He died yesterday at 81. I grew up watching sketches like this on the Carol Burnett show, and I think he and Tim Conway were my first comedic influences. Next to my Dad, of course ;-)

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Most of you know that I'm a huge fan of www.snopes.com. Whenever you send me one of those chain e-mails about Christian TV being taken off the air or some other nonsense, I'm the one who replies to all sending you to the Snopes link showing you that it's bogus.

That's what makes this so painful.

A few weeks ago, Lynn put her name and resume into the Nanny Network, hoping to do some childcare for a local family. She got a few good leads, including one from a local businessman who traveled alot, and needed someone to collect his mail, pay his bills, etc. while he was away. He offered Lynn $400 a month to do this, and he sent a cheque for $2500 drawn on our local BMO. Lynn deposited the cheque, took her $400 as agreed, and set up a PO Box for him. A few days later he had her wire a "supplier" in France $1900 through Western Union. A few days after that we received notice that the $2500 cheque had bounced. We've been scammed. We're out $1900 (which we could not afford to lose) and we have no way to find this guy. Almost like he planned it that way.

So we went to the bank (ours and BMO), and they have their fraud people on it. Also reported it to the local police as we have some indication that he may be local. When I went to Snopes, like I should have done in the first place, I found the very similar "reshipper scam". They prey on people that want to work from home to earn a little extra money, the very people, like us, who can ill afford to lose any extra cash. That was a rent payment and a car payment for us.

I tell you this just so you can be wary. If they can scam me, they can scam you too!

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My friend Yossi and I are aggressively marketing our unique real estate video tours with our new website www.realestatevideopro.com. Stop by and check it out, and if you're a real etsate professional, or know one, we'd be glad to meet and explain how real estate can help you sell your property!

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She would argue that she's in her 13th year, and I guess she'd be right, but we're trying not to rush her to that milestone. We're really proud of Shaniah - it's not easy to make the changes she's had to make this year with the move back to Canada, and she's done really well. We had a lot of fun a few weeks ago when we went on the ultimate Daddy Date to the Dominican Republic for ten days. Other than losing her camera, and getting an emergency haircut (long story) it was an awesome time of filming and visiting friends.

Happy Birthday Shaniah ;-) I love you!

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Nowhere too exotic this time, depending on how you view rural Ohio. I'll be leaving this afternoon for Tallmadge to spend another week filming at www.wardjet.com. I'm really enjoying the time I spend there... a fascinating product and a great organization.

Shaniah has her 12th Birthday party today, beginning at the pool at the Y and then coming home for more festivities. Her email address is shaniah.mullins@gmail.com if you want to send her some birthday love ;-).

We just published our Spring '08 newsletter too, so if you'd like a copy let me know!

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Well this could be interesting. Since I spend so much time on Facebook, it makes sense to be able to update my blog from there, right. Will see how it goes!

As for today, I'm getting ready for the Fellowship Regional Conference in Cambridge on Thursday and Friday, where I'll have a display set up for Virtual Visitor. So that means finishing my display, creating a Keynote show, and designing a small flyer to hand out. Virtual Visitor was originally designed exclusively for churches, but other organizations are using it to bring outsiders in, and to "open a window to their world", as our slogan goes.

Maddy's fever is back up again today, not as high as it was, but high enough to warrant a trip to the doctor this morning.

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This was a song and video I presented at our church when I got back from Ecuador in February. It tells some of the story of the five missionaries who were martyred in 1956, and the wonderful new life their deaths brought to the Auca. (Sorry for the sound quality... that's "live" for you!)

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