NIU

blog about banking

Posted by Stacy on Wednesday, August 27, 2008 10:04 AM

Surfing the web can be a lot of fun. Most of the time I am online doing something for school and then for fun on a whim, I will look up something funny or go on you tube, or something like that. Well the other day, my friend and I were working together and we decided that it would be fun to have a party so we found a party planning blog at www.partyplanningthoughts.com. On this site, we found a lot of really fun ideas for parties. Sometimes our best information comes from those who have tried things before us, or people in the industry. That is what makes the internet so interesting. Lots of information that you could never access before is now right here at your fingertips. Just type in anything like for instance blog about banking. And there you go you are at www.bankingthoughts.com reading someones take about what is going on in the industry. It is amazing because you don't even know who they are or where they are, just whether or not you want to hear what they have to say. And with all the hub bub about the real estate market, if you want to know more just go to google and type in real estate market blog and there you are at www.homemarketthoughts.com reading all about the ins and outs of the market. Really I don't think at this stage in the game that there is anything or any information that you can't find somewhere out here on the web. Look at me, I am a nobody, but you are listening to what I have to say, and isn't that interesting. Maybe not so interesting but did you ever wonder what the person looks like, what part of the world they are in, are they old or young, fat or skinny. Many people communicate with strangers all the time on the internet, I however don't. I really don't want to talk to total strangers, and have honestly made a few web friends by accident, but not by meeting them in chat rooms or online dating services or anything like that. I for the most part need that face to face interaction with other human beings and therefore I find texting and IMing less than satisfying, but for some people it is there primary form of communication. I wonder if someday, due to all the technology if people will stop speaking all together. Kinda freaky huh?

blog about debt

Posted by Stacy on Wednesday, August 27, 2008 9:52 AM

I have recently become inspired to begin blogging about finances. There is a lot of information out there on the web about all kinds of great savings and financial advice and blogging has become a very popular method of sharing ideas and information with complete and total strangers and I really enjoying hearing other people's take on things. I find it helpful and I also find that it helps if we all feel that we are together, especially in our endeavors to stretch the dollar. I have read quite a few blogs that I have found very helpful for instance just the other day I was reading this very informative financial blog at www.thoughtsonfinance.com. This blog has a great article on it that tells about ways that you can save money on gasoline, which includes some really helpful things like making sure your tires have plenty of air in them, which honestly I hadn't even thought of until I read it. Sometimes you actually know the information, but still somehow you overlook some of the obvious things that you can do to save money.

With finances on the brain, I began to think about debt and what I could really do to take some positive steps in improving my financial situation and one of the big things that I came up with was finding a way to get out of debt. I found some great information on this blog about debt, that included information about saving money in addition to ways to pay down your debt and improve your credit score. This blog at www.thoughtsondebt.com has some very helpful information and is a really great site. I can't wait to see what else they post on here.

I check back often on blogs that I find helpful, because with blogs, usually the person posts on them pretty regularly and I like to see what information they give me next. Now granted some blogs are not really worth my time. I mean some people just really want to rant and rave without any solutions. I really like the blogs that have a positive spin on them, with actions that you can take to improve your life. After all if all I wanted to hear was ranting about the price of things I could just listen to myself and other whine all the time.

free antivirus

Posted by Stacy on Friday, August 22, 2008 8:10 PM

My husband is always looking for ways to keep our computer safe. It seems to be a bit of an obsession with him, and he is very careful about which sites he goes on and what information they are putting into our computer. Honestly, he gets upset anytime it seems to him that the computer is going slower, as he knows that means that he needs to run another Free Antivirus scan on it. He did purchase more information on antivirus related issues and they told him that buying some spyware software would help. Then I found out that you could get free spyware and virus removal online, and he was really mad. He can be very cheap, however, he really does want our computer to keep running quickly and he can't stand it when he can't access a page or it takes a really long time.

He works overnights and when he comes home if he thinks the computer is not running just the way it should be, he runs a scan. I wouldn't mind it so much if it didn't take a half hour to an hour to run one. He gets upset if I shut down the scan midstream. He says that he needs to get the viruses and spyware out everyday to not only keep the computer running well, but to also prevent us from having our personal information stolen.

Lately, even with the free scans the computer is still running slower than he would like, and it is saying that we are running out of memory. I think it is because of all the pictures that I have stored and never take to the store to get printed up. I tried one of those USB memory sticks, but it would only hold about 3 of my picture files. I am really hoping that once I get my pictures out of the memory that the computer starts running better, because otherwise he is going to pay to have our computer cleaned out and get some memory added to it. He priced this service locally and they want about $200.00 for the process, but I think that it will probably be worth it since our computer is a nice one with a Pentium processor and I really don't want him to go out for a new computer because I know he will buy something cheap. That is just his nature.

