From the Archives - Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy. What sort of genealogist am I?

Ten years ago on this day in 2011 I penned the following post which I am resahring here. I don't think I have changed much. 

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Randy Seaver's latest edition of Saturday Night Fun reminded me of a post that I wanted to go back and read. Because I forgot to star it in my RSS reader I had trouble finding it. Thanks to Randy for directing me to The Stardust and Roots Blog where I found  "Sears Catalog of Genealogists".

In this humourous post Bart Brenner categorises genealogists. I had a few chuckles as I read through the post and worked out where I and my GeniMates belonged. I encourage other genies to read, enjoy and reflect on this post.

The categories Bart listed were:

1)  Albert Einstein model (the academician)
2)  Marian the Librarian model (the archivist)
3)  Indiana Jones model (the archaeologist)
4)  Margaret Mead model (the cultural anthropologist)
5)  Frank Buck model (the hunter and tamer)
6)  Amelia Earhart model (the test pilot)
7)  Ambrose Monk model (the hoarder)
8)  Cinderella model (the fairy princess)
9)  Steve Jobs model (the technogeek)

I imagine that others would share the difficulty I had in filing myself neatly into one of Bart's boxes. I am affected by the environment and my moods so my approach on a particular day will vary according to these influences.

I am significantly a Steve Jobs model with a big touch of Margaret Mead. My messy overcrowded house indicates I have a strong dose of Ambrose Monk in my makeup.

How about you?

Genealife in lockdown - Robbed

Genimate Alex Daw over at the Family Tree Frog blog has challenged fellow geneabloggers to write about their lock down experiences in a series of blog posts on Sundays during National Family History Month in Australia.

See what Alex has to say about the challenge here:
https://familytreefrog.blogspot.com/2021/07/genealife-in-lockdown-nfhm-blogging.html

This is my fifth and final post for the challenge.

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In last week's post I wrote that I was both physically and emotionally grounded, I neglected to say that I am frustrated. I am angry with Covid19 that has robbed me of nearly two precious years of my life. I have a lot of mileage on my clock and I want to make full use of the time I have left. Covid19 has robbed me of many opportunities to share in the lives of those near and dear to me and to fully enjoy my twilight years with my dear husband.

Adding to my frustration are the actions of a minority of our fellow citizens. During lockdown these fools, because of their selfishness and/or stupidity, flout the rules that are in place to keep us safe and progress towards coming out of lockdown. While protesting about their lack of freedom they are robbing those of us in the majority of our freedoms. These thieves are a blight on our society.

Angry and Frustrated

Meanwhile I am cruising along in the cosy and comfortable environment of my home prison doing some of the things I always do. 

Pleased my prison is more Hilton than the Hanoi Hilton (pictured)

The beauty of this situation is that I have extra time on my hands. I have been reviewing genealogy research done years ago, chasing down DNA connections, learning Airtable, updating my personal blog and generally organising my Geneastuff. And then there is Zoom!

Geneastuff

I didn't realise how busy my pre-Covid life was until I started tidying up my digital photo albums and adding meta-data to the photos that record family activities.  I spent a lot of time with family. With 21 close family members there are always plenty of occasions to celebrate birthdays, Christmas, Easter, Mother's Day and Father's Day.  I was a busy old girl.

We managed a 2021 Easter Hunt in between Lockdowns

While I enjoy spending time in my beautiful home environment I am missing out on many opportunities to travel. I feel that I am just marking time until Mr GeniAus and I can spread our wings and leave our cosy nest. How we will ever manage to empty our bucket list while we are still healthy enough to travel far and wide?  While I enjoy the virtual travels in my daily Facebook memories I still have a bad case of itchy feet.  I am grateful that Covid gave me time to recover from my ankle surgery in January last year. My surgeon told me it would take 18 months for my foot to recover from that trauma  - well that time's up and I'm ready to get moving.

My ugly tourist sandals want to come out of retirement

Wearing my optimist hat I see a few more months of pain and marking time followed by a slow return to the new normal. Later in 2022 I can see Mr GeniAus and I on the tarmac in Sydney settled in a Qantas jet as we toast our next adventure.

Ready for takeoff

Cheers to Alex and the fellow genies who have shared their thoughts and stories in this challenge.

From the Archives - Between the covers

This post first appeared on the GeniAus blog on 25 August 2011. We have subsequently visited the cousin on several trips to the UK, whenever we visit he usually gives us an item or two from his Gowans collection. That's Genearosity.

Genealife in Lockdown - Grounded

Genimate Alex Daw over at the Family Tree Frog blog has challenged fellow geneabloggers to write about their lock down experiences in a series of blog posts on Sundays during National Family History Month in Australia.

See what Alex has to say about the challenge here: 
https://familytreefrog.blogspot.com/2021/07/genealife-in-lockdown-nfhm-blogging.html 

This is my fourth post in for the challenge.

