Fun stuff -- word related or not, ramblings, junk, whatever.

[2cute]

Tried to send a private message but got this

Screen Shot 2023-02-08 at 10.18.35 PM.png


haven't figured out how to fix this. Tried checking the box for private messages, but still got this message.

Yep, I've gotten that too. I just ignored it as when I contacted admin it didn't change. I just chatted via this section instead.


For while now periodically I get this strange message ...

WT weirdness p4 Notifications I can't view 05.21.22.png
When I click a link from my notifications. Hello, If I'm not allowed to view it why are you sending me the link? Duh.


and this goodie ...

WT weirdness pt1 05.22.png
You & minus one others (-1 others) posted to my subscription. Hmm ... Minus one, does that mean someone (or a few people) deleted their post(s)?

[Naboka]

Tried to send a private message but got this

Screen Shot 2023-02-08 at 10.18.35 PM.png


haven't figured out how to fix this. Tried checking the box for private messages, but still got this message.

[crazykate]

Genealogy is fun, particularly now that so many records are available online. My grandparents started doing genealogy when they retired, and they actually had to go to the towns where their ancestors were from and look through the records there, which was less convenient, particularly if people didn't just marry people from the same parish for several generations in a row. Now that most records are available online, I can just click through without driving from one place to the next within office hours. I'm also lucky that in Austria continuous records started being kept in all parishes after the 30 years war, and although not everything is legible, I have managed to trace some of my ancestry lines back to the mid-1600s.

[JedMedGrey]

Check to see if you can use Ancestry and other databases and services through your library. We used to be able to access Ancestry from home, but now can only do so in the library. There are other services available from home, such as Consumer Reports.

[Nylimb]

My grandmother & father both used the term "he's the son of the second cousin twice removed". For the longest time I didn't understand what that meant. Now I do. Twice removed means from the person you are related or 2 generations. Now second cousin also means 2 generations. So this cousin is actually 4 generations 'removed' from your related relative. So he's your fourth cousin. I too have fourth, fifth & even sixth cousins that I know. Each generation is a number. I too always hated those terms. Why not just say he's your fourth cousin?

That's not how I understand these terms. I think the standard usage is that someone is your first cousin if you share a grandparent, your second cousin if you share a great-grandparent, your third cousin if you share a great-great-grandparent, and so on. A child of your n-th cousin is called your "n-th cousin once removed". A grandchild of your n-th cousin is your "n-th cousin twice removed", and so on. And that works in reverse too: an n-th cousin of your parent is also called your "n-th cousin once removed", etc.

So saying that someone is the son of your second cousin twice removed is non-standard. That person is either the son of a grandchild of your second cousin, in which case he's your second cousin thrice removed, or he's the son of a second cousin of your grandparent, in which case he's your third cousin once removed.

There's a "cousin calculator" chart at https://www.familysearch.org/en/blog/cousin-chart that explains how this works.

[2cute]

I am from a small town, and my mother often said that we were related to everyone. I doubted that, and she proved it to me once. The thing was, only she knew all the relationships. She still knows them, too -- even though she sometimes says her son is her (deceased) brother when she's at the nursing home and can't recognize herself in pictures, she can rattle off stuff like "he's the son of the second cousin twice removed", and I have utterly no idea what any of that means. My mother is, to be kind, "addled". She's 96 years old, and by chance lives across the hall from her daughter-in-law's mother who is 93 and simply old. Neither of them know the relationship and no one's going to tell them. My mother wouldn't remember anyway. Her short-term memory is almost gone entirely. And yet she retains this incredible store of relationships. Everything else is scrambled but the family history remains. She thinks I did things her father did or my father did, and my younger brother is tied somehow to her younger brother, but that genealogy stuff remains. I'm leaving out the stuff about the dinosaurs she saw (in detail, it's almost convincing). It's oddly fascinating to see how a mind disintegrates, but I don't want to observe it very closely.

My grandmother & father both used the term "he's the son of the second cousin twice removed". For the longest time I didn't understand what that meant. Now I do. Twice removed means from the person you are related or 2 generations. Now second cousin also means 2 generations. So this cousin is actually 4 generations 'removed' from your related relative. So he's your fourth cousin. I too have fourth, fifth & even sixth cousins that I know. Each generation is a number. I too always hated those terms. Why not just say he's your fourth cousin?

One thing I wish I had done when these relatives were alive, was have them draw the family tree. Yes yes, I know you can join Ancestry & do the work yourself (& suck up all your free time in the process), yet since they know the lineage, why not get their version of it. Its so much easier to understand when its written down in branches or tree form rather than using terms like twice removed.

[bwt1213]

I am from a small town, and my mother often said that we were related to everyone. I doubted that, and she proved it to me once. The thing was, only she knew all the relationships. She still knows them, too -- even though she sometimes says her son is her (deceased) brother when she's at the nursing home and can't recognize herself in pictures, she can rattle off stuff like "he's the son of the second cousin twice removed", and I have utterly no idea what any of that means. My mother is, to be kind, "addled". She's 96 years old, and by chance lives across the hall from her daughter-in-law's mother who is 93 and simply old. Neither of them know the relationship and no one's going to tell them. My mother wouldn't remember anyway. Her short-term memory is almost gone entirely. And yet she retains this incredible store of relationships. Everything else is scrambled but the family history remains. She thinks I did things her father did or my father did, and my younger brother is tied somehow to her younger brother, but that genealogy stuff remains. I'm leaving out the stuff about the dinosaurs she saw (in detail, it's almost convincing). It's oddly fascinating to see how a mind disintegrates, but I don't want to observe it very closely.

