You have every reason to be proud; for my part, I'm humbled by your ability to keep on keepin' on. As for me, I got caught short a bit. My 1st job was for minimum wage when I was 13 cleaning cages & aquariums at a pet store during my summer vacation, and kept on working for a couple hours a week during the weekends through the school year. When I was 15, I didn't work for $ but spent my summer picking up certifications to be a lifeguard the following summer (i.e., 1st aid, CPR, Basic Water Safety & Rescue and Advanced Lifesaving; I'd also picked up merit badges in swimming, rowing, canoeing & lifesaving. That fall, though, playing rugby I took a bad hit and blew out one knees and seriously screwed up the other (its so loose I may as well have blown it out). So there went the next summer, since I spent most of that year in a soft cast & on crutches (this was before they had those fancy-schmancy surgeries where they replace the joint). I finally got a brace that I can wear in the pool 4 years back and finally get to spend some time swimming my old strokes (I swam competitively when I was in my early teens, 100 & 200 fly, 200 & 400 IM, and switched off/on with back & fly in the medley relays, depending on where I was needed). That's cool, since I really, really missed swimming. Anyway, I worked the end of high school at a gas station & another pet store & threw papers my first years of college. Then I got a job selling luggage and went a couple years making ends meet with student loans while I made my final push through my BA & MA. After that, I sold mattresses, Ekornis chairs & cedar chests, then worked in watch & jewelry repair. That's what I was doing when my brain went kerplooey. Getting benefits was tough and took longer than it should, partially because I wasn't brought up not to work, and partly because 9/11 happened and I didn't want to be a drain on the system, but my doctor wouldn't release me to work--he actually took a hardline with me one day and spelled it in no uncertain terms: "You are done. You need to look at long-term care, period." I still didn't want to hear it and dragged my heels more, so much so that by the time there was a judge involved some of my work credits had lapsed; the judge, after reviewing everything, issued a ruling that I guess was pretty firm, and reinstated those credits because SSA hadn't followed their own rules with my case so why should I be penalized. The really funny thing is, I found out, that had I never, ever worked, when I went on disability I would have had my survivor's benefits re-instated and all that other garbage would never have happened. I'm not sure how I feel about that though--with the benefits, I'd have more money coming in each month, but I'm not sure that I'd have appreciated what I have now had I not worked, learned the value of a dollar, or gone through all that extra BS I went through. The most important thing, though, is that I get to spend more days and hopefully more years watching my nieces grow up, teaching them some lessons (reading to them, teaching them how to read animal tracks--the ones I can remember from scouts anyway), and so on. And I'm still, in my way, learning little lessons here and there, too, from reading, watching how my nieces grow up, play, experiment and so on, from keeping up with current events on TV & radio (my TV's usually tuned to CNN or MSNBC, or to Discovery or History International, and my radio's tuned to NPR), and then there's the things I've picked up here on this board already, so its not so bad. Of course, if there was one thing I'd like to do, its go to the Shambhala Mountain Center in Colorado (it was next-door to my old scout camp) and just take a good, long, deep breath and be thankful. Waxing poetic again ... .

Yes, I know exactly what you mean. I have to be somewhat proud of my self for all the hard work I put in during my working life which has allowed me to draw a large enough disability benefit that enables me to live independent of further charity like HUD, welfare, and food stamps (though a small benefit of food stamps would be nice, I'm not monetarily rich by any means). I agree that Rob injects a lot of personality into his sites as well as allowing his models to do the same. Danielle has such a wonderful personality and this site reflects that.

Fascinating, but not entirely unexpected. It makes perfect sense that Rob would keep two places so that his personal life and business were separated, and it makes sense that the house he keeps for work is where it is so that there is more privacy to work freely. I'm guessing that the site is doing phenomenally well that he can afford multiple houses, pay for the content and hire the gentlewomen to pose for him, and I know that while there's something of a sliding scale that women are paid in LA depending on what they do, Rob from what I gather pays very well, and so he should! I'm often thinking about exploitation and for what its worth, and using dear Danielle as an example, I think that she's exploited less working for Rob than she was working at the department store she worked for. Why? She knows what she's doing for Rob, why she's there, and she's well compensated, I assume, whereas retail pay for sales associates is notoriously low. She's there basically selling memberships which pays her bills as well as Rob's, while the department store has a lot more mouths to feed, beginning with the CEO and Board, the stockholders and then the actual people who do the hard work keeping the customers happy, stocking the shelves and so on. And as I'm saying this, I'm thinking about my Mom's cousins in Calif. & NY who are probably doing as well as Rob--the family in NY own a small chain of clothing & shoe stores, while the cousins in Calif own a horse farm & stable on the one hard where they teach dressage, and a construction company on the other (their businesses were inherited, by the way--thinking back to what their parents' started with post-Depression & post-WWII, its terrific, I think, to see what they made out of their modest beginnings, just as I'm impressed with how far Rob has come with his art as well as with the business). Pride is something I try to avoid, since it usually leads to complacency and failure, but humility is good because it keeps the senses sharp and makes you aware of how f0ortunate you are, how hard you worked and how much more you can do to make yourself or your product better, so just as I'm humbled by the successes of my Mom's cousins, I'm just as humbled by & appreciative of the success of Rob, Danielle, Lia, Alison and every other contributor to this wonderful place. Know what I mean?

