Most of you know Marc & I run a business online and because of that business we are open to jerks on the internet trying to hack our accounts. I’m creating this post out of shear frustration with how this system currently works and how one compromise can tumble the deck of cards to the ground.

So if you’re like most people, you are using gmail for your email. Gmail has always been free (with the exception of purchasing additional storage) since it is supported by ads, as well as basically data mining your emails (I’m sure they call it target marketing). If you’ve ever lost your gmail password or god forbid been hacked, you already know the process of getting this straightened out is a nightmare. So I’m going to run down a checklist of sorts to maybe help you if this happens to you.

Before I start, I want to say one of the best websites out there for trying to weed through all the website contact BS is called GetHuman; use it, you will be glad you did.

Step 1: You realize your gmail might have been hacked (denial will set in a this point, because you’ve been so careful)
Step 2: You think maybe I just ‘forgot’ my password and look for the Password Recovery Page
Step 3: Google sends back the following response when you try and reset your password and you know you didn’t associate a yahoo/hotmail/msn account to your gmail account (this is where you start to freak out)

To initiate the password reset process, please follow the instructions sent to your ******@yahoo.com email address. If you don’t have an alternate email address, or if you no longer have access to that account, please try to reset your password again after 24 hours. At that point, you’ll be able to reset your password by answering the security question you provided when you created your account.

We use the security question for account recovery only after an account has been idle for 24 hours. We do this to prevent someone else from taking over your account.

If you’re unable to answer your security question or access your recovery email account, please complete this form. If you’re concerned about the security of your account, please visit our Security Center.

Step 4: Immediately begin searching for an actual phone number to call customer support (see above about gethuman), realize 30 minutes later, there isn’t one. Your ONLY option is to fill out this form and say your account has been compromised. Fill out as much information as you can on this form. They say it will take 24 hours for a response, but with all of this said, WTF Google? I get it, we have a “I use you, you use me kind of relationship”, but when I’ve trusted you with some pretty damn important information, don’t make me wait 24 hours for just a response. I’ve had people say well you get what you pay for. Really? is that the acceptable response?

Step 5: Create or use an existing email that you know is secure. If you don’t have one, make one (in fact it’s probably better that you do create a new one) This is the email you will use for the accounts that haven’t yet been compromised. The problem is now if you change your password on any service you’ve used the hacked email, guess what, that change is going to be sent to the hacked email account! So have that backup email to use when changing the information on accounts that have not yet been hacked. Also make sure you have a secure password on your accounts. Not sure what a secure password looks like? Test it here Update: we decided to invest in a one password system for the Mac called 1Password. It gets high praises from a number of our friends and colleagues, plus there is an iphone app too! I know there are PC based password systems, but I’m not familiar with them. If you use a good PC password management system feel free to post it in the comments below.

Step 5: Start contacting all of your financial accounts that you’ve linked this email. That includes Paypal, Banks, Credit Cards, etc. I will say that working with Paypal & Bank of America has been the best so far. Paypal let us know that the person had transferred $3000 out of our account, but since we called them, they said the transfer would not occur since it was now unauthorized. I also worked directly with BoA and shutdown all online accounts. The alternative email will come in handy for any of these services once they verify you are who you say you are. What this whole thing is boiling down to is a big pain in the ass.

Step 6: Go through a list of all the services you have used this email with and change the email and the password. Services like iTunes, WordPress, Amazon, Twitter & Facebook. (I’m still racking my brain thinking of sites that I might have missed)

Step 7: Wait. I’m finding this to be the hardest part. I feel like there are things I can be doing, but I can’t actually think of anything more to do.

Step 8: Evaluate a service like LifeLock. I’m not sure if email hack is part of their service, but it’s worth checking out. Think of anything that might be in your email that could be used for identity theft. Do you have your social security listed in an email or if you’re using Google’s other services like Docs what is listed in there?

Step 9: Find out if your financial service offers authenticators. Both Paypal & Bank of American offer these. You can order the Paypal security key authenticator for $5 & Bank of America offers SafePass for $19.99. They both work similar to the authenticator that people use in World of Warcraft. This is your money that we are talking about here, so take the measures to secure it as much as possible!

