This is a guest post from Amanda, a Colorado tech writer and an activist for children with congenital heart disease. This article is about Amanda’s personal experience with insurance. It’s not a prescription for other people, but insights into the value of insurance in her own life. It’s her hope that it will get you thinking.

Okay, I have to rant. AT&T will be charging existing iPhone users an $18 dollars to upgrade to the iPhone 3G. This is in addition to the price of the new iPhone plus the increased voice and data rates. In short, if you’ve been a loyal AT&T customer, you’re getting a penalty to upgrade.

From time to time, I post short interviews with interesting people about their insights on happiness. During my study of happiness, I’ve noticed that I often learn more from one person’s highly idiosyncratic experiences than I do from sources that detail universal principles or cite up-to-date studies.

Let’s take a few moments to remember some of the things that made June 2008 a great month at Unclutterer.com. June’s most popular posts: The six-way opener multi-tasker Baby toy alternatives (part 2) What to do if you are organized and your partner isn’t Unitasker: Battery eater Internet password organizer giveaway Additional highlights:

Trisha asks: Should I omit any positions I have held for less than a year or insignificant ones? What is your opinion? I would rather explain a gap, like moving or staying at home with the kids, than explain why I left something after only 4 months. If it’s not relevant, leave it out.

By Linsey KnerlThe story made headlines all over the world, as pet lovers struggled to find out how the food they gave their companions could have made them sick. Even with the massive recall across store shelves everywhere, contaminated food was being sold by some markets, and the list of “dangerous” food continued to grow.

After Mark Bittman mentioned my post about minimalist food selections in his popular New York Times food blog, I was inundated with questions about minimalist cooking.

Legendary companies like Google and Goldman Sachs are famous for saying that success is all about people. Gathering great talent, it seems, is a sure bet for tremendous breakthroughs. Entire industries have sprung up to help managers find and hire top talent (think head-hunters!).

Have you ever heard of visualization? Of course you have. Everybody’s heard of visualization and everybody partakes in it whether they realize it or not. How it works though is an altogether different matter. I want to take a closer look today at the mechanics of why visualizing works without necessarily delving into concepts and theories that cannot be proven.

Written on 7/01/2008 by Anand Dhillon, of Self-Help for Self-Mastery.In business, it is often said that success is determined not by what you know but by who you know.

My sister-in-law has cancer. Last week, a biopsy revealed that Stephanie has a cancerous lump on her thyroid. She’ll likely have her thyroid removed, meaning she’ll need to take medication for the rest of her life. (She’s 37 years old.) She’ll also probably need a handful of radioactive iodine chemotherapy treatments. Prognosis positive

As I looked at the two sacks of sheets at the bottom of our closet, I realized it wasn’t the best use of space. I don’t fold well and to get around this I simply shove sheets into a pillowcase. The fitted sheet is always the one that makes the whole process aggravating. Real Simple has a how-to guide on efficient ways to fold just about anything.

Thomas hacked some rolling doors for his Oppli media unit. I can't find the link to the Oppli on Ikea's site, so it may not longer be in production. He says, "My intention was noise reduction. The Playstation 3 and my HTPC are a little bit loud for some music or film.

By David DeFranzaEveryone has his or her own strategy for finding the best price on airfare. Some people swear by sites like Farecast, Farecompare, and Air Fare Watch Dog. More and more people, however, are relying on Kayak.com to sniff out the cheapest fares.

Here's a question: if the need for a product has to be created by the manufacturer, if aggressive marketing is required to convince people to buy the product, can the product, no matter how renewable its materials, really be called sustainable? Because isn't using resources to make things we don't even need the definition of waste?