The list-making has begun. No, not gift wish lists—I mean those end of year lists of the top, best, or most important. In recent days there have been three new lists of notable women in tech. The Wall Street Journal published a list of The 50 Women to Watch 2008. While WSJ is focused on women in the business world, I found it interesting to scan this list for women whose businesses were high tech leaders. For example:

Despite governmental pressure to "drop the issue," parents in China whose children died from complications of melamine-laced milk are taking a very western approach -- they are suing.

I'm starting to travel for work again at the rate of a 90 mph where I arrive home just in time to unpack, do laundry and then turn around and hop on another plane. All the while planning additional trips because stress is so very becoming on me. But as I go through the travel process again and again, I'm realizing that since starting my job that requires more time being probed by TSA than actual work, that I do have some good tips on being able to afford all of this travel since it seems that I need to like eat and stay and hotels and stuff.

At 56 years old, Amanda* has no illusions about her future career as an attorney in the U.S. She knows her career is about to come to screeching halt. It could be this week. It could be January. She doesn't know when, but she knows it's coming.When I called her this morning she was at the shoe repair shop. She said there is no work for her at the office. This from a woman who just several months ago regularly woke up at 4:00 am to be in the office at 6:00am and who didn't return home until 10 o'clock at night.

Remember EPIC -- the uncanny dystopic 2004 flash movie that predicted that the combination of social media and advanced search technologies would drive the New York Times out of business by 2014 and create a society in which one mammoth corporation stored, controlled and delivered all of our information? Between the recent announcement that the Christian Science Monitor and US News and World Report are ending their print editions, and the ongoing free-fall in the Times' stock price, at least part of that movie's vision may actually be coming to pass.Or maybe not.

Despite not knowing anyone named Agnetha, I decided to open this email with the festive greeting 'Tis The Season To Be jolly. Turns out Agnetha works for the San Francisco Warwick Hotel -- the same hotel I stayed at during BlogHer '08. Agnetha was just doing her job. Trying to drum up some holiday business for the hotel. This was her brief message:

No one knows how many businesses were started simply because the entrepreneuse( that's the feminine counterpart to entrepreneur) found herself jobless and little prospect for a new job. That's certainly how I started my own business. With so many people getting laid off -- it is only natural that a signficant portion of them will dance with the idea of trying to work for themselves.

We are experiencing some pretty historic financial circumstances lately. but you know what? A desperation mentality is not attractive and the more you feel and act like a desperate teen looking for a prom date, the more likely you will create circumstances in your life to truly be desperate about.

Meet Addison Berry, a woman who traveled a roundabout path into tech and is now one of the most visible leaders in the open source content management world of Drupal. My thanks for Addi for agreeing to answer some questions and let us get to know her.

At one time I had a dog named Fido. While we didn't get him a full-fledged Halloween outfit, we did get him a Halloween Collar. Chances are,if you want to get your pet a Halloween outfit this year, you should find some good sales. Time was when the Pet Industry touted itself as recession proof.

Everyone has heard of search engine optimization, right? But have you heard of findability? I hadn't, until recently.

Neo-haggling is being hailed as the latest trend in shopping.It is the art/passion of looking and asking for a discount on everything you buy. I didn't know it but I am a leaning-neo-haggler. While I don't haggle for everything I buy, I absolutely haggle on many items. The Sunday Chicago Tribune had a front page story about Neo-Hagglers. Their ranks are growing. Half of consumers surveyed in April by