PHP setting of datetime field in CCK through Rules, How to stop continuous updates?
Thanks to Clive's help, I determined the problem was with the field type. There were several similar seeming Date/Time field types available to use, I was using one called "datetime". I switched to another one called "datestamp" and the datestamp field retained its original value after refreshing. I guess the "datetime" field is designed to always return the current datetime value of now(). Thanks for helping me work through this friend!