Just to inform you...the house that you see in most of the videos and pictures is not the house that Rob lives in, although he does own it. He refers to it as the FTV house which he bought just for the purpose of having a secure place to shoot model updates. The house he lives in is even grander than the FTV house.

It seems to me that when you have to give something up, you miss it, sure, but eventually you just have to come to grips with its absence. Simplify, in other words. I've tried to simplify my life in a number of ways through the years. Stuff that seemed important and vital turned out to be just added and unnecessary stress. I'm sure you've had the same things going on in your life. "Parting makes the heart grow fonder," and all that. Along with that, I'm sure you've found, that as you let some things go, you gain a greater appreciation for what you've left behind. I think that was part of what drew me to FTV and helped me make my mind up to join after watching the site grow through the samples over the past 6 years. There's a casual approach Rob's taken with the gentlewomen--not overly staged, and even though Rob's house (I assume that's where a lot of the indoor & pool scenes are shot) is grand, its also got a comfy, airy, down-to-earth feel to it (his autos, on the other hand, are over the top, but not necessarily in a bad way!). Getting back, while I find the photos & video at other sites to be very nicely done, there's an absence of personality there that Rob has here. I feel like I get to meet the women through the interviews, what they write and so on, and am not just getting some highly orchestrated whatever. There's more "honesty" if you will here between Rob, the women and us, I think, than when we're just presented with staged images & video without that personal touch, you know? Anyway, I'm happier today than I was a month ago, and now my big question is, why did I take so long to make up my mind and join? I can use the excuses that its a luxury or that its not pragmatic, but the truth is I tend to over-think (you'd never have guessed, would you?). And I tend to over write, too! Cheers, amigo--and best with moderating!

I miss alcohol drinks too (various wines, wine coolers, bourbon, wide range of beers) although I occasionally indulge in one beer at no more of a frequency of one per month when I can afford to buy it. I was never a cigarette smoker but I do miss the occasional cigar (I used to know a lot about them but it's been so long since the last one however I do recognise all that you mentioned), and I miss my pipes (custom blend tobacco, large pipe collection, among my pipes were a couple meershams one of which was handcrafted and among my wood pipes was one that I bought directly from the pipe maker whom I met and befriended when I lived in Florida, I still have the best pipes put away somewhere). I agree with you about what's important to keep close. It's hard to find gentlewomen out in the nasty real world. It's good of Rob to gather them all in one place for us to treasure. Thanks for the congrats!

Hey there--

I was just thinking about things I miss. I miss red wine (especially Merlot & Pinot Noir), I miss Guinness (even black & tans--that's 1/2 Guinness & 1/2 Newcastle Brown), and I miss good single-malt scotch, straight preferably, maybe with just a dash of water. The last drink I was was somewhere around 4 or 5 years ago. I also miss smoking. Yeah, dirty habit, but once upon a time, in my late teens & early 20s, I smoked. I don;t miss my Camels (hard pack, cotton filter), and I don't miss my cigars so much (Davidoff seconds, Churchill or Baccarat coronas, EMS or candela wrapper), but I do miss my pipe (brier, straight stem, with vanilla burley). Some things are good to leave behind, but then there are some things worth keeping close, like the gentlewomen of FTV, Lia and so on. Dontcha agree? Congrats on becoming a member of the Mod Squad!

I had a water weight problem too (well, okay, I still do to a degree). My doctor put my on furosemide then added in potassium so I wouldn't lose too much. It wasn't fun. It took the better part of those 1st 3 years to get me semi-stabilized. My feet & ankles looked like an elephants for a while. They did all the usual tests looking for the usual culprits ...CT, MRI/MRA, blood work (which is still monitored every 3-4 mos, then there's my blood sugar tests). They even sent me to have an Indium-111 scan to see if I had a carcinoid (none was detected). Then, after they couldn't find the root cause of my problems, they started focusing on long-term treatment. which is where I'm at now. I'm not going to get better, but there is that chance of slowing the progress of my conditions down and buying my a few more years, maybe a decade, maybe more depending on how medicine advances. By nature, I was a cynic and while I'm, still a skeptic about a lot of things, at least I'm seeing things with a little more hopeful optimism than I used to, and that ain't so bad. Besides, even on a rough day if I have my nieces we can usually watch a fun movie, like Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, or we can watch Hogan's Heroes or Star Trek or I can pop in my Live Aid or Live 8 DVD and they can sing and dance and have fun and that does lighten the heart.

