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In Honor of U.S. Soccer…

So I realize I am a complete dork, but I love soccer and the U.S. really showed something this past week.  Clint Dempsey was highly impressive as well as Tim Howard, so I decide to spread the word on the music video Clint had put together several years ago.  Enjoy!

Loaning Money to Family…

So let’s say I have a family member who called and asked for a little money.  Now let’s say that family member called back and asked for a little more money.  Ok, now let’s say said family member has a track record of not wanting to work and not paying their other bills or loans.  Would you want to lend them money?  Didn’t think so. 

Here’s the problem.  Lending money to family and friends should always be done with a contract and in my opinion should only be done if you can afford to never see that money again.  I say this because family and friends are the first people to not honor their commitment with a loan.  Now this isn’t always true, but I wouldn’t take any chances. 

I realize that it is extremely hard upfront to say no, but what happens when you loan money out and then you hear nothing but excuses when it is time to pay it back?  I would rather it be tough upfront and keep talking to the family memeber or friend, then end up not talking because of a bad loan arrangement.  This is just my opinion, now I need to go and listen to my own words.

Family Tech Support, Can I Help You?

So you work on a computer in some fashion?  Well that makes you the family tech support, you know that right?  If this isn’t handled correctly, this could get way out of control.  I know from experience.  I have worked as an IT consultant for quite some time now and I have let it get out of control from time to time.

We all want to have our family and friends up to speed on everything and I have even been somewhere and notice something messed up and jumped right in to fix it.  That is something you simply can’t do.  You need to learn your limits.  I cannot fix everything nor do I want to.  If the issue is out of your comfort zone, recommend a place or person that can fix it properly.

Make sure your family and friends know your value and respect your time.  I have a friend who seems to have problems quite often and he lives a pretty good distance from my home.  Most of his problems seem to be fairly easy to fix, so I suggested for him to unplug the tower and bring it out.  I have an extra monitor, mouse, keyboard, and room on my router to hook up to the internet. 

This friend happen to prove to himself how valuable my time is and how good he had it.  He called Best Buy’s Geek Squad and got a minimum price to look at his machine of $200.  That brings up another topic.  There are times that you need to charge.  You can give a discount, but let’s face it.  If they are using the machine for a business or if the problem is extremely time consuming  then you need to invoice them.

Let’s face it, you can’t make everyone happy and they need to realize that.  This is tough since I am in the middle of digging myself out as the family tech support agent.  I would suggest for times when you could log on to their machine and check some things out, install LogMeIn and add them to your account.  This works great for working on my brothers machine in Florida when I am in St. Louis.

WSS & MOSS SP2 is Now Available

Everyone that writes on SharePoint has an article on this, so I thought I would join the mix.  Look I am a geek and this involves my job.  Also check out Joel’s article on SP2, “WSS & MOSS SP2 is Available - 5 No Brainer Reasons to Install“.

Windows SharePoint Services

• Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 Service Pack 2 Changes.xlsx package
• Service Pack 2 ( x 86 ) von Windows SharePoint Services 3.0
  http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyId=79BADA82-C13F-44C1-BDC1-D0447337051B
• Service Pack 2 ( x 64 ) von Windows SharePoint Services 3.0
  http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyId=79BADA82-C13F-44C1-BDC1-D0447337051B
• Service Pack 2 des Language Packs ( x 86 ) von Windows SharePoint Services 3.0
  http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyId=085E5AC8-58F6-4CF9-8012-33B95EE36C0F
• Service Pack 2 des Language Packs ( x 64 ) von Windows SharePoint Services 3.0
  http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyId=2C2B6CAF-B46D-45EB-AC4D-DEAAA48C3A2C

Office SharePoint Server 2007

• 2007 Office Servers Service Pack 2 Changes.xlsx package
• 2007 Server Microsoft Office Service Pack 2 ( x 86 )
  http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyId=B7816D90-5FC6-4347-89B0-A80DEB27A082
• 2007 Server Microsoft Office Service Pack 2 ( x 64 )
  http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyId=B7816D90-5FC6-4347-89B0-A80DEB27A082
• Microsoft Office-Server 2007 Language Pack Service Pack 2 ( x 86 )
  http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyId=01C6A3E8-E110-4956-903A-AD16284BF223
• Microsoft Office-Server 2007 Language Pack Service Pack 2 ( x 64 )
  http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyId=66C5026F-9F47-4642-8378-2526918009FA