[crazykate]

That happens to me when I go to family funerals or reunions. They all know me & I have no clue who they are. They all live near each other & I, farther away so I only see them every 10 years or longer. I do alot of smiling & nodding & try to figure out how the heck we're related.

My husband is from a small town where everyone knows each other, but he's bad with names. So when we're there together, people will greet us and talk to us, and when I later ask my husband, "so who was that?" He'll say something like "uh I think she's friends with my mum but I can't remember her name" or something like that.
Now that wouldn't be so bad, but in the 15+ years I've known him, I've made some friends there and play in a church band on Sundays and sometimes take our kids to see their grandparents at times when hubby is busy or sick and can't come with, so I'm sometimes in his town on my own, and everyone knows me and I have no idea who they are because I've never been properly introduced, but they don't realise that.

[2cute]

Floppers...when she posts, the board lights up.

You deserve a radiant filter for your posts.

As for the wife and I keeping each other: good plan.

Can't go anywhere in this very large suburban town without her knowing someone. Sometimes when I'm out by myself, people will stop and talk with me enthusiastically--and I have no clue as to who they are. The burden of being someone's social addendum.

That happens to me when I go to family funerals or reunions. They all know me & I have no clue who they are. They all live near each other & I, farther away so I only see them every 10 years or longer. I do alot of smiling & nodding & try to figure out how the heck we're related.

[Naboka]

Im a '67 baby, and weirdly, that resonates with me. (also, strangely admiring (not jealous, but wistful) that that is something that you and your wife share. Now that I think about it, it makes me happy, that should be celebrated! ) I think you and your wife should keep each other!

Floppers...when she posts, the board lights up.

You deserve a radiant filter for your posts.

As for the wife and I keeping each other: good plan.

Can't go anywhere in this very large suburban town without her knowing someone. Sometimes when I'm out by myself, people will stop and talk with me enthusiastically--and I have no clue as to who they are. The burden of being someone's social addendum.

[floppers]

Im a '67 baby, and weirdly, that resonates with me. (also, strangely admiring (not jealous, but wistful) that that is something that you and your wife share. Now that I think about it, it makes me happy, that should be celebrated! ) I think you and your wife should keep each other!

[Naboka]

Whenever the clock hits certain numbers my wife and I get excited, point to the time and share the moment. Like this morning when it was 11:11 while we were playing wordle.

Just a thing we do.

Kind of fun.

Saw this average score and...

average score 666.777.png
Sometimes it's just the little things that make life cuddly.

And then, like clockwork...

Screen Shot 2023-01-14 at 4.17.08 PM.png

[floppers]

I love that!
You also described the feeling perfectly, like the meaning of life was revealed... I remember when I made my second person, my heart was already full with my first, and I was worried about whether my love would be divided up now there'd be two of them... But as soon as baby no 2 arrived, it felt like a new dimension opened up and I had twice as much love to give. It's also why I'm not getting into a "favourite child" debate, because it feels like I love each of them 100% of their own pocket dimension. (That made no sense, did it?)

That made perfect sense! I'm very much liking the dimension analogy, and particularly pocket dimesions! bwt1213, hearing that the feeling is universal is very encouraging. Good luck with becoming a great grandad, and as for being overly prideful, we are supposed to fail at that, it's our job!

One of my relatives is a great believer in pride coming before the fall, but in this instance it's irrational to think that us being proud of the people we made, they people the people we made, made, and the people that might be made by the people that the people we made, made, could somehow lead to a fall. The same relative refuses to watch the football team that she supports, or her own offspring playing sports because she believe her prescence makes them lose..she was taken aback when I told her that I thought it amazingly egotistical for her to think that her prescence would have such an effect of all the players on each team, and their supporters.

[bwt1213]

I love that!
You also described the feeling perfectly, like the meaning of life was revealed... I remember when I made my second person, my heart was already full with my first, and I was worried about whether my love would be divided up now there'd be two of them... But as soon as baby no 2 arrived, it felt like a new dimension opened up and I had twice as much love to give. It's also why I'm not getting into a "favourite child" debate, because it feels like I love each of them 100% of their own pocket dimension. (That made no sense, did it?)

It makes perfect sense to me, and I'm not even your sex. It's how I see both of my daughters. Perhaps it's universal!

[bwt1213]

I am still hoping I live long enough for the elder grandson (now 25 years old) to produce a great grandson. It would probably please my wife more than me, but it would please me immensely. The grandson in question is living with his girlfriend who is approximately a year from her PhD, while he has put his studies on hold and is working full-time to make that degree happen. He needs (Spike, your attention is requested) two courses to get his BS in mathematics, and would then immediately start on his MA in the same subject. I think, however, that I might have a great grandson from the younger grandson earlier. That one just signed a national letter of intent to play college baseball, and he has very nice young women throwing themselves at him as moths to a flame. If I didn't think the women in question were so thoroughly good I might have a problem. I'm trying hard not to be overly prideful and probably failing.