Hot and Hot On The Trail

Pretty hot for us up here in the Mitten State.  70+ humidity makes 97 degrees feel like 100+, as if 97 wasn't a killer temperature!!

I am feeling very lethargic and in no mood to get out and drive in my car whose A/C doesn't want to work properly.  

I don't know how the people across the street stand it!  The biggest house on this street and they have no A/C!  They only close the windows when it rains.  

With all the money they have, it's not like they can't afford it.

We aren't going to get a break until next Tuesday.  I don't know how you people down south can stand the heat and humidity the way you do.

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I did not go to the Old School Gal Pals lunch today.  One reason being, it is at least a 50 minute drive and with the A/C in the car not working properly, I'd probably faint and end up in a ditch somewhere never to be found again!  Plus, still a bit iffy with the digestive problems, which today seemed to be clearing up or at least changing into a bit of normalcy.  We can only hope.

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I need to get out and to the store.  The food situation in meager.  Of course, food is unimportant, but...when the Pepsi gets low--that crisis will drive me out into the heat.

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I used my new Norwex cloth's the other day.  Oh. My!  Some kind of little miracles.  I wet the one with just plain tap water, wrung it out, wiped down my bathroom mirror and then used the purple one to dry with.  I had toothpaste on that mirror and water spots and it came out shining!  Even with Windex and paper towels, I usually have to go back over it to get rid of all the streaks.

So the, I cleaned glass in a picture frame, same result and then one of my big windows.  I am amazed!!  It took me half the time and only went over it once and no streaks and the glass just shines.

I don't understand how you can use just water and it gets everything off the glass.  When you are done, you just hang them up by the little straps on the inside and use them again and again and.........  They can be laundered, when they get dirty.

You can use the blue cloth on anything--counter tops, fridge, etc.  The purple one is only for drying windows.  Microfiber and supposed to last a lifetime.

Considering how short my lifetime will be, I guess I need to bequeath them to my sister!

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I am waiting impatiently for my couch and chair to arrive.  4-6 weeks is a really long time.  Kind of like the last 6 weeks of pregnancy?  You know how long that feels.  Right?  My carpet is two weeks old, so maybe by August I will have my furniture?

In the meantime, I am in the final stages of my last genealogy.  Printing out the books and then will take them to the Print Shop to have them bound and they will be ready.  

I am kind of disappointed.  My client wanted me to find out something about some of her ancestor's.  No matter where I looked, Google, Census searches, Ancestry, on and on, I could not find proof of what she wanted.  

This rarely happens, but sometimes, other family  members, from years ago, have marked some of their information as "Private" and there is no way to access that.  I tried sending an e-mail to one with the same last name, who had some of the "Private" records, but they never responded.  I don't know why people do this.  Something in what they've found they don't want anyone else to see.  Plain nuts!!  It's not like their last name was Hilter!!

Oh well.  I can only do what I can do.  Of course, if I were able, I could get in my car and drive to the places where they were born and lived and snoop around, but.....................

People sometimes have the wrong idea about genealogy.  They are afraid that bad stories or things are going to show up.  That is not the case.  Occasionally, there will be a written report about the early founders of a certain area, or an obituary that shows what the person was like, but most of what I find are the dates and where they were born, married, died and the cemetery they are in.  Searching all of that, hoping their parents names will be listed so I can go up, one more generation.

Up, up, up I go.  Hoping to make it to the very top of their family tree.  

I love it!  I love the mundane searching!  I love seeing how far I can get up the tree and what I find.  

So many young women died as young mothers.  So many families, with lots of children, had three or four of the little ones die.  That always tugs at my heart, but that is why, those early families had lots of children.  They knew, some of their children might not make it to adulthood.

It is fascinating---at least to me.

Mind Over Matter

I feel kind of sorry for Dar.  She had a minor car accident the end of April.  There was hardly any noticeable damage to her car, but something in the impact has thrown her entire body out of whack and she is in constant pain.

She is on her 3rd medical doctor.  Her 2nd medical physical therapist and her first orthopaedic surgeon.

None of them can agree with what is wrong with her.

She was going to physical therapy and they were working on her neck.  Come to find out, that was making her neck and spine worse.

The medical therapist pulled her out of that therapy clinic and is sending her to another one--one where the medical therapist knows the owner.  Of course, that physical therapy clinic is nearly 20 miles away.

Her medical doctor referred her to a pain clinic and she had a bad reaction to the Depo-Medrol (Cortisone).  

