They are everywhere...

For Heather



While in Seattle I was on the lookout for the beloved black one. Here another lover names their boat for the mysterious Raven.

Traveler’s notes:

When approaching wild creatures like Griffins. Move slowly and do not challenge them with you eyes. Keep your eyes down.

Night rides are exhilarating, but keep all loose things tied down like hats and gloves, etc.

Bring sturdy walking shoes and dress in layers.

Stinging bugs can be discouraged with spray on Citronella oil

Virtual tours can interrupt your working environment. Magic headphones are available at your request.

Ancestors can drop by anytime, be prepared to offer tea and cookies.

Most bandits and ogres do not accept American Express.

An open window is an invitation for a night ride from good or evil.

Bring a good pen and a notebook that can take on the elements.

Wireless Internet in dodgy. The best reception is the top of the Faraway tree.

Cell phones are discouraged. The walking dead seem to find them attractive.

Towels and blow dryers are provided at registered bathhouses and hot springs

Wearing your heart on your sleeve is well received with other like-minded travelers.

MIA

Missing in action...I am recovering from a visit to California. I will try to post soon.

Love,
Luna

For Heather

Sometimes it is in the leaving behind that we must wonder at its value to us.
Ruins in Wapatki, AZ.

heather: HELP

I HAVE BEEN FIGHTING WITH MY E-MAIL...and finally give up./ I want to enter trading treasures blog. Could you please put me in so I will start posting some of my tradeables. Love you and miss all your energy . Jane

New Idea - Hermitage Publications Trading Room

Pre-Loved Treasures Trading Room

For details see:

http://hermitagepublications.blogspot.com/

- click on the above link to go there.

Most of you are already members of this blog,

but if you would like an invitation, let me or Heather know,

Imogen Crest - Hermit

Ad-cent-less - a follow-up to Adsenseless and sensibility

It seems I am not alone. A dear friend who runs a wonderful website and support groups for an orphan disease (very like mine) has now also been defrauded of what should have been earnings on advertising, earnings badly needed to help this retired widower run this site (=http://pspcommunications.org>http://pspcommunications.org and =http://neurosy.org>http://neurosy.org). It grieves me particularly because I was the one urging him to give this advertising a try to earn the monies needed to run the website which many of us ill with devastating neurological diseases depend on for up-to-date information and support.



Bilked by people who parade themselves around as some sort of champion of the common man. They had done the same to me some months ago, the article is archived here, http://my.opera.com/alettames/blog/show.dml/110757 , called AdSense and Sensibility. The villain in this case is Google, who owns the AdSense service, which places advertising on your website, collects money from advertisers which is then supposed to pay out to the owners of the various webpages hosting their ads for them. Their revenue depends on webmasters keeping interesting content and attractive design to bring more and more traffic to their ads. Many of us throw much of our energies into running websites as a means of generating income and/or providing a public service. The time and effort we spent on our websites benefited them directly. We could have been doing something else, we have been seriously taken advantage of. Any good and decent person is devastated by being accused of committing a fraudulent act, let alone the rest of it. We are suffering some considerable hurt.







Their tactic is to recruit you, collect up revenue from advertisers and then cancel your account and take you earnings themselves. We've been robbed, friends, pure and simple, and I haven't a clue where we can find any justice. So far I haven't one contact with any different experience, so Google is just making one hell of a profit from all this. Meanwhile we support the websites, and blogs which we keep interesting enough to provide their advertisers with foot traffic. It is a crime, and devastating to someone just trying to earn a bit extra and keep websites viable. They take full advantage of people who want badly to be part of the earning public, especially crucial when you live in a society which counts the marginal population as losers, no matter what the circumstances. The reward for these efforts is to be taken advantage of.



The advertisers have sued once successfully (http://www.internetoutsider.com/2006/03/google_clickfra.html ) to have monies returned to them which were found to have been fraudulently charged by Google, the blame for which they (Google) now gives these small time web site operators. The amounts they bilk from us after accusations (without proof) that we somehow fraudulently inflated clicks on those ads, we have no way of knowing if they have been returned. The amounts are low enough that no advertiser would even know about them. I suspect our earnings are being used by Google in whatever way they like, perhaps to pay the settlement to the larger (casino and porn) advertisers.

It is plain that reading article after article on the web regarding these tactics that the practice is commonplace, most particularly among the people who earn less than one hundred dollars a month. The big earners tend to get paid. Those of course would also be the people who might afford lawyers to bring litigation forward. The people being victimised by this practice are the small earners who work from home, quite often because of disability or homemakers needing the added income. It is not the casinos and porn cites that are being accused of fraud. Google takes advantage of the small website owner because they cannot fight back, and it will satisfy the powers that bee, because on paper it looks like Google is doing something to fix the problem of fraudulent clicks, they are trying to keep future litigation from starting up, and the ones they have lost looking for all the world as though they are "dealing with it".



