finding information on a particular topic.

JetEye.com basically allows you to take a shortcut - by posting other people's best links on a given topic. Groups of links are stored in what are called 'jet packs' and can be accessed and used by anyone on the site. For example, if you were interested in the 2008 Presidential Election or were doing research on the British monarchy, you could go to JetEye.com and type in those terms. Your results would be 'jet packs' - groups of links created by other people looking for similar information. By using other people's links, you're taking the shortcut of not having to weed through all the bad, non-useful links that you might get from a Google search and can head straight to information that someone else has already screened and deemed useful.

I don't know - maybe it's the fact that I actually like doing research - but I think this is a cool site and a cool concept. You can even take it a step farther and start creating your own jet packs for others to use. The more people that use the site, the better the information gets, and the more time we can all save by not having to wade through useless site after useless site in search of the one or two good ones. Give it a try next time you have something you want to learn more about!

How 'Bout Them Cougars?!

I posted last December on the year I spent teaching high school and coaching basketball. It was a great year - loved it more than any job I've ever had and we had a great team and a great season. At that point, we had the best team in the history of the school. That statement, however, is no longer valid.

This Saturday night, Apex plays for the state 4A basketball championship for the first time in school history. They're playing against East Mecklenburg, a powerhouse team from here in Charlotte, who is also playing in their first state championship game. Apex has really had a miraculous season. With their leading scorer academically ineligible and their 'star' having graduated last year (now playing at Fairfield University in Connecticut), the team started the season 4-9. They've been on a roll since and have shocked a number of heavily favored teams on the road to the championship. They barely even made the state playoffs when the season ended (seeded 3rd out of 3 teams from their own conference)!

Obviously the kids that I coached are long gone - most of them are already out of college but I'm still proud to have been at Apex and I'll definitely be pulling for them on Saturday!

Watch Sports on Your Computer - For Free!

I have my friend Todd to thank for today's website recommendation. Channelsurfing.net is a pretty bare bones, plain site. No fancy interface or pretty graphics to be found. That, however, does not lessen the 'coolness' of this site. What it offers are links to live video streams of sporting events from around the country and around the world. VERY COOL.

I have used the site to watch a number of blacked out NBA games or games that weren't being carried locally. I tested the site out today and saw that the Atlantic 10 basketball tournament was being shown. This is not to mention all the international sporting events that are linked to from the site (you can watch international soccer to your heart's content from this site). Todd has been spending some time on the west coast recently and told me that he watched the last UNC-Duke game on this site - all LIVE. Most live streaming sites are pay only and many don't have good performance. My experience with this site has been that it has very good performance and it's completely free! I will say that it doesn't always work well with Firefox (my preferred internet browser) - so if you want to give it a try, I recommend using Internet Explorer. Next time your favorite team isn't on showing in your area, give it a try. You might be able to watch online for free!

Website Recommendation: AllMyFaves.com

Have you ever seen that commercial where the guy is surfing the internet and gets a message telling him that he's reached the end of the internet and must go back? That's how I often feel. I often struggle to find good sites that I haven't seen before or have not already decided that I'm not interested in. The site I'm recommending today helps with that.

AllMyFaves.com is a site that brings you the best of the internet organized into categories. When you hit the site, you'll see lists of the top ten sites in various categories displayed. Site listings are updated weekly and you can also drill down into more specific categories for some topics. For example - it doesn't just list the top 10 entertainment sites, it allows you to drill down into TV dramas, movies, etc.

Next time you're on the hunt for some interesting content or want to try some sites that you haven't been to before, start here. You're likely to find something that's new and interesting!

Blogging - A Family Affair

Sorry for the lack of activity today. I actually started a new job and today was my first day. It was spent in your standard first day orientation - getting your computer, learning how to submit expenses, etc. My mind was definitely on blogging (and about a thousand other things other than what was being talked about - it was pretty dry) - but I decided to lay off the blogging in the name of trying to make a good first impression.

If you've been here with me since I started this blog back in October, you might remember a post I did on my brother's blog. He is a Pastor here in the Charlotte area and, while his blog is very different than mine in terms of its content, it's definitely a cool blog and he posts some interesting and inspirational stuff. I read it every day. Recently my sister also joined the blogosphere. Her blog is all about her life - her family, her job (she's a great elementary school teacher - fits her personality perfectly!), her hobbies, etc. I'm so impressed with how quickly she's picked up the whole 'blogging' thing. She's posting tons of pictures, cool links, all kinds of stuff. It's definitely not type of blog as my brother's or mine - but it's a good one and I'm proud of her. Check it out HERE.

Website Recommendation: UShip.com

My friend Matt introduced me to a new website this morning that I think people will find really useful. UShip.com is a startup company that aims to connect people that need to ship goods (whether that be boxes/packages across the country or household moves across town) with reliable moving companies. The great thing is that it's an auction style site. You list the particulars of your move and literally thousands of companies bid on the job. You can choose the shipper of your choice based on recommendations, price, feedback from other users, etc.! Even better - there's no cost to use the service!!

Here's just a quick example of how this might be a good site to bookmark for future reference. When I moved to Charlotte from Memphis almost four years ago, I was moving a 2 bedroom apartment (far less stuff than I have today). That move cost me over $4,000. I put in the particulars of that move on UShip (using their estimator tool) and it came back with a price in the $900 - $1200 range. Now - I'm sure that probably didn't include some of the extras that I purchased like packing and insurance - but it definitely looks like this is a place that you could go to save yourself some big time money.

A final note - my friend Matt knows one of the guys running the company and he says it's growing like crazy. I say that to let you know that this isn't some fly by night scam type website - we have actual human contact and have heard some of the 'back story' on the company. Give it a shot if you've got a move coming up, need to ship something you sell on Ebay, etc.