Being a Family Guy is The Toughest Job in the World

Being a Family Guy is The Toughest Job in the World

A friend of mine has the toughest job in the world. We're in the same business and even work for the same company, but he has what I regard as the most difficult and demanding job. You see, in addition to working here with me, my friend Jim is a real family guy.

I don't just mean some fellow with a wife and kids. Lots of guys have those. I mean my friend Jim's purpose in life seems to be to ensure the welfare and happiness of his family. By my standards his family is huge. He has a wife, four kids--two in elementary school and two in high school, a mother-in-law, his own mother, two sisters, and two brother-in laws. Long ago I lost count of his nieces and nephews. On my desk I have a Rolodex with the names of my business contacts. Jim could fill his own Rolodex with just the names and birthdays of his family.

Over the years there have been occasions when I've accompanied Jim after work. Even a simple trip home usually means at least one stop at the grocery store and more often than not a stop at the high school to pick up a teenager who stayed late for sports practice. It's not just Jim's constant movement, constantly being on-the-job and looking out for others, that astonishes me. It's also the amazing feat of memory. How does he keep track of so many people?

Jim's care and affection doesn't stop with just his immediate family. Once he was worried that his mother-in-law might be getting depressed after a surgery so he moved her across several states to put her up in a spare bedroom in his house. He also plowed up, destroyed, a patch of his beautifully tended back lawn because he knew his mother loved to garden. Once his brother-in-law was in danger of losing his apartment. Jim took time off from work to go and have a discussion with the landlord. And it seems the spare room at his house always contains an uncle or aunt on an extended visit.

I've often wondered how Jim always seems to remain in a good mood. That's not to say he doesn't get sad or angry. Once I saw him arrive at work with sort of a dazed expression. In his right hand he held what looked like a lock of blonde hair. It seems his youngest discovered scissors. That was three years ago and the lock is still bound together on his desk at work. And just this morning I overheard him having a telephone conversation with his sixteen-year-old son. His voice was patient, deliberate, and final. When he got off the phone he looked over at me and said, "I love that boy. He's silly and misdirected. He's still got a lot to learn. But I love that boy." I wanted to ask him what the kid did, but I'll probably find out later. See, tonight is Jim's wedding anniversary, and Jim asked if I'd come to his place and spend time with his kids while he takes his wife to a restaurant.

I don't know how this guy with the toughest job in the world, this family guy, does it. I guess he must love his work.

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For Those who Like to Laugh and Those who...

It has been said many times that laughter is the best medicine – and it is of course the best medicine because it relieves stress. As you know, stress is a killer and lurks behind most illnesses which you could term as being (almost) psychosomatic!

Do you laugh many times during your busy day? Sometimes it is not easy as you feel a bit down or out-of-sorts and laughter is the last thing you want. So you want to be miserable—well, that is your right to be yourself. But you know, it is easy to come out of feeling low; all you have to do really is to change your attitude—like changing your coat.

Try this; if you smile a bit even if you have nothing to smile about, you will almost certainly find something to smile about! Something will pop up for you to smile, grin or burst out laughing. So wax a smile and see what happens, you’re going to be surprised.

Have a look at ways to include laughter in your daily activities, maybe you could read some daily funny quotes on the internet? Scan through the paper for comic strips and one simple cartoon can spark off a thought about someone or something bringing a smile. Did you know if your heart is full of laughter you will live a lot longer? So laughter becomes no laughing matter.

Okay, I agree. Sometimes laughter takes quite an effort and can be "felt" by your family and friends…suddenly the phone rings and mom says “I was just thinking about you, are you okay?” It is almost ESP and there is the connection from your heart which mom picked up. "Nah" you say, "That's all a load of bunkum, I don't believe that for one moment." Well, try it--if it works for you that’s great. If it doesn’t that is also okay. Wax a smile and your personality stays intact.

If you are really gung-ho about life, fun will find you and so will fun people. It is something like a magnet as you connect to these humorous folk over the “airwaves.”

Go here for some wonderful funny quotes and sayings that pop up which should bring a smile or two.

Hard Work Putting Together my Family Fun Website

So it has been some time since I last wrote anything here. That is not because I am lazy although I like to loaf once in a while. Nope, I've been working flat out on my website, getting to know HTML code, putting together one minute movies I make for YouTube and writing up content for my webpages. That chews up many hours in the day!

