Author: Shelly

Genealogy

Apple-Cranberry

Shelly

I stopped at the grocery store on my way home yesterday, against my better judgment. I hate the milk-toilet paper-bread buying frenzy that possesses everyone when a storm hits. But, I needed cat litter, and I figured, if I was going to stop, I should pick up some veggies and rice, too. I wandered through the juice aisle, thinking I’d pick up some V8, when I got distracted by the cranberry juice. I suddenly remembered that I had half a bottle of sour apple vodka at home, and if you can’t drink during an ice storm, when can you drink?

After spending all day test driving GEDCOM-to-HTML converters, I’m completely brain dead, and thankful for my foresight in buying mixer. Aaah! I’m pretty sure that I’ve never, ever had such a damnfine tasty beverage.

As for the GEDCOM-to-HTML converters, ugh. I didn’t find one I liked well enough to fork over money for, and the free ones I tried didn’t make me happy, so I ended up back where I originally started. After making a few spelling corrections and fixing and adding information that some very kind relatives in Ireland sent me, I settled for just exporting the family tree directly from the database I use. I’m not in love with the format of the web pages it creates, but until I find something I like better, I guess that’s what I’ll use. If nothing else, I can be reasonably sure that it won’t convert living flags to dead (oops!). There’s nothing quite like prematurely killing off one’s relatives, eh?

Oh, and it’s still icy out, and not in a remotely pretty way, so I didn’t even try to go out and take photos. I think what that means is that there will be no PotD today.

Oh, andalsotoo! I did get to see the eclipse the other night! The sky cleared up very nicely. It was absolutely beautiful. Harriet wussed out on me after about 15 minutes, so she spent the rest of the time standing inside the patio door, staring disgustedly at me. I think she was convinced that I was up to No Good.

Photography

Roses

Shelly

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My cube neighbor also works part-time at a local grocery store. The floral department there was giving away left-over, past-their-prime roses from Valentine’s Day, so she brought some in to work. They smell amazing. Too often anymore, roses have been bred for blossom longevity, shape, and color at the expense of scent. Not these roses, though.

Genealogy

The Basquills

Shelly

I’ve gotten three e-mails in the last week from family members in Ireland who found my genealogy pages. I’m excited, obviously, but at the same time, it scares the hell out of me. I’ve been ambivalent about this family history project. On the one hand, I want to know, but on the other, gawdalmighty, the responsibility!

So, I’m trying to write an email to a 70 year old great uncle first cousin twice removed (he’s my grandma’s cousin). I’m having some sort of serious social anxiety attack, and it’s not pretty. And when I finish this email, I have to email a third cousin (named Sinead, I kid you not). She’s the great-granddaughter of my great-grandma Nell’s brother. And then there’s another Basquill who contacted me (don’t know how she’s related, but obviously, she is somehow).

Aieee!

Crankypantsing, Photography

Space Planning

Shelly

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Space Planning (NOT TO SCALE!)

Or, an hour spent huffing white board markers.

I am terrible at making diagrams, especially when they’re supposed to be to scale. Somehow, though, I was the one who ended up in charge of the white board.

It occurred to me, about half-way through the meeting, that it would be nice if we had a gridded white board. Wouldn’t that be nifty?

As to why we had to have a meeting and white board diagrams, just so we could move a freaking table down the aisle 10 feet, that will forever remain a mystery to me.