8 gifts that don’t cost a cent
August 31, 2008This simple checklist can help measure how you are nurturing your relationships.
The Gift of Listening
But you must really listen. Don’t interrupt, don’t daydream, don’t plan your response. Just listen.
The Gift of Affection
Be generous with appropriate hugs, kisses, pats on the back and handholds. Let these small actions demonstrate the love you have for family and friends.
The Gift of Laughter
Clip cartoons. Share articles and funny stories. Your gift will say, “I love to laugh with you.”
The Gift of Solitude
There are times when we want nothing better than to be left alone. Be sensitive to those times and give the gift of solitude to others.
The Gift of a Favor
Everyday, go out of your way to do something kind.
The Gift of a Written Note
It can be a simple “Thanks for the help” note or a full sonnet. A brief, handwritten note may be remembered for a lifetime.
The Gift of a Compliment
A simple and sincere, “You look great in red,” “You did a super job,” or “That was a wonderful meal” can make someone’s day.
The Gift of a Cheerful Disposition
The easiest way to feel good is to extend a kind word to someone.
wholemeal apricot slice
August 18, 2008Preparation time: 25 minutes
Total cooking time : 25 minutes
Makes :24
Ingredients:
200g unsalted butter
1/2 cup caster sugar
1 cup plain flour
1 cup wholemeal self-raising flour
Filling:
200g dried apricots, finely chopped
2 teaspoons honey
3/4 cup water
Directions:
1. Preheat oven to moderate 180 deg Celsius.
2. Brush a 27×18 cm shallow rectangular tin with melted butter or oil. Line tin with baking paper extending over two sides.
3. Using electric beaters, beat butter and sugar until light and creamy. Add sifted plain and wholemeal flours and mix to soft dough. Place 2/3 o fthe dough in prepared tin and smooth surface with the back of a metal spoon.
4. To make filling : Combine apricots, honey and water in a small pan. Stir over medium heat until mixture boils. Reduce heat until mixture boils. Reduce heat and simmer for 5 minutes or until liquid has evaporated. Cool.
5. Spread cooled filling onto base. Crumble remaining dough in fingers and sprinkle over filling. Bake for 25 minutes or until golden brown. Cool and cut into squares.
Notes:
Storage time: Slice may be stored up to three days in an airtight container.
Variation: Use any dried fruit or combination of different fruits for the filling. Peaches, pears, apples and ginger would all be suitable.
Reference: Biscuits and Slices by Periplus
hack yourself
August 8, 2008Hack yourself: wondering if your network is secure? Run the same tools hackers do to test your PC’s defenses. Here’s an article i happen to read in the net that may help some of us about pc issues :
COPYRIGHT 2007 Ziff Davis Media Inc.
But hold on just a second, bucko. There’s nothing in this article that will help you break into NASA mainframes. The programs we’re going to show you are common knowledge among security aficionados. Even so, these are the kinds of tools that are often used to poke around unsuspecting user’s PCs–precisely because they’re prepackaged and ready to go.
So let’s step through a typical hack and run some of the attack tools. The idea for this exercise is to look from the outside in, to see if you can penetrate your own network’s defenses–the equivalent of trying to open your doors and windows from the outside after locking them. This will give you a better picture of what your network looks like from the hacker’s point of view as well as show any vulnerability.
While many hackers run Unix and therefore have the greatest variety of tools available to them, here we’ll focus on programs you can run on Windows. For more ways to evaluate your network’s security, check out Larry Seltzer’s how-to “Make Your Network Safer by Attacking It” on our Web site (go.pcmag.com/network attack). And you’ll find more networking articles at go.pcmag.com/networksolutions.
Survey the Landscape
You can check the state of wireless in your house or apartment–or just go wardriving–with NetStumbler (go.pcmag.com/netstumbler). At its core, this Wi-Fi tool lets you get the lay of the network land, showing you who’s “out there.” While you can theoretically do the same thing with Windows XP’s Wireless Network Connection Status window, NetStumbler’s picture is far more detailed. It helps find unsecured networks, dead spots with weak signal, and rogue access points that fool unsuspecting users, and it even helps sort out wireless interference.
NetStumber’s List view shows lots of details about nearby wireless networks. Looking across the columns, you’ll see entries for MAC address, SSID, channel, speed, encryption type, and details on the signal-to-noise ratio. There are also filters along the left-hand side to sort by signal strength, encryption status, and other characteristics. The Graph view, meanwhile, plots signal strength over time elapsed.
If your laptop has a GPS device connected, NetStumbler can use it to show exactly where each access point is located physically–information that is helpful in wardriving or finding “rogue access points” that don’t belong on a company network. (Incidentally, NetStumbler doesn’t officially support USB-based GPS devices, though some are known to work. And there’s a workaround using a software “port bridge”–check out Jeff Duntemann’s Wardriving FAQ at faq.wardrive.net, as well as the NetStumbler.org forums, for details.)
