Canon Power Shot SX10IS - Macro

The Canon Power Shot SX10IS has both Macro and Super Macro functions.

The Macro function can be used in AUTO mode and is for distances of 12-20 inches (30-50 cm) from the subject. This is easy to use. On the rocker control button press the little flower on the left side. You will see the little flower in the display area. (To cancel macro and return to normal, just press it again.) Macro works in any mode except Landscape (the picture of a mountain)

You can use the zoom in Macro. When you do a bar will extend from the left of the display and will show the zoom range. If you extend the zoom bar into the yellow the camera will not be able to focus and will revert to focusing at a normal distance.

To use Super Macro, you must be in Full Manual (M), Manually set aperture (Av), manually set shutter speed (Tv), or Program (P). Press and hold the Macro button for more than one second. The flower will appear on the display with an S in the middle of it. The zoom function will not work in Super Macro. In Super Macro you can hold the camera 1 inch from the subject to actually touching the subject.

I've had good luck with using the Macro function, but Super Macro is more tricky. I'll add a couple of photos here to compare when I get a set that makes sense. The picture below was taken with Macro.



See Canon Power Shot SX10IS - Changing ISO or click on camera in the labels below to find all articles about cameras.

web ad income today (3 blogs, 2 web sites): Adsense $.07 Adgitize $.20 Project Wonderful $.03 ______________________ Total: $.30 Bought 1 month Adgitize Ad -$14.00 Total to date in March $4.88

Giving CMF Ads a Thumbs-Up

I signed up with CMF ads just over a month ago. I have chosen not to blog about it until now because I was waiting till I had enough credits to advertise as well as display ads.

The premise of CMF Ads is an exchange of advertising via credits you earn, although it is possible to buy credits for cash. If you sign up to display ads you can set a price, the recommended number of credits is 5, and then wait for advertisers to select your blog to advertise on. You can place blocks of CMF ads on your blog. When you see squares like the one above on someone's page, it usually means that they do not currently have anyone who has asked to advertise on their page.

I discovered early that 5 credits is too much to ask unless you have a very high-traffic blog. I get about 100 hits a day on My Quality Day, the blog I signed up with. So I reduced my asking price to 2 credits and quickly got two advertisers. Ads run for 31 days and then you are paid the credits. So at the end of my first month with CMF ads I had 4 credits to spend. I have turned those around and bought ads for the next month on two other sites that each charge 2 credits.

You can actually have more ads running than you do ad boxes. The ads will rotate through your boxes with equal display frequency, and you get all the credits. So it is possible to have two boxes, sell 3 ads at 2 credits each, and earn 6 credits.

There is nothing else at all that you need to do to earn credits. There is no time-consuming clicking. In the 20 hours since I bought my ads they have each received about 30 impressions and 1 click thru. There is a formula by which they calculate the approximate CPM value of your site. And they are currently valuing each credit at $0.25. Credits may be accumulated and sold back to CMF ads at a rate of $10 for 80 credits.

CMF ads is working on a referral system that might earn credits for the referrer. So if you are interested, and click-thru from any link on this page, it would be great.

There are some rules about publisher sites. They must be in English, not be pornographic, contain original material and be updated regularly. They can't be illegal file sharing sites or have automatic popups or redirects.

CMF ads has a support forum. In fact, you sign up for the whole site by signing up for the forum. That is nice, because you don't have to log in to the forum separately.

I need to get busy and place some on this blog!

CMF ads

web ad income today (4 blogs, 2 web sites): Adsense $.01 Adgitize $.20 Project Wonderful $.22 ______________________ Total: $.43 Total to date in March $18.58

Adgitize Announces New Higher Payouts Beginning in April

Today, Adgitize founder Ken Brown has announced that beginning in April, 2009 higher payouts for affiliates will be available. Since the network's launch in November 2008, Ken says that he now has a better handle on the ratio of affiliates to advertisers. He began Adgitize on a conservative basis to be sure that payouts could be made. He is happy to be able to now deliver higher earnings.

If you have not yet checked out Adgitize it's time to give it a try. Their slogan "World Class Advertising on a Blogger's Budget" seems to be panning out. My first ad just finished. With one month of advertising I received 1753 hits from Adgitize and 239697 banner impressions. I think that's pretty remarkable compared to other ad/traffic promotions I've tried.

See Adgitize Me- Part 1


Adgitize Me- Part 2

web ad income today (3 blogs, 2 web sites): Adsense $.04 Adgitize $.22 Project Wonderful $.04 ______________________ Total: $.30 Total to date in March $18.15

Trying Out Traffic Exchange Business

I signed up at a new traffic generation site yesterday. I've yet to know how it works out, but it's brand new. There are some things I like and some I'm not sure about yet.

First let me say that I was drawn to this enterprise simply because it is being undertaken by Shari and Cindy of the Shari's Gone Country blog, and I really like that.

The site works similarly to Blog Explosion (and I suppose other such sites). A splash page for member sites show inside a frame which contains your clicking stats, some ad links and banners and a timer. When the timer runs down (meaning that you've viewed that page long enough to keep the bounce rate from soaring), a code appears that you must match and click to load the next site. There are occasional prizes of points that pop up. This interface works much better than the one on Blog Explosion. Due to using a splash page rather than the actual web sites, it loads faster, with fewer errors, and only makes you wait 10 seconds to click on to the next page. Of course you have to create a splash page. They say that they will be rolling out some templates for those soon.

What do you get for the clicking? Each site is worth 0.4 of a point. There is some conversion factor that converts points into cash. Even people who sign up at the free level will be able to either cash out their points or trade them in for banner and text link views. Impressions can also be traded for views. There are higher levels of membership for a price at which you get a better return on clicks.

You can now enter your own 768x60 banner and create text links. Still no info on how to enter a splash page.

Nevertheless, it is to anyone's advantage to get in early if you would like to try this sort of thing. Until the end of March there are bonuses for having people sign up under you, and for some amount of time yet for every day that you surf 125 pages you get an entry into a drawing for a free month at a higher membership level.

You are allowed to convert points to a one higher membership level as well.

Click the graphic above, or text below, if you would like to try it out. As I said, the basic membership level, nicknamed Executive, is free.

Traffic Exchange Business

web ad income today (4 blogs, 2 web sites): Adsense $.02 Adgitize $.19 Project Wonderful $.04 ______________________ Total: $.25 Total to Date in March $17.85

Blog Contest - Ms Recipe Spring Fling

Ms Recipe is sponsoring a Spring Fling and Birthday contest from March 20- April 3, 2009. This will appeal most to Entrecard members.