web design

Posted by Stacy on Friday, August 22, 2008 9:11 AM

When I first started up my own website, I hired a local woman to do my web design. I guess she did an okay job, but I really didn't know much about it. I mean it looked good, but I didn't realize how awesome a governement website could be. After a year or so I was tired of looking at the same old site, and I really wanted a change. A friend of mine suggested this person they done some business with in the past. They were located in Sydney and so I thought I would give web design sydney style a try. Well I was so impressed with the work they did, the site looked fantastic. I was so impressed with how professional everything looked and it was so highly functional. What I didn't realize that the package that I purchased was all inclusive. It included a full range of search engine optimisation features as well as some other services so with this company, so not only did I get an awesome looking site, but more traffic to boot. Well, needless to say I was thrilled and in honor of the friend who referred me to this company, I threw a little dinner in his honor. It was a surprise, but I invited a few mutual friends and it turned out really nice. After a night of dining, Tom came back to my place for a night cap. We reminisced about old times, we had known each other for years, and to my surprise we had an evening full of romance. I had never seen Tom in that light before and was not really sure at what point my feelings for him had changed. As he was leaving, he confessed that he had been in love with me for years, but the opportunity had never really presented itself to let me know. With that we kissed and he left vowing to call me in the morning. The funny thing is that all these years we had been friends, and I never knew that he had those type of feelings for me, and quite honestly, I never had those feelings for him, until that night. I am really glad I planned that dinner in his honor. It was a blessing in disguise.

blog about health

Posted by Stacy on Wednesday, August 20, 2008 8:32 AM

Honestly, I have just recently learned about blogging. In a summer class that I took at school they were talking all about communication and how today communication has taken on such a new and interesting form. Lately there is no one who can't become a writer and have their thoughts heard or should I say read on the web. We were told that we needed to find and read three different sets of blogs that were not written by celebrities or stars, just average people with ideas and opinions about the world, and then we needed to take some of their ideas and start a blog of our own. Well, I got online and first tried to find a travel industry blog. I have always been interested in traveling, and have even written some of my best papers about my traveling experiences. I found a neat little blog site called www.travelersthoughts.com. This person has a lot of good information about travel and seems to have traveled a lot, even more than I have so that was cool. I really found it interesting and then I really couldn't think about anything else to research so I decided to try and find a blog about health and I did at www.thoughtsonhealth.com. Again some very interesting stuff, but not anything I could really write about myself. I did however like the writing style of this particular writer. Then since I have been thinking a lot about switching my car insurance lately I decided to see if I could find an insurance blog. I didn't find it at first, but I eventually came across www.insuredthoughts.com. This person had some really good insight into the insurance industry and some really good advice. The one thing I learned about the blogging, however, was that in order to be really good at it, the topic had to really be something that you had a lot of knowledge about and compassion for. I decided that I would write my blog about animals, since that is where my passion lies. I completed my first blog and found myself typing up 2 more before the class that Tuesday. When I got to class I was asked about which blogs I read and what I wrote on. Many people wrote about the things that they read in other blogs. The instructor asked me how I got animals from the blogs that I read, and I of course told him that the one common thread in the blogs that I read was the passion and knowledge that all the bloggers had, and I thought I had better have the same about my own blog. Needless to say, he was impressed with my insight.

party supplies

Posted by Stacy on Thursday, August 14, 2008 1:47 PM

With only three weeks till the semester starts, every in our house is getting ready to make this an epic year for all of us. We're all of course going to be very busy getting the best grades we possibly can while working towards our respective degrees, and we're planning some slamming parties. We just moved in to our new house last week so we're sort of busy right now just making sure that we get all of our stuff in before the semester begin and we don't have any time to do anything but relax and study. That's why we are trying to do so much all at once.

The first week of class we're planning our first party which is going to be a themed luau party. I got the idea this summer when I went to Hawaii for a week to see my parents who live over there. They moved right after I graduated from high school and have lived there in apartments since until their new house gets finished. I brought back a bunch of party supplies and had some things shipped to make the party a little more authentic than all the other island themed parties I am sure you will see this fall. The only difference between my party and a real Hawaiian luau will probably be the rave music I have planned for later in the night. I will be the DJ and also the distributor of the glow sticks and glow necklaces. These two elements combined into one party are going to make this one of the greatest parties I have every thrown.

At the moment though I am personally making sure that all of our musical equipment is set up and that our basement is our personal music studio. Last year we played so much that we have all gathered together to buy ourselves a full music set up and a good recording program. We hopefully will have a bunch of the songs we wrote last year done so that we can play around town by the middle of the fall or by the spring. The DJ gig at my party is going to be practice for a bunch of clubs dates I have set up on the weekends this fall around town. I hope I can seel you all either at the party or at one of my gigs at some point.

bad credit mortgage

Posted by Stacy on Thursday, August 14, 2008 8:48 AM

If you are like many people out there who make it all the way through college without ever considering your finances or worrying about your credit, you are probably going to eventually run in to a little bit of trouble. Finances and debt are something that every college has, but probably the last thing on many of their minds aside from paying for the basics and the leisure activities. Eventually though, most of us are going to want to make some kind of a financial step beyond simply trying to pay back our loans and not get put out on the street. Because we are in college I can assume that we all place some kind of value on having a career that is both fulfilling to us as well as financially rewarding. It may also be safe to assume that most of us do not want to live as renters for the rest of our lives, but actually seek to have some sort of significant financial and material independence. Aspiration such as buying a house and buying a car cannot be done unless we have some kind of financial stability aside from our debt, or we have some kind of alternative option.