Sniff Out Browser Data
Wireshark (www.wireshark.org) is a comprehensive network protocol analyzer. Usually it’s used to troubleshoot network issues, but it’s also a packet sniffer–meaning that you can pull data out of any live network stream over Ethernet, Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, or even USB connections. It can also attempt to decrypt traffic on WEP and WPA networks.
Try capturing data on its way to and from your local machine to see what’s visible: Go to Capture | Interfaces and click the Start button next to the appropriate network adapter. We saw nothing at first when connected to our Belkin router–Wire-shark can’t sniff data on a switched network, and some routers have trouble with promiscuous mode, which is necessary for sniffing. But when we plugged a laptop directly into the cable modem, we saw the data window in Wireshark light up.
Visit a Web site, log in to webmail, or, as the Wireshark site suggests, fire up an Internet radio station to see different kinds of traffic. Wireshark displays it all in unreadable hexadecimal but decodes each piece in plain text to the right. Sift through it to find Web page downloads, text submitted into forms (including unencrypted passwords), and more.
Crack Your Own Passwords
Cain & Abel (www.oxid.it/cain.html) is a password cracker program for Windows XP, NT, and 2000 systems. It uses several algorithms, including Dictionary, Brute-Force, and Cryptanalysis attacks, to try to crack passwords from within a network. These passwords include wireless network encryption keys and cached IE7 log-ins.
For our example, we’ll use it to recover passwords stored on a home machine. Choose a category on the left-hand side–we’ll start with Wireless Passwords. Right-click on the ones showing on the right–which should correspond with a list of the hot spots you’ve stored passwords for–and select Send WPA-PSK [or other encryption] Hashes to Cracker.
Next, click the Cracker tab. You’ll see a fairly long list of Hashes on the left-hand side. Scan until you see “WPA-PSK Hashes”; the words should be in bold, showing that new Hashes have arrived recently. Click on that, and then right-click on a particular Wi-Fi network SSID that appears on the right.
Here’s the fun part: Run the attack of your choice, such as Brute-Force or Dictionary. If it’s a good enough password, it could take the program years to crack–fortunately, Cain & Abel will warn you if it’s predicting this scenario. If your password is weak, the program could figure it out quickly. Cain also has its own built-in sniffer. This way you can listen in for passwords from another machine on your network, such as when logging onto a Web site. The things you learn with these tools can aid in beefing up your home network’s security.
RELATED ARTICLE: EDITOR’S TIP
FOR MORE HACKING TOOLS, check out sectools.org for a list of the top 100 used. Many are for Unix machines, but there’s also a wide selection of Windows and Mac OS X programs available. Of course, you could also install Linux on your PC–read our installation guide at go.pcmag.com/linuxinstall.
springs
July 28, 2008We are springs. Everything that knocks us down is a chance to jump up
even higher. Every loss is a chance to show that we can bounce back
and try even harder.
Every fall is a chance to get back up and show that we won’t be
kept down.
Nobody and nothing can defeat us. The only person who can defeat you
is you. If you give up, you are defeated. If you persevere, you win.
It really doesn’t matter
what they throw at you, you are a spring and you can bounce back.
Whatever happens, keep going. If you keep bouncing back, you win!
blame
The kids are finally getting the message. Daddy says, “Blame is a
waste of time” they keep repeating to each other. Hopefully if they
repeat it to each other enough, they will take the message to heart
themselves.
It seems to be a human trait that we need to find explanations for
everything that happens. And so it stands to reason that we need to
find blame for everything bad that happens. But things don’t always
happen because someone wills them to, there is not always a guilty
party and we don’t need to blame people.
There is a place for blame – when a person responsible for
something needs to make amends or be prevented from repeating his
crime. But most blame is petty and totally unnecessary and harms the
blamer more than the person we blame. And that is what blame is a
waste of time.
P.S. I really have no recollection of saying “blame is a waste of
time” to my kids, but who am I to rain on their parade?
success
Success or happiness? Happiness or success?
Sometimes there are tough choices to make, but sometimes it’s just
a matter of understanding what a few simple words mean. Consider the
choice between happiness and success. Sometimes we mislabel
“success”.
Do you take that job in management and leave the hands-on world you
love so much? Isn’t that a moot point. Would it be a success to move
up into management? If it brings more money and less happiness, is
that a success? Will it bring your family more happiness if you are
unhappy?
If happiness is not success, then just what would qualify as success?
how much should i give?
When you give, remember to keep a balance. I know I had a tendency to
give and give, until I had nothing left for myself–time, energy,
even resources.
And when I was in this depleted state–I was not vibrating abundance!
When you give, find your comfort level. If you pay attention to
your emotions, you will find the place where you are giving with
a knowledge of your abundance. You will feel the joy of giving,
but still feel like you take very good care of yourself as well.
