Vik-Thor's Journal

SANKOFA

Sankofa is an African word from the Akan tribe in Ghana. The literal translation of the word and the symbol is “it is not taboo to fetch what is at risk of being left behind.”

The word is derived from the words:

• SAN  (return)
• KO  (go)
• FA (look, seek and take)

from: https://www.berea.edu/centers/carter-g-woodson-center-for-interracial-education/the-power-of-sankofa

I have been into genealogy for awhile (off and on over the years.) I even started to try to start doing this as a GeneaBlog last year. 
In a mostly ON mood right now.

I have traced my family back 4 generations with confidence (Great-Great Grandparents) mostly born in the mid 1800s. and so far they have been in the southern Illinois / Indiana, and central Tennessee area (some outliers in Kentucky). I have found 1 who (definitely) participated in the US Civil War. Most of this generation were too young or old for Civil War service. (Though war of 1812 has some.)
The previous generation is a lot more sparse in knowledge and documentation, which considering the ones I have some documentation are early 1800s (and one couple 1790s). I will have to do trips to TN for some of them, and hope they have the documents. (FamilySearch.com lists when various counties started keeping various records.)

The one ancestor I am viewing as my main brick wall right now is my Paternal Great-Great-grandpa (Benjamin F. Rose). The only document I have of him is his marriage license to GGrandma Tabitha Green. It gives his parents, age, and where he was born, (between 21 and 23, born in White County IL). I have found his parents in marriage records for White County, married in 1854, I have not found any of them in census records. (The one that would have been the most likely, the 1890 Census, was destroyed...)
There has been some conflation with another Benjamin Franklin Rose in some online records, who lived and died in Effingham IL.

Husband, I've not gotten as far back, and have gotten to Italian and German ancestors at the Great-Great-grandparents level. So that will but a kink in tracking them down (Though I do follow a GeaneaBlog that talks about italian research quite a bit...)




 

President #45’s first official ‘press conference’, with hand picked reporters, still doesn’t go quite as he hoped. The first reporter went with their journalistic integrity, and actually asked a relevant question or at least attempted to before he shut them down, yelling “That is NOT an approved question! You are only supposed to ask questions from the preapproved list you were handed! You’re FIRED! NEXT!!!”

He points to another reporter, who stands, holds up a sheet of paper and says, “You mean these pabulum questions? We’ll be releasing them to the public so they know what you want to talk about, but…” tears the sheet in half and drops it to the ground. And the majority of the reporters in the room yell in unison “We want to know why you haven’t released your tax forms!”

45 gets red in the face. “Who cares! Old News! Noone wants that! You are all FIRED!!! One more chance!” Points to a man holding up his hand with a BREITBART sign in it. “Steve’s lackey, from Breitbart!”

“Mr. President, how do you feel about the rumours that there are neoNazi’s among your supporters?”

“Well now, even though that isn’t one of the officially worded questions, it is close enough. Remember in the future, when Breitbart is our OFFICIAL NEWS OUTLET! To ask the questions as they are written for you! Now obviously the Nazis are dead, we defeated them in that big war in the 40s! That my grandparents fought in! We killed them all dead! There are no more Nazis! Anyone who claims there are still Nazis around is a LYING LIAR! The Liberals want to make you think there are still Nazis around to keep you scared but they are all dead. Just like anyone who opposes us will end up being!” Pauses for a second. “After all, everyone dies sometime, right?” With a bit of a grin on his face.

Press Flack Spicer comes on stage, “NO MORE QUESTIONS! THIS INTERVIEW OVER! CLEAR THE ROOM!” As others among 45’s ‘loyal guard’ rush him back stage.

The official transcript is released the next day on Breitbart.com under header OFFICIAL NEWS OUTLET, without the last two sentences of 45’s rant. Lackey Conway says “Lord Trump never uttered those words that you think He did!”

Breitbart is DDOSed after instituting a NO COMMENTS policy on their ‘stories’, to be replaced by raw footage of the press conference, on a loop.

Everyone expected the Trumpish Inquisition.

Nobody expected him to actually take the Presidency seriously. But after the first couple months he buckled down, made some key changes in his Cabinet, and became one of the best Presidents ever.

When Betsy DeVoss tried to get Christian Creation Science inserted into the curriculum of all schools nationwide, he uttered his famous phrase: “You’re FIRED.” on his first national TV address. In an act of surprising candor, he continued, “Truthfully, I was even more surprised than Hillary at my election. What I was really wanting to do was just expose how corrupt the system had gotten. I lost sight of that, and let it go to my head for awhile. I never expected the Senate to confirm all my Cabinet picks! I am submitting a new list of Cabinet Secretaries to the Senate as I speak. These Secretaries actually know the subject of their Cabinet posts, not in an adversarial way. As an example, my new pick for Secretary of Education is C.G.P. Grey.”

“I am also asking Congress to work on making gerrymandering obsolete.”

Life always includes struggles:
once they are no more
there is always death.

I actually hung out at the mall in Carbondale quite a bit when I was in high school. Primarily at the WaldenBooks store. You would think I would try to get a job there, but for some reason I never did. The mall bookstore I got a job at was when I was living in Champaign, over 15 years after I graduated HS. I wish now I had tried getting job at WaldenBooks, because of the benefits of cheap books! :) My college job was working at the Lesar Law School Library, which is where my mild interest in the law came from.

