I picked up my cell and had 6 missed calls and the red flags went up. The first text I saw was from my sister “Call dad *ASAP*”. Alarms were going off in my head. Then a text from my dad: We’ll be heading your way in the morning. Please call me.

They live 5 hours away. Why were they coming here? What was wrong?

With shaky hands I called my dad, still in bed, but now wide awake. I started hoping my husband would come in the room so he could be there with me, but I didn’t have the voice to call him.

My father was telling me that my uncle, his brother, had been in a motorcycle accident the night before.

He was dead.

God, no! Of my father’s 11 brothers and sisters, his was the only number I had in my cell. Because I didn’t need any of the others. He checked up on my family constantly. He visited all the time. He brought us tomatoes from his vines and in the summer we had a cookout and swam in his pool.

This was not happening.

But the chain of events were taking place and as much as I didn’t want them to occur, they already had.

My husband was in shock. The kids haven’t quite grasped it yet.

A couple of cool things to note about my uncle:
- He was a veteran of the first Gulf War. With that, he’s receiving a full military sendoff tomorrow at the Tennessee Veteran’s Cemetary. His funeral is also today, Veteran’s Day.

- My uncle was an avid motorcyclist and member of The Defenders, a local motorcycle club comprised of former military and police enthusiasts. After his burial tomorrow, The Defenders will ride to his accident site, be joined by several other motorcycle clubs from surrounding states, and they will finish his ride. That’s the most awesome thing I’ve ever heard.

(As an aside, his club members have been holding a vigil at his house since his death. They’ve chopped enough firewood that his widow, my aunt, won’t have to worry about it for the full winter. They’ve cleaned her carpets, brought food, and made sure she’s wanted for absolutely nothing. It’s truly been awesome to see, in every sense of the word.)

- He was also an avid hunter, and had land across the street from my house. He’d come over in the early mornings after he got off work and sit in a tree stand, watching for deer. We never saw any. The day after we learned of his death, my husband saw a buck and two doe. It was his way of letting us know he’s alright.

Your prayers and thoughts are so appreciated. He was a great friend, uncle, and veteran and his loss has had a great impact on my family. We miss him so much.

Rest in peace, Uncle Raymond. We love you.

Just because.

My question (and his subsequent answer) may surprise you!

RDY: Here’s one I’ve been “marinating” on for quite a while now…

In one of your products, you mention that you can never be happy WITH money if you can’t be happy without it.

I’ve been dirt poor and lived in my car…and I’ve been successful. When I was living in my car, I wasn’t happy. Money is what allowed me to pay for food, clothing, shelter (that wasn’t a rest stop on the interstate), etc.

Money was what allowed me to provide for my 3 kids. Buy them toothpaste, a hair brush, and daily vitamins.

I don’t remember a time that I was happy without money.

How is it possible to be happy without money? I ask, mind you, not because I don’t BELIEVE its possible, but am curious to know HOW.

Looking forward to your response!
Rachel

MF: Great question. There are many people who are happy living in poverty. There are many who are miserable. Same is easily said about those who have money. Many are miserable even though they have all the material riches they ever wanted. Others are happy and they have money. This indicates that there must be another factor other than money or the lack of it that allows for happiness and peace of mind.

RDY: I just think back to that time when I slept with one eye open at rest stops along the interstate, worrying that the repo man would find me and take my car/temporary house and I can’t imagine being “happy” with that situation. Maybe happi-ER than if I was sick and all alone, but certainly not content with the direction I’d taken my life in!

I can’t imagine being happy living in poverty. Taking my kids to the movies in the middle of the day “just because we want to” is waaaay more fun.

Thanks for the answer, Matt!

MF: And that’s why you’re no longer there. You can’t imagine it anymore – nor can you imagine being happy then. And theirin lies an answer. Those who can imagine themselves happy while poor – are. Those who can’t aren’t. Yet once the journey out of poverty begins in your imagination, so does happiness. Regardless of whether you are rich or poor, you cannot be happy unless you can imagine it first. There are plenty of miserable people who are in far better financial circumstances than you or I. There kids are drug addicted. There’s no peace in the home. If you think you must have money to be happy, then you have no power over your emotional state in the absense of it.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20091025/us_nm/us_usa_housing_detroit

Check out what’s going on in Detroit!

There’s one thing to think about, though…even if you bought it for $500…you still gotta sell or rent it to make money. Always remember your exit strategy before you buy a property!