To enter, you must do the following things:

1. You must have an active blog where you’re posting regularly
2. The blog post must be in English.
3. Write a blog post that includes 1 of the banners on Ask Ms Recipe, a link to Ask Ms Recipe blog , and the links to all of the sponsors.
4. Subscribe to Ask Ms Recipe's feed by email and verify it in your email account. Be sure to use the same email you subscribe with in the email part of the comment submission or include it in the comment

Sponsors can join the contest as it will be drawn by Random.org

Following is a list of the prizes and sponsors:
First Prize Winner Receives 42,000 Entrecard Credits +Extras from the following Great Sponsors:
The Sugar Buzz Project 1,000 Entrecard Credits + 125 Ad Space 1 Month + 14 PHP Script Package & MRR
A Journey for Life $5.00 Cash by Paypal
Lainy’s Musings 1,000 Entrecard Credits+ $5.00 Cash by Paypal
Ask Ms Recipe 2,500 Entrecard Credits +Top Space 1 Month 125 located in sticky post.
Diet Recipes 10,000 Entrecard Credits +
Churchies Hideaway 2,500 Entrecard Credit
Life’s a Pizza Pie 2,000 Entrecard Credits
Girl’s are Made of Sugar and Spice and Everything Nice 1,500 Entrecard Credit
My Point of View 1,500 Entrecard Credits
Everything has a reason 1,500 Entrecard Credits
In my kitchen 1,500 Entrecard Credits
Our Journey to Forever 1,000 Entrecard Credits
Womensselfesteenblog 1,000 Entrecard Credits
Hot Shit Form 1,000 Entrecard Credit
Nita’s Random Thoughts 1,000 Entrecard Credits
The Joy of life Forever 1,000 Entrecard Credits
In Retrospect 1,000 Entrecard Credits
Because Someone Cares 1,000 Entrecard Credits
Written Expressions 1,000 Entrecard Credits
Chronic Chick Talk 1,000 Entrecard Credits
Wiehanne 1,000 Entrecard Credits
Medan Daily 1,000 Entrecard Credits
Life of a Filipina Blogger 1,000 Entrecard Credits
Pictures and Cultures 1,000 Entrecard Credits
Creative Café 500 Entrecard Credits
E-Pamilya 1,000 Entrecard Credits + 125 Ad Space 1 Month
Moms…Check Nyo 1,000 Entrecard Credits
Dashing Smiles 1,000 Entrecard Credits +125 Ad Space 1 Month
The Pinay Blogger 500 Entrecard Credits
Symphony of Love 125 Ad Space 1 Month
Multiple Themes and Layouts 125 Ad Space 2 Weeks

Second Prize Winner Receives from the following Great Sponsors:
Blog Head Radio 30 Second Internet Radio 1000 Impressions Ad +Click Through Ad
Fickle Minded-A life that is less Ordinary 3,000 Entrecard Credits
Real Man Toys 2,000 Entrecard Credits
Family Health and Me 2,000 Entrecard Credits
My Thoughts in Daily Living 1,500 Entrecard Credits
In the Presence of Vultures 1,500 Entrecard Credits
Thomas Web Links 1,000 Entrecard Credits
Thomas Travel Tales 1,000 Entrecard Credits
A Moment to Exhale 1,000 Entrecard Credits
Random Thoughts 1,000 Entrecard Credits
Rare Ordinary Thoughts 1,000 Entrecard Credits
My Barefoot Journey 1,000 Entrecard Credits
Simply Wp 1,000 Entrecard Credits
Creations by Carlota 1,000+125 Ad Space 1 Month
A Simple Life 1,000 Entrecard Credits
Free Online Japanese Recipes 1,000 Entrecard Credits
Nurseabie 1,000 Entrecard Credits
Marvz18 1,000 Entrecard Credits
Online Games 1,000 Entrecard Credits
God’s Best Gift 1,000 Entrecard Credits
Simply Elegant Girl 500 Entrecard Credits
Loutianren 500Entrecard Credits
Life’s Tricky Situations 500+125 Ad Space 1 Month
Your Online Doctor 125 Ad Space 2 Weeks
Season Episode Online Watch 125 Ad Space 2 Weeks

3rd Place Receives 19,000 Entrecard Credits + Custom Blog Layout and Ad Space:
My Web-blog Custom Blog Layout (Blogger) +125 Ad Space 1 Month
Learn,love, and laugh through blogging 2,500 Entrecard Credits
Wherabouts 1,500 Entrecard Credits
In the Life of Mne 1,500 Entrecard Credits
Techno Mirror 1,500 Entrecard Credits
Walk with Me 1,500 Entrecard Credits
Life’s Sweets and Spices 1,000 Entrecard Credits
Wonderful Things in Life 1,000 Entrecard Credits
My Life’s Adventures 1,000 Entrecard Credits
Marv18 Tech Guide 1,000 Entrecard Credits
Mommy’s Little Corner 1,000 Entrecard Credits
Lovely Pink 1,000 Entrecard Credits+125 Ad Space 1 Month
Iowa Hippie Chick 1,000 Entrecard Credits
Fickle Minded-Wonderful Memories 1,000 Entrecard Credits
Story Sharing Earning 1,000 Entrecard Credits+125 Ad Space 1 Month
Café Café Games 1,000 Entrecard Credits
This is So Me 500 Entrecard Credits+125 Ad Space 1 Month
Winziph|Zipping In 125 Ad Space 1 Month
Winziph 125 Ad Space 1 Month

4th Place Receives 13,500 from the follow Sponsors:
Doi Speaks 2000 Entrecard Credits
Confessions of a Fitness Diva 1,500 Entrecard Credits
Thoughts and Obsessions 1,000 Entrecard Credits
Just Keep Trying 1,000 Entrecard Credits
In the Eyes of the Beholder 1,000 Entrecard Credits
I’m Walking on Sunshine 1,000 Entrecard Credits
Babette’s Defintely Maybe 1,000 Entrecard Credits
Through the Rain 1,000 Entrecard Credits
Honey Sweet Learning Center 1,000 Entrecard Credits
Mavierhose 1,000 Entrecard Credits
Abhishhek Deshpande 1,000 Entrecard Credits
Homemade Remedies 500 Entrecard Credits
Batuananons 500 Entrecard Credits
The Designers Blog 125 Ad Space 1 Month
Streaming-Online Watch 125 Ad Space 2 Weeks

5th Place Receives 10,500 Entrecard Credits+Ad Space:
Everything Plus the Kitchen Sink 1000 Entrecard Credits
One at a time 1000 Entrecard Credits
Simple Happy Life 1000 Entrecard Credits
The Path to the Pegasus 1000 Entrecard Credits
On the Verge 1000 Entrecard Credits
Yummy as Can Be 1000 Entrecard Credits
Made to Worship 1000 Entrecard Credits
Portuguese Menu 1000 Entrecard Credits
Health and Beauty Diva 500 Entrecard Credits
From this Side 500 Entrecard Credits
Kharlota Dot Com 500 Entrecard Credits+125 Ad Space 1 Month