She has had x-rays (cracked ribs and cracked sternum), CAT scans (stenosis in her neck and her spine is crooked), yesterday she had the EMG--there is severe nerve blockages in her neck and all down her arms and wrist.

Her whole body is in a state of inflammation, but because she is on a blood thinner, she can't take an anti-inflammatory.  That could cause bleeding in her stomach.  

She brought all her records over for me to look at and her referrals and what is to be done.

I think the part that made me the saddest, on each report/referral/prescription, it states in red lettering:  Guarded:  Anxiety Disorder. Hysteronics.

I don't think she even has noticed that or doesn't realize what it means.  With that notice on her records, when they "tweak" her and she screams out in pain, "they" think she is just being over dramatic and the pain is "all in her head".  The pain is exacerbated by her mental state.  And perhaps it is.

Her car had one small dent in her back bumper and the front grill was damaged.  That's all!  How could she have been hurt so badly?
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Pammie called me Sunday.  A few of her high school classmates were getting together and they invited her to join them.  Pammie is like her Momma--the first instinct is to make up an excuse of why she can't make it.  BUT--she went!!!!!!!!  AND she had a wonderful time!!!!!!!!

What was really funny, one of her friends asked her, "How is your Mother doing?"

Pam answered, "Okay, I guess.  Why?"

And her friend said, "Well, she fell!  I read about it on Face Book.  (The girl is on my friends list.)

So Pammie asked me, "How ARE you doing?"

"Scrapped up and bruised, but I'm fine!"

Pammie said, "I guess I'm going to have to look at my Face Book so I know what's going on.  I only open it to play games on my phone."

HAH!
Just "shows to go ya"--if they called more often, to check on their Momma, they'd know what is going on.  HAH!

Tonight Madeleine stopped in to bring me some magical towels that Karen has and bought for me.  Gosh--it was wonderful to see Maddie.  She is as brown as a berry from her two months in Guatemala.

These towels are made by Norwex and all you do is use them and plain water to clean windows/mirrors and the glass just shines!  I can't wait to try them out tomorrow!!!  Karen said that it normally takes her three hours to do the inside windows on the main floor and when she used these towels, she got it done in 90 minutes and the windows look better than they ever have.
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I am getting close to finishing up the genealogy for my client.  Probably 8 more hours of work and then I will be ready to print it out.  

The end of the week--Thursday through Saturday, we are going to be under the Heat Dome, like much of the States, so I will be in my Cave with the A/C running.

Catch ya later!!

Jude

You Are Only As Safe As You Think You Are

Ms. Sally, my blogging buddy, posed the question, "Is there any place safe to live nowadays?"

It sure doesn't seem like it.  We even have Road Rage incidents here in this upscale County.  The demographics here are 0.76% African American, 3.57% Asian and 0.51% Hispanic.  I know I sound racist, but I credit those stats with the peace and calm and relative non-crime in this area.

I thought, 8 years ago, that with a Black President, he would help unify the races.  Instead, it feels to me, that all he has done in that regard is make them feel empowered to misbehave.  Like they think they can get away with anything.  I heard him speak at the funerals in Dallas.  All he did was make a political statement.  I didn't hear many words of comfort for the families who were suffering!
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I still know of a much safer place to live then even here.  It is a little town of 1,200 people called Byron, Michigan.  The last crime committed there was a would be bank robber who rode up to the bank on his pedal bike, passed a note, got about $5,000.00 and was caught and arrested before he got five miles outta town.  A guy heard and saw him and called other men in town.  While one guy followed him, the other guys got the Constable, who was home eating lunch, and they all took off after him, keeping in contact on their cell phones.  He was headed back toward Pontiac!  (About 50 miles away.)

All around this little town are farms and residential areas--no sub-divisions, just homes--built on what used to be farms, mostly on still gravel roads.  

Out where I lived, the only time the County Sheriff is called is when someone hits a deer and they have to have the Deputy come out to make out a report so their car insurance company will pay to fix the damages.

Dar told me she'd be scared to live out there because, "Someone could break in, rape and kill you and no one would hear your screams."  I asked her, "Who do you think would break in?"  "Anyone!", she replied.

So I pondered, "Do you honestly think some bad guy is going to drive forty miles out here from Flint or Lansing, and just happen to pick your house to break into?  Think of all the houses he would have driven by and then...just happen to pick yours.  Nonsense!"  She's a City Girl, so she doesn't understand how much safer it is to live in the country.

