• Posted 12/19/2024.
    =====================

    I am still waiting on my developer to finish up on the Classifieds Control Panel so I can use it to encourage members into becoming paying members. Google Adsense has become a real burden on the viewing of this site, but honestly it is the ONLY source of income now that keeps it afloat. I tried offering disabling the ads being viewed by paying members, but apparently that is not enough incentive. Quite frankly, Google Adsense has dropped down to where it barely brings in enough daily to match even a single paid member per day. But it still gets the bills paid. But at what cost?

    So even without the classifieds control panel being complete, I believe I am going to have to disable those Google ads completely and likely disable some options here that have been free since going to the new platform. Like classified ad bumping, member name changes, and anything else I can use to encourage this site to be supported by the members instead of the Google Adsense ads.

    But there is risk involved. I will not pay out of pocket for very long during this last ditch experimental effort. If I find that the membership does not want to support this site with memberships, then I cannot support your being able to post your classified ads here for free. No, I am not intending to start charging for your posting ads here. I will just shut the site down and that will be it. I will be done with FaunaClassifieds. I certainly don't need this, and can live the rest of my life just fine without it. If I see that no one else really wants it to survive neither, then so be it. It goes away and you all can just go elsewhere to advertise your animals and merchandise.

    Not sure when this will take place, and I don't intend to give any further warning concerning the disabling of the Google Adsense. Just as there probably won't be any warning if I decide to close down this site. You will just come here and there will be some sort of message that the site is gone, and you have a nice day.

    I have been trying to make a go of this site for a very long time. And quite frankly, I am just tired of trying. I had hoped that enough people would be willing to help me help you all have a free outlet to offer your stuff for sale. But every year I see less and less people coming to this site, much less supporting it financially. That is fine. I tried. I retired the SerpenCo business about 14 years ago, so retiring out of this business completely is not that big if a step for me, nor will it be especially painful to do. When I was in Thailand, I did not check in here for three weeks. I didn't miss it even a little bit. So if you all want it to remain, it will be in your hands. I really don't care either way.

    =====================
    Some people have indicated that finding the method to contribute is rather difficult. And I have to admit, that it is not all that obvious. So to help, here is a thread to help as a quide. How to become a contributing member of FaunaClassifieds.

    And for the record, I will be shutting down the Google Adsense ads on January 1, 2025.
  • Responding to email notices you receive.
    **************************************************
    In short, DON'T! Email notices are to ONLY alert you of a reply to your private message or your ad on this site. Replying to the email just wastes your time as it goes NOWHERE, and probably pisses off the person you thought you replied to when they think you just ignored them. So instead of complaining to me about your messages not being replied to from this site via email, please READ that email notice that plainly states what you need to do in order to reply to who you are trying to converse with.

The End of Summer...what do YOU think

K

kiote9

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Does anyone else get depressed as the end of summer draws near?

The nights are cooler, the leaves are changing, all the little animals are trying to find lots of food, the deer are more active, the sky seems clearer and darker at night, and I just want to find someone to crawl into bed with and sleep the rest of the year away....... I don't want to see this ending.

I love summer, the heat, the humidity, the beach, the hot sweaty sticky uncomfortable feeling you get on those day when the thunderstorms are building, the lightning flashing across the sky, people wear fewer clothes and seem more open...friendlier, you can go outside just to stop being inside and you don't have to get dressed to do it, wanderlust and the endless call of the night.

Spring is the youth of the year, summer is adulthood in full swing, autumn is the "old age" before the winters "death". Yes, then comes another spring and a rebirth, but the long wait and the cold and lethargy that comes with the declining weather.....I don't know. Maybe if I was a winter person it would be different, but alas I am not. I like the feel of the night air in the summer, caressing my bare skin after a midnight swim, the scents and sounds, the birds and animals, the energy and the life.

Some autumn days are priceless in their beauty and have their own intensity, but the cold and rain and the barrenness that it brings***deep sigh****

How does everyone else feel about the changing seasons?