Well for now, this is all I got. If you’ve been through this and have additional things to share please feel free to add them to the comments below. Thanks for ‘listening’ to me rant

Update: We received confirmation from Google that they re-enabled the account to the safe email that I created. Total time it took 6 hours for them to investigate and reset the secondary email. I believe it is critical to provide the information they ask for: 5 emails of people you email frequently, 5 labels you’ve create on the account and the estimate month and year the email account was created.

Why oh why do spammers use Skype to send me stupid IM’s? I’ll tell you why, to make me laugh. Who knew I had an Indonesia Italian relative name Shafi Spagnuolo. LOL! By the way Skype, if your reading you might want to figure something out. I get at least 2 spam messages a day with stupid crap like this.

Dear Spagnuolo,

Dr. Jerry Wood.

I was recently a guest on The Incredible Podcast of Amazing Awesomeness and Mike asked me about some of the things I enjoy cooking. Now while I don’t profess to be an excellent chef, I do have a few standard recipes I’ve learned over the years that have made my husband very happy. I also realized I can’t find them anywhere online. So here is my blog post writing out 4 (technically 5) of my favorites: New Jersey Tomato Pie, My Favorite Red Sauce, Meatballs and finally for dessert, Baklava!

New Jersey Tomato Pie

Ingredients for pizza dough (you will need to make your own dough since the pie will need to be very thin)
1 package of quick dry yeast
1 cup of lukewarm water
pinch of sugar
1 tsp salt
3-3 1/2 cups unbleached white flour

Method for dough
Step 1. Warm a medium mixing bowl (I prefer glass since I speed up the rising by putting the bowl in a warmed oven) by swirling some hot water in it. Drain. Place the yeast in the bowl and pour on the warm water. Stir in sugar, mix with a fork and allow to stand until yeast has dissolved and starts to foam (5-10 min)
Step 2. Use a wooden spoon to mix in the salt and about one third of the flour. Mix in another third of the flour, stirring with the spoon until the dough forms a mass and begins to pull away from the sides of the bowl.
Step 3. Sprinkle some of the remaining flour onto a smooth work surface. Remove the dough from the bowl and begin to knead it, working int the remaining flour a little at a time. Knead for 8-10 min. By the end the dough should be elastic and smooth. Form it into a ball.
Step 4. Lightly oil the mixing bowl (assuming you’ve cleaned it already). Place the dough in the bowl. Stretch a moistened and wrung-out dish towel across the top of the bowl and leave it to stand in a warm place until the dough has doubled in volume (if you do not have a oven that does proofing, turn the oven on to medium heat for 10 minutes before you need the dough. Turn the oven off and place the bowl with the dough in it in the turned off oven with the door closed and let it rise there) To test whether the dough has risen enough, poke 2 fingers into the dough. If the indention remain the dough is ready.
Step 5. Punch the dough down with your fist to release the air. Knead for 2 minutes.
Step 6. If you want to make 2 medium pies divide the dough into 2 balls. This recipe will freeze nicely if you don’t want to use all of the dough at one time. Just wrap in plastic wrap and freeze.
Step 7. When you roll out the dough, lightly oil the pan

Ingredients for Tomato Pie
1 16-20 oz can of diced tomatoes
1/4 tsp of fresh minced garlic (the kind you can get in the jar & have to refrigerate)
2 cups of mozzarella cheese, cut into cubes, not shredded
4 tbsp freshly grated Parmesan cheese (for the top of the pie)
1-2 tbsp olive oil

Method for Pie
Step 1. Preheat the oven to 470 degrees for at least 20 min before baking. In a blender or food processor add the whole can of tomatoes (and minced garlic if you like). Blend for about 5-10 seconds (you will still see chucks of tomato)
Step 2. Roll out dough onto your pizza pan as thin as you can and the add tomato sauce onto the dough with a spoon.
Step 3. Sprinkle evenly with the mozzarella. Dot with basil if you like. Sprinkle with Parmesan and finish it off with a drizzle of olive oil.
Step 4. Bake for about 15-20 minutes or until the crust is golden brown and the cheese melted and bubbling

