Thursday, April 21, 2011

How to increase sales?

It has been a while since the maintaining mentality crept in. Since all the profits are just enough to support the family, there's nothing much to spend on the business. So, the best thing to do for the business is to maintain and hoping that the customers would be happy with what we have to offer.

If there's extra profit to spend on the business, there are many things I want to change. The signboard is in desperate need of change. That would cost about $2K. Another unit of air-conditioner could keep all the customers cool and cozy wherever they are seated. And of course the floor can be upgraded. Many thoughts came to mind. I've seen the trade show flooring and the trade show carpet. I'm still trying to figure out which is the best upgrade for the floor. Cost and durability are two main factors to be considered. Maybe a few of my company logo mats to greet the customers would create a nice atmosphere. I was thinking of using logo canopy outside my shop but that would not be appropriate for the time being.

Praying that once God bless me with more profits, all the above changes can be done. Then, once the place is more elegant and conducive for the customers, they would come again and again and my sales would increase and increase.

Saturday, April 09, 2011

Am I Kicking Out My Tenant Again

From the day I started renting my apartments until today, I have not get any tenants that do not give me any problem or any that stay through the contract period. Either they leave earlier or I kick them out.

At present, both my tenants have been late in paying the rentals. One of them can't even pay the full amount of the electricity bills till I have to cut the supply. I have been giving in to them for the past 2-3 months. One of my tenant's father even called me to tell me to stop harassing his daughter for rent! I smsed once to asked for payment. The tenant gave a date. On that particular date, I did not received the promised payment so I called. Right after that phone call, the father of the tenant called me. I doubt he understands the meaning of "harassing". If my wife were to talk to him, I'm sure she will kick his daughter out from the apartment that instance.

This month will be their last chance. If they are late again next month, I'll tell them to look for other apartment. Then I will have to go through the hassle again to look for furniture cleaning tips, floor tile cleaning machine austin and best home carpet cleaners austin to make the apartment clean again before I put it up again for rent.

I am really praying hard that we will get a good tenant next.

Thursday, April 07, 2011

It is not fair at all

Recently, there was a story of a house owner who was slapped with a fine of $3K by the electric company for stealing electricity. Unfortunately for him, he does not do it. It is his tenant who did it. His tenant is an employee of the electric company so he knows the dirty trick to steal electricity. The owner who had to pay the outstanding electricity bill of $5K when the tenant left the house had to fork out another $16K to repair the house before he can rent it out again. He thought that his ordeal is over until he received the fine for something that he does not do. It is just not fair at all.

I too have been cheated by my tenants before. I had to pay $2.5K for the outstanding electricity bill. It is just not fair. In situations like these, I wished that I have good Compensation Lawyers that can fight for my case. Why should I have to come out my hard earn money to pay for other people's usage? Or in the case of the house owner, why should he pay the fine when the electric company failed to take action after numerous reports being made by the house owner.It is not fair at all.

Monday, April 04, 2011

Protecting our children

I read with a shock about the latest tragedy on a seven year old boy in Arau, Perlis. He was tied up with a rope and repeatedly assaulted by the school teacher. He died two days later in the hospital. What on earth is happening to the school system in this country? Disciplining a child is a must but it must never cross the boundary of abuse. We hear of cases of kidnapping, molestation, rape and various kinds of abuses on our children reported in the paper almost daily. The world is getting worst everyday.

We need to protect our children from evil people. Yet, we also need to protect our children from our own ignorance. Many times, our children would suffer from our lack of knowledge about the danger or side effects of the medicine we give them. One good example is Topamax. While it is generally prescribed by the doctors to prevent migraine headaches to both children and adult, it can also cause cleft lip or cleft palate – birth defects that occur when the lip or palate fail to completely fuse together. It is our responsibility as parents to ensure that we are being informed thoroughly of any kind of medicine the doctor wants to prescribed to us and to our children. Most of the medicines would have side effects.

If any of your children are suffering because of such negligence by the doctors, one option is to go for Topamax lawsuit. Check out O’Hanlon, McCollom & Demerath – Personal Injury Lawyers – 808 West Avenue, Austin, TX. 78701 – 512-494-9949 or any other lawyers that you know can help.

The world is no longer safe for our children. We as parents must take up our responsibilities to ensure their safety, directly or indirectly.

Sunday, April 03, 2011

A big batch of chicken salad

Guest post written by Betty Slagle

I have a really big lunch that the women in missions at church is hosting for members after church on Sunday morning. That means that I need to take at least one dish with me to it, so I've been going through some of my cookbooks looking for stuff. But when it comes to those lunches, anything that's supposed to be hot kind of gets lukewarm by the time that people actually eat it.

So I thought that for once I would actually fix something that keeps cold instead. I went online to figure something out to fix and when I was doing that I came across some info about satellite internet packages and after I read a little more info I decided to sign up for one of them for my home service.

I decided to make a big batch of homemade chicken salad to keep in the fridge during teh church service and a platter of different kinds of bread and crackers so that people can get stuff to put their chicken salad on.

Friday, April 01, 2011

Back to the old days - the slingshots

When I was still young, I used to play with slingshot. We don't have the money to buy the ready made slingshot so we make our own slingshot. That was fun. The best branch that is suitable for the slingshot frame is the guava tree branches. We can always find a "Y" shape branches that can be used for the slingshot frame. We then would go and find unused bicycle tire tube and cut it into long strips to be used as the band. As for the holder of the stone, we would find any suitable leather (mostly from old worn out or torn shoes). It was fun making our own slingshots, something that we can be proud of and treasure so much.

We would then practice shooting with our slingshots. I pitied the chickens, buffalo, squirrels, dogs and also the trees that became our target practice. We would play till late evening and get hands dirtied picking up the stones from the ground as our ammunition. I don't remember our parents being hysterical when they see us dirty. We can just go to the well and give ourselves a good body cleansing scrubs. Our scrub set is not the modern type of scrubs as most of it are from nature or whatever that we can use to scrub our body. Now, you can find medical nursing scrubs that are sold in the pharmacies or even online.

Now that I have my own children and they are big enough to use a slingshot, I decided I would make our own slingshots. Thank God that there are still a few guava trees at the back of our house compound. Instead of using unused tire tube for the band, I decided to just use the rubber band. Managed to find an old shoe and cut off the leather for our slingshot stone holder.

The first slingshot are ready made slingshot bought from the shop. The other three slingshots are made by yours truly for the children to play.
Okay, now it is time to use the slingshots to shoot at the stray dogs hanging around the house. Adios.