This is a test of the Windows Live Writer blogging tool. Please disregard.
Oct 27
If you look through my previous posts you will notice a lot of extraneous characters scattered about haphazardly. This happened after my website was hacked. I first thought it might be a further hack but it turns out it is a result of my site having been moved to a newer server, with theoretically greater security, after the hack was corrected. I think it is a problem with the character set on the old server databases vs. the new one.
I will be looking into fixing the problem if it continues, but if it disappears from now on I will probably just ignore the old posts. They are readable.
Oct 24
Last week I experienced something that all web page owners dread. My website, timepage.org, was hacked.Â
I only noticed it because some of the formatting suddenly became garbled. I didn’t see any new comments or activity. When I went into the web files I saw that most of them had long bits of random spam inserted into the code.  I, being the strong logical person that I am, immediately panicked and started flailing around the web directories, trying to see if I could figure out some pattern. It soon became apparent that it was a pretty complete graffiti attack.
Eventually I had the web people restore a backup (Thank goodness for those.) and I have been fiddling around with various permissions and file updates all week to get it back to where it was. I think I may be OK now. We’ll see.
The really bad part is the insecurity it has introduced into my computing life. We had a break-in at our house many years ago and I remember how we felt violated and vulnerable for a long time. It seems that way again. They apparently had used a password to gain access. My ISP thinks that they must have got the password off of my personal computer with some kind of virus/malware that I picked up. I can’t find any such application with any of the pile of security applications I know about and have access to.  Very disturbing. I am in the process of removing password caches from my browsers and applications and changing passwords to more secure versions.  Who knows where he got the darn things.
Computers were supposed to make thing easier, remember? When something like this happens, all of the efficiencies you have spent all this time building up go down the toilet. It is really getting harder and harder to have fun on these things.
Oct 05
I was out yesterday and although it was a bright, sunny day, fall was definitely making itself known. The air was crisp. When the wind blew, and it did blow briskly at times, it blew right through you. It is surely that time of year and the calendar is only needed for confirmation.
Since I have retired, I have found myself driven by these seasonal changes more than before. When I was working, it wasn’t nearly as sharp edged as it is now. I was aware of the seasonal metamorphosis, but other than the short days and a lot of driving in the rain, it was happening over there somewhere. Now, as the yard goes into hibernation and the outdoors loses its charm, my whole focus moves indoors. One of the things that seems to then happen is all of my computer projects finally get more time. This blog is only one of those projects but I hope to use it to explore some of the others and hopefully you will see a little more life here in the future.
One thing you can watch is the Cycles tab on the front page. I am going to build a little summary of the generational model of social cycles that forms the basis for the TimePage web site that is my main contribution to the cyber world. Â My draft is coming along but it is still too long for its main purpose. Â And, of course, I am going to keep working on the Family tab. Â That has to be coordinated with my family tree and other genealogical resources so it is a little more complicated.
Sep 17
| Tears of Autumn by Charles McCarry is a spy novel that manages to also be a historical thriller.  The hero of this story is an experienced U. S. undercover agent named Paul Christopher who finds himself caught up in the circumstances surrounding the assassination of President John F. Kennedy.  The story follows his attempts to convince his superiors of his take on the situation leading up to the assassination and obtain the evidence to support his ideas. It is an exciting, quick paced and believable read. The book is well written, well researched, and in the end may have you second guessing your personal beliefs regarding the Kennedy assassination.
This is one of several Paul Christopher books by the author but the first that I have read. The book was good enough that, even though I am not normally a spy novel devote, I would be tempted to read another in the series. |
Jul 25
I have been a little distracted lately. My daughter, and youngest child, got married last weekend and although it has been a wonderful time, with visiting relatives and all of the festivities, it will be good to get back to the humdrum of everyday life. Hopefully you will see a little more activitity here in the future.
Jun 23
Well, I have stepped over a controversial threshold. I received a Kindle for Father’s Day. As a book reader and a technical consumer it may seem like a no brainer but it will still be a difficult commitment. I am old enough that for most of my life information was books. There were no options.  Then when computers came along, although it got pretty fuzzy pretty quickly, you had a choice as to where you wanted to grab your information. I, and I think most of us really, made a choice to accept working with small bits of information on the computer but, when it came to digging into a great amount of written material, we still preferred Ol’ Gutenberg’s book.  There were electronic book programs, and even a couple of e-book reading devices, but they all had the drawback of forcing us to try reading on some form of electronic, pulsating video screen.  I stayed with books.Â
But now there is really an option.  The Kindle display is calm, clear and simple. Easy on the eyes but still with the advantage of word search and annotation. The book files are generally lower priced than their printed counterpart and very easy to download. I did find some that were more expensive than I expected and, actually, I couldn’t find several books ( I think most of them were older books). On the whole, however, there is a great selection. A lot of books are free and, if you get your free books elsewhere, .txt and .doc files can be converted and loaded onto the Kindle. The new Kindle 2 even has a text to voice option.
But I haven’t made up my mind yet. I will have to overcome my loss of the book itself. A proprietary digital file just can’t match up I’m afraid. I will let you know when I have spent enough time to really know. For now, I did buy my first book which, I think we can all agree,  is trully the nature of the beast.
Jun 02
| Just finished The World Without Us by Alan Weisman. It was an interesting idea for a book and generally interesting to read but it seemed a little unorganized to me. The author was trying to imagine the world without people and he approached that question by looking at what people have done to their world and what will become of all of that stuff if they were suddenly gone. I will have to admit that he dug up some pretty amazing examples of human impact, some of which I had never heard of before. He seemed to jump around, however, and didn’t seem to build a general case for his point of view.
I was also hoping to get some sense of why he thought the question itself was a relevant one. Is there some reason to believe that humankind will be moving out of the picture at some point? He hinted at that reasoning but never actually dealt with it, even though there are many signs on the horizon that humanity may be pushing the boundaries on several different fronts. I think it is worth a read but it was a little less enlightening than I had hoped. |
May 23
In an earlier post I hinted that I was thinking about trying to incorporate my Family Tree into the TimePage structure. I have just made my first baby step in that direction. The Family Generations web page lists my family ancestors in relation to the social cycles of U. S. history as set out in the TimePage. As time goes on, and in concert with other updates that I am working on, I will be expanding the scope of this content and integrating it into the timelines.
Apr 18
I have opened a twitter account for the TimePage. It’s name is “takingmytime” and a link to both it and my personal twitter account are on the sidebar. I am planning to use this account specifically to follow leads related to history, genealogical studies and other reference data that might prove useful for my websites. I won’t, therefore, be following everyone who decides to follow “takingmytime”. If you have a twitter account that you think The TimePage should be following, let me know. If not, try my personal twitter account. No conditions there.
“Takingmytime” is also a place where I will be plugging the TimePage by linking to its content and tweeting what is going on there.