There are some people who, though they may pay attention to their finances quite closely, still manage to find themselves in a position of having a bad credit rating. For these people, the options out there can seem a bit limiting and quite sparse to non existent. Luckily for these people we live in a society where if there is a demand then there is some way to make your dreams happen. There are a few companies out there who offer mortgage loans for people with bad credit. A bad credit mortgage can save the option of home loans for people with poor credit. These are options that allow for something a bit more long term than it would for people with good credit, but it is an option that may be impossible otherwise.

There is hope for people out there who need it if you are of the latter group, but it is definitely easier if you just start thinking about your credit and finances as early as possible.

sonoma wine tours

Posted by Stacy on Thursday, August 14, 2008 8:42 AM

Planning a wedding and a honeymoon can be very stressful. I am so looking forward to my wedding, but I am also looking forward to the end of all the planning. What to wear, who sits where, what kind of flowers, cake, meal, it all can be very overwhelming. Fortunately for me my soon to be husband is a wonderful help and has been by my side through all the planning and decision making. I really want everything to be perfect and his response to me is as long as I am getting to marry you, then nothing can be more perfect. I really love him for that. Most of the arrangements are done, but we have yet to decide on our honeymoon. We are both a little concerned about traveling overseas. We are not sure how American's will be treated in the different regions of the world, so we have definitely decided to stay in the US. My fiancee loves wine tours and I love the beach, so we are thinking about a 3 week honeymoon in California. We will spend sometime seeing all the touristy things, you know LA and shopping on Rodeo Drive (well, maybe window shopping LOL) and going on a few Sonoma wine tours. We will end our honeymoon out with a week on the beach, so we get some unwinding in before our return to the rat race.

We agree this will be a best of both worlds vacation, a compromise, our first of many in this marriage. We are both really looking forward to married life and spending more time together. We have already picked out and bought the perfect house, nothing elaborate, just the right size for our starting out phase, room for a kid or 2 if we choose. Neither of us is in a big rush for kids, but we both would like to have a few kids some day. We want to secure our relationship and the finances of our lives before bringing kids into the picture. We have a few friends who have gotten married and had kids right away, and it seems to be a lot of stress on a new marriage. We will enjoy spending time together as grownups first, and then a few years from now, maybe add a baby. I guess we will take that part of it a step at a time.

payday loans

Posted by Stacy on Wednesday, August 13, 2008 12:31 PM

Sometimes people in this world, of all ages and creeds like to have themselves a lot of fun. I don't think that this is a secret to anyone. At the same time though, responsibility for things that may have happened or money they may have spent is equally as universal. Every kind of person is capable of going a little bit overboard in one way or another at some point in their lives and that's the truth. In this country though we have things in place where if people need help recovering from those types of unintended consequences then they have somewhere to turn when it's needed. Short of legal issues, there are corporations out there that are designed to be your safety net we something goes terribly wrong.

In any event of short funds, a person has options such as things known as payday loans. These are basically little income supplements designed to keep your head above water until you can get to your own sort of financial stability. There are many different kinds of payday loans that are each meant to suit different kinds of needs. There are things called free payday loans which may be used in the event that you can ensure a quick turnover of the funds on your end. These are quite strict I believe and so are only meant if you have a good way of coming up with the proper compensation.

There are also loans known as no fax payday loans in which you just pay online and enter in your information without having to go through the hassle of faxing information to the office. I think that this helps a lot of people out there because many people never own a fax machine and thus would cancel themselves out of the process anyway. These loans are great for those people who want the money electronically sent so that they may just turn the money over in an automated billing payments system. This saves people time and energy that would have been wasted on traveling to the office and then to wherever they would have to pay said bill.

All of the types mentioned are just a great source of relief for those in short term financial binds.

california treatment center

Posted by Stacy on Tuesday, August 12, 2008 9:24 PM

I have just finished my paper that should solidify for me and A in my summer course that is finished as of tomorrow at two. I have to hand in this paper today and then I have my final tomorrow which I think I will just knock out of the park because I know the material so well. The class is a counseling education program designed to be a very in depth look at the inner workings of the world of drug treatment programs. It is probably the most in death class I have taken quite yet that has actually centered around programs and not just theory. For the class we had to do projects like building up treatments plans and daily schedules for a character sketch we were each given.

The paper that I just finished was a research project about a California treatment center in which I was assigned to explore their style of treatment. For this project the research was probably the hardest because I basically had to do it all by corresponding with counselors inside of the program who are of course very busy with their work. I did get all of my information though and it turned in to a wonderful paper which I think bears a lot of merit in what kind of work I want to do after I graduate. The center specialized is drug treatment for men and I know this is what I want to do. I am all about equal sexual rights but I know that treatment for abuse and substance issue seems to work a lot better and a lot faster when it is with a similar gender group.

In my correspondence with the counselors at the center I also got some great references and numbers to call if I ever need a job. I think that this is one of those projects that college is meant to provide which increases our knowledge of a topic while also giving us a way to explore what we're interested in working with. It is opportunities like this that really keep me excited about the next assignments I get each week in all my classes.