There has only been one killing out there, where I used to live, as long as I can remember.  That was an old farmer neighbor who found out he had Stage 4 cancer, so he shot himself.  It was tragic, but we all kind of understood why he did it.

Honest!  The only people who would break into your house, would be another neighbor and......none of them would do that sort of thing.  If they did?  It wouldn't be too hard to follow his truck tracks right to his house.  LOL
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So--we have had a lovely cool weekend here.  Heat and humidity rolling in this evening, so I have the A/C running.  Supposed to get up to 97-99 by Friday.  We'll all be trapped in our homes when that happens.

The diarrhea has lessened.  I did hear there was a digestive bad buggie going around.  I was suppose to go up north to Karen's cottage with her, Madeleine, my sister and Chuck this weekend, but had to cancel because of the diarrhea.  I'd hate to be out on the Pontoon boat and need a bathroom!!!!!!

Now, it only occurs every couple of hours, when I go to pee.  I expel gas and out comes some small pieces of digested food.  YUCK!!  I know, too much information!!!
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My cat Buddy decided today to do something he hardly ever does.  Yak up a fur ball.  Right in the middle of the new carpeting.  Talk about yucky!!!!  I cleaned it up best I could, without gagging and luckily, I have special carpeting spot remover.  Worked like a charm, but I'm ticked off about it anyway.  DANG ANIMALS!!!!!!!!!
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Boy!  Did I have a time this weekend.  Put in about five hours on the climb up the family tree branches.  I found lots of background on my client's grandfather.  So interesting and going back generation after generation.  He had gone to a prestigious college, was in the Men's Glee Club and the Rowing Team--I even found a photo of the handsome man.

Something tickled at the back of my mind though.  His name was the same and his wife, but---every report said he was born in 1903 and she in 1915.  I wondered why he'd marry someone 12 years younger.  Of course that happens, but......something just didn't feel right.

I didn't have his birth date, so I e-mailed my client and she had it.  He was born in 1915!!!  Well, I knew he hadn't been in college in 1924!  So I had to go into my record area and "kill" him off and all his ancestor's.  I also deducted the 5 hours it took me to find the incorrect information.  It was MY fault, my client doesn't pay for mis-information on my part!

Somebody STUPID uploaded their Family information to Ancestry.com and it was incorrect!!  That's okay.  It was a reminder to pay attention to my intuitions and make sure I have the right people!
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Time to get off here, play a few Face Book games and hit the sack! 

Have a great week.  Be watchful.  Be careful.  Be safe.  You never know where the next crazy will strike!!! 

I May Fall, but I ALWAYS Get Back Up!!

Thursday:I have had diarrhea for 6 days!  Another reason to stay close to home.  I Googled and read and either I have Colon cancer, or not enough fiber and healthy bacteria in my diet.  Assuming, the way I eat, I opted for adding fiber and probiotics to my daily intake.  

Friday--today:  I think I may have IBS.  Taking the probiotics has helped actually.  Still--this is not normal for my usually constipated self--although, there have been times in the last year or so that I have had bouts of diarrhea.

YES!  I know!  I should go to the doc, but the first thing he suggest is a colonoscopy and those things scare me.  No--not the prep, I'm having that sort of thing right now.  No--not the thought of being put under--I LOVE Fentanyl or Versed.  I had a friend die from a colonoscopy.  "They" pierced his colon and didn't realize it, until a few days later when he was full of peritonitis infection and died.  My sister also had a problem.  So--what to do.  What to do?
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I fell again last night.  Had the same kind of episode I did a couple of months ago.  11:30 last night, I turned off my computer and my desk lamp, grabbed my Diet Pepsi and headed out to go to bed.  I took about 3 steps and I could feel it coming.  I tried to set the Pepsi down on my desk, but my eyes were all googley and the desk wasn't where it looked like it was, so I dropped the Pepsi and then, down I went.  I grabbed for the chair, which tipped over, which caused the box fan sitting on top of the chair to crash and quite a few other things came crashing.  I wondered to myself, "What is all that noise?"

It's like a 2 second black-out.  I don't faint--I just get disoriented and lose all feeling in my legs and down I go.  The chair fell on top of me and the box fan fell on my legs.  I hit my bad left shoulder and fell on my right hip--I don't know how I did that, but my left elbow was scraped and bleeding and my right hip felt really bad.

