www.itowler.com - Ian's Home on the web

Well after a few days, I have some of the site put back together.  The main reason for the update to the site was to update the software that the site runs on.  The site used to run on a CMS called Xoops, and I wanted to switch it over to Drupal.  I wanted to make the switch for several reasons, but mostly I am becoming more comfortable with the Drupal way of doing things.  In addition I felt that the Xoops platform was not moving forward with progress. 

So as you may have noticed, things at Itowler.com have changed.  I am in the middle of changing around the software that Itowler.com runs on, and for the next few weeks, things will be changing a lot.  My goal is to get the basic features back up soon, and then play around with the look and feel of the site after that.  Hopefully by the end of the week, the blog posts will all be back, and the a few other things as well.  The picture gallery, I still need to figure out how I want to do that.

I have not been as active as I would like (nothing new there) about keeping this up to date, but such as life.

Book Review:

The name of the book is Imperial Life in the Emerald City : Inside Iraq’s Greenzone, by Rajiv Chandrasekaran. The book was published in 2006, and was a New York Times Book Review, Best Book of the year. The main focus of the book is the Coalition Provisional Authority (CPA) and the reconstruction of Iraq. As the Baghdad bureau chief for the Washington Post, Chandrasekaran has probably spent more time in U.S.-occupied Iraq than any other American journalist. The book is narrated from Chandrasekaran’s point of view, and it is an interesting one because Chandrasekaran has been in Iraq for such a long period of time, he is able to interact with the local Iraqis and gain their insight about the reconstruction.

I knew I was not doing so great about posting, but WOW I am really behind. I looked today to see how far behind I was, and realized that I had not posted anything for 55 days. Whoops. Things have been busy, but not that busy. I need to get more posted up here, and will try to “Catch up” in the next couple of weeks. I should have written 22 posts by the end of May, and As it stands I have only written 11, So I am a little behind.

If you spend any amount of time reading about personal finance on the internet, you will eventually find a common thread about what to do.

• First, stop the bleeding. This means stop using your credit cards.
• The second thing is to establish an emergency fund. Most places advocate an emergency fund of $500-$2000 dollars, with $1000 dollars being the most commonly recommended.

End of the quarter Review :

Well 3 months have passed since the start of the year, which means that it is time to do an end of the quarter review. I am going to see how I am doing on the goals that I established at the start of the year.

Last week I talked about VINE, a research tool for those doing research in Indiana. In the post I mentioned that I had found several Towler Obituaries and a few Hoffman’s. Using the information that I gathered in VINE, I sent away for copies of each of the obituaries. One of the Obituaries that I sent for was the Obit of Mrs. Mary Hoffman.

About a week ago, I was surfing the Internet, looking at some Indiana Genealogy sites. Indiana, along with Kentucky, and Virginia are areas that I have done the most research in. Looking at my family tree, my previous 4-5 generations all have solid roots in Indiana, on both my Mothers side and my Fathers side. While surfing I somehow managed to find my way to the Indiana State Library webpage. I have been to the site before, and I have had a little bit of success, but not a tremendous amount. I generally have a little better luck at the Individual County or City Library pages. This time while making my way through the Indiana State Library page, I found a new resource named VINE, that should be helpful. VINE stands for Vital Information Exchange, and appears that the intent is to make a single point to search for multiple types of records. The VINE project overview page states:

Book Review (#2)

All The Money in the World, How the Forbes 400 Make And Spend Their Fortunes.

Written by Peter W. Bernstein and Annalyn Swan, this book examines members of the Forbes 400 list. The Forbes 400 list has been compiled every year since 1982 as a list of the 400 richest Americans. The list is published by the Forbes Magazine, and was the idea of Malcom Forbes, who was a firm believer in Wealth building. The list is based on the personal fortune of its members. The list has attracted attention since its inception, and some of those who have been named in the list have even sued Forbes, wanting to keep the extent of their wealth private. In 1982 you needed around 75 million dollars to make the list, in 2007 you will need to be a billionaire. The book is pretty well written and flows nicely. At times it can be a little dry, but all in all it was a pleasant read.