My favorite Red Sauce

Ingredients
1-2 tbsp olive oil
1 small onion chopped (I just put it in my food processor)
1 clove of chopped garlic (I just use a half spoonful of the minced garlic in the jar…this stuff is a time saver!)
1 can (14oz) of diced tomatoes (don’t drain)
2 tbsp of chopped parsley (dried or fresh…dried of course is faster)
1 tsp dried oregano
2 tbsp of tomato paste (I usually do half a can and put the other half in a small container for another batch later)
1 tsp sugar
1 can of HUNTS traditional sauce (yes it does matter that it’s hunts…it’s about a dollar at walmart)

Method
Step 1. heat the olive oil in a medium sauce pan and fry the onion for 2-3 minutes or until translucent. Add garlic and fry for 1 min
Step 2. Stir in diced tomatoes, parsley, oregano, tomatoe paste, sugar and (salt and pepper to taste if you want)
Step 3. Bring the sauce to a boil, then simmer for about 5 to 10 minutes. Pour HUNTS tomatoe sauce in and bring to boil

In the last step if I’m in a rush, I will just add the Hunts sauce after I bring my base to a boil. But the idea is to reduce the base and then add the hunts sauce

Meatballs!
Just my standard meatball recipe that I use for meatball subs and spaghetti & meatballs

Serves 8
Prep Time 15
Cooking Time 15
Ingredients
1 small can of drained chopped mushrooms (food processor works great)
1 lb of ground beef
2 cloves garlic (again the jar of minced garlic works great. this would be a full spoonful for 2 cloves)
4 tbsp dried parsley
3 tbsp dried basil
1 egg
6 tbsp plain breadcrumbs
2 tbsp of grated parmigiana cheese (I get mine from Costco and freeze it. And use as needed)
salt and pepper
4 tbsp olive oil
1 medium onion chopped (love that food processor!)

Method
Step 1. take mushrooms and chop them up (the finer the better). Combine the meat with the mushrooms, garlic and herbs. Stire in the egg. Add the breadcrumbs and parmesan. Season with salt and pepper if you like (I usually don’t). Form the mixture into small balls 1 to 1 1/2 inches
Step 2. In large heavy frying pan, heat olive oil. Add onion and cook over low heat until soft (I actually like to add a half spoonful of minced garlic too). Raise the heat to medium and add the meatballs. Roll them often to brown evenly. Typically takes around 10-15 minutes for them to be done.

Baklava
Greek dessert

Cooking Time 1.5 hours
Ingredients:
1 lb. Phyllo dough.
4 to 5 cups walnuts, chopped in food processor. You can also use pistachios
½ cup sugar.
¼ tsp. ground cloves.
1 tsp. cinnamon.
¾ lb. sweet butter. (3 sticks)

The filling
Step 1. Combine nuts, cinnamon, cloves, and sugar.
Step 2. Melt butter in a saucepan.
Step 3. Use pastry brush to brush inside of a 14 X 10 ½ inch pan with melted butter.
Step 4. Line bottom of pan with one piece of Phyllo dough. Fold under excess Phyllo.
Step 5. Alternate sides with each piece of Phyllo, brushing the top of each layer with melted butter.
Step 6. Repeat six (6) times, making six layers.
Step 7. On the 6th sheet, sprinkle evenly with nut mixture.
Step 8. Continue layering butter sheets until all nut mixture is used and use 6-10 more buttered sheets of Phyllo to form top crust.
Step 9. Use a sharp knife to cut into diamond shapes. (basically you’ll cut it like you would brownies but then divide them in half to form a diamond)
Step 10. Bake at 300° F for about 1 ½ hours or until lightly brown.

The Syrup: I eyeball how much of the syrup to pore so not to flood the baklava. The syrup will be liquid (not very thick) after it is done boiling.
1 1/4 cups of water.
1 1/2 cups sugar.
1 1/2 tsp. lemon juice.
1/2 tsp. vanilla.

Step 1. Combine syrup ingredients. Boil syrup for about 5-7 minutes and then allow to cool. (the syrup can be warm just not boiling)
Step 2. Pour cooled syrup over hot pastry.
Step 3. Each individual Baklava slice can be served on a bake paper cup (cup cake cups).

