The end of the semester has passed...

...for those of you who have me bookmarked, feel free to visit as much as you like!

Best Buy has a 10% off coupon good from December 26, 2006 to December 30, 2006. If you received a Best Buy gift card for any recent holiday, this would be a great thing to combine with it! This is valid for in store only. Print it from the link below and bring it with you.

Printable Best Buy coupon

Acronym Finder

I've always hated seeing people use acronyms that I don't understand. For example, someone might send you an email saying "Do you know when this is, TIA!" and you may be left wondering, what does TIA mean?

For cases like this, I use the site acronymfinder.com. You can put in just about anything and get an answer!

For example, TIA means Thanks In Advance.

I always had a professor talking about "WYSIWYG" and I had to look that one up.

It's an interesting site, to say the least, and much more specialized than just "Googling" something.

Dumpster Diving strikes Major League Baseball

In just about every one of my courses, I've spoken about things like identity theft, and the importance of things like shredders. Here's a case where a multi-million dollar agency just threw out personal information of over 90 professional baseball players, including superstars Moises Alou (now on the New York Mets) and Jim Thome (of the Chicago White Sox).

Evidence found in Dright's home included Social Security numbers, dates of birth, canceled paychecks, obituaries and infant death records.

This is the sort of stuff that needs to be shredded, because there are people who will find it if you don't. Case in point!

Bookstore Buyback...

From the bookstore....

BUYBACK IS NOW IN SESSION!!

PLEASE GIVE US A HAND GETTING THE WORD OUT.

THE BOOKSTORE WILL PAY STUDENTS 50% OF THE NEW PRICE OF ANY TEXTS THAT WE NEED FOR THE SPRING SEMESTER

IF WE DO NOT NEED THE BOOK FOR THE SPRING, WE WILL PASS ON WHATEVER OUR WHOLESALER IS PAYING

VALID THROUGH 12/22

Of course I would recommend waiting until you take your exam to sell the books back, but 50% is not all that bad of a price.

School Stuff: Bursar's Office Open this Saturday (12/16)

Just an FYI from the Bursar's Office (aka: the people who receive your money)

The Bursar’s office will be open this Saturday December 16, 2006 from 8:30am to 12noon. We are encouraging students to pay their Spring 2007 semester bill, by either paying with Financial Aid, entering into a payment plan with a $50.00 deposit or paying their bill in full.

Blog Update

I added the ability to search (THANK YOU GOOGLE!!) my blog quickly and easily for past topics. Enter a search term and over on the right hand side and click on "Search".

Math Review

The math department is putting on free review sessions for MA 004, MA 006, and MA 007. If you're getting ready for the finals, this would help you prepare.

Review Session MA 004
Friday December 15 (3 pm - 5 pm)
Room A208B (Paterson Campus)

Review Session MA 006 & 007
Saturday December 16 (9 am - 11 am)
Room W105 (Wanaque Campus)

Attention NetFlix Users

Blockbuster is doing one of the more interesting promotions that I've seen.

If you use the Netflix, you can bring in your shipping label (the part you usually throw out) and get a free rental from Blockbuster.

Obviously, they are trying to get you in store and interested in the Blockbuster service, but I did personally get a few free movies today.

If you use Netflix, this is going on until December 21st.

http://biz.yahoo.com/prnews/061205/datu010.html?.v=83

Long Term Study: No Link Between Cell Phones and Cancer

So, apparently all the fear some people had about cell phones causing cancer is not a problem. There was a long term study done that seems to show no correlation!

News Link

Selling Stuff on Ebay

I was speaking with one of my students about selling stuff on Ebay. With a little effort and some things she's picked up in her Web site design courses, the hardest part of auctioning things is writing good descriptions.

One PCCC Student's Inventory on Ebay

Free Address Labels

We all know I like free stuff. Here's something that came up in my morning CIS 101 course today.

We were discussing printers and address labels came up, and there are a few sites that offer free address labels (return labels for your mailings).

Rather than pay for them, there are some places that will provide them free.

These are places that will give them out for free:
Maker's Mark (an adult beverage company)

These are charitable organizations that would love a donation, but don't require them for the free address labels.
American Diabetes Association

National Foundation for Cancer Research