If you are trying to give so much that you feel uncomfortable–
listen to your feelings. Do some tapping to make sure you
aren’t acting simply out of fear. When your emotions are
clear, you will know how to tell when you are giving in joy
and gratitude. It FEELS GREAT!
details
Everything looks bigger with a magnifying glass. So when things look
too small, why not take aout a magnifying glass?
This advice might seem obvious for reading the instructions on a
bottle of medication, but what about taking out one’s proverbial
magnifying glass when one’s world feels too small or one’s circle
of friends seems to small or somehow one’s luck seems too small.
Instead of focusing on the quantity, focus on the details.
This is my room, and it really is a marvelous place.
I have just two friends, but look what good friends they are.
Not much good seems to be coming my way of late, but look at these
two things that did happen. Wow! Those were great.
With a magnifying glass, everything seems bigger because we can see
all the beautiful details in their splendid glory.
yellow
I am not saying yellow is my favorite color, but it is the official
color of happiness. That’s because somewhere along the line we
adopted yellow as the color of those smiley faces that symbolize
happiness.
Yellow is also the color of the sun, bringing brightness and joy into
our world. It is a warm color and rooms painted in yellow are
generally happy rooms. And yellow clothes seem to bring out a certain
joy and energy in people.
Yellow is the color we most often use to highlight the good parts of
a document, the parts we want to review again.
Let’s hear it for yellow, a truly happy color.
sometimes…
July 19, 2008Sometimes you will only see what’s wrong in your life when someone better comes along to make you realize what you’ve been missing…
eyes… heart…
You can close your eyes from the things you don’t want to see…
But you can never close your heart from the things you don’t want to feel…
giving up… letting go…
When giving up becomes less painful than holding on,
Then, that’s the time to let go…
Jealousy
July 7, 2008Whoever said the cause of jealousy made any sense? After all, it’s got green eyes…. it’s awful…. it can be hurtful….
Certainly not the people who live in mansions, drive nice cars, and have people called “Wallingsworth” working for them.
Certainly not the people who are physically fit without lifting a weight, eat anything they want, and never age a day.
And the list goes on….
Whoever said life was fair? Look back at that whole Cain and Abel incident in the Bible. Talk about taking the issue to extremes….. What was the real cause of jealousy in Cain?
Webster defines jealousy as: intolerant of rivalry or unfaithfulness, disposed to suspect rivalry or unfaithfulness, hostile toward a rival or one believed to enjoy an advantage, vigilant in guarding a possession. Does that describe at least half the world or what??
So……how does your thinking get so messed up? How does this negative, destructive stuff get started?
It starts when:
- You determine your self worth based on your possessions, status, or looks.
- You feel “entitled” because of something that’s happened to you somewhere along the way.
- You have feelings of insecurity or low self esteem.
Here is a FREE self esteem test that will show you if your jealousy issues are tangled up in your self esteem.
The bottom line? You want the best of the best and you want someone else to give it to you. Oh, and by the way, you don’t want to feel any discomfort, inconvenience, or pain to get it.
But there is some good news! Once you recognize what’s happening, there’s hope. You can’t completely eliminate the cause of jealousy, but there are some things that can help control it.
And the Answer Is…………
1. Stop comparing yourself to everyone else. God’s plan for you is completely different than His plan for someone else. You may be “in training” for something God has in mind for you. But as long as you waste your time comparing yourself to others, you’ll never move forward.
2. Know that where you are is where you need to be. As long as you remain focused and upset about where you’re not, God won’t put you anywhere else.
3. Start focusing your time on what you can do for other people. When the revelation finally hits you……..”it’s not about me”, you’ll finally be released from all that negative junk that pulls you down. Spend your time being a blessing to other people and God will take care of everything else.
4. Overcoming jealousy gets much easier when you realize that God has an amazing plan for your life. Pursuing that plan takes your focus off other people and onto God’s best for your life.
5. Take the time to learn. See how others have not only discovered the cause of jealousy in their lives, but have overcome it. There is no reason to have to learn everything on your own. There’s alot of help out there.
why?
June 30, 2008You eased the pain when I faked the wound. You calmed me down when I faked the mood. You were instantly there when I faked the call. But why didn’t you catch me? I didn’t fake the fall…
love…magic…illusion
June 29, 2008“When your feelings get strong for someone, it’s always wise to stop for a while and give your heart a time to breathe.. a time to use your mind, to weigh the situation based on reason, not on emotion.. because the saddest thing that can happen is when someone falls in love while the other wants nothing more than friendship..
Love can sometimes be magic, but magic can sometimes be just an illusion…”
only choice
Somewhere between heartaches and waiting,
comes another chance to be found by someone
who can show you that,
you don’t deserve to be just an OPTION,
but..
THE ONLY CHOICE…