I laid there for a moment to make sure none of my parts were broken and then had the hard job of getting up off the floor.  I couldn't break a hip as they are both metal, but I thought perhaps I had dislodged the right one--but, nope I was okay.  

I ache all over today, but at least I didn't hit my head.  I wish I had waited until I got into the living room.  I would have had a nice soft cushion with that new carpeting.

NO!  I do not need to go to the doc for this!  I have been to a neurologist.  It is caused by my blood pressure dropping when I stand up too quick and move too fast.  Also there is a problem with my optic nerves. If I have been doing close work--computer or reading or knitting, when I stand up, my eyes don't adjust right away and I get very light headed.  I am supposed to take off my glasses, look at something far away to readjust my eyes, move my legs up and down to get my BP up and THEN I can stand up and walk.  

Other than that, I am working on genealogy--trying to restrict myself to 4 hours a day because, I tend to sit here and get so involved that hours pass and then I really do get googley eyed from the strain and concentration.

The hot weather and high humidity broke last night, so today was an all windows open and door open kind of day.  We will be like this until late Sunday and then the temps and humidity start to soar again and next weeks weather radar map shows a big red glob hanging over Michigan.  The "Dome of Hell" one forecaster called it.

I used .8 gas units last month so was told my the gas company, not to pay this month.  On the other hand, my electricity bill was up from last year and I owe more than my budget payment.  We never get ahead, do we?

I need to go buy food one of these days, if I think my intestinal system will allow me to be away from the bathroom for a couple of hours!  Right now, I am eating bananas, and cheese and crackers and drinking protein drinks.

It could be colon cancer, although no one in my near or distant family has ever had that, or any cancer in my ancestral tree, for that matter, but I suppose I could be the first.  If it keeps up, I will go and get checked--other tests first though, before a colonoscopy.  

Message From the Cave of the Clan Hunter

It has been hot and humid, so this person has not gone outside in 3 days!  When John stopped in last night, I hadn't yet unlocked the door from when I went to bed on Monday night!

I am the Clan Hunter, staying hidden in my air conditioned cave and spent nearly 6 hours today trying to figure out a "clan" who seemed to want to name all their descendants, William.

4 generations of  father's naming their sons, William.  I had that in my own family:  Conradt named his son Peter, who named his son Conrad, who named his son Peter.  You just want to scream!!

Searching for the youngest William and up pops all sorts of stuff about him.  I get all excited and copy it out and then realize, it isn't him, it's his grand father, or father, or even--Great grand father.  The only saving grace is they each had wives with different names.  :-)

Writing it down in the "book" can be a real trial.  When I head the page with, "Your 7th Great Grand Parents were,"  I gotta make sure it is THE 7th great grand parents--not the 8th or the 6th.  Which happened today.  Had the 5th great grand parents stats and photos of their grave markers and all, and then realized, all the info was really the 6th great grand parents.

"ARGGH"!  i said, right out loud, and then inserted a blank page, moved that info down, and back to enter the info for the 5th great grand parents.

While searching and messing around, I DID find a lot of interesting stuff about the 8th Great Grand Father of my clients surname.  He was the 1st immigrant to the new world and helped settle the area and make a new town.  

This is fascinating shit stuff, my friends!
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This morning, 10:30, just as I was immersed in William's and concentrating really hard, lost in history, I heard a knock and someone trying to open my locked front door.

Dar and Daddy.  ARGGH!  Well, Daddy was interesting to talk with--after Dar stopped trying to answer all the questions I asked HIM.  He and I reminisced about WWII, rationing, living, etc.  He may be 95, but Dar wasn't even born yet, so she had no clue, but a few years older than her, I remembered a lot.  I loved that!!!

Daddy has been running Dar ragged.  He insisted that "they" clean out her shed and found 15 cans of old paint.  She is all in a panic on how to get rid of it because her brother told her it was illegal to put it in the garbage for pick-up.

"That's just BS!" exclaimed Daddy.

"It sure is!"  I retorted.  "Put a couple of cans in each of your garbage pails each week and they will take it."

Daddy also insists they go out for breakfast, 8:00am every morning, lunch at 1:00, and then every evening, out for an ice cream sundae.  Every time I look out the window, I see them driving either in or out of the driveway.  HAH!

He has called to make an appointment to have her two decks power-washed and then "Her and I are going to paint them.  They look like crap!"

She thought it was stressful with her son and two grand kids living there, and they kept to themselves so she rarely saw them, Daddy is going to put her over the edge!

