Month: April 2016

Crankypantsing

Strong Unrecommend

Shelly

I thought I’d be clever and clear my browser history. I navigate from the address bar a lot, and sometimes the drop-down menu gets cluttered. No big deal, right? But when I cleared my browser history, Firefox got hung up. I eventually force-quit the program, via task manager.

Huge mistake. When I restarted Firefox, it wouldn’t start in regular mode. Safe mode worked fine, but starting in regular mode made the program freeze before it even got to the start screen. Force quitting made n error message pop up. There was something wrong with the add-on container. A web search indicated it might be a Flash problem, but I was unable to fix it. One of our tech support people found a work-around. He created a new user profile, which seems to be working. So far, so good, at least.

Tech support is willing to do a little maintenance for Firefox, but if it breaks too badly, we are told to use Chrome instead. I really don’t want to use Chrome. I have a “one service from Google” policy, and that one service is Gmail.

I hope I don’t run into the same problem on my own machine. If I do, though, I’ll just switch to Opera. Opera isn’t supported at work, though. Hmf.

So, I strongly unrecommend doing what I did, whatever the hell I did.

Pets, Photography

Budget Solutions

Shelly

Wheat Paste #wheatpaste #craftycrap #problemsolvingonabudget

Finished! I covered the bottoms of the patio windows with tissue paper adhered with wheat paste. This will block the dog from seeing and reacting to everything that walks by, which will hopefully help her rest her injured psoas. Total cost of six sheet

With Frances injured again (AGAIN!), it’s clear that some things need to permanently change. One of the things that has to change is that she can no longer have any access to getting on the furniture. She hasn’t got any sense, and she’ll see or hear things that require her attention RIGHTTHISMINUTE, and launch herself off the couch like a little black torpedo. Not good for a dog with bad joints. So no couch.

I also needed to find a way to block her line of sight to the back field, so she doesn’t react to every thing that moves out there. I priced static cling window film, but it was going to be around US$50 to cover just the lower portion. That’s ridiculous. I have tissue paper on hand, though, and wheat paste is cheap and easy to make, so that’s what I used. It worked great! If I do it again, though, I would use much less wheat flour. The paste was awfully thick, and it doesn’t need to be, for my purposes. I also wouldn’t add the flour to already boiling water. That creates an unholy mess of lumps that then need to be strained out. Instead, I’d mix the flour and water, whisk it until it’s smooth, and then cook it.

I’m happy with the finished product, though. It looks decent, it was easy to do, and the total cost was about 10 cents.

Genealogy

Poverty Relief Loan to Walter Baskwell 26 Apr 1841

Shelly

Ireland, Poverty Relief Loans 1821-1874
Ireland, Poverty Relief Loans 1821-1874
26 Apr 1841 loan 859 to Walter Baskwell, farmer, Lukane
witnesses Owen Moran, farmer, Curvey and John Basquill, farmer, Lukane

This comes from a comment on the last post. I don’t know who this Walter is. I suspect he’s the brother of “my” Michael, as he’s living in Lukane (Lackaun), which is the townland where Michael and his siblings were born. There is no way to prove that, though, at least not yet.

Confusing matters is the fact that there are two Walters who were born about the same time, in the same area. Cousins, maybe? One married Anne Kelly, emigrated to Stockport, England before the 1861 census, and died there in 1886. The other married Annie McFall and emigrated to New Zealand.

So which Walter took out the loan?

It’s also possible that both Walters, with wives named Anne/Annie, were living in the same area of Ireland, then the same area of England, at the same time. It could be Patrick and Mary Giles/Mary Scahill all over again!

I thought I’d blogged about that mess, but I can’t find the post. Maybe I dreamed it? The short story is that there were two Patrick Basquills who emigrated to England. One married Mary Giles, and the other Mary Scahill (sometimes spelled Cahill). If you are researching Patrick Basquills living in Stockport, England in the late 1800s, you need to be very careful. Otherwise you might find yourself conflating the families of Patrick the bricklayer and Patrick the hatter. Patrick the bricklayer married Mary Giles. Patrick the hatter married Mary Scahill. Patrick the bricklayer was the son of James Basquill and Mary Holland. I’m not sure who Patrick the hatter’s parents were, but most of the Ancestry trees I see him in have his parents as Patrick Basquill and Catherine Moore. I don’t think that’s correct, though, because as far as I can tell, their Patrick married a woman named Margaret Moore (strange coincidence, but they happen).

Anyway, it’s possible that some of the English census records I’d assumed belonged to Walter and Anne Kelly actually belong to Walter and Annie McFall. I need to look more closely at the information I have, to see if I can tell if there are shenanigans going on.

Pets, Photography

Piglet Sleeping on My Flannel

Shelly

Piglet sleeping on my flannel #cats #tuxedocats #caturday

It’s a lazy Saturday with much Netflixing. I just realized Piglet, sleeping on the couch behind me. He rarely does that. And he’s got his head on my flannel.

I would have gladly strangled the horrid little brat this morning. He was at his naughtiest. But then he goes and makes himself sweet and adorable and all is forgiven.