I'm posting this on behalf of a good friend- it's a really great cause that i thought i'd share

The Darkhorse Report
www.darkhorsefoundation.org

For those of you who are fans of the Darkhorse Foundation- it might be beneficial to know that your efforts *are* actually making a difference.

In case you are not familiar with us, last month, we received our 501c-3 status from the IRS and are now officially recognized as a public charity at both the Federal and State levels. This was both hard earned, and an exciting step in our evolution.

As you may know, The Darkhorse Foundation was created to help aid at-risk youth, and to rescue wild American horses from Federal lands where our government would have otherwise rounded them up and had them slaughtered in accordance with section 142 of Consolidated Appropriations Bill (HR 4818), passed by the US Congress in 2005.

But all background aside, as the Foundation Director, I wanted to take a moment to publish a little blurb about something which is infinitely more important than all of the aforementioned: To wit- how important it is to have people like you who make it all possible.

...While last month was really our very first month in terms of getting things up and running- of getting our website fully functional, of organizing our finances, and so on- it was nonetheless exciting in that we were actually able to generate a small amount of revenue by driving users to our website (www.darkhorsefoundation.org), and having these users create revenue for the Foundation simply by doing things like using our Google-based search engine, like clicking on a sponsored ad, or by downloading free software that was of interest to them.

In fact, last month was a record breaking month for us in terms of the number of unique site visitors, and in the coming months, it is our hope that we will continue to spread word about what we are trying to do, and to begin to deliver really compelling content that will make users come back to visit our website frequently.

Furthermore, it may please you to know that this revenue isn't being squandered- its being set aside in a tax-deferred, interest bearing account which is earmarked to assist in the ongoing development of our horse ranch, to be used as seed money for grant matching, and for the day to day operations of the Darkhorse Foundation.
Certainly, noone here is getting wealthy- but with the help of a few of your mouse clicks, we can continue to make a difference.

So, visit our website: www.darkhorsefoundation.org, and Google something- anything, it doesn't matter... click on an ad, make a donation, set us as your default when you want to Google something, send word on to a friend, add us as a myspace friend (http://www.myspace.com/darkhorsefoundation )... all of your efforts will help to save our great American horses from slaughter, and will help to steer at-risk kids onto the right path.

Sincerely,
-Stephen E. Kerver
Director, The Darkhorse Foundation

let's just start by saying i feel like banging my head against the frakkin keyboard! my son is driving my to the village of the insane. so i'll start with this morning and work my way back to Friday...
quarter to 9 this morning i'm laying in bed enjoying the extra rest time of the three day weekend... DING DONG- who in the world is at my door? the police have my son in the back of their car and it's his friends dad who showed the police where we live. OMG- i'm all morning foggy and i have to talk to the police! so the officer lets him go in the house while we talk. they found him walking about 5 miles away, he said he was going to his friend's house and that we were at work! what? i think my son has lost his mind, from what we can put together is that he left at about 6 this morning, i think he was running away to escape the trouble he was already in- just a guess.
so go back to friday- i get a call from the school, needless to say i'm like what did he do now. i find out from he teacher that he took his gameboy and was playing in class. come to find out , it isn't his gameboy- it's mine, so OK he stole my GB to play at school. then the teacher is telling me that he would not participate in class so she sent him to the back of the room, where he proceeded to eat a box of cookies ( snacks for the entire class) and then tried to lie his way out of it.
so here i am at a complete loss. seriously, i can't spank him, as it would do no good and i'm mad so that is out of the question. so what in the world do i do, i figured i gave him a reasonable punishment for the Friday offense, but now this- i'm not sure what i'm supposed to do.
this was the original punishment- write sentences until he had a good week at school, then grounded for four weeks ( no TV, games , toys, bike, fun) and the four weeks he had to be good the entire time.
i was thinking of having him pick out the things in life he thinks he wants- the lifestyle, job, house and then research how one gets those things and then research what happens to runaways and people who continue on the path he is on now. maybe seeing the cold hard facts and visiting the jail will show him that this isn't the road he wants to follow. any ideas would help!