Mike's Place

Yes, it worked! I was able to recover the document, and have ported it into Word. I still have quite a bit of work to do, proof-reading and converting it into a web document. And figure out a good way to display the family trees.

Labels: Geneology

I've dived back into the geneological pool, having created a Facebook group for Maughmers online, and having started friending the assorted Maughmers on Facebook.

I've already gotten a couple questions, including a request for a copy of the original Maughmer book. Unfortunately there isn't any such thing any more, though several years ago I transcribed the text for potential use later (i.e. now).

Unfortunately, the transcription was done with an ancient, ancient program called WordPerfect, which I no longer have. I just downloaded a trial copy for Windows, in hopes it can read the old document, which I can then (hopefully) copy into Word.

Hopefully this'll work. I'd hate to have to transcribe this entire book again.

Labels: Geneology

I'm still working on a better design, than one of the generic templates from Blogger. I'm doing the work locally, so I don't need to keep publishing changes. Eventually, I might even get it done. :) I found a showcase of really nice blog designs, from which I'm hoping to pull an idea or two. I wish I had the artistic talent of some of these people.

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For some time now, I've been toying with morphing this into a general-use Maughmer site for the descendants of Jacob Maughmer. In 1976, my great-grandfather published a family history. Unfortunately there are holes, including just about any useful information about our legendary progenitor, the children born since 1976, and an entire branch of Maughmers in Chillicothe, OH.

As I own the domain (and have for 15 years), I've also been toying with setting up maughmer.com addresses for Maughmers around the country. I need to switch ISPs though, before proceeding with that plan, as I'm not impressed with the company who bought my existing ISP. I'm now looking at Speakeasy.

I did set up a Facebook group for Jacob's descendants, and plan on inviting the assorted Maughmers on that site. We'll see how it goes. I'm not sure how many will react to getting group invites from some random Maughmer they've never heard of. :) In reviewing the list, I did speak with a few of them twelve years ago, when I was doing some geneological research. Unfortunately my job and marathon training kept me very busy at the time, so I shelved the project. My aunt, however, has been busy continuing her grandfather's research over the intervening twelve years.

Toby's pestering me for a walk, so I'll continue this later. :)

Labels: Facebook, Geneology, Toby

Heard on Countdown this evening...

Representative Michele Bachmann (R-Minn) apparently finds it "interesting" that the last time the United States experienced a swine flu epidemic was in 1976, under the leadership of another Democratic president -- Jimmy Carter. Who, by the way, didn't take office until January 20th, 1977.

Ms. Bachman has apparently also been appointed to some Republican committee on energy. Regarding carbon dioxide, she had this to say...

"...there isn't even one study that can be produced that shows carbon dioxide is a harmful gas. There isn't one such study because carbon dioxide is not a harmful gas, it is a harmless gas. Carbon dioxide is natural. It is not harmful."

My suggestion to Ms. Bachmann: Read more.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carbon_dioxide#Toxicity

In general, I love the suggestion that if it's natural, it's harmless. Like funnel web spiders. And botulinum. And Elizabeth Bathory.

Labels: Politics

Some formatting done, more remains. Unfortunately, none of my archives are currently available. Some new company took over my old web hosting company, and rearranged their directory structure. So, Blogger is no longer writing my files to the correct location when I make an update. Looks like I may need to handle it manually (sigh).

Not all that happy with this format, for the simple reason that sidebars on the left tend to make the site display improperly on mobile devices (such as iPhone). Need to pick a different format, with the sidebar back on the right. Will probably just tweak this one, rather than pick one of the other Blogger templates.

Need also to remove some of the extraneous spacing, and add a Twitter feed.

Labels: Blogger, iPhone, Twitter

I decided to switch to a simpler format for my blog. I'm making some changes, and the prior layout was a bit of a PITA. This new format should more easily allow me to add tweets to my site.

Labels: Twitter

Caught a brief whiff of skunk off Toby last night. Ugh, every now and then it resurfaces. The vet said it could take a few months to go away completely. I read one person's account on the interwebs, saying it took two years for the skunk smell to dissipate completely from from their dog. It seems mostly to reappear when he gets wet, or when he's curled up in a ball, sleeping, thus heating the affected area.

Labels: Skunk, Toby

I'm tweeting now, with automatic updates to Facebook. Need to figure out a way to also update my blog.

Labels: Twitter