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By no means go hiking without a camping tent – I learned that the almost-hard way. I say “almost” because considering that I’m not just alive to tell the story but suffered no injuries, either, it probably wasn’t as difficult as it could have been had I not been so lucky.

I and my buddies did not have a camping tent between us since it was just supposed to have been an simple day-hike over (and up) easy terrain. A thousand-foot mountain affords nice enough views, to be sure, such that the curvature of the earth could be faintly seen, but it isn’t considered a big deal by any who hike or climb real mountains.

So, obviously, we didn’t bring a camping tent. And sure enough we get lost, and with only another two hours of daylight left most of us decide to backtrack downhill – except for myself and another companion. And although we do eventually summit, as novices we make the mistake of mistiming our descent, such that it is already twilight by the time we choose to head back.

You see, being so inexperienced we mistook the fact that there was still light in the sky for having enough time to get back down. But of course we were at the summit, where we had a great view of our surroundings – this was Mount Buck, the highest point in the whole Lake George area of New York.

And though the sun was low on the horizon it seemed wonderfully bright all around. Golds mixed with blues turned pink and white – it was a swirl of colors matching the happy dance of emotions within that we’ve finally reached the top.

Lost in our reveries, we did not realize that not only does the sun set in seconds, but that in a forest the canopy of foliage will make even mid-afternoon seem much, much later to the human eye….

It is tough getting educational toys because, well, how would you really measure whether something is educational, especially when it involves very young children even toddlers? In fact, many child psychologists believe that just about anything is “educational” for a child, particularly at really young ages when almost by definition anything they come into contact with teaches them something about the world, about which they know practically nothing!

When you do not know a lot to begin with, everything is educational, isn’t it? And so the world is full of educational toys as a result, as any object can be played with and, in the very playing with, help to develop the motor skills and cognitive abilities which toymakers claim their products foster in a child.

And yet clearly there are toys that do seem to somehow provide a lot more than entertainment value, for instance programmable robot kits. So perhaps a better way to think about educational toys is to not regard them as being absolutely educational or not, in which case it’s arguable that a plaything could be made of nearly anything and that play itself is an inherently educational activity.

The confusion, as ever (according to most semanticists, anyway), concerns semantics, or meaning. If we mean by the term not merely something that can be played with such that skillsets of some kind are fostered, but instead those toys which are clearly a lot more capable of fostering a skillset, particularly one that is not readily developed otherwise, then shopping becomes substantially easier!

Thus, it will turn out that puzzles like a Rubik’s Cube are extremely educational while alphabet blocks are much less so. And as parents, we want to encourage our kids to not only explore but push their intellectual envelope, so while good old-fashioned dolls and the like may stimulate the imagination, a lot more ingenious toys can also stimulate such higher-order faculties as pattern recognition and problem solving.

Taxes and all of those forms… Let us face it, tax forms can very often be complicated. There are several questions many people ask when they get or need to send out tax forms. One of the more talked about questions is, if you get a W9 form request, just what should you do with it?

Well if you get a W9 request then according to the Internal Revenue Service you need to respond to it, assuming that that person asking for it is responsible to give you a 1099 form (this is an information return). If they are not required to give you a 1099 form (information return), well that would be a entirely different story.

So what happens if you will not respond to the W9 form request?

If you don’t respond to the tax form W9 request you will be subject to a fifty dollar penalty in addition to future backup withholding. Backup withholding? you might probably ask, well if select not to give the info needed to a required filer of an 1099 Form (information return, not to be confused with a 1040 form) they are required to withhold up to 28% which is remitted to the government.

One way of making money on the web is to find explosive niches to blog about, wildly popular topics that individuals go on the internet to research and read. For example, you can start a web site devoted to a successful Television shows with a big audience. This ensures interest in your web site, which is the first step in making money online: providing something that folks find valuable.

This is what it means to find explosive niches to blog; you want to offer a forum where people enthusiastic about a certain topic can gather and exchange views. In order to make money, the topic has to be “explosive” but “niche” – popular but not so popular where you’re likely to be a Johnny-come-lately to the proceedings.

The trick is to find that delicate balance where the territory is still fresh enough, so to speak, so that you can claim your own stake, and territory that isn’t so out of the way such that very few people will be interested in dropping by (your web site).

That’s how you can blog residual cash to your business, generating money even while you sleep because the whole thing is computerized and automated! The idea is that you have what’s known as a turn-key system set up that will basically run on its own without needing your constant supervision.

So to continue with our Tv show example from above, you would create a web site devoted to that Tv show, with gossip, news, and reviews on the stars, episodes, and plotlines – anything that would be of interest to a fan of that show. This show has to be popular enough to assure you of numbers (very important as any salesman will tell you: only 1-3% of “eyeballs” actually “convert” into real sales – money in your pocket), but not so popular such that other people already have web sites up (which you will be hard-pressed to steal readers from!).

New York is one tough town. And it prides itself on its cut-throat lifestyle, even as the number of charities blossom as nowhere else. The serial success story that is Zalman Silber is an example of the businessman-turned-philanthropist. But isn’t it ironic that a place which worships material success gained by one’s teeth and nails, as it were, should find itself so concerned about appearing charitable, too? As if the rich are secretly embarrassed by their fortunes – as if Balzac was right, that “behind every great fortune lies a great crime,” or as if Jesus was correct, that “it is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle….”

As if, to be frank about it, the rich give in order to assuage their guilt.

What is it about this world that should so often find the elevated so close to the base? One can observe dichotomies existing side-by-side, many times in peace and, even, complete ignorance of one another, even in New York, even in the 21st Century.

And one wonders if such philanthropy, targeted towards one’s own community, set up to benefit one’s own interests, are perfectly true acts of charity or just another way in which the ego manages to further inflate itself.

Such concerns, of course, likely do not concern those like Zalman Silber, who give freely as they please and couldn’t care less about such quibbles. Indeed, it is safe to say that for those who do have the funds to give, giving is a pleasure in itself – akin to any other form of spending money.

Now that’s not as cynical as it may sound at first. For spending money is a form of experiencing one’s own power, one’s own ability to produce satisfaction and pleasure. It may well lead to egotism, and it often does, to be sure – but at its root is a simple human joy at being able to affect one’s surroundings, one’s world. It is the same joy that accompanies a child who can crawl, then walk, then run, then ride a bicycle, then drive a car, then pilot a boat or helicopter or airplane. The proper spending of money can be life-enhancing in a very deep way, far more so than the mere accumulation of creature comforts. The proper spending of money – as in charitable donations – allows one to give of oneself, in a sense, a very important sense. For money is power, and in cases of honest work to give money is to have given of one’s time and one’s very life – the time spent earning the money, the life devoted to productive work.

And such is, as the humanist Erich Fromm had noted in his many works on human psychology and human society, the most demeaning aspect of poverty, that one cannot give of oneself. For it is not he who has much, but he who gives much, that is rich – and yet, to give requires one to first have! And it is the tragedy of the poor that they can scarcely provide for themselves, never mind share with others – though, strangely enough, survey after survey has determined that the less money one has, the greater a percentage of one’s income tends to be given away in charity. It is as if the poor know something which escapes the rich. It is as if the New York of lights and smiles is unaware of something so basic that it can only be known to those whose lives involve the basics and no luxuries.