Would their advertisers like it much if they knew that much needed earnings were being taken from people already being run into the ground by a marginal existence, or the charitable efforts of people like my friend who runs the website in the memory of his late wife who died of PSP? It is devastating to have accusations hurled at you that you've been a fraud and your accounts have been closed and your earnings confiscated without any benefit of recourse. Letters are not answered. I have sent them out routinely over the past couple of months and there have been no replies. I suspect as my other friends near the amount that a cheque should be sent with their earnings they will find themselves also being accused of a crime and monies confiscated by Google, judge, jury and executioner. I feel horrible that I suggested it, I did so in good faith. Faith, as my father often reminded me, belongs in church. He was so right. In future I will not suggest anything for which I have not already been paid (cheque cleared the bank).



To date no successful litigation or even an investigation into these practices has occurred (that I could find, don't hesitate to correct me if you know better). It probably won't. The best we can hope for is that more and more of the "bilked" will come forward and post their stories on the web, and sign the petition on line at: http://www.noodleware.com/adsense/



So, please if this incenses you, read the article, sign the petition, post your story, or least leave your comments here. also think about using other search engines, use www.Yahoo.com or www.Anwers.com, consider changing your www.blogger.com hosted blog, if you have one to another host such as www.my.opera.com or www.blogdrive.com, they are every bit as good, if not better. If you want advertising on your website to earn other income, try www.AdBrite.com, or affiliate programs such as www.CafePress.com (their cheque cleared the bank).

No longer a nice little old lady

I've posted a new poem to the folk on Lemurian Mysteries, a battle won and lost a war. (:-)

Go West!

A few weeks ago we rose before dawn to follow the moon setting into the west. I am loving Portland and I have happily lost myself in my paintings. I miss you all!

Love,
Luna

Isolating Experiences Along the Web

Feeling somewhat isolated lately, I miss the correspondences in my inbox which stopped when our Yahoogroups moved to google. I suppose I should explain, that is why I might seem verly solitary these days. Please don't feel that I am withdrawing at all, and I certainly welcome emails directly from anyone who posts here.

After having had some problems with AdSense and Google over their unjust cancellation of my account and thus pocketing the few dollars I had earned by supplying them with and audience for the adverts, I closed all my personal blogs on blogger (owned by Google) and closed all accounts, such as googlegroups, which is why I've lost contact with with the group here, sadly. I feel however that it is important to stick to your guns. I feel I have been wronged and until and unless Google makes some effort to ad least enter into dicussion with me and treat me as a human being and not a number on the internet, I shall have to keep it this way. I will try to post here still, but it is much harder to remain connected wihtout the group correspondences that arrived by email when it was on Yahoogroups (not owned by Google). Why must they make life complicated and dehumanize us so?

So now I moved one former blog of mine to Opera Community - http://my.opera.com/alettames, where I post most regularly, though I do try to post here at least at the Hermitage blog.

It is still cold and damp here in Vancouver. Unexpectedly cold and I've been forced to spend much more time in be, to remain warm enough to function. That has resulted in a wealth of sketches, but away from the computer so mucyh there hasn't been much writing.

Well, I thought I should explain, and to say I do miss the corespondences, but have to stay true to my convctions also. If you've no idea what I'm talking about re: google you can read my epistle regards that topic at http://my.opera.com/alettames/blog/show.dml/110757

Not allowed

I was not allowed on the wonderful art blog with Alletta's current paintings. Please everyone look for her wonderfully colourful works. I tried to say:O Alleta: keep on and on making such beautiful things for us. What a cure your work must be for the long dull Vancouver days I knew so well. Your colours make me want to sing out, shout. You have given me joy. May I print some? Fran

The elves have accepted the invitation

The Elves inc. have accepted the invitation and are waiting for their owners to attend Elves Incorporated and find the elves have gathered with gifts in hand in front of the big tent screen. The Secretary

Belated Valentine Card

I don't get mushy on Valentines Day.

So I was going to write a story ( as a joke...really a joke! )about a woman who wanted to give her love her heart so she gets this surgical tool and... come on it's Anita here so you probably know where this is going.

The I saw all these lovely images and poems and I thought..come on Old Girl there must be something you'd like to do for your Muses for Valentines.

So I thought really hard and decided everyone loves Kudos right? They don't make you fat, but boy do they taste and feel good! So that's what I'm going to do for my Muses.

It's Kudo Time!
Here we go...

No one else probably gets why I call these guys my Muses but they are and I'm sure they appreciate that after dragging me to write every single day I'm showing them off...so this is for them and if it grosses you out...too bad.




The guy in the hat is my husband,he belives I'm a real writer...How could you NOT be inspired by that?




Then there's my friend Heather...this represents the doorways she's opened for me. So a big giant Kudo for her too.



Happy Valentines to All My Muses
Anita Marie

Elves invitation

The elves have set up a circus tent and would like to send you an invitation to submit a suitable act for the main performance. Consultation with your own elf should be considered. The Secretary and the Superintendent

The donkeys addition

Drop by to see the donkey from Paris and Jim's next poem. The Secretary