Another store I would hang out quite a bit was an import store. I always liked looking at the stuff, but I very rarely bought anything.

It may sounds odd for someone who is involved with Where's George? to say they really wouldn't mind if the $1 bill was discontinued, but truthfully, I wouldn't. Seph and I already use uncommon denominations to a very large extent already. He tends to pull his allowance from the bank as mostly $1 and 50¢ coins, whereas I tend to do $2 bills and $1 coins, with a smattering of 50¢.

One of the main arguments for discontinuing the $1 bill is the cost savings, since a coin would last significantly longer than the current average of just under 6 years for the $1 bill. After all, the US Mint hasn't produced the quarter with the eagle back since 1999, so the youngest is 17 years at this point, and they are still easy to find in circulation. Heck, even finding Bicentennial quarters isn't all that uncommon! Whereas any $1s earlier than 2009 series are becoming somewhat rare in circulation. (You can use the tables @ the US Paper Money site to figure out when your bills were actually printed. [that is NOT a Federal Government site!])

The only way for the official cutover to $1 coins to happen is going to have to be a cold turkey approach. The Bureau of Engraving and Printing is going to have to actually stop producing $1 bills and let the ones currently in circulation wear out. Other countries have switched over easily enough.

Trust Everyone, but Cut the Cards

I used to play cards quite a bit more than I do now. I would play UNO with family, Spades and Hearts with friends through college years, and Cribbage with my step-mom. I remember parents playing Pinochle with the neighbors, but that is a game I never learned. Occasionally I would play Solitaire (of some sort, since there are so many variations.)

Seph would play Solitaire quite a bit, and had several decks. I even bought him a couple, including one from The Devil's Panties. He has taken to playing several Solitaire games on Facebook lately.

I bought a Cribbage board a couple of years ago, to try to get us into playing, but we never did. And of course, with our current work schedules, we don't really get much time to play games together. Our main cooperative game now is bowling. I joined a local league back in fall of 2014, and we both joined it this year. He is looking to put together a web presence for the league again. (They used to have one, but it seems to have gone inactive sometime in 2013.)

I've occasionally tried doing meditation with Tarot cards. And even recently backed a new Tarot deck on IndieGoGo. However, I've never been very good at that. And obviously never tried doing any readings for anyone else.

Most of these decks can all be shuffled the normal way. With or without a cut at the end. However, I have played Cards Against Humanity a few times, with enough expansions that the deck can be up to 12" tall. For 'shuffling' that, I will just do lots and lots of cuts.

Yum!
Barrel of crabs, all cooked perfectly, ready to share with a group, ready to collapse into a food coma.
Some melted butter, bucket for shells, some ears of corn thrown in also. Maybe some baked potatoes.

Om-Nom-Nom-Nom

I quite like bowling. So does my husband Seph (javarod). Haven't done much of it lately, only partly due to the fact that Seph is pretty much on the opposite schedule from me these days. I work standard office hours, 0800–1700 Monday–Friday. He is now working overnight stocking @ WalMart, with his days off being Monday–Tuesday night and Tuesday–Wednesday night. So the times we get to see each other is quite a bit more limited that what it used to be. Plus, I do D&D with friends down at tygercowboy's house on Monday nights.

We've bought several Groupon's (and other deals) for bowling. And we use them, but we can't seem to get any others interested in it when we go. I've gone to local Furry bowling several times, and have fun, but that also isn't a regular event. (And it tends to be a party, where some bowling is done. Leading to lots of gutter-balls, especially for those who do it in fursuit.) Whereas I tend to focus more on the bowling, and party on the side… My overall average for the last few times I've gone has been around 170, and most of those have been with house balls. The last group bowl I was at, a fursuiter guttered every frame in a game.

What I need to do is find another bowling league. I was in a league back when I lived in KC, in the 90s. (great good gods, has it really been that long ago?) I bought a ball and even my own shoes. They ended up stolen out of my car one night, along with a nice chain-mail shirt. :Þ
Not really sure why I didn't try to find a league in Champaign IL, or Phoenix AZ, or here in Saint Louis MO yet… Actually, it would be a good idea for me to get back into regular league play… Went for a physical last week, and my Triglycerides came back high (237). The doctor wants me to start taking pravastatin, which I don't want to do. I'm the first to admit I am overweight, and need to get more active. This will probably be the kick I need to do it. You may remember I was riding my bike to work fairly regularly for a bit. The weather has prevented that a bit, along with the fact I really did not like a hill on the route. I may see about walking.

Anyway, we both enjoy bowling enough that we have recently bought balls and had them drilled to fit our fingers. That way we don't have to search among all the house balls to find ones that fit well enough. Mine is a 12 pound, opalescent blue. Seph's is the interesting one. He found a 10 pound Ed, Edd, and Eddy bowling ball on eBay. Got it cheap, less than $2 for the auction. The shipping bumped it up quite a bit, but still quite affordable for a bowling ball. We picked up bags at a local K-Mart that is closing. About the only other thing I need to get is a wrist brace, and I'll be good to go. (May eventually buy another pair of bowling shoes, but in general, I'm OK using house shoes.)