Meant to post about our last cruise...

..Time got away from me.

John and I had a very fun cruise over Thanksgiving to Grand Turk (gotta wonder what 'Little Turk' looks like), St. Maarten and Puerto Rico. I would not recommend the ship though - Holland America Westerdam; it just wasn't one of the nicer ships we've been on and even the food was not particularly good. The room, however, was a gorgeous upgrade with a great balcony - about 3x our normal size.

What struck me the most was, the moment we walked on board, I noticed that I was surrounded by 2,000 Gert and Joes. John was definitely one of the youngest passengers on board. We both spent most of the cruise helping these darling little old people. I was always picking up something or straightening lap blankets, etc. John would see these folks scratching their heads in front of the non-intuitive coffee machine every morning and would punch the right button or them. They were always most appreciative...

About the 5th day on board, I actually awoke earlier than John and went to get coffee - now, this was the first time I'd done it so, I'm sorta waking up, sorta scratching my head as I stand in front of this non-intuitive machine and punching 'buttons' on the machine that are not buttons. Quite sadly, and much to my dismay, a younger person came up to help me. I was appreciative...

We did have a great cruise and had these wonderful pictures taken. We both love these. We had so much fun. We have so much fun every single day. How wonderful!

Memories of Dad

Was just 'talking' to a 'friend' (whom I've never physically met) who is from eHow, the writing site I joined a year ago. I'm making around $125/month in residuals, which is not bad, considering I'm not all that active any longer and, ostensibly, I'll make $125/month for the rest of my life. Not a bad past time if you can even fake writing. Also, I just think it's sweet that I have these new 'friends' who check in on Gert very frequently. Joan and Peggy are always asking about her and they've never met her - cracks me up.

Anyway, I've been trying to unravel the 'secret' to writing online - you get money from the ads that are on the article. There's a lot of theories about how to draw in good ads, search engine optimization, etc. And, I think I have a handle on it as I'm getting steadily better until...

I write a crappy article about banana bread - really nothing special and, monetarily, according to the algorithm I've figured out, it shouldn't be earning much. In fact, it should be a real stinker. It's just a great recipe I wanted to share so I wrote it up. No search engine optimization, no keywords, no nuthin' except for a recipe for a fabulous banana bread.

Here it is:

How to Make a Light Banana Bread Recipe That Will Melt in Your Mouth

As you can see, it's really not all that special. It is, however, very good and, really surprisingly, it's making money (fast and a fair amount!). It basically defies everything I thought I'd unraveled; frustrating, to say the least.

So, I was lamenting such to my eHow friend, Peggy, and it dawned on me that my chasing the dream of unlocking making money on eHow writing was a lot like going to the horse track with Dad.

Dad and I would start off betting strictly off names and then, it would evolve into something like the below:

Lori: Hey, Dad! That horse, the brown one who won, took a dump right before the race.
Dad: Yeah?
Lori: Well, he was obviously lighter in his loafers

So, we'd watch the next horses come out and bet the one who just 'dumped.' Sure as shit (pun intended), he'd finish last. So, the next round would go:

Lori: Hey, Dad! Did you notice that the horse who won this race was brown too?
Dad: Yeah?
Lori: Well, maybe it's 'brown horse' day.

So, we'd bet the brown horse. Of course, the next horse who won would be grey but would be wearing purple colors.

Lori: Hey Dad! Did you notice that all of the horses who won so far are wearing purple?
Dad: HUGE LAUGH...and then we'd be off to bet purple,..and, of course, the blue horse would come in but the jockey's initials would match the last winning horse's jocket....ad nauseum.

We had us some fun.

I just read this to Mom and she said 'Get the number 5 in there somehow. Remember how we'd always bet the number 5?'

Ah, life. Watcha goin' do but laugh?

As an aside, here's some links to Peggy's web presence; she's pretty amusing:
A Good Book is Awaiting
Found Money in the Street
The Lint Filter
Examiner
Suite 101