I know there are many geographic differences (as well as personal differences), so you might not see or feel what I do. I'd like to hear what you have to say.
 
A friend of mine wrote this. I've always sort of liked it and I think it applies here too.

You'd think after all these years, and there are more of them gone by than I care to count anymore, I'd be used to this. The sun not quite being up, that I've grown used to and even like most days. I've always liked the dark and predawn darkness, with just a hint of the shadows lessoning, outlines of the dresser and all the picture frames on top of it, memories sweet and fond in each and everyone, the perfume bottles and a lifetimes worth or knick knacks just starting to gain an outline, all coming back to life with the burgeoning day. Even on a day like this one, where I know the clouds won't be breaking up, the sun won't truly break through them, the rain, a light unceasing patter, will rule this place and time. The girl next to me, funny I still think of her as a girl though she's been a woman for far longer than anyone would guess, she's so beautiful that I still see her as the girl I met so long ago, still sleeping soundly, hand slightly curled on the pillow next to her head, palm up and a couple of stray strands of curly hair wrapped around her fingers, tangled there as I've seen them countless times before. Gently I reach across and unwrap them so she won't pull it and wake herself up, as I have so many times that it has become almost a ritual.

I want to enjoy these first few minutes of the day starting, just the cat and I watching, the black clouds gradually lighten and turn grey, dark and heavy and so close that it looks like they'll get caught up in the branches of the oaks or spear themselves on the pinetrees that dot the hillside just beyond us. A sudden burst of rain hard and fast against the roof like a thousand squirrels chasing a thousand fallen acorns from end to end across our house, ten thousand tiny pitter patters in less than a minute and it's gone, replaced by the more somber cadence of a gentle mother cleaning her child after a day spent playing outside, a swish and hiss and slow brushing of the water on our house, rythmically arythmic, repeating the same sounds but never in the same order. I almost fall back asleep just looking out the big bay window, watching the clouds trudging along, heavy and thick while I'm snug and protected, feeling like a kid myself under the big blue comforter, wrapped around the girl, the woman, the best part of the morning, the best girl in the world, like I am every morning, the luckiest man that ever was, but the rain, as it always has, has captured me, snared me like a fish in a net, fully able to see his captor and totally unable to do ought but proceed as he always has, and so I lay there, watching and listening to the day come back to life once again, the gentle breathing of the girl a soothing counterpoint to the wind which has gentled now, urging genltly instead of hurling madly, the rain up against the window, the drops doing the last dance of their short existances, running, sliding, slipping down the glass in ones and twos and threes, becoming little verticle rivers, branches dividing and joining over and over with neither rhyme nor reason, frantic to become only they know what, before they join with the earth once again, to begin the long wait until, once again, they can become raindrops and become part of the dance, the very rythum, the breath of life itself.

But sleep is not to return, as it often promises to but never does, and neither of us, not sleep nor myself, are surprised or disappointed that our long standing relationship has fulfilled itself one more time. The girl next to me, curls more disarrayed than before, hand now under her cheek, stretches long and luxuriously, straightens out her slender form, still glued to mine as it has been all these many many mornings we've woken side by side, takes a deep breath and without ever opening her eyes snuggles back against me, curling her legs up and wiggling her bottom up against me, pulling my arm back around her waist, its normal resting place, holding both her and the well-worn and faded blue flannel shirt she's used as a nightgown so long, and sighs deep and contented that all is well in her world, knowing full well that I'll be there, watching the raindrops dance and listening to the wind through the branches and boughs outside singing to us here in our wamth and comfort, knowing that there is no where else in the world that I would rather be than right here right now gently curled about the girl, the woman, I've woken next to so many times before and in such blissful happiness that there really could be no other way to begin any day other than this.