6th Place Receives 9,000 Entrecards+ Ad Space:
A Taste of Both Worlds 2000 Entrecard Credits
Kusineria sa Amerika 1000 Entrecard Credits
FickleMinded- A Pixel Worth aThousand Words 1000 Entrecard Credits
Vday 1000 Entrecard Credits
Mi Famila 1000 Entrecard Credits
My So-called World 1000 Entrecard Credits
Netsource 1000 Entrecard Credits
The Frugal House Wife 1000 Entrecard Credits+125 Ad Space (TBA)
Chica Chicka 500 Entrecard Credits
Journal of Journey 500 Entrecard Credits

7th Place Receives 6,500 Entrecard Credits+ Ad Space
East Coast Life 1000 Entrecard Credits
Inhale Exhale 1000 Entrecard Credits
Dirt Track Gone Wild 1000 Entrecard Credits
The Journey of Life 1000 Entrecard Credits
Lady Programmer 1000 Entrecard Credits
24 Patrol 500 Entrecard Credits
Comp Tech Gadgets.com 500 Entrecard Credits
Live Love Pink 500 Entrecard Credits+ 125 Ad Space 1 Month

8th Place Recieves 4000 Entrecard Credits +Ad Space
My Country Home 1000 Entrecard Credits
Just the tip of the iceburg1000 Entrecard Credits
In Memory of 1000 Entrecard Credits
Erlinda's Wandering Thoughts 500 Entrecard Credits<
My Daily Sunset 500 Entrecard Credits +125 Ad Space 1 Month

9th Place Prizes 2,358 Entrecard Credits +Ad Space
Blogtactic 1108 Entrecard Credits
My Online Adventures 500 Entrecard Credits
Nita’s Corner 750 Entrecard Credit
Pets R My World 125 Ad Space 1 Month(Kid Friendly only)

10th Place Receives 1500 Entrecard Credits
Filipino Online Community 500 Entrecard Credits
Healthy Living and Lifestyle 500 Entrecard Credits
Arts and Entertainment Center 500 Entrecard Credits
Walking Newspaper 125 2 Weeks

Special Prizes from Sponsors:
Only open to people who live in one of these countries only. You must include the country you live in to qualify for this drawing.
1 Pair of Earrings from Homemade Jewelry (USA only)
6 Month Subscription Soap Subscription from Copper Cauldron (USA, Canada or Mexico)
4 Recycled Crayons from Mama’s Little Monkeys (USA only)
100 Personalized Cards 1 design (100 cards), or 2 designs (50 Cards) (27.00 Value)Dublicious

Extra Prizes:
First 4 Valid Contest Submissions Receive the Follow from Sponsors:
1st Submission:Blog Contest Station 759 Entrecard Credits
2nd Submission: Life’s Journey 500 Entrecard Credits
3rd Submission:Asian Drama500 Entrecard Credits
4th Submission: Aphrodite <500 Entrecard Credits
2 Lucky Winners Win 500 Entrecard Credits for the Most Creative Post from:
1st Lucky Winner: Hairstyle Digest 500 Entrecard Credits
2nd Lucky Winner: Movie Review 500 Entrecard Credits
The Last Person who Enters the Contest will Win 500 Entrecard Credits From:
Dashing Beauty 500+125 AD Space 1 Month
Chica Chicka 500 Entrecard Credits
Journal of Journey 500 Entrecard Credits

Ask Ms Recipe

web ad income today (4 blogs, 2 web sites): Adsense $.02 Adgitize $.20 Project Wonderful $.03 ______________________ Total: $.25 Total to date in March $17.60

Link Referral Basic - Is it Worth The Time?

LinkReferral is a networking site that is designed to send more traffic to your blog. One of my other blogs, My Quality Day, has been listed on it for quite some time, with the Basic (free) package.

When you sign up, you put your blog in a category, chosen from these major groups

• Computing/Technology
• Life/Home
• Education/Career
• Reference
• Entertainment
• Shopping
• Finance Travel
• Health
• Adult
• Money Making Opps.
• Top1000
• Miscellaneous
• Social/Personal Pages

This blog wouldn't be a bad fit, but my other blogs, on nature-related topics, fit poorly.

Has it generated more traffic for My Quality Day? Only on the days when I was willing to spend about an hour working on it. The secret to getting lots of hits is to get your blog into the top 10, or at least the top 30. You do this by meeting requirements in four categories of action. To make the top 10 for the day, you must meet all four requirements

1. You have to visit 30 of the sites in their blog members list. The theory is that people will choose to visit the top sites, which is why you want to spend the time to get there. Of course, just to be contrary, I liked to scroll down and visit sites that were lower in the list. You can't do this quickly, because if you click too quickly it won't register all your visits. This doesn't make much sense to me. I can understand why you want a site to load fully, but you should be able to click several links and then let them load.

2. You have to review 5 sites. Reviews are supposed to be meaningful with at least two sentences. They give good guidelines for writing reviews. However, it's just not worth the time this takes. If you offer constructive criticism (there are a lot of crappy blogs around), the owner of that blog will come back the next day and give you a poor review. These reviews are manually checked and graded by LinkReferral! With all my efforts to write meaningful reviews without spending all day, I've not gotten better than a B. Phooey!

3. You have to select one blog to mark as a favorite. I often had a hard time finding one that I was interested in. I know, I should have just picked one... who cares if I really like it, right?

4. You have to make a post in the forums. Well, you know what kind of forums requirements like this create. This is also manually moderated and useless comments don't count, so people tread a thin line between making it sound like they have something to say and not really caring. There are several topics where your comments don't count toward the requirement.

To be fair, on the days when I spent the time to do all of these things, my blog did end up in the top 10, and I did see some traffic from LinkReferral, but not nearly as much as through some other social networking sites.

Bottom line... I'm still listed there. My current rank for My Quality Day is 81 of 17413, and that is without doing anything there for weeks. My account stats says that I've gotten 5 visits this month through them. I'm content to just let it be out there as a possible source of visitors and a link, but the frustration factor was high, and I can't spend the time to guarantee a top spot every day.

Multiple blogs must be entered under separate accounts. You can upgrade to a premium package for $49.99. This gives you opportunities to make money. I haven't signed up for this so don't know how well it works.

LinkReferral

web ad income today (4 blogs, 2 web sites): Adsense $.10 Adgitize $.19 Project Wonderful $.05 ______________________ Total: $.34 Total to date in March $17.35

Spin to Win with Joe Tech

Have you run across Joe Tech's web site yet? Play slots and win free text ads for your web site!