One of the things I did a long time ago was establish my privacy settings in Facebook. It took a bit of work, but in the end I feel I have more control over who sees what from my profile. Both my husband and a close friend of mine recently commented on how they were frustrated with Facebook because they didn’t want everyone seeing all their information. So it occurred to me that there were people out there that didn’t know how to set up their privacy settings. So with the new Facebook policy that was recently announced, you really should be establishing your privacy settings. You’ll see quickly why below.

The following is a small tutorial to help you sift through the privacy settings (in plain English) Of course the screen-shots may change over time (depending when you find this post) but from what I can tell once they are set up Facebook won’t mess with them.

First thing you will need to do is go to the Friends page (top left) and decide what kind of friend groups you want to create. Notice if you haven’t already you should create a Limited Profile Friend group (we’ll assign permissions here in a sec) After you have all of your groups created you will need to go through all of your friends and assign them to 1 or more groups (yes I know this will take some time, but once it’s done you will be much more organized)

After you have set up all of your friend groups. Go to Settings -> Privacy Settings -> Profile Information.

From here choose any Facebook area, such as Basic Information and click Custom in the drop down box. You will see the option to exclude groups and for me that group is titled Limited Profile. One thing I would like to bring attention too is the Posts By Me category. I believe this is a new category with the new Facebook policy and thus it is defaulting to have Everyone see what you post. This means all of the following will be seeing by people that are not your friends (ie search engines, companies, old boyfriends, you get the idea): Default setting for Status Updates, Links, Notes, Photos, and Videos you post. So you will need to go into your privacy settings and set this to My Friends or whatever category you have created to limit access to what you post. By the way this was very seeky of Facebook to do this…bad facebook bad!

After you have set all of your Privacy settings up, check out your home page. You can click on each friend category to see only the status updates from those people you’ve organized in your friend groups.

Well it’s been over a year since I’ve last posted and what a year it has been. The Wood Whisperer continues to grow and we are as busy as ever with the site. We celebrated our third year anniversary in October with the site and in just 1 month we will be celebrating the 1 year anniversary of our premium membership section of our site called The Wood Whisperer Guild. In addition to getting our free content listed on some great devices like Tivo and Roku recently, we’ve also started distributing the show through a company called PegMedia and can now been seen in over 60 public access TV stations all over the US! So when I read my past post about whether we should go into to TV, I guess the answer is yes, but on our terms

So with all of this work on The Wood Whisperer, I’ve also managed to start a few of my own projects. Both are audio podcasts, involving 2 of my favorite things; movies and video games. First is The Movielicious with Patrick Beja and Mark “Turpster” Turpin. Really Patrick makes Movielicious happen since Turpster and I just have to watch movies and show up for the call It’s not a serious review show, but we do have a lot of fun when we record. Since Patrick is in France and Turpster is in the UK, we don’t always get to see the movies that are out in the States right at the moment, but we make the best of what we can watch and make fun of each other in the process. Average run time of the show is 1 hour with 2-3 main movies reviews and 3 dvd recommendations and 1 awesome poster from photoshop queen Kichelle.

The second show is called Ladies of Leet and it’s also an audio podcast with myself, RandysMolly and GypsyGirl. The podcast is done every 2 weeks and we discuss whats happening in both consoles and pc gaming news and what games we are playing and our thoughts on those games. We also have a bargain buy section of the podcast were we discuss any great deals we find on and off the web. Average run time of the show is 1 hour and 15 min.

So if you’re interested in either topics please feel free to check out the websites and subscribe to the feed. You might even catch a live recording of The Movielicious if you subscribe to Patrick’s twitter

So after 5 months, I’m finally getting the second session out that Marc and I gave at PodcampAZ last year. In this video we discuss some of the things we discovered during the first year with our podcast, The Wood Whisperer, including start-up equipment, marketing, media kits, press releases, sponsorships, advertisers, connecting and surveying your audience. And if you can believe it, we did it all in under one hour! Of course it goes without saying that these are just our experiences. You may find that not everything we talk about applies to you, but hopefully you can walk away with at least 1 new piece of information or insight into a relatively new medium (personally I think you’ll walk away with more And if the video wasn’t enough, you can also find our presentation on Slideshare.net

I would like to thank David Yamamoto again from the Phoenix PC Users Group. Without him this video would not have been recorded. Thank you Dave!!!