My website target is to load at least one page a day which includes not only the writing but also getting my photos edited in Photoshop, checking the code, loading the page/s up and then checking it in various browsers. I am sure a lot of you know how much time it takes to put a 500-700 word content page together - especially webmasters.

With all this work I am pleased to say my unique visitor count is going up gradually and I think that has to do with interesting content.

I put a new page in today "How to Draw Animals" even though my website is more about Family Fun. These how-to-draw lesson are aimed at young children and families so parents can guide their kids to more creative interests rather than watching the tube.

My sister Shirley who lives in South Africa sent me these pics today, they are soooo good I thought you might like to see them here: Sorry, when I uploaded them Google gave me an error message so it will have to wait until the next posting.

Please write some comments here if you get a chance to see my website. It is not really cool at the moment but it will be as I climb out of the learning curve!

Creating 2 minute movies...

It is January 3rd today—a Saturday—and I can’t get wireless connection possibly because everyone in the neighborhood is online, so I’m writing this offline in Notepad ready to drop in as soon as we get connected.

The good news is I have found a writer at NAA (Need-an-Article) and I should be able to outsource all my writing except for blogs. Lynne, my new writer, has written up several articles recently and one of them is Funny Facts which is all about those trivia things that kids enjoy and learn a lot from. She is also writing up an article about Funny Kids and the crazy things they get up to. This should be worth reading ‘cause it is usually quite funny.

I am looking for an open source 2D animated software; if you know of an affordable one please drop me a line or email me through my email at http://FamilyFunCartoonsBlog.blogspot.com I’ve only looked at Opus and Retas Pro but they look complicated and they are expensive. I sometimes go to Amazon to check out the feedback on software and books, if it has less than a 3-star rating I do not bother to read it.

My goal is to create two-minute movies for YouTube which will be about characters who are slightly dysfunctional but they get on well with their siblings and friends but less so with strangers. They will play against each other in with a lot of humor added, some of it a bit zany and some outright crazy. I will leave my movie URL’s on this blog so please call back, email or go to my RSS feed either here or on my website.

An Exciting Year Ahead!

This has been one of those exciting times of the New Year when I will go over the past year and locate all the failures I’ve had and the “not accomplished goals” and find out why these have not been attained.

I’ve had many wins this past 2008 and any given action I’ve done to achieve this I will duplicate and strengthen for this years goals. In fact, 2008 has been a great year for me. I am a relatively newbie on the internet and especially putting together my own web page.

It all started last February when I’d spent countless hours looking on the internet for any ideas I could do from home to make a modest income. There seems to be innumerable offers to make bucks from all and sundry. Your head begins to spin after awhile and you get to a stage where you do not believe anyone. It is all hype.

GRQ was an acronym I got to know well (get rich quick) and I discovered there is no such thing on the internet…it took some time to discover this but it eventually sunk in. “I get up at 10 am, have my coffee and start to work my 1 hour day in my PJ’s.” This came up so many times it made you want to puke!

There may well be genuine offers but not one GRQ that I found valid. I trashed them all. I also went through hundreds of “This is not a GRQ scheme” and found this was also a ploy to bet bucks from your wallet.

A friend then showed me his stats for the past year and how he struggled getting up his own website for his home made wooded toy products. I was impressed with his slow gains in the first few months which then took off after about 6 months; he had about 10 or so unique visitors a day to 300 in six months. In the first nine months he didn’t make a dime and then the orders slowly trickled in and the money followed.

He said, “Do yourself a favor and check out SiteSell.” Which I did and so in February last year I signed up with them and I’ve never looked back. It was a huge struggle at first learning HTML, how to write content, how not to spam and thousands of others things I had to put together—but eventually it all came together and I got my first check today from Adsense.

I’ve now had thousands of unique visitors a month and they are growing steadily and my CTR is creeping up slowly but surely.

If you have the time, go to my website and check it out. It would be great if you can leave feedback, good or bad…I always learn heaps from other people.

The best to you for 2009, may it be all that you have planned for and more!

http:www.familyfuncartoons.com

Looking for More Writers For My Website

I have spent a lot of time today looking for more writers to add content to my web pages. I have, no kidding, about 600 more pages that need to be written up. Of course my pages are all about family fun, a little humor added here and there; coloring-in pages, games and a few pages about cartooning.

Writers have to have a unique voice as if you are talking to a person in front of you. Writing great content begins with keywords and this is not always easy especially if you are writing for children.

First post January 1 2009.