Find the widget in the right hand column of this blog. You can click to play and you will be taken to Joe's web site. The odds of winning are really good, and you are awarded text ads to your site in several sizes. Play every day!

web ad income today (4 blogs, 2 web sites): Adsense $.04 Adgitize $.18 Project Wonderful $.03 ______________________ Total: $.25 Total to date in March $17.01

An Attractive, Useful Nutrition Widget

I stumbled across this widget and I like it a lot. It gives a lot of information about eating well in a compact format that is fun to use and nice to look at. For those of us who learn by visual recall it's a great "poster" of nutritional knowledge.



First of all, you can see at a glance the essential vitamins that we need and generally, in a picture to the outer edge of the wheel beside the letter denoting the vitamin, what foods provide that nutrient.

If you click on either the letter or the food you will see that the text in the bottom box changes. There are five tabs in the bottom box. The one on top is Fruit. When you click on a letter or its corresponding food picture you will see a list of fruits with that vitamin. You may click any of the other tabs. Vegetables or Nuts are similar to the information under Fruits - a list of the foods containing the vitamin.

The next tab is Benefits. You can click there to learn what this vitamin does for your body.

The final tab is Guidelines. This is perhaps not quite as obvious in its meaning. I thought that it would give recommended daily amounts. It does not. But it gives additional food sources; for example, Vitamin B12 is not found in fruit, vegetables or nuts, but rather in meat, fish and dairy products. There is also information under this tab about what problem a deficiency of the vitamin will cause.

For a quick and easy reference, this is hard to beat- much easier than looking at columns of text on a page.

If you want to share this widget, click on the bar at the bottom and social network sites will be displayed. If you want this widget for yourself just click on the star at the bottom of the widget, on the right, or go to Clearspring Vitamin Wheel

web ad income today (4 blogs, 2 web sites): Adsense $.03 Adgitize $.19 Project Wonderful $.03 ______________________ Total: $.25 Total to date in March $16.76

Paying Post - Report on First Assignment

I just received word that my article on internet advertising has been accepted. That is good. The not so great part is how long it took for approval. I had four hours from the time I took the assignment to submit the URL of the article. It took 2 days and 4 hours for it to be approved.

It's not that I thought I would have this money in my pocket tonight. You have to have a minimum of $25 in your account for a payout anyway. But it seems like the turnaround time should be a little better. At least, if they don't work on weekends perhaps they should say this on the web site. I don't know if this was a factor or not.

I am not eligible for any other assignments yet. Apparently this blog is too new, because you need an Alexa rank higher than 1,000,000 to be offered most assignments. So I need to work on improving that. Nevertheless, I made my first $10 on a blog.

PayingPost

web ad income today (4 blogs, 2 web sites): Adsense $.03 Adgitize $.22 PayingPost $10.00 Project Wonderful $.04 ______________________ Total: $10.29 Total to date in March: $16.51

World Calendar - Know2Go

I learned of this site yesterday, and I've signed up. This is not a paid review, but my personal opinion. Know2Go is an ambitious attempt to collect a calendar of events from around the world and combine them into one huge database.

The owners freely admit that they are not offering anything that one couldn't find out for themselves, if they hunted long enough. But being able to package all this information in one site is a huge time-saving resource.

There are three usage levels. One may simply use Know2Go for free without even registering. In this way you can find all the event information, although it may take you a few search levels to do so. One may register for a free membership. All you need enter are your name, address and email- about as much as is required to read some newspapers online. This gets you "speed search," a feature that supposedly gets you to any event in three clicks. For $19.99 a year you can subscribe. This gives you access to historical events and allows you to access the site from a mobile phone. With either a free membership or subscription you get a personal calendar.

The strength of the site is that anyone can enter events. They encourage the submission of any public event, Golf tournaments, Craft shows, concerts, little league playoffs... whatever, no matter how local. The events will be verified and then added to the live events.

Groups (called vendors) with regular events or an annual calendar may make arrangements to have their activities automatically entered into the Know2Go database.

To find an event you may search by the location, the event type, or the date. Event types are divided broadly into Activities and Lifestyle. To find a location, begin with a world map and focus in to a country and city of choice, Activity categories might be anything from Bowling to Football, while Lifestyle includes grouping such as Fashion or Festivals.

The site is easy to navigate and fairly intuitive. There is a good page of instructions for those who would like more specific help.

Know2Go

Review - The Works Bleach Automatic Toilet Bowl Cleaner

This is not a paid review. This is my own personal opinion of a product that I am sure will remain on my "best finds of 2009" list.



First of all, let me say that we have very hard water, which I'm sure had a bearing on the problem. We have some rust, but the primary cause of the hardness is magnesium and calcium. Over time, a toilet that was brand new in 1994 became badly stained. A significant portion of the problem was the use of one of those blue tank tablets that was used for several years while I was off at grad school. I would have no qualms about telling you what brand did this, if I knew, but I don't. The first picture below shows the toilet when it was scrubbed as well as possible. You can see the permanent dark blue ring and general dingy-ness of the porcelain below the water line. Note there are striped stains above the water line.



I worked really hard to try to remove these stains. I tried several kinds of cleaners, including The Works liquid and gel, Clorox Toilet Bowl Cleaner for Tough Stains, Iron-Out Tabs, CLR, Scrubbing Bubbles, Comet, Ajax, Zud, pure Clorox, and baking soda. Nothing was making much impression. I just couldn't resign myself to such a dirty-looking toilet. I mean, I'm certainly not a neatnik, but when I do clean, I like the results to be satisfying!

I decided to work my way through some choices on the supermarket shelf to see if anything would help. Around November 1, 2008, The Works Bleach Automatic Toilet Bowl Tabs were on sale. Since I like their liquid toilet cleaning products, I thought it would be a good thing to try. The next picture was taken six weeks later, after one tab (placed in the tank) application. You can see how much the blue stain has already faded.



The active ingredient in the product is trichloro-s-triazinetrione, which is a very strong oxidizing agent. One needs to not touch the tabs, and wash even after handling the packets. They claim each tab will last 11 weeks, but my experience has been about half of that. The next picture was taken today, March 22, 2009. As you can see, the only remaining stains are some of the stripes above the water line, but even those are fading. I am very impressed. In addition, the tabs are cleaning up the mineral deposits on the inside of the tank. Perhaps when this is all removed the tabs will last longer.



Although these are a little pricey at a regular price of $3.99 for two tabs, using them has cut down on how often I need to use liquid cleaner on the bowl. With the removal of the terrible stains and the reduced need for toilet bowl cleaners, I think this product is very worthwhile.