Some of the websites mentioned in the session

Skaeser Lights & Photography
blip.tv
Tubemogul
Podcast Designs
Branders.com
Survey Monkey
eSurveysPro
PRWeb
Podcast Brothers
Leo Laporte
Radiohead

Right Click to download iPod (mp4) file

Back in November of last year, Marc and I had the pleasure of hosting 2 sessions at PodcampAZ. The first dealt with how we used uStream.TV to connect with the of audience The Wood Whisperer. Of course uStream can be used all sorts of different ways, but really we looked at it as a tool to build connections with our audience. The result…both Marc and I have a much stronger sense in who is watching The Wood Whisperer as well as making some amazing friends in the process.

So for those who couldn’t attend PodcampAZ or were in another session (there were so many). I’m posting the entire session right here. Yes I know it’s an hour long, but there was a lot of great discussion going on and I didn’t want to leave anything out (not to mention I didn’t want another delay in putting the video out).

I’d also like to thank David Yamamoto from the Phoenix PC Users Group. Without him this video would not have been recorded. Thank you Dave!!!

Click to download iPod (mp4) file

First, I just wanted to thank everyone for the words of encouragement on the single episode of Everyday How-To. We really did have fun making the podcast, but I think it was just adding too much to both of our plates. So Marc and I decided to scale it down a bit. So without futher adieu I present DINKS Like Us. I’m not sure if this will be your typical ‘couples cast’, though we are a couple. Marc and I realized that we are both teachers at heart and I think if your going to listen to our show we really hope you walk away with at least one great piece of information you didn’t know before. So sit back, grab a sodie and enjoy our very first episode! Thanks for listening!

This is a question I get from time to time and to be honest when I first started looking into writing my own press release for The Wood Whisperer, I quickly wanted to hire someone else to do it for me. So I began my search for any and all information on the subject. One of the best places I found was a site called Publicity Insider and from there a complete run down of the process and purpose of a press release. Really I look at a press release as a means to formally define what your company/service (yes your podcast is your company) can provide.

The press release can then be distributed through a number of methods including free services like I-Newswire, PR.COM , 24-7 PressRelease and PRWeb.com. Once the press release is distributed then reporters or editors can choose to use some or all of it in their own websites/newspapers/magazines. Remember you are basically writing an article for them, in order for them to use it they will need to see the value/benefit in what you are promoting (ie are you providing a service that will solve a problem or make someones life better by watching/listening to your podcast) .

Here is what my original press release for The Wood Whisperer looked like and how a couple of sites took that information and repurposed it on their own sites:
901am
Social Computing Magazine

Now keep in mind that with the online PR sites there are 2 options, free and paid. I decided to use the free service that pr.com offers and then pay for the upgrade with prweb.com. Why? I had a nice little intro video that I wanted to couple with my press release and to get that service I had to pay. I’m sure many of you know much more than me about distribution of press releases so if you have additional advice, please add a comment below.

So what does this press release do for me? Besides the obvious of getting your company/service officially out to the general reporting public, it also can provide a go to “what your podcast is all about” statement. If I ever need to give a company or individual a rundown of what The Wood Whisperer is about, I can simply point them to my press release with video on PRweb. The information is designed to be straight and to the point and the video is entertaining as well.

So if you’re like me examples always help; so here are just a couple press releases I found from other podcasts out there. If you have one of your own, feel free to list it in the comments below. I’m always interested in seeing how other podcasts create their own press release and to be honest I don’t see very many.

MBA Working Girl Podcast
Fantoo Girls Podcast

Well it’s finally seeing the light of day…our first and only episode of Everyday How-To. My hope was to produce it regularly when the travel for my job slowed down, but until then I thought it would be fun to release what we had recorded months ago (btw the travel has not slowed down at all). It’s a little long, but the outtakes at the end are worth it

Recipe for Crunchy French Toast

5-7 bread pieces
2 eggs
1/2 cup milk
1 tsp.vanilla
1 Tbsp cinnamon
3 Tbsp flour (all purpose)
1/8 tsp. salt
1 Tbsp butter (for the pan)
1 1/2 cup of Honey Bunches of Oats with or without Almonds (crushed)