Month: June 2008
Wild Columbine
Mulligan, Please?
The Universe really shouldn’t make it difficult for me to get to work, because I might just take it as an invitation to turn around and go home. Between the elevators being out of commission and the escalators turned off, I had a hell of a time getting to the 3rd floor. And it does not help that I dislocated my kneecap and tore a ligament in my knee! Six weeks ago! It was just starting to get to the point where I could walk without it hurting or popping, so of course, I tripped over the goddamn cat last night and injured it all over again. Just in time to hike up two flights of escalator steps (you know, the extra tall ones?).
I can has do-over?
Overheard
I just got back from the cafeteria, and the guy in line in front of me asked the cashier, “Where’s the salt?” What I want to know is, what on earth is he going to use it on? He had a box o’ chicken nuggets and an order of waffle fries from Chik-fil-a. Surely, neither of those things needs additional salt?!!!
The Silver Lining
Not a very big one, mind you, but there were a couple of good things to come out of yesterday’s blogular melt-town. First, I finally got around to cleaning out the blogroll. Second, I fixed the stupid paragraph spacing. That’s been bugging me the whole time I’ve been using this template.
In other news, it looks like Mr. Upstairs really is on his way out. One of his bedroom blinds has been up for the past week (I’ve never seen any of them open before), and it occurred to me that his lights haven’t been on when I’ve left for work (also unheard of). He’s definitely been AWOL. And then, he was back again last weekend, loading more stuff into his car. Now he’s gone again.
There’s all of that, but I also talked to Across the Hall Neighbor, who works for the property management company. The woman who runs the office told her that Mr. Upstairs hasn’t turned in his lease renewal form. Now, they send those out about a month (or a few days, as I found out last summer) before your lease is up. If you want to stay, you sign it and turn it in by the deadline. If you don’t turn in the form, you lose your lease. Meaning, you don’t have to give notice; you just move out by the final date and that’s that.
Crankypantsing about Crankypantsing
One of the blogs I occasionally read is by a woman who really, really, really does not like tourists mucking up her lovely city. Having lived in a tourist town (albeit much smaller than San Francisco!), I know that it can get old, being surrounded by people who are unconnected and who don’t belong there. And in our case, people who would wander into our house, thinking it was a shop.
So, I can sympathize. Really. What I don’t understand is that she, herself, travels all the time. She’s always posting about going here or there, or about her travel plans for her next week off. Doesn’t that strike you as a bit hypocritical? I mean, she’s a tourist herself, and here she is griping about tourists. And I can guarantee you, her impact as a tourist on the small towns she visits is much greater than that of the folks who swarm San Francisco is on her.
In other news, there’s a vulnerability in the version of WordPress I’ve got installed on my blog. I’ve been reluctant to upgrade, because of all the hell I went through with having to reinstall Coppermine. I’ve noticed, though, that my blog is loading very slowly. I assumed it one of my web host’s periodic slow-downs, but apparently not. I looked, and someone hacked my blog account and loaded a bunch of code into my template. It was easy to nuke, and is running nice and fast now, but I guess this means it’s time to upgrade to a more secure version.
Fingers crossed! I’m downloading a back-up, in case things go ‘splodey. I won’t be able to reinstall from the back-up, but at least I won’t entirely lose 3 years worth of journaling, either.
The Error Has Gone
And so have my blogroll and my categories. Um, yay. But at least what is here seems to be working properly. And the category section, while hosed, actually does work. I just have to come to terms with the fact that nothing I’ve written over the past three and a half years will be sortable.
Errors
I has them. Or, my blog does. I upgraded WordPress this morning, which I’ve been putting off. After the fiasco I had with Coppermine going ‘splodey and the lack of help in fixing it, I just didn’t want to invite myself to an encore performance. Ugh.
So, first, my whole blog was hosed. Nice. I reinstalled from a back-up, and it’s working, except for the obvious errors. Apparently WordPress 2.3x doesn’t have the same structure as older versions, so it handles things like post categories and links differently.
And that’s about all I know. The actual posts are there, and comments seem to be working. I haven’t checked to see if there are errors when you try to comment. I don’t need to make myself feel any more stabby than I already do.
All this, because my blog was hacked and there was a bunch of code inserted into my footer template. It was making everything load slooooowly. I removed it, then decided I’d better upgrade. Silly me!
Today’s Findings
It’s more of a singular finding, actually, than a findings. I may have misunderstood, but I thought Estelle Hoover (grandma’s grandmother) was paralyzed later in life (polio?). Not so! Whatever happened to her occurred at a young age, because she was listed in the 1880 census as being paralyzed. She would have been about seven years old in 1880.
Other than that, I’ve been cleaning up census info and trying to fill in some of the gaps as I come across them, which is why I saw the reference to Estelle being paralyzed.
Something else I turned up, which might be something and might be nothing. The 1870 census lists a Henry Hoover married to a Tallula, with a son named Adolphus. I’ve been assuming that this is Estelle’s family. The names are uncommon and the ages and locations match. I wouldn’t have thought twice about it, if it hadn’t been for the fact that Henry’s occupation is listed as a physician. I don’t think that can be correct. If it’s not, then the enumerator made a mistake, Henry or Tallula lied, or it’s not the same family after all.
1870 US Census, lines 86-88
I just think it’s unlikely that Henry, who is listed as a dairyman in the 1880 census, a peddler the 1889-1890 Atlanta directory, and a repairman in the 1900 census, could have been a physician in 1870. I mean, I realize that doctors weren’t quite the same thing back then as they are now, but that’s a pretty big stretch even so. On he other hand, that would have been right after the Civil War. If he’d fought in the war, who knows what sort of position he held? He might have actually been trained as a doctor or medic, then not stayed with it after the war.
Horse Skull
One of my mom’s friends is a sculptor. When I was up there a few weeks ago, we went to her studio so I could meet her, look at her work, and take photos of some of her horse bones.
I’m working with a kit lens, which isn’t great in low light, even with the aperture wide open. Then again, it might have helped if I’d remembered to boost the ISO. Duh! At 200 indoors, I’m lucky anything turned out.
red paper boat 