I have written a number of reviews on Shared Reviews. Here are some of the bathroom cleaning products I have reviewed.
Clorox Toilet Bowl Cleaner for Tough Stains
The Works- thick formula toilet bowl cleaner
Zud Heavy Duty Cleanser (for rust stains)
Scrubbing Bubbles Bathroom Cleaner
CLR Kitchen and Bathroom Cleaner
Iron-Out Tablets
The Works- bleach automatic tabs

web ad income today (4 blogs, 2 web sites): Adsense $.05 Adgitize $.23 Project Wonderful $.02 ______________________ Total: $.30 Total to date in March: $6.22

Is Online Advertising Valuable?

All too often I hear the words, “I don’t do internet advertising.” As the owner of a web site that promotes local recreation, I have been trying for two years to sell ad space to local restaurants, canoe liveries, campgrounds, etc. I have a handful of successes with about a 50% cancellation rate at the end of the first year. Why so many dropped accounts? The most common reason given is that no one told these businesses that they learned of their service on my web site.

This is a ridiculous standard that no other advertising medium is expected to meet. Experts estimate that it takes somewhere between 8 and 13 views of a product or service before people will read, buy– even consider becoming a consumer.

Newspaper advertising is not targeted. Billboards are large, but again, not targeted, Radio is not targeted. Television may be marginally targeted with cereal advertised on the kids’ shows, soap on the “Soaps,” etc, and magazines are perhaps the most targeted, but also the most expensive form of traditional advertising. Direct mail is also targeted. All of these channels have what appears to be dismal return rates. Targeted direct mail by non-profit organizations generally gets less than a 2% response rate, and that is high compared to the others! So why does anyone think that the internet will produce better results?

Advertising is, at its core, a way to put a brand in front of the public to build familiarity. And web logs, blogs, are highly targeted venues, many with strong followings. It just makes sense that advertisers should want to use this channel of exposure. Many companies do now choose to advertise on blogs.

However, bloggers are usually not corporations, but individuals. They want to be sure that they will be paid for displaying advertisements. They want to have control over what appears on their blogs, and they often want to be part of the process.

Advertisers want to be sure that they are getting what they pay for. Viral marketing is the current trend, and personal endorsements sell products. But if a company pays someone to post about their product they want to be sure that the post is positive, well-written, and in good English (or whatever the language of the blog).

PayingPost is an internet advertising broker that can step into this wide gap between companies and individuals. It is free to register with PayingPost for both parties. Once a blogger is registered, various opportunities will be offered him or her, to either post news releases from companies or to write about products. Although the tone of the article is specified, no blogger is forced to accept an assignment for a product that they are not comfortable promoting. The article must be approved by PayingPost, and if it meets the standards, the blogger will be paid the agreed-on amount of money.

For any writer interested in promoting products on their blog and making some extra cash, PayingPost.com is recommended.

web ad income today (4 blogs, 2 web sites): Adsense $.03 Adgitize $.20 Project Wonderful $.02 ______________________ Total: $.25 Total to date in March: $5.92

Truvia- The Newest No-Cal Sweetener is Natural

Cargill began releasing information about its newest low calorie sweetener in May 2008. Advertisements are now appearing on television for the brand, Truvia. But what is Truvia?

Truvia (pronounced Tru-VEE-a) is the trademarked brand name of a natural sweetener made from the leaves of a South American plant. The stevia plant, Stevia rebaudiana Bertoni, is native to Paraguay. It’s common name is sweetleaf. Naturally about 300 times sweeter than sugar, it has been used as a sweetener for over 300 years. The commercially extracted sweetener developed by Cargill and Coca-Cola Company from the stevia plant is called rebiana.

Rebiana was only allowed to be marketed in the United States as a supplement until 2008, when the Food and Drug Administration relaxed the ruling. It is now allowed as a food product.

Rebiana is an industry response to a strong consumer demand for a natural, zero-calorie way to sweeten foods and beverages.

Although the stevia plant is native to Paraguay it is also grown commercially in China. Sweeteners prepared in large quantities from stevia have been in use in Japan for over 30 years, and comprise 40% of that country’s low or zero-calorie sweeteners.

The leaves of stevia are harvested at their peak sugar season. Once dried, they are steeped in a process much like making tea. This brew is then purified to make a food-grade sweetener. The resulting rebiana is approximately 200 times sweeter than sugar. Rebiana has a clean, sweet taste. There is some indication that at higher concentrations a slight licorice aftertaste is experienced.

Research published in the scientific journal Food and Chemical Toxicology clearly establishes the safety of rebiana for use as a natural, zero-calorie sweetener in food and beverages. A rigorous safety evaluation program – the first of its kind to evaluate rebiana – addressed unresolved questions and verified the safety of the product for use as a general purpose sweetener. The research program included metabolism, safety, intake, stability and human studies that complement the body of previously published research on purified steviol glycosides, the sweet components of the stevia leaf.

In July 2008, commuters in New York City were given free samples of iced tea and lemonade sweetened with Truvia as they passed through Rockefeller Center. Comments were generally positive, such as “Good flavor; surprisingly no aftertaste.” A greenhouse demonstration of the plants was also available.

On December 17, 2008, the Food and Drug Administration approved Truvia for sale as a food product. Cargill spokesman Marcelo Montero stated, “Given the extensive research conducted to assure the safety of Truvia rebiana, Cargill has tremendous confidence in the product. The FDA letter further validates what the science has concluded- that Truvia rebiana is safe for use for all consumers.”

Some recipes using Truvia are available at the Truvia web site.

Since this information was released, I have learned that Truvia may contain a large amount of erythritol, another plant-based sugar. Erythritol is safe and much cheaper than the pricey Truvia. It can be purchased in a pure form. You can read more about this at All-Star Health

portions of this article taken from news releases of Cargill, May 15, 2008 Cargill introduces Truvia™
and December 17, 2008 Cargill Receives Official Notification from Fda Supporting the Safety of Truvia™ Rebiana

web ad income today (4 blogs, 2 web sites): Adsense $.02 Adgitize $.20 Project Wonderful $.03 ______________________ Total: $.25 Total to date in March: $5.67

I Love Hate Associated Content- Part I

I've been a writer on Associated Content for about a year and a half. There isn't room to tell all of my opinions of that site in one blog post. I'll just jump into the middle and share the latest outrage.

First, let me say that I make about $5 a month from Associated Content. Not getting rich there either, and more on that at a later date also.

For months I've only been posting articles for pay-per-view. I've just had an article pulled because they say that even though I have documented the quotes I used, that there is too much copied content. I see they've added the tag "Information From the Source" to their logo. I wonder if they are going through the million+ articles written by over 200,000 people and pulling everything with long quotes.

