Happy New Year

Hi folks,

I'm blogging live from Walt Disney World so I'll keep this short:

Happy New Year!

It's been a great first year for the blog and I hope you'll come back frequently next year.

Much love,

Buena

Networking for beautiful Russian wives

After posting recently about a social network for Jewish folk, I got to thinking more broadly about these networks. Talking about this with a Russian friend of mine, Olga, made me think to look specifically for social networks of expatriates. So I started looking...guess what?

I came across a Russian wives site! More than one, actually, but Loversplant.com was the most interesting. The brides' profiles are worth a read. You won't believe it when I tell you so, but: most of the brides are looking for a life partner. That's right, the whole life. To be honest, I think that Loversplanet.com might outstrip koolanoo in this regard. The site gives the definite impression that prospective Russian wives put marriage as their main priority (read: they put family before their career). Dating is a route to marriage and family, not a diversion.

Of course, it is hard to know whether the avowed interests of these brides will hold up on that fateful first date. But I have read in some places that the divorce rate in marriages with Russian women tends to be lower than with local marriages. So, if you are a family man, perhaps you should actually consider a Russian wife!

Link: Russian wives

More Camera, More Style, Modest Price - New York Times

I, too am asking this question this year:

How much digital camera can you get for $300? This year, 11 companies submitted their best cameras with a street price under $300. The contenders are the Canon A630, the Casio Exilim Zoom EX-Z700, the Fuji FinePix F30, the Hewlett-Packard Photosmart R827, the Kodak EasyShare C875, the Nikon Coolpix S7c, the Olympus Stylus 740, the Panasonic Lumix DMC-FX3, the Pentax Optio A20, the Samsung Digimax NV3 and the Sony Cyber-Shot DSC-W100.

The answer, finally, seems to be that you can get something pretty great for $300. I've tried three of the cameras listed above, and all of them take better photos than my cheap old film camera, by far. So, I'm thinking that maybe this is the year I finally get a new camera for Christmas! Did you hear that, Jerry? Do you still read this blog?

Link: More Camera, More Style, Modest Price - New York Times

My hero!

I'm Jewish, and my husband is Catholic. So we have a lot of jokes about who's really in the club and who isn't.

Well, a friend of mine just send me a link to a hilarious video from www.koolanoo.net, which bills itself as the world's first Jewish social network. Let me tell, you it is far from the first! The site will also offer Jewish Dating services. But the video is well-produced and funny and koolanoo will be successful if their web site has half the style of this video:



Link: Jewish Dating

Ronaldinho to the rescue!

Barça needed a win to avoid early elimination, and Ronaldinho came through, of course. But in what style!

Ronaldinho surprised the Bremen defense in the 13th minute by rolling his free kick along the ground — under the jumping defensive wall — and inside the right post from just outside the area.

All soccer fans should see this goal. Of course, we've all pulled that trick in practice--but to pull it in such a huge game, playing against pros, requires some serious cojones.

Had Barça lost, they would have been the first reigning champions ever to be eliminated so early.

Link: IHT

Desktop Wallpapers

I've got my own laptop now and I'm getting serious into the wallpapers. For a while I was into personal themes: vacation photos, mostly. Now, though, I've started to explore sports and outdoors themes.

The best site for free desktop wallpaper is American Greetings. These wallpapers are free and easy to download; a wide variety is available from Christmas to inspirational to outdoors; the wallpapers are spyware-free (I had a run-in with some wallpapers that weren't, which led to a run-in with my irate husband); and there are screensavers to go with the wallpapers.

These are highly recommended. Check 'em out.







Link: free desktop wallpaper

Sevilla beats Espanyol!

I wouldn't say that Sevilla necessarily blew this match. The Tamudo goal was amazing and maybe Tamudo deserves the credit. Check out the replays if you can.

Sevilla surrendered a lead to lose 2-1 at Espanyol and blow their chance to go top while Celta Vigo came back from two goals down to earn a draw at Mallorca in Spain's Primera Liga on Sunday. Mali striker Frederic Kanoute put Sevilla ahead after 26 minutes, and it looked that despite being outplayed for much of the match and Sevilla keeper Andres Palop making several saves they may get the three points. However, former Spain striker Raul Tamudo engineered an outstanding equaliser in the second half. Facing his own goal and with two defenders in attendance, Tamudo pulled the ball back and spun between his markers before beating the advancing Andres Palop with a cool near-post finish.

Link: a great goal!

GroupLoop

Are you in my GroupLoop?

Sorry for that nonsensical question, but I just like saying "GroupLoop".

I've started using GroupLoop.com recently and I love it. See, I get the raw end of my husbands numerous adventures in sports and business. I am the scheduler and organizer, and I can tell you that when you have to schedule 12 different busy board members for a meeting, the situation can get difficult quickly.

GroupLoop.com takes away most of this pain, offering group messaging, calendar, file sharing, and RSVP systems all in one place. This site is sort of an integrated combination of other services that are available in other places, plus some new ones that make life easier. I like it a lot.



