Great gift for military families: webcams!

I've so loved watching the puppies. Brian Williams of NBC Nightly News is, for some reason, flummoxed by it. He seems like such a cool guy on The Daily Show and SNL, so it's odd to me that he's baffled by America's obsession with cuteness. Cheer up, Brian! It's been a crappy year, and it was lovely to find such an adorable bright spot.

but I really want to give praise to the founders of the site that has let us all watch the puppies for so many weeks. Ustream.tv is a site founded in 2006 by two West Point cadets, Brad Hunstable and John Ham (which is awesome because john ham is a fabulous product!) They teamed up with Dr. Gyula Feher and created Ustream so that anyone with a computer and webcam could communicate with anyone else for free. They have donated webcams to families of soldiers stationed in Iraq. They had been frustrated how hard it is for soldiers overseas to communicate with their families. Thanks to this clever site, soldiers with kids can now see their dumplings back home. I can only imagine the added moral this gives our troops and their amazing families.

I'm very thankful as well, for the added bonus of boosting my personal moral by getting to watch these cutie patootie pups for the past few weeks.

If you you know anyone who has family overseas, a wonderful gift to them would be a webcam. I have no affiliation with any webcam company, so I'm not asking you to buy what I'm selling. If your church or work or any other group has members of families with soldiers overseas, my vote is you all chip in and buy them a webcam, so their soldier can get the amazing gift of seeing their loved ones smiles and tears.

I will also say that you can support ustream.tv by clicking on any ads you see that interest you. They will get paid if you sign up or buy things from their site. Never buy anything you don't need or that you can't afford, and never give information you don't feel comfortable, but I am very pleased with this company and want to give my support! (They have also offered to donate webcams to the new families of 5 of the Shiba pups that are getting new homes. Who can't support people that want to spread puppy cuteness?)