Since I've already announced that this blog is for some product reviews, guess what tomorrow's post will be... and I'm saving up the vitriol for another blog about Associated Content in the future.

web ad income today (4 blogs, 2 web sites): Adsense $.02 Adgitize $.20 Project Wonderful $.07 ______________________ Total: $.29 Total to date in March: $5.42

Getting Started with Paying Post

I first learned about PayingPost by writing a review of the company for another site. It looked quite promising to me personally. So I have signed up, and this blog has been approved to be a member.

Essentially, PayingPost is a broker between bloggers and companies who wish to advertise products. I will write a separate post about internet advertising, but for now, let's assume that it is a wonderful and underutilized market. Advertisers want to know that they are getting quality reviews, and writers want to know that they will be paid. PayingPost is the middleman that makes it work.

Registration is free for both bloggers and advertisers. Blogs must be approved to participate, which can take a few days. This blog was approved when it had been live for only a week, so there is no minimum post requirement. I would think that there is a quality of writing issue. When a successful advertisement is posted PayingPost will charge a commission.

Advertisers may present bloggers with a press release about a product which a blog may choose to display. The other choice is for images and some text to be given to a blogger and the blogger writes about the product. In both cases the blog provides backlinks to the company. Articles must be approved by PayingPost before they are posted on the blog.

Make no mistake, this is advertising. When I accept future assignments from PayingPost, I will be telling you mostly what the company wants you to hear. However, I can choose which products I am willing to promote. Most assignments are worth $10 or more.

I have added an image link to the right column of this blog. This is another opportunity provided by PayingPost. Anyone can hire me directly to write about something for a minimum of $5.

As I get future assignments I'll let you know how well this works.

web ad income today (4 blogs, 2 web sites): Adsense $.01 Adgitize $.19 Project Wonderful $.05 ______________________ Total: $.25 Total earned in March $5.13

Why I (Used to?) Like Entrecard

I joined Entrecard (EC) in January 2009. I was hoping to find some way to seriously increase traffic to my blog, and this particular networking tool is different from most of the others.

If you have noticed on any blogs a box with a 125x125 pixel banner with a black and orange box beside it, or a band below it with a single, capital E, that is an Entrecard Drop Box. I have added one to this blog today.

The idea is that you can earn credits by clicking on those boxes in other people’s blogs. You also get credit when other EC bloggers click on your box. With these EC credits you can buy advertising space on other blogs in the system. That’s how your blog’s banner gets on other blogs.

My traffic immediately increased. I began to make several friends in the blog world, including a few blogs that I make an effort to read and comment on every day. Pretty soon, people were stopping off at My Quality Day and leaving interesting comments. And my two news blogs were getting a lot more traffic even if no one was leaving comments. For the North Country Trail News blog this was great exposure. The news is mostly pertinent to those who care specifically about the trail.

One of the general complaints about Entrecard is that people just drop and run and don’t read the blogs, and thus it makes your bounce rate go up. This is true enough, but it’s obvious that if you have things worth looking at that people eventually slow down and look. Before EC I had one regular reader of My Quality Day. Now I have double digit followers and every post has multiple comments. This is what blogging is supposed to be!

A couple of days ago EC announced a major shift in its emphasis. They will be attracting outside advertisers whose ads will be running with blog ads up to 50% of the time. The up side of this is that finally those with extra EC credits can cash them out for real money. There was great hue and cry about the down sides. First of all, all EC widgets will need to be either above the fold or within one scroll down from there. This has not yet been tightly defined since this will vary on different monitors. (After initially saying that the widget had to be above the fold, this standard has been relaxed.) This is a design issue for some people, while others are upset because many advertisement brokers insist that their ads be above the fold. There is only so much real estate at the top on any blog.

The next biggest complaint is that bloggers would have to pay via EC credits to decline to run ads of which they did not approve. EC has since decided that they will not require people to pay in order to refuse certain ads. Bloggers on Today.com (and others?) will be given an option to run no ads except the traditional blog ads. Today.com does not allow any commercial ads other than their own, so the new EC plan would have eliminated anyone using the Today platform from their network.

Some bloggers have already left Entrecard. I know of one who left in protest and is back already since EC actually listened to some of the complaints.

Me, I’m going to stick around and see how it works out. Two of my widgets were already high enough on their respective blogs, and I moved the third one up a bit. The one on this blog I just added today after it was approved. Perhaps there will soon be another small tally of cents per day listed below.

web ad income today (4 blogs, 2 web sites): Adsense $.01 Adgitize $.20 Project Wonderful $.05 ______________________ Total: $.26 Total to date in March: $4.88

Feedjit Live Stats Widget

I've been using the Feedjit widget for live stats on my other blogs for some time, and I like it a lot. It shows visitors where other visitors have come from. That is fun but the real advantage of Feedjit is that I can log in, off of my blog, and see where the most recent 50 visitors came from, and also if they left by clicking on a link on my blog. It tracks this traffic in real time.



I am adding one to this blog today. This is the image widget (you can also choose the javascript widget for some blog platforms). On the Feedjit "join" page click "Get the Javascript Widget" at the bottom of the column of choices.

There are four choices on this page, but the one I am using is at the far left, "Life Traffic Feed." Click the top line "First Customize It." This is pretty straightforward. If you click on a color square you will be given a palette where you can click on a color, or you can use a hexidecimal code (the pound sign followed by six numbers and or letters) to select the colors. The results will show in the sample widget. So it's easy to match your blog or web page. You can also select the width as long as it's between 160 and 260 pixels. This all relates to what your visitors will see.

Once you are happy with the look of the widget, just grab the code in the little box and paste it into your blog or web site. It will immediately start to track visitors in real time. (There are options for Blogger or Typepad if you don't know how to add the code to your blog)

You can then click the widget where it says "Watch in Real Time" (I like to right-click and open in a new tab) and open a whole page to see those most recent 50 visitors. Of course it starts from when you install it, so it will take a certain amount of time for the queue to fill. From this page you may choose to remove your own IP from the list so that your own location will not keep showing up in the list.



You can see, left to right, whether the line indicates someone coming or leaving, their country's flag, their browser, their operating system, and the logo of the site they came from (if it has an icon). In text their city and state will be shown, the name of the site, and the location on your site where they landed. This might be the general blog page or a permalink. On the right is the running time, and how long ago the visitor came or left. Leaving entries are only recorded if they actually clicked on a link on your site.

It continues to "listen" for traffic, so if someone else comes to your site you will see it appear at the top while all other entries scroll down one line.

web ad income today (4 blogs, 2 web sites): Adsense $.00 Adgitize $.21 Project Wonderful $.06 ______________________ Total: $.27 Total to date in March: $4.62

Canon Power Shot SX10IS - Changing ISO

My articles about using the Canon Powershot SX10IS are not likely to proceed in logical order from simplest to most complex, rather they will just show up as I discover and use the features.