Patience pays off

My subscription to MyHeritage ran out a couple of months ago. I usually cancel the automatic renewal of subscription option because I don't want to pay the full price to renew. Within a couple of days I was phoned by a pushy marketer from Israel offering me a piddly discount off the full price of the $AU349 to renew. This has been followed up over the intervening weeks with several emails offering other smallish discounts. On the last occasion my renewal was due I hung out for a discount of around 50% before I renewed. I renew when the price represents reasonable value to me.

I only use MyHeritage for DNA Matches and Searching for Records. I totally ignore the other features like photo enhancement and others' online trees. Without a subscription I can still see my DNA matches and access from home the subscriptions from a genealogy society and public library to which I belong to explore the records on MyHeritage. 

A full subscription of MyHeritage is not worth $AU349 to me. It is a nice to have but not a must have subscription. Recently there was a discount of around 50% offered to Rootsmagic users which I was going to take up but I missed the closing date. Currently there is a discount offer of  around 50% through the Family History Federation which I have been considering.

I like to have a basic tree on MyHeritage  to make it easy for DNA matches to work out how we might relate but one of the emails I received from MyHeritage recently told me my tree was too large and I would have to renew to keep my tree in the site.  I also received an offer on 12th August to renew at up to 49% discount. I ignored that offer and put in a request for  my tree to be removed and received confirmation that this would happen in the next few days.

You'll never guess what was in my email box this morning. 

I paid up straight away. At $AU95.98 I am pleased to have MyHeritage back in my genealogy toolbox. (And they haven't removed my tree yet!!)

Genealife in Lockdown - from Classy to Comfy

Macys, New York Flagship Store

Covid19 has played havoc with my clothes shopping activities.

I purchase most of my clothes on my regular visits to the United States where I hit the bargain racks in Macy's, Ross Dress for Less and other discount stores. As seasons in Australia are opposite those in the northern hemisphere I can usually pick up a few bargains for our local 'new season' from the 70% off discount racks. But that's not all, there are also the shoe bargains from the same stores. 

Full prices in the US are usually much lower than in Australia so I can buy fancy labels like Calvin Klein, Levis, Ralph Lauren, Tommy Hilfiger etc. that I would never buy in Australia. It's now around 20 months since I have been to the US and contributed to their economy with my essential clothing purchases! 

While I am no fashion plate I love having smart clothes and a touch of glitter (this old girl needs all the help she can get). My 'going out' clothes have been languishing in my wardrobe as I am saving them up for future special outings and travel. I only got my glad rags out once during the pandemic (after we were vaccinated), for one formal occasion in June when the Covid situation in Sydney appeared to be in remission. 

During the pandemic we didn't stray too far from home until we were fully vaccinated, even when we weren't in lockdown as we are now.

At home I dress for comfort not for style. During the warmer months I wore the same couple of casual dresses or a tshirt from Big W (I bought a couple of new ones) and knee length pants. For the cooler months I splashed out and purchased two pairs of tracksuit pants from Best and Less (one of Australia's cheapest chains), on my top half I have been wearing one of three skivvies in rotation with the outer layer being one of two fleece tops I had bought for our Antarctica trip from Mountain Warehouse. For a bit of variety I also have two other pairs of old trousers and a couple of heavy cardigans and on cooler days I may supplement all this with a fleece vest.

Comfy Fleece

Prior to our scheduled departure this month for a conference in Norfolk Island I felt like some retail therapy. I splashed out at the Myer sale and bought three new jumpers, two of which are still in the plastic shopping bag due to the postponement of that conference.

My lovely collection of flatties, sparkly sandals etc are gathering dust while I wear comfortable footwear. In summer I get around in ugly blue or red tourist sandals and in cooler months I wear UGG moccasins or boots with socks. For more energetic activities I wear the ugly expensive shoes that were suggested by my ankle surgeon.

 

I hope Calvin, Ralph and Tommy are enjoying their sojourn in my closet as, with the current Covid numbers in NSW,  I think I'll be doing comfy for quite a while yet.

Genealife in Lockdown - Empty Pages.

Genimate Alex Daw over at the Family Tree Frog blog has challenged fellow geneabloggers to write about their lockdown experiences in a series of blog posts on Sundays during National Family History Month in Australia.

See what Alex has to say about the challenge here: 

https://familytreefrog.blogspot.com/2021/07/genealife-in-lockdown-nfhm-blogging.html 

As someone who is always up for a challenge I will try to post on the topic Genealife on Lockdown each Sunday in August. Following is my second post of five.

Genealife in Lockdown - Aunty Joan

Genimate Alex Daw over at the Family Tree Frog blog has challenged fellow geneabloggers to write about their lock down experiences in a series of blog posts on Sundays during National Family History Month in Australia.

See what Alex has to say about the challenge here: 

https://familytreefrog.blogspot.com/2021/07/genealife-in-lockdown-nfhm-blogging.html 

As someone who is always up for a challenge I will try to post on the topic Genealife on Lockdown each Sunday in August.