I’ve got some VERY successful investor friends in Detroit who are making money hand over fist while the rest of the country is scratching their head trying to figure out what to do with the economy. It CAN be done, people!

Wanna learn more and live in the Detroit area? Check out:
http://www.REIAofMacomb.com (That’s Dylan and Nathan)
http://www.wholesaleMI.com (That’s Jeremy and Jared)
http://iraconcierge.com (That’s Paul)

I’d trust any of these guys to run a real estate investing business FOR me, they’re that good.

Look em up and tell em Rachel sentcha!

So instead of going on my own rant, I decided to link to HIS rant today (and a comment at the end by yours truly).

Enjoy!

http://larrywinget.net/blog/?p=244

Why’d I write this one instead of the videos I’d been doing? Quite frankly, I didn’t want you to hear me yelling, cuz that’s what I’d have been doing. Why? WHY?

So, ok, wait…I just want to clarify…

Some guy that no one cares about got up on stage during an awards show that no one cares about to take the microphone from some girl that no one cares about to ramble on about something that no one cares about.

But apparently people do care because its all over the friggin’ news AND EVEN OUR PRESIDENT feels the need to comment on it!?!?!?

So now everyone’s up in arms about something that happened two nights ago – WHO CARES? “Ooh, I can’t believe Obama called him a jackass!” and “OMG – can you believe what a jerk he was?” or “Beyonce sure was swell to let her continue her acceptance speech!”

Are we really using what happens at a show that quite honestly the networks create in order to get us to plug in and shut up about things that actually MATTER in our daily lives – and passing it off as “News”? Seriously?

You draw breath right here, right now. Not two days ago. Not last night. But, in the present. Right now. Move past some idiot with less self-control than Carney Wilson in the Golden Corral dessert line! (Oh yeah, I went there).

You wonder why you don’t get anything done in a day. What are you concentrating on? Crap in the news?

You wonder why your business isn’t growing. Are you actively marketing it or sitting around with your thumb up your butt wondering who’s gonna win America’s Got Talent (incidentally, that show appears to be an hour long version of “Stupid Human Tricks” that use to appear on David Letterman).

You can’t figure out why you aren’t making more money and blame the recession. It’s not any “recession” – it’s you! Being lazy! Flipping through the channels on the idiot box instead of working on how to get more customers!

HONESTLY!

Wanna know why I can finish my business day by lunch? Because I’ve spent almost 9 years BUSTING MY ASS to do so!
Why can I choose to not take incoming calls? Because I’ve spent 9 years putting petty, trivial sh*t to the back burner to do what my business requires of me.

Did the world stop turning when Kanye grabbed the mic? NO.
Did you lose precious minutes to tweet about it when you could have been doing something more productive? Probably.
Are you allowing time vampires and bandits to steal the hours in your day by clogging your mind with nonsense? Yes.

It’s time to take back your day and actually GET SOME WORK DONE! Stop surfing the internet, shut down all the windows except the ones that are required to get work done (and that’s not email – justify it however you want but your life doesn’t end if you don’t check it every 5 minutes).

And when you’re ready to get serious about making money with your business instead of the hobby its become, when you’re ready to take some of the bs off your plate – lemme know.  You concentrate on running the biz and I’ll concentrate on making you money by creating your marketing material. Deal?

Taken from Forbes.com

Business Name: Fairy Tales Hair Care
Business Location: Passaic, N.J.
Entrepreneur: Risa Barash, 43
Product/Service: Head-lice prevention shampoos and conditioners
Start Date: 1999
Start-up Costs: $1,000
Revenue in 2008: $6 million

Business ideas come from anyone, anywhere, anytime. In 1999, Risa Barash, a 33-year-old stand-up comic, heard from her then-fiancé’s cousin (got that?) about a rash of head lice cases at his Hewlett, N.Y.-based children’s salon. After doing some research (including a lot of chatting with relatives in Israel, where head lice was a big problem), Barash hit upon an organic preventative shampoo, as opposed to chemical-based products applied only after the louse has taken up residence. Her big break came one morning while watching The Rosie O’Donnell Show — Rosie was lamenting her own children’s lice outbreak. Barash wrote a letter (in the voice of a fellow well-known comic), walked over to the NBC studio and told the security guard she was delivering some hair products for O’Donnell’s kids. The next day, Fairy Tales Hair Care’s Rosemary Repel Shampoo was the talk of the show.