I was trying to take pictures of some of my houseplants this week. On the automatic setting the camera insisted on flash, and the shot below shows how the light bounced off the "Desert Rose," creating a hot spot that I don't like.



So I decided to switch the camera to Manual and see how difficult it would be to increase the "film speed." The larger the ISO number, the less light is required to take a good picture. In film developing ISO (formerly ASA) referred to the film's sensitivity to light. So for film with a high ISO you could keep the shutter open a shorter length of time. In digital technology the terminology has been retained and an arbitrary relationship between the exposure and sensor data has been created so people with long familiarity to film to not need to rethink the entire photographic process.

Therefore, since the plants were in rather low light, I wanted to increase the ISO so that I would not need to use the flash. Here is the result of changing the ISO to 1600, the highest regular setting allowed on this camera. Now, I've eliminated the hot spot, but overall the shot is a bit dark. (Supposedly there is a way to get the ISO to 3200 for special situations, but I haven't figured that out yet.)



It was very easy to make this change. With the selection wheel on the top right of the Canon Powershot SX10IS, move the wheel to M rather than AUTO.

Press the ISO button on the rocker control button on the back right of the camera. You will see the display change to the screen shown below. If you do not see this, press the DISP button once, and it should change. You can now push the ISO button several more times to change the ISO through values of 80, 100, 200, 400, 800, 1600. You could alternatively change that number by rotating the wheel that surrounds the control button. I chose 1600 and then took my picture.



Below is the final result after I had lightened the shot a bit with photo software. Overall it is a bit dark and dramatic, but I eliminated the hot spot caused by the flash and I am satisfied.



See Canon Power Shot SX10IS - Out of the Box

web ad income today (4 blogs, 2 web sites): Adsense $.08 Adgitize $.24 Project Wonderful $.03 ______________________ Total: $.35 Total to date in March: $4.35

Adgitize Me! - Part 2

I promised to tell you how to advertize and earn on Adgitize, and here we go. I won't cover every detail, but hopefully will explain enough that you could get started there without too much trouble.

General Info:

• Create an ID and password and it works for all three categories of participation.
• There is a support forum which requires a separate ID and password. Staff, usually Ken Brown, will respond to forum questions within a few hours.
• Daily points earned are compared against the total available points and you are paid that percentage of daily available revenues.
• You will be paid automatically on the 20th of the month when you reach $10. Payouts are by check or PayPal.

There are three ways to participate atAdgitize. Any blog or web site may choose to do any or all of the three. You can earn money if you are in any of these categories.

1. Be an Affiliate- this means that you advertise their site, but you earn something for anyone who signs up under you.
2. Be a Publisher- this means that you display the ads of those who choose to Advertise through Adgitize
3. Be an Advertiser- this means that you pay money to have your ad show on the pages of those who are Publishers.

Affiliate Info:

• Select from two designs and a number of sizes of banners, put one on your site.
• When someone follows this link from your site and signs up as an Advertiser you get $5.00
• You continue to receive $1.00 a month for every month that site is an Advertiser.

Publishers Info:

• Select from two banner sizes and several group alignments of ads to display
• You earn points for new posts on your blog
• You earn points for the number of page views and ad view from your site
• You may optionally earn points (max 350/day) by clicking on ads on other Publisher's pages

Advertisers Info:

• Create an ad in one of two sizes to display
• Purchase by the week ($7), two weeks ($10), or month ($14)
• You earn points for new posts on your blog
• You may optionally earn points (max 500/day) by clicking on ads on other Publisher's pages
• There are some point earning perks for those who are both Advertisers and Publishers

Other useful info:

• To earn points by clicking on ads you must first wait for the page to load completely
• You can only click on one ad from any one site per day
• You can only click on an advertiser's banner once per day, but once your click for an advertiser has been recorded you will no longer be shown that ad, so you don't need to keep track
• Many Advertisers also are Publishers so there is a good chance there will be ads to click on a site you just reached by clicking
• As you click, your stats will be recorded by Adgitize in a blue bar below the ads. You will see it change from "Adgitize Me" to "Adgitize 5" when you have clicked on 5 ads, "Adgitize 10" when you have clicked on 10 ads, etc.
• If you can't find a site that displays ads there is a list under Members Lounge / Reports / Blogs not clicked today
• You do have to be logged in on Adgitize for your clicks to count. You can do a lot of work for nothing if you don't pay attention to this.
• It does take quite a bit of time to click through the maximum number of allowed sites per day. However, since my blogs are also on Entrecard (not this one yet- need to have more posts), and so are a LOT of Adgitize blogs, so I click for both at the same time.
• There are lots of stats to track your points and earnings listed under Members Lounge / Reports

web ad income today (4 blogs, 2 web sites): Adsense $.00 Adgitize $.21 Project Wonderful $.03 ______________________ Total: $.24 Total to date in March: $4.00

Adgitize Me! - Part 1

Today I've added a two-ad block of Adgitize Ads, and an Affiliate banner to this blog. Also today I'll tell you why. Tomorrow I'll tell you how.

First, let me tell you why I won't tell you all the reasons that one web advertising tool is the best or worst. At least not yet. I don't think that any one tool is the best or worst for everyone. But I will tell you why Adgitize is working well for me at the present time.

As you can see from my daily income tables, most days it accounts for about half of my blog income. At this point in my blogging career there are three reasons why I blog.

1. To provide quality content to a specific group of readers. All of my other blogs focus on this reason:
   • The longest running is Get Off The Couch News. It provides information about quiet, muscle-powered outdoor recreation in western Michigan. It is tied to a web site I designed about locations for those kinds of activities, Get Off The Couch. I do need to have that site make money, but it too was begun just to provide quality content.
   • The most recent, except for this one, is North Country Trail News. This blog is a continuation of a daily news feature that I used to do on the NCT Association web page. I simply love that trail, and if I make a little money it would be great, but I really just want people to learn more about the trail.
   • In the middle, I began My Quality Day. This is a more personal blog that grew out of a much more personal blog for family and close friends that grew out of a page on the almost blog site Xanga. So I've been doing this "public" writing thing for quite a long time. My Quality Day is an attempt to share with people the really interesting things that I find along the daily path when I take the time to look for them.
2. To attract readers- If I provide content but no one reads it I get discouraged and it all seems rather pointless.
3. To make money- Well, this all takes a ton of time. If I could monetize it that would be justifiable. We technically live below P-level. I don't care a fig for "rich," but I wouldn't mind not squeezing every nickle until it bleeds.