"Daddy!  You're going to kill me!"  she said.

"We gotta get this stuff done.  I don't have time to waste!"

Finally!

Saturday afternoon--cleared out 

Sunday, mid morning, Aaron

arrives to rip it up.

Sunday night

Monday morning- 10:00, 

Kevin arrives to put the new down

Putting down the padding

Best pad I could buy, if it feels this

soft, what is it going to feel like

when the carpet is down!

Carpet down and being stretched 

and trimmed.

None of that nasty metal strip

between rooms! 

I love a man that knows 

how to vacuum! 

WOW!  It IS the right color! 

Both cats walked around the whole perimeter

of the living room and then discussed it.

They acted kind of fearful of it.

Got my tree branch back up. 

Finally, after three weeks,

putting it back together. 

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I want to thank all of you--for your support and encouragement.  I was afraid I'd get scolded, "You can't afford to buy food and your getting new paint job and carpeting?"

Well, this didn't come out of my monthly budget.  This came from helping Chris with her knitting and crocheting designs, and from every time one of my kids, or sister gave me $$ for my birthday or Christmas.  From every pop bottle I returned. Some of my neighbors even gave me their pop bottles to return, because they knew I was saving up.

For my genealogy clients--you are looking at what I did with YOUR money. LOL  

All of that, I put away in a jar.  Sometimes I had to dip into that jar for car repairs, but I kept stashing.  

2.5 years later?  I feel like a real person, not some poor, old woman on welfare!

My house is so neat and clean--at least the living room is.  LOL  Inch by inch.

Now, I'm still stashing for my media center/electric fireplace and hopefully, next summer I can get this nasty room painted and new carpet put down--or at least, painted.

The good Lord willing, and I stay well and keep working--when I "kick", the kids will have a (nicer) place to sell!  

A Big Surprise!!

So, how much did your Medical Medigap Supplemental insurance go up?  Here in Michigan, our Blue Cross insurance has had some sort of contract with the State not to raise prices.  That contract has now run out and mine went from $40.42 a month, up to $142.00 a month!  Dar's. John's and Merle and Pearl's went up also.

Thankfully, if I can prove that I have less than $17,000.00 a year, mine will stay at $40.42.  I will have no problem proving that!  I have $14,500.00 a year.  It seems nowadays, you gotta be well-off, or really poor to be able to live a decent life.  Those in the middle seem to get hit hard.  Remember when the middle class was a comfortable way of life?
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So, Attorney General,  Loretta Lynch and Bill Clinton just happened to meet in her private plane for a talk about Grandchildren, and yesterday she says the DOJ will bring no charges against Hillary?  Even though FBI Director Comey told of the many infractions Hillary made with her e-mails?  Then they showed clips of where she denied it all and clips of what Comey said.  It was sickening to see her look straight in the reporters face and lie like that.  How can she be President, and be privy to all sorts of classified information, and keep it secure, if she couldn't do it as Secretary of State?    

I forced myself to sit down and watch a half hour Live Trump rally in Ohio.  I didn't make it for the half hour.  I barely made it for 20 minutes.  He is by far one of the crudest, nauseating, man I have ever seen running for the Presidency!

What a sad state our Country is in to have these two as our choice for the highest office in this land!  The last 8 years have dragged us down near the edge of the pit, I fear the next 4 years will dump us into the bottom of the pit.  AND--we can do nothing about it!
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IT HAPPENED TODAY AT 4:26 pm.  Something I have always wondered if it might happen.

The genealogy I did for Awkward Widow and the one I am working on now for Dawn, I found a common Great Grand Father.  Awkward Widows 11th Great Grand Father and Dawn's 8th Great Grand Father.  Each one descended from a different child of Sea Captain GILES HAMLIN!!!!

The 1st Hamlin immigrant to American, settling down in Middletown, Connecticut!

I am telling you!  This absolutely freaked me out!!  When I saw his name pop up, I knew it sounded familiar and when I searched, there was his cemetery and the fact he had been born in England and all his children's names.  The same photos I had in Awkward Widow's genealogy book.  I just started shaking!!

So, there ya go, Awkward Widow/JB and Dawn, you are like 9th or 10th cousins or something.  LOL

How would it happen in a million years that I would just happen to do a genealogy for each of them--not knowing them, only from this blog?

SPOOKY!!!!!!!!!  

The old "Six Degrees of Separation" !