Delightful Templates

I found another site for free Blogger templates tonight. It's called Delightful Dots, and there are a bunch of really nice looking templates available. Each one comes with html and instructions for installing it on your blog. Some of the templates come with matching headers. They're just all really cute, and I'm having a hard time picking a favorite.

Free Credit Report

Image via Wikipedia

If you're like me, you've been hearing that it's now free to get your credit report every year. Before you had to be turned down when you applied for credit, or you had to pay for it. However, no matter how many times I heard that I could get my credit report free, every time I checked a site that offered me that 'free' credit report, it always came with strings attached. Sure, I could get my credit report, if I signed up for a trial of some service or other. I don't know about you, but I don't really consider that free. I mean, it doesn't actually have to cost me anything, but I do have to agree to try something and then remember to cancel before the trial period is up. I just hate getting into things like that.

Today on the local news they mentioned the free credit report again. This time I paid closer attention, and they gave a link to the site where the credit report really is free. No strings. Just free. Just in case you've been distracted, like me, by the seemingly free credit reports with the catchy songs, this is the one you were looking for: AnnualCreditReport.com

The site is sponsored by the nationwide consumer credit reporting companies: Equifax, Experian and TransUnion, and once every 12 months you can request a free credit report from each of them through the site. All three reports do not have to be requested at the same time, so you can request your report from Equifax now, wait 4 months and request your report from Experian, wait 4 months and request from TransUnion, and then repeat the cycle. That way you can keep an eye on your credit reports throughout the year and hopefully catch any discrepancies right away.

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Organize Your Desktop

Is your desktop cluttered with icons? Mine isn't too bad, yet - because I recently had to reinstall Windows, and I'm gradually reinstalling programs as I need them, but I know it can quickly get out of control. That's why I was particularly interested in Fences when I read about it on Lady Banana.

Fences is a free program designed to organize your desktop. You create shaded areas on your desktop and place your icons into them. You can have as many as you want, start with one of the included layouts or just start creating your own. Label them, move them, resize them, and organize your icons by dragging them into the boxes.

The part I really like about Fences is that, when you don't need to see your icons, you just double-click somewhere on the desktop, and all the icons disappear! You can see your wallpaper again! When you need an icon, simply double-click again, and they all appear. It's really fun. Yes, I'm easily amused, what of it? You can exclude individual Fences so that they're always visible even when you hide the others.

If you want to see it in action, there's a decent video on the Fences website showing how it works. I think it's a really neat program that's really easy to use, and I love the idea of getting my desktop organized and hopefully keeping it that way.

So What Does it Mean?

Interesting...

PageRank and Backlinks

I put two of my urls into this PageRank predictor and these are the results:

( www.alwaysbcmom.com )
Present PR : ( 0 ) || Future PR : ( 4.1 ) ~ 4
The PageRank Live-PR and PR-history below...

Yahoo back links: ( 15132 )

Altavista back links: ( 11600 ) Now wait for history records:

www.alwaysbcmom.com PR & BackLink History: Any new or change will be saved and listed here while checking the PR.

Report	G.	Google	Google	Google	DC	DC	DC	DC	DC	DC	SE	SE	SE	SE	SE	SE	SE	SE	SE
Date	PR	BLs	Index	Term	1	2	3	4	5	6	Yahoo	Yahoo	Yahoo	MSN	MSN	MSN	Altavista	Altavista	Altavista
Today	0	266	372	859	0	0	0	0	0	0	BLs	Index	Term	BLs	Index	Term	BLs	Index	Term
2/19/2009	0	266	372	859	0	0	0	0	0	0	15132	2989	3370		2370	105	11600	3020	3370

( www.justgottasharethis.info )
Present PR : ( 1 ) || Future PR : ( 3 ) ~ 3
The PageRank Live-PR and PR-history below...

Yahoo back links: ( 1462 )

Altavista back links: ( 1470 ) Now wait for history records:

www.justgottasharethis.info PR & BackLink History: Any new or change will be saved and listed here while checking the PR.

Report	G.	Google	Google	Google	DC	DC	DC	DC	DC	DC	SE	SE	SE	SE	SE	SE	SE	SE	SE
Date	PR	BLs	Index	Term	1	2	3	4	5	6	Yahoo	Yahoo	Yahoo	MSN	MSN	MSN	Altavista	Altavista	Altavista
Today	1	6	217	282	1	1	1	1	1	1	BLs	Index	Term	BLs	Index	Term	BLs	Index	Term
2/19/2009	1	6	217	282	1	1	1	1	1	1	1462	120	186		42	6	1470	111	183

 

Yes I know that all prediction = guessing, but still, see anything a little weird there?

Make Your Pictures Look Old

I have photo editing software, but I don't always know what I'm doing with it. Sometimes I get a great effect by playing with the filters and effects in the program. Sometimes I don't. Of course, even if my image turns out great, I don't always know how to do it again.

I will be able to make my photos look old any time I want. Not because I figured out all the steps, but because I found this site that does it for me. First, select "English" at the top of the page, unless you read Japanese, that is. Then, all you have to do is select a photo from your computer or the web and click the convert button - and you've got a picture that looks 100 to 150 years old.

Like this:

It really does look old, doesn't it? It even makes the car look old!

No, not really - here's the original:

I think I'm going to have some fun with this site and my Old World Wisconsin photos.


Make your pictures look old. It's fun. It's easy, and it's free.

Online Brainstorming

I just started playing at bubbl.us. It looks like it could be fun and probably useful. It lets you create, save and share mind maps - for FREE.

I captured a screenshot, but then saw that I could embed the sheet in my blog, so I'm trying that: (just drag it around in the window to see or zoom out to see it all)

When I was in college, I knew a few people who took notes in this fashion. I always thought it looked really neat, but never learned to take notes or plan things this way. With this simple web app, I think I might have to give it a try. I'm already thinking it could be a good way to plan and organize a web site. You can even share and collaborate with friends so you can work together on a project.

What kinds of things do you think it would be useful for?

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