Link: GroupLoop.com

Rice prices up and sugar down in Kabul

This kind of pedestrian article is one of the amazing things about the web. Over in Kabul, somebody is surfing the web actually looking for this stuff. Just like I do every day or every week anyway here in the U.S.

KABUL: Prices of rice went up and those of sugar registered decline in Kabul markets as compared with the last week. Prices of rice ...

Link: Rice prices up, sugar down in Kabul

RockStartup.com

My family is a veteran of the start-up wars. My husband has started three companies in the past ten years, and each experience has been more painful than having a baby. And I know exactly what I'm talking about, in that arena. I've given birth to two children without any pain medication, and I'd rather have another child tomorrow than start another company.

For folks like us, RockStartup.com is fascinating to watch. This site chronicles the birthing pains of PayPerPost.com, which pays bloggers to cover new businesses that are looking for coverage. This process--the birthing of a company--is a thrill even secondhand, and this site brings you as close as you can get to the process without your actually having to max out all your credit cards, drive down to Sand Hill Road, and put your family's well-being on the line.

This show walks the line between a web reality show and a documentary. I'd say that it is a documentary, with the boring parts taken out.

I will say that I suspect that some of the painful parts have been taken out, in addition to the boring parts. Ted Murphy shows up at Draper Fisher Jurvetson within the first 30 seconds of the show. In my experience there is a lot of hard work before that arrival at the VC's offices.

Link: web reality show

Canada wins at soccer's Peace Queen Cup

I am really envious of the women's soccer situation in Canada. There, women play more soccer, earlier than here in the US--but there is a real interest in women's adult professional and amateur soccer to sustain the players as they get older. Here, the fans don't even support the men, let alone the women.

Christine Sinclair of Burnaby, B.C., scored two first-half goals on Saturday as Canada posted a 3-2 win over Italy in the Peace Queen Cup, a women's soccer tournament in Seoul.

Link: Canada wins at soccer's Peace Queen Cup

Moving.bz

I have a friend who struck it rich in a minor, tenth-person-hired, kind of way. Nevertheless, she is going to take the opportunity to follow a dream and bike around the United States. When I say that she is going to "bike around", I don't mean that she is going to meander aimlessly all over creation. I mean that she is going to circumnavigate the United States. Yes, she is a serious biker.

She is looking for a Self Storage facility in which to keep her whole life. I visited a couple of seedy, down-at-the-heels locations with her on Saturday, but we didn't see anything confidence-inspiring. And she is going to be keeping her whole life in this facility, so something better is definitely required.

My husband pointed us to Moving.bz. This site has a truly complete directory of storage facilities all over the US. It is extremely simple to find what you need and get multiple quotes: just type in your zip code and press go. You'll get a list of storage facilities with the major features outlined, and you can request another quote right on the site.

You know what this means, right? Yes...this means we'll spend the coming Saturday playing pickup soccer rather than cruising for storage facilities.

Link: Self Storage

Anheuser-Busch Cos. Reports Increased Sales and Earnings

I think that the Anheuser-Busch folks are benefiting from my husband's total addiction to sports...and drag-racing, if you call that a sport, which I don't!

BUD today reported that third quarter 2006 net sales increased 4.7 percent and diluted earnings per share (excluding a one-time litigation settlement in 2005 ...

Link: Anheuser-Busch Cos. Reports Increased Sales and Earnings for the ...

Web Hosting

I've been on Blogger.com now for about three months, and I like it pretty well, but I am still thinking about moving to my own web site. I want to expand this blog into a directory of sorts for soccer in the USA, growing fuschias, and other interests that you haven't even heard about yet!

But the feature list I have in mind is pretty impressive, and Jerry tells me that Blogger just can't handle it. I want message boards, live chat rooms, a large database of photos, and large directories of web resources. So Jerry has me looking for web hosting. He says that if I can find a great deal on a site with (and I quote, because I don't know what this means, for the most part): "shell access, ftp access, cgi priveleges, and subdomains" then he'll help get me up and running. And he wants me to do it cheaply, of course, says I shouldn't need to spend more than $25 per month.

So I've been browsing over at Web Site Host Directory for budget web hosting. This is a well-organized site showcasing some amazing deals. For example, pulling up the "Budget Web Hosting" sections yeilds several competitors charging only $4.95-$5.95 per month for a package of services that should be enough for most any blogger...but of course, not for me and Jerry! We have an almost pathological need to search out better (more expensive!) products. So I check the "Unix/Linux" hosting section and immediately found a provider offering more than I need ("2000MB space, 20GB Transfer, Unlimited Email Accounts, FrontPage, PHP, CGI, Ruby & Ruby on Rails, JSP & Java Servlets, MySQL, Crontab, ASP & .NET (Windows Only), Webmail, Spam Filtering") for only $9 a month. Pretty incredible.

So the next question is: which of these competitors is most reliable? Which ones are going to be up 99% of the time, which are going to back up my data, and which have the best tools for managing the site?

Web Site Host Directory offers some help here too, with FAQs and articles about web hosting that will help you ask the best questions of prospective providers. Also, there is an news section filled with information that is of interest to bloggers generally, not just to hosting services providers.

Link: budget web hosting