Just made donation to Houston Area Respite Care (www.harc-hou.org), hope you'll consider too

Houston Chronicle: Trying to Save a Godsend, 2010-Apr-26, by Jennifer Radcliffe:

But with donations down in this tough economy, the Houston Area Respite Center is in danger of closing its doors. It doesn't have the $90,000 a year it needs to operate the parents'-night-out program or its social club for adults with special needs. A combined 1,033 people used the programs last year, up from about 300 in 2007. ...

Parents stretched thin by the demands of everyday life with special-needs children between the ages of 3 and 23 get a four-hour break to run errands, enjoy a dinner out or catch a movie.“This place is a godsend,” Richard said.

Just finished sending alumni newsletter in waves, avoided throttling, but also learned more

This is a fragment of a screen shot from my email software, PoliteMail. Although the company allows the option of using their mail servers, that has led to higher undeliverable messages for me. The regular email server for the account (a free Windows Live account) lets me send about 200 indentical messages a day, and by breaking the newsletter emailing into waves, I find that I'm better able to handle the information flow and notice how it's going. For a small database like ours (less than 1000 but shortly to double in size), this method allows me to give personal attention to any problem. 

An email bounce is a member with whom we've lost the connection. If I see a formally active member whose email starts bouncing, I often have a phone number and I can get an updated email address from them.

Have so many fun projects to work on... Weekend seems to evaporate...

I'll have my weekend vicariously by looking at some cool photos. Drew and Didi live in San Antonio, but they took this cool picture in downtown Houston, apparently at trials for a bike race.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/morganti/4546981985/ 

Today is a day for exploring. Looking for the best place to meet in Houston.

This view of Houston on the horizon was taken by Jason McElweenie, http://www.canerican.com/ 

http://www.flickr.com/photos/deneyterrio/255727575/ 

Want to run uphill in Houston? Runner's World now has RouteFinder

I'm not a runner, so maybe this is old hat, but I hit the page, they detected a Houston IP, loaded a list of runs, and when I clicked on one, I could see the elevation changes I'd face. From this angle, Houston does look hilly. Now THAT's a service magazine.

Discovered via Mediapost's 2010-Apr-21 Out to Launch newsletter by Amy Corr

Tyler Thompson visited Houston and we got these beautiful HDR images

Every morning I search Flickr for Creative Commons licensed photos just uploaded with a tag of Houston. It's a great way to get a new perspective on my home city.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/82036561@N00/4541513091/

Building content to be distributed by free services

A friend who 'bootstraps' the marketing of his events is always asking me about free listings and publicity opportunities. Sometimes I'm a little stumped, but Harry Gold's article brings up a good list of sites that will distribute your content for free IF it's set up properly. For instance, you have to make a presentation to post at www.SlideShare.com. Do you have to time to present your story in a few slides and post it there? Can you make it compelling? It's a trade-off between the time on your hands and the money in your pocket.

The sites suggested make a good checklist. Not all will always apply, but it's easy to forget one without a checklist.

1. Your web site
2. Facebook
3. Twitter
4. YouTube
5. SlideShare
6. Docstoc
7. Flickr
8. Your blog
9. Event calendars
10. Article marketing
11. House email
12. Employee email
13. Bonus: Don't forget basic SEO opportunities

ClickZ: Include Free Media in Your Online Media Plan, 2010-Apr-13, by Harry Gold