The chimes gong in the wind, reminding me of the church bells heard so long ago in childhood, soothing and smooth, deeply sonorus, felt as much as heard and contributing to the feeling of rightness with the world. The sights, the sounds, the gentle breathing of the girl next to me, how could one man be so lucky? It's a question I often ask, but only to myself, never out loud. No one could possibly have an answer for that and I don't really want one. It is and that's good enough for me. It has been all these long years and there is no reason for that to change. No reason at all. The rain agrees and continues its gentle downpour. The wind agrees and continues it's gentle blowing through bough and branch, its gentle touch singing in the voice of the chimes hung around the house. All is well, here snug under the big blue comforter with the slender curly haired girl sleeping so gently in my arms, all is well.

Don't you wish it was raining?
 
Awww Wes, you had to make me cry before I left for work, didn't you?

Thank you, that was beautiful.
 
Living in Phoenix, it is very,very difficult to get depressed about the end of summer. Nothing moves, the heat waves off the pavement, tempers flare constantly...no, I shall be glad for the coolness.

greg
 
While it has cooled off here over the last week or so, it has been a really nice summer. Saturday I (sadly) sent my older girl back to her mother up north after her second visit this summer. The week before that my son started college. And this morning my youngest child started her last year of elementary school. She didn't even look back at me as she got on the school bus. :(

But on the whole I am quite happy. The mild temps last here almost until the first of the year. We'll have garden fresh tomatoes on our Thanksgiving table and if we are lucky our last roses will bloom right around Christmas. How bad is that?

The best part is that the tourists will mostly be gone until Memorial Day!! The beaches are ours again and I can bring my dogs there when I please (the city places restrictions on them during the summer).
 

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Your daughter is beautiful Jim!

I was very sad that my boys had to go back to school today. I like having them here sitting in the livingroom in their underwear, wrapped in blankets, trying to wake up and wondering what are we doing today.

But then again, now I can run the roads (when I can afford the gas) and do my errands alone, have lunch with friends, or take a nap without interruption if I want.

Two sides to every story.

This was a beautiful summer for sure.
 
I actually like fall moreso than summer. The fact that its a prelude to the bitter cold of winter doesn't impress me but i love the beauty of the changing colours.

Summer is nice, i've enjoyed the thunderstorms, the beautiful sunsets, the flowers in full bloom but i'm not a fan of the incredible heat we've had. I prefer cooler temps....not cold just not so hot that i can't sleep lol.

Each season has its own advantages....i do like winter for those cold nites curled up with someone by the fireplace hehehe. Of course being in Canada, the winters are not something i look forward too (not all of us love hockey LOL).
 
I enjoy each of the seasons very much and look forward to each. But I have to admit that I get sick of Winter very quickly and my anticipation of Spring and the awakening of the World around me that it brings far exceeds any of the other Seasons.
 
Oh a pool............how i wish for a pool. Summer, winter, doesn't matter, if i had a pool i'd be in it 24/7 lol. I must have been a fish in a previous life. hehehe

Ok i said fall was my favourite season...........and it still is but already its getting colder in the evenings and i'm not impressed LOL................

Red :)
 
i should emphasize.........i can stand cold water (not freezing water) when swimming but i hate snow........hehehe when i said winter i meant swimming in an indoor pool but it doesn't have to be heated for me to swim, as long as it isn't covered in ice and snow lol

Red :)
 
This sums it up

fairly well for me. I was listening to VH1...I didn't turn it on, someone left the TV on that channel...and this song came on.

GREEN DAY LYRICS

"Wake Me Up When September Ends"

Summer has come and passed
The innocent can never last
wake me up when september ends

like my fathers come to pass
seven years has gone so fast
wake me up when september ends

here comes the rain again
falling from the stars
drenched in my pain again
becoming who we are

as my memory rests
but never forgets what I lost
wake me up when september ends

summer has come and passed
the innocent can never last
wake me up when september ends

ring out the bells again
like we did when spring began
wake me up when september ends

here comes the rain again
falling from the stars
drenched in my pain again
becoming who we are

as my memory rests
but never forgets what I lost
wake me up when september ends

Summer has come and passed
The innocent can never last
wake me up when september ends

like my father's come to pass
twenty years has gone so fast
wake me up when september ends
wake me up when september ends
wake me up when september ends
 
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