lol just noticed, no pun intended with the use of the word smartly!

Thank you Ann for your response. I was thinking of tools such as Hubspot grader, do you know of more services such as those? To accept smartly, one must know the true value of the blog. I have not been doing that I must admit, but now that I am getting more requests I think I may need to start doing it!

I got a few more. Posting you want a guest blog but not even giving your email and asking to go get the email in a convoluted site with no clear email posted. Not giving good author byline specs, not notifying the author of the post URL so they can promote it as well. There is alot of help me, help me, but forget about me helping you out there.

I would love to see an article from on how to research the person who is offering the guest blogger and guidelines for accepting them. How do you know they will be good for you in terms of the benefits of posting in their site (expected referred traffic, eyeballs on the article, etc). Do you have a calculator to examine these possibilities? I have been thinking of coming up with one but I really need someone like you to advice what is for example the average traffic for a decent blog that will start helping you with some traffic referrals? What is a reasonable amount of links in your byline? Beyond the traffic to their blog how else can you measure influence (I am not a very firm believer in Klout, is there another measure?)?, etc.

Tati was the first word my brother spoke and he was referring to me. He is 2 years younger than me!

I think your nickname is closer to your true description: Santa ;) for the goodness in your heart!

A fact about me as you requested: my nickname as I was growing up was Tati

Samantha I think the question you posed at the end is flawed. The question should be what steps can I take to be happy here where I want to be? And certainly it is doable because even if there are so many parasites and bad things for you in that place; there are steps to avoid them and there is a parasite regime you can start as well to prevent them taking a hold of you. There are certainly some nasty parasites with no cure but most are manageable once you know you have them.

I think for you the ultimate question is: Are the steps I need to take to stay healthy here and maintain my happiness something that I can manage without losing my health or my happiness? Only you can answer that; but as an outside observer I believe the "pain" of the cautions and precautions will not be that bad to warrant sacrificing happiness!

I think with a little precaution you can have your health and your happiness and the question you asked only have one response: YES! ;)