Emergency Contact Info for FLA Driver's Licenses

This became effective in the state of Florida as of 10/02/2006

You can have 2 emergency contacts attached to your FLORIDA  drivers license.  In other words, if you are in an accident and they run your drivers license 2 emergency contacts will pop up so they do not have to search for relatives.

Go to    www.hsmv.state.fl.us       go to emergency contacts, put in your drivers license and then it will ask for the name, address, and phone number of 2 people you want to have contacted, save and your done.

iPod Alternatives

29 Reasons You Don’t Need an iPod, 1 Reason You Do

Is the iPod still the best MP3 player on the market, or is it just the device that everyone knows about? Here is a nice list of 29 alternatives to an iPod that should all be available for the holiday season:  http://www.mp3newswire.net/stories/6002/ipod-killer-christmas2006.html

Gizmodo Disclaimer: if your wife/child requests an iPod for Christmas, we recommend that you stick with an actual iPod. Because a lecture on the superiority of triangular geometric design is the last thing anyone needs on Christmas. – Mark Wilson

Unified Theory of Everything Financial

Scott Adams is the creator of the Dilbert comic strip.  He was nominated for a Nobel Prize this year in Economics for his Unified Theory of Everything Financial.  This is MUST reading.

From a MarketWatch article:

Quietly hidden in Adams’ groundbreaking work is a financial formula so simple it rivals Einstein’s E=mc2. In its original form Adams’ formula was apparently so heretical and so explosive that no major house would touch it when he proposed publishing it as a one-page book. After initial rejections, he announced sadly that “if God materialized on earth and wrote the secret of the universe on one page, he wouldn’t be able to find a publisher” either.
Fortunately for America’s 95 million investors, Adams’ secret nine-point formula was finally revealed in “Dilbert and the Way of the Weasels.” Notice its simple brilliance in the exact reproduction of his formula:

1. Make a will
2. Pay off your credit cards
3. Get term life insurance if you have a family to support
4. Fund your 401k to the maximum
5. Fund your IRA to the maximum
6. Buy a house if you want to live in a house and can afford it
7. Put six months worth of expenses in a money-market account
8. Take whatever money is left over and invest 70% in a stock index fund and 30% in a bond fund through any discount broker and never touch it until retirement
9. If any of this confuses you, or you have something special going on (retirement, college planning, tax issues), hire a fee-based financial planner, not one who charges a percentage of your portfolio

Adams boldly states that this is “everything you need to know about personal investing.” In just 129 words, nine simple points, one page you have the unabridged “Unified Theory of Everything Financial.” That’s it. Everything!
Thanks to Adams’ formula, the average irrational investor can ignore Wall Street: “Everything else you may want to do with your money is a bad idea compared to what’s on my one-page summary. You want an annuity? It’s worse. You want a whole life insurance policy? It’s worse. You want to invest in individual stocks? It’s worse. You want a managed mutual fund instead of an index fund? It’s worse. I could go on, but you get the point.”
Check the bottom line: A portfolio with an asset allocation of 70% in Vanguard’s Total Stock Market Index (VTSMX) and 30% in the Total Bond Market Fund (VBMFX ) is doing just fine, performing remarkably close to the S&P 500 index. Moreover, that simple two-fund portfolio is perfect for the vast majority of America’s 95 million investors who are passive much as Adam’s Dilbert character.
The truth is, most investors have little or no interest in Wall Street’s casino action; all the time-consuming research, the sophisticated stock-picking tricks, the costly trading necessary to play in a market drowning in 10,000 stocks, 18,000 funds and more than 100,000 bonds. Most investors have jobs and kids as their top priority. Moreover, Dilbert’s simple two-fund portfolio compares favorably with our other lazy portfolios.

Investigating Contractors

DBPR: Don’t Take Contractors At Their Word

http://www.local10.com/money/index.html

Kathleen Corso, Local 10 Producer

PEMBROKE PINES, Fla. — When Valerie Terras decided to upgrade her hurricane window protection, she got bids from three different companies.

She was ready to hand over a hefty deposit to one company, only to find out they weren’t licensed or insured.

“You think because someone comes out and talks to you and responds to your calls, they’re legit,” said Terras. “Then when you dig deeper, you find out they’re not what they claim to be.”

Terras discovered the company’s lack of credentials by searching state and county databases.

Officials with the Florida Department of Business and Professional Regulation say that’s something every consumer should do before hiring any contractor.

“Don’t take the contractor’s word that they are what they say they are,” said Mark Reneger with the DBPR.

Start by asking for and getting copies of their license and insurance. If someone shows you an “occupational license,” Renegar says ignore it.

“This is not a license at all; this is simply a piece of paper anyone can get for paying a fee to the county. It’s really just a tax and the term is changing to reflect that,” said Renegar. “It’ll soon be called an ‘occupational tax.’”

Many consumers are also unaware of a new Florida law regarding contractor deposits. Under the law, any contractor who requests a deposit of 10 percent or more must pull a permit within 30 days and start the work within 90 days, unless the consumer agrees to different terms in writing.

No matter what the time frame is for the job, be sure to check the contractor’s complaint history with your local Better Business Bureau, the Florida DBPR, and the county where you live.

“Any public complaints are public record,” said Renegar. “You can get copies and know exactly what this person did wrong.”

Properly checking out a contractor can be a time-consuming process, but Valerie Terras considers it time and money well-spent.

“Now I can know that I’m hiring someone with the proper qualifications, and if there are problems, I’ll have recourse through the state,” said Terras.

Resources:
MyFlorida.com
Miami-Dade County
Broward County
Better Business Bureau

Copyright 2006 by Local10.com. All rights reserved.

MEDIA-CONVERT.COM

Convert files with Media-Convert

Media-Convert is a free online service that will convert audio, video, and text files for you, from and to virtually any kind of format.

All you need to do is figure out where the file is resting on your machine and what format you want it converted to (Media-Convert automatically detects what kind of format the file is in). For instance, maybe you need to switch an Access database over to an Excel spreadsheet - you can do that here. Converted files show up in a couple of different formats: URL, zipped, mobile, or downloadable from the site itself. ­ Wendy Boswell

Media-Convert.com [via Digital Inspiration]