Are you ready for the upcoming school year? We hope so. But if not, AOL is here to help you prepare. Time is running out before the first day. So instead of running around from store to store trying to collect everything, search all of your Back to School necessities on AOL Search for easy one-click access to the best back to school items. No matter which grade they are entering, kids love picking out their own school supplies.

Celebrity gossip is a guilty pleasure. Hollywood stars are always up to something new, whether it's breaking up, fighting, hooking up, partying or simply living their extravagant lives. With so many celebs, so much drama, and so little time, how can you keep up on all the best celebrity news? Unless you are planning to become a paparazzi, check out the new TMZ Celebrity Tracking Toolbar for the best way to track your favorite celebs.

AOL Mobile Search has been awarded a Silver Medal by mocoNews ! The mobile search blog held a competition of sorts to see which search engine has the best mobile results for the search term " Olympics ." Yahoo! and Google tied for gold and MSN Live came in third place for bronze. Swimmers Dara Torres and Katie Hoff are jubilant about their silver medals and so are we. OK, so ours wasn't won in Beijing's Water Cube , but it feels great just the same.

DMOZ , the largest human-edited directory on the Web, celebrated its 10th anniversary this June. The DMOZ directory organizes the ever-expanding Internet for it's growing population of web users. Contributors take the time to sort out the less relevant content that many search engines provide and then organize the valuable listings into categories. Anyone on the planet who has the passion and the willingness to volunteer can choose a topic they care about and join in .

Emails can be so boring. Next time you have something to say, say it with an eCard. Whether it is "thank you" or "I miss you," AOL greeting cards are the best way to send a message and brighten up the recipient's day. With AOL greeting cards, you can search through our collection of hundreds of cards until you find one that's perfect for you. Just search greeting or eCard to see our new one-click with categories made especially to help you find what you are looking for.

The Olympics are only here for 2 weeks, so don't miss a second of them. Capture all the excitement of the Olympics right in your browser with the AOL 2008 Games toolbar! In hundreds of years of Olympic history, it has never been this easy to keep track of the action. Toolbar buttons provide one-click access to all the most important information, including photos and video. View the schedule of upcoming events right on your toolbar with the "schedule" button.

The Olympics are only here for 2 weeks, so don't miss a second of them. Capture all the excitement of the Olympics right in your browser with the AOL Olympics toolbar! In the hundreds of years of Olympic history, it has never been this easy to keep track of the action. Toolbar buttons provide one-click access to all the most important information, including photos and video. View the schedule of upcoming events right on your toolbar with the "schedule" button.

Are you still flipping through a three-inch thick book of yellow paper when you need a phone number? It's time to ditch that hefty phone book and turn to a better resource. The new AOL Yellow Pages combines access to phone numbers with all the best of AOL's resources. With AOL Yellow Pages, you can find phone numbers, addresses, and the best services in your area just by searching. Every search result will bring you a detailed business page,

Are you still flipping through a three-inch thick book of yellow paper when you need a phone number? It's time to ditch that hefty phone book and turn to a better resource. The new AOL Yellow Pages combines access to phone numbers with all the best of AOL's resources. With AOL Yellow Pages, you can find phone numbers, addresses, and the best services in your area just by searching. Every search result will bring you a detailed business page,

Do you love to stay in the know but hate having to dig around for the latest news and gossip? The new Hot Searches Widget from AOL Search is just what you've been waiting for. Everyday we compile the days hottest searched stories into one easy-access list just for you. All you have to do is download the widget and add it to your desktop or favorite personal page )Facebook, Blogger, Yahoo! and many of your other faves(. Download the widget by clicking "Copy Me." It's free,

Yesterday's earthquake in Southern California was a frightening event for everyone. Even though I am on the east coast and gladly do not worry about those, I was still nervous for my friends and the other AOL employees located in California. Thankfully no one was hurt and there was no major damage. The event got me thinking about what emergency actions we need to take when earthquakes and other disasters strike, besides running to stand in the door frame.

Yesterday's earthquake in Southern California was a frightening event for everyone. Even though I am on the east coast and gladly do not worry about those, I was still afraid for my friends and the other AOL employees located in California. Thankfully no one was hurt and there was no major damage. The event got me thinking about what emergency actions we need to take when earthquakes and other disasters strike, besides running to stand in the door frame.

You don't have to cruise the Internet for driving information every time you want to cruise in your car. With the Mapquest toolbar, all the information you need is right on your web browser. Whether you use Internet Explorer or Firefox, the Mapquest toolbar provides one-click access to their most popular features, including gas prices, traffic conditions, and driving directions. Say you are planning a road trip,

We all love searching the Internet for today's headlines, hot gossip, interesting stories, funny videos, and more. Here at AOL we love searching so much that we dedicated a whole page to what users are searching for now and what they will want to search for in the future. The AOL Hot Searches blog is the only spot that you can see the most popular searches of the day. Every day we look at which news, celebrity gossip, events, sports,

Filed under: New , Shameless Self Promotion , Mobile Search Just like drivers of the Bugatti Veyron , iPhone[TM] users want to surf the Internet using the best ride they can find. So today we're pleased to unveil in beta AOL)R( Mobile Search for the iPhone. AOL Mobile Search optimized for the iPhone is an extraordinary search engine that's finely crafted to allow users of this brilliant device to get Better Answers, Faster[TM].

Filed under: New , Shameless Self Promotion What do AOL users search for? Check out this year's hottest searches! We break down the list to reveal the top searched politicians, celebrities, news, athletes and more. We also added some fun categories, such as top searched accidental celebrities )I'm very upset that Sanjaya is not the number one searched accidental celebrity!(. Plus, our friends at Truveo put together top video searches,

Filed under: Search Tips Thanksgiving is definitely my favorite holiday. I get to eat a lot without making any excuses and I don't have to worry about buying presents for the event or trying to stay awake when the ball drops at midnight. This year, I'll be hosting Thanksgiving and the pressure is on! First of all, hosting a dinner party is a rare occasion for me since I don't cook much. Secondly, I'll be feeding eight people and my dining table only seats four people.

Oh yes, it is that time again ... time for the fall TV premieres. It seems like there are so many shows on this season, it is hard to keep up! I also moved and have not had time to purchase a new Tivo; therefore I have to maintain a rigorous TV schedule in order to keep up with things. Being as I do not have time to watch ALL of the shows that I am interested in every week, I can always search for them!

Filed under: New , Shameless Self Promotion DMOZ just launched new blog! You can find it on http://blog.dmoz.org . According to Bob Keating, Managing Editor of DMOZ, the blog will be used to communicate authentic messages about DMOZ, highlight its enhancements, allow editors to showcase their categories, recruit new editors and get comments from DMOZ users. Check out his full post . Personally, I'm ecstatic with the launch of the new blog!

The Little Team that Could. That is how I will remember AOL Search kickball team from 2007. We named the team Ball Go Far! ... now the ball did not always go far when I was kicking it, but most of the time it did. This summer over 20 AOL Searchers came out to weekly kickball games and gave it their all. Now, we may not have always won and the weather may not have always been entirely favorable, but it was certainly a good time. Ball Go Far!