Cheers--

Yeah, I understand about diet changes. Because of my metal heart valve I have to take a blood thinner (anti-coagulent) for the rest of my life.Most of the foods that health experts say should be eaten for good health (i.e. green leafy vegetables, greens, lettuce, etc.) I can't eat unless I have the exact same amount of the same thing every night. Those green things contain high Vitamin K which is the vitamin that helps blood to coagulate. Too much Vitamin K makes my blood thinner less effective and if my blood is too thick there is a great danger of a clot forming on the metal valve which would cause it to stop working. I have to have monthly blood tests to monitor the thickness of my blood. Also, because I don't get a lot of exercise and I have the water weight problem, I have to eat a low fat, low cholesterol, low sodium (too much sodium makes me retain water and I'll bloat) diet. So I have to read every package of food that I buy to make sure it's within the guidelines. Mostly I stick with boneless, skinless chicken breasts and fish, squash (for vegetables), a small salad, tomatoes, red potatoes (with low fat butter and no fat sour cream), grain type cereals (mostly raw oatmeal, I hate the instant oatmeal), low sodium block cheese (swiss and monterey jack), and lots of fruit (bananas, oranges, pears, necterines, and melon). I buy as many low sodium products as I can and try to stick to regular meal times. Before I had my heart problem I was an irregular eater, eating meals when I got hungry and then having a whole lot of food at once. Plus some of my favorite foods were in the green leafy catagory (spinich, artichoke, brussel sprouts, lettuce) and my favorite dessert was cheesecake (I could eat a whole cheesecake all by myself). If I ate now the way I used to I'd probably die in a very short time. I agree that life is worth living for as long as is possible so I've changed my whole lifestyle in order to continue being alive.

Hey there, WhyYou--

I've had my moments. The 1st three years I was down and out, I was really just in, meaning I didn't go out. Its a bit of a shock, you know (and I know you know). I spent most of those three years debating about and researching how big a dose of the dozen meds I'm on it would take to put me down (one was used in an episode of Quincy as the cause of death, another was used in CSI, same reason). My biggest fear was that I was going to wind up a big burden for my family, closely followed by the desire to make an end so that my niece wouldn't get too attached to me. A yar into this whole thing, I got more news: I was now diabetic. My Dad died when he was 32 of heart disease complicated with liver issues, while my uncle (his brother) died of complications of diabetes just days before his 42d, so it was like getting hit with two sledgehammers. Obviously I kept going. I can be stubborn as a mule (or maybe I'm just too much of a jackass?). Both of my Dad's parents died of strokes (1 year to the day apart), and my Mom's mom died of heart disease after having several bipasses. Nowadays I eat a lot healthier, lots of cereal, avoiding foods with corn syrup in them as much as possible, getting a bit more exercise and so on, but its a balancing act. Some of the foods you might think are good for me, i.e., vegetables, can be problematic. Because my liver is wonky, my blood doesn't get filtered as well as it should and purines can build up causing metabolic arthritis, so not only do I have to take care of the meats I eat, but I also have to watch how much spinach, broccoli, beans, nuts, asparagus, artichoke and so on I eat. I got out of balance back in April this year and would up shut-in for the better part of two months, thankfully the same time my Mom was on vacation so she could watch my nieces, and then they went to their mom's family in Sta Rosa for several weeks which gave me time to get on crutches first, then use my cane and so by the time they got back home, I was just getting back on my feet again. I just saw my doctor a few weeks back and got a new diagnosis: pancreatitis. Oh joy, just what every diabetic needs, yet another complication involving the pancreas. That explains why I can't eat granola like I used to, or a host of other things without winding up in pain soon after. So its a new thing to adapt to, and where I lost one med a few months ago (no longer covered), I just added one back. The new med gets doubled in about 2 1/2 more weeks, and then maybe I'll have myself sorted out for a little longer. Some days it feels like for every one step forward, there's two or three steps back, but at least I figured out that life's worth living, and I have 2 nieces now who I just adore and who, in spite of everything else, make me feel a little younger again, especially when reading Dr. Seuss or watching Fuse on TV. Viva la vida!