So, I want traffic to read my blogs, and traffic is key to advertising income. Enter the next problem. This is a topic that deserves its own post, but it has to be mentioned as part of the logic of using Adgitize. I write about topics that aren't even on the fringes of the categories of the lists in many social networking or blog listing sites: hiking, backpacking, nature study. I do add my blogs to a number of these lists, but sometimes Hobbies or Recreation is the best fit I can find. Not great for attracting readers.

I began on Adgitize as a Publisher. That means that I displayed other sites' ads on my blogs (I signed up with My Quality Day and Get Off The Couch News). To earn maximum points, and therefore cash, you need to find other Adgitize Publishers and click on the banners they display for Adgitize Advertisers. I discovered as I was doing this that I was reading a fair amount of material on those sites, since I needed to wait for the page to load completely for the click to be recorded.

After a few weeks of this I decided that if Adgitizers would be seeing my banner and clicking on it that they would be reading some of my content whether they initially wanted to or not. And I didn't have to find a category to shoehorn my blogs into.

Of course I agonized over the price. Adgitize costs $14 per month. In 30 days I had made $2.30 there. So if I did similarly in the next month I'd be about $10 in the hole, but would increase traffic to some unknown extent. I took a deep breath and bought an ad for My Quality Day.

Those 31 days of advertising are still running. In the first 15 days I have made $3.23, so it is conceivable that I could earn back half of what I spent. As for traffic increase, I am impressed. So far my banner has been displayed 114,738 times. Whether people clicked or not, they are seeing the name of my blog- creating brand recognition. So far my blog has received 856 clicks from those impressions of the banner. That's a 0.12% clickthrough rate. That's quite decent. Of course Adgitizers have an incentive... to earn their own twenty cents a day (it's a percentage thing- more on that tomorrow), nevertheless, they are clicking.

So for me, for now, that's why I am using Adgitize. Check them out!

web ad income today (4 blogs, 2 web sites): Adsense $.39 Adgitize $.20 Project Wonderful $.04 ______________________ Total: $.63 Total to date in March: $3.76

Canon Power Shot SX10IS - Out of the Box

I have been forced to buy a new camera. My beloved Pentax SLR has died, and these days it isn't worth the cost of repairing a film camera. At the same time, two weeks ago Photo Works announced that they were suspending film processing as of TOMORROW. That's crummy in the first place and really, really short notice. My cheapie Kodak Easy Share digital is having issues, so I really knew that I had to get a camera for my hike documentation, writing, etc.



I had hoped to finish hiking the North Country Trail with all slides for pictures. But it is not to be. I'm making the total digital transition now. So I started looking, and it turned out that the camera I decided on was on sale, so I had to make one of those instant purchase decisions I hate, and came home from my trip to the Philadelphia Flower Show with a new camera, the Canon Powershot SX10IS.

The Canon PowerShot SX10IS is something of a hybrid with many great features you would only expect on a dSLR, but not the weight or the price tag that those carry. I think I'm going to like it. But it has a lot of things to learn, so I figured I would review those and share my observations here as I explore how to use it.





Here are a couple of comments right out of the box.
Pros

• The viewing screen folds in or out, swivels and tilts. You can switch between using the traditional viewfinder or the screen. The screen can be folded into a pocket in the back of the camera for protection. It can be turned over so that it is visible but on the back of the camera. It can be folded out and angled so you can actually see what you are taking a picture of for "over the top" shots, self-portraits, etc.
• Although there is a real learning curve for the many features it has full AUTO mode, so you can start taking pictures instantly and learn the fancy stuff as you go
• If you use the viewfinder, it isn't a true viewfinder but a small look-into reiteration of the screen view (but not true SLR where you are looking through the lens). So, you can't see anything if the lens cap is on, and the (thankfully) short freeze after a picture is taken also shows there so you know when you can take another shot

Cons

• It is heavier than I would like for hiking. It weighs 1 lb 9 oz. The Pentax weighs 2 lbs even (with no extra lenses), so I'm still ahead. But I had hoped to shed a bit more weight.
• It is difficult to pick up without accidentally hitting some button that you don't mean to. I have small hands, and I find this a challenge. I think someone with large hands would find it quite difficult. Maybe I just need to get used to it.
• The strap is just the right length for me. Horray! The reason that is a con is that most of the world is larger than I am. Anyone of any bulk will need to replace the strap.
• The strap bracket is really tight. The strap fit ok, but I had a very hard time getting a lens cap tether to fit in there with it.

I'm going to stop for this post. My plan is to write just a few things about the Canon PowerSho SX10IS at a time. Probably only one thing as they begin to get more complicated. Perhaps my learning can help someone else who is considering, or has purchased this camera.

web ad income today (4 blogs, 2 web sites): Adsense $.00 Adgitize $.20 Project Wonderful $.05 ______________________ Total: $.25 Total to date in March: $3.13

Three Column Success

Well, as you can see, I now have 3 columns. They are not fancy, but they work. That is more than I can say for instructions from several other sites. The set that worked was found at The Cutest Blog on the Block. I sort of wish the article column was on the left and the two narrower columns on the right, but for now, I'll accept this!

I'll continue to work on adding more features, but this is an accomplishment for today.

web ad income today (3 blogs, 2 web sites): Adsense $.01 Adgitize $.20 Project Wonderful $.22 ______________________ Total: $.43

Templates for Blogger

I find that I really have quite a few topics that I want to talk about. Perhaps for another day I'll talk about why I have stuck with blogger / blogspot platforms.

Meanwhile, I have been trying to find three-column templates for blogger that actually work. I have found several sources that don't seem to. The first one is BlogspotTemplate.com. They have 14 designs for blogger with three columns. I can't get any of them to work. They consistently produce errors that say the code cannot be parsed.

I know just enough javascript to work my way out of some problems, and alter some applications. But I have no idea how to take a huge block of code and figure out what is wrong.

I've found a site that explains how to make blogger templates into 3-columns. I'm going to give it a try. I'll report how well it works.

Have I Learned Anything?

I've been at this tricky private / public tightrope walking called blogging for a couple of years now. I never believed for a minute that I would make $5000 a month as the tabloid ads promise. And, believe me, I haven't.

The sad truth is that I'm up to about 25 cents a day. Now, I'm pretty frugal, but even I can't live on that. Many of the money-making opportunities come from writing product reviews, participating in blog contests, and other kinds of activities that don't relate to the themes of any of my other blogs.

And I have learned a few things. I've learned about some of the ways that work to build traffic, and some that don't seem to work for me. So I'm going to start writing about it all. In order to join some of the traffic-building sites you have to have an established blog with a number of entries. I had better get started.

web ad income in March through today (4 blogs, 2 web sites): Adsense $.35 Adgitize $2.03 Project Wonderful $.50 ______________________ Total: $2.88