March 2017 - Page 4 of 7 - Ramblin' with Roger

Is it my Irish eyes that are smilin’?

Peace from Roger O’Green.

I haven’t scheduled it, but I think I need to take one of those DNA testing kits. I haven’t investigated how precise they are yet, but there are three things I’m hoping to discover:

1) Was the picture on my maternal grandmother’s wall of one of her ancestors, and therefore one of MY ancestors, English or Irish? I’ve heard both.

If the latter, I’d be one of 33.3 million “who claimed Irish ancestry in 2013. This number was more than seven times the population of Ireland itself (4.6 million).”

2) Were ancestors on my fathers side Dutch or “Pennsylvania Dutch,” which is to say, German? Here again, the lore conflicts.

3) I want to get into one of those registers to try ascertain whether I can find a match that will tell me who the biological father of my father is?

Not sure which product, MyHeritage or Family Tree DNA, or LivingDNA or 23andMe or Ancestry.com’s product or something else is the best for the price and will give me the information I want.

Have you folks used any of these products? How satisfied were you with them? What did you learn that you are willing to to share? Your feedback, if any, will probably have an impact in my decision-making.

I’m also curious about why, if you considered doing one of these tests, why you did not? Cost? You already know? Lack of curiosity?

For me, the results might inform my travel plans when/if I ever retire. This is not merely an academic query, though I would like the Daughter, who has relatives she can trace back to the 14th century on her mother’s side, to have a clearer record on her father’s.

Of course, on this St. Patrick’s Day, I’ll always be a bit Irish. They color the Chicago River with my last name, FCOL. Peace from Roger O’Green.

A blog change is gonna come

Did I screw it up? Is THAT the reason the files aren’t “taking”?

I get this email from my blog provider for the past seven years:

The datacenter cost has gone up extremely and I have had to reconsider my position of offering web hosting. Within the next few months all clients will be cancelled as their contracts come up for renewal.

Roger you will need to register at https://www.namecheap.com/myaccount/signup.aspx so that I may push your domain name to you so you can manage it and make changes to the server names, renewals etc.

Did that.

You will also have to find web hosting with another company within the next month and transfer your website files and MySQL database to the new host.

I DID find a new web host, but my files wouldn’t upload. Need to contact the help desk. Arrgh!

To make backups of your domain name simply login to your cPanel account and click the BACKUP icon. Be sure to backup the home directory and the database to insure you have all your files.

Did I screw it up? Is THAT the reason the files aren’t “taking”?

To login to cPanel use the following information…

This was a hard decision for us but we just cannot continue with the cost that’s associated with the datacenter.

Once you have found a new web hosting company and moved all your files, please let me know so I can remove your files from the server.

The pressure!

We wish you the best of luck Roger, in your endeavors and I have been a frequent reader of your blog for years…

Any questions just let us know and talk soon.

Bottom line is that I’m working on a transition, which has cut into my blogging time, so there may be some terse posts in the near future.

Just know I’m not going away.

March rambling #1: Platypus Controlling Me

The Toxic Attraction Between An Empath And A Narcissist

What Is Your Name? Where Are We? Who Is President? Oh God

Trump(Doesn’t)Care cartoon

Poor People Need BETTER Health Insurance than the Rest of Us, Not Worse

The lessons we fail to learn: Warren G. Harding

American ‘Christianity’ Has Failed and I don’t want to preach a faith that can be so easily adapted to self-hatred and self-harm

How the baby boomers destroyed everything

The 1862 Binghamton (NY) Race Riot – something I did not know about my hometown

After Slavery, Searching For Loved Ones In Wanted Ads

Coins of the Rebellion: The Civil War currency of Albany merchants

Jobs, Income, and the Future

A brief history of men getting credit for women’s accomplishments

The Weight of The Last Straw

7 Lies About Welfare That Many People Believe Are Fact

Albany, NY Plane Crashes Into Houses On Landing Attempt, March 1972

Contractor sues for $2 million in unpaid bills on Drumpf’s D.C. hotel

Kellyanne Conway’s interview tricks, explained, and her boss’s 10 steps for turning lies into half-truths

A college course on calling out scientific crap

The adult children of him will ditch Secret Service protection once he leaves office

Sen. Gillibrand Has Perfect Response To Regime Misspelling Her Name

‘Where I come from’ we claim universal generalities as our peculiar virtues

Some ‘snowflakes’ can take the heat

The biggest threat facing middle-age men isn’t smoking or obesity, it’s loneliness

About Robert Osborne

Amy Biancolli: woman walks into a sandwich shop

The Toxic Attraction Between An Empath And A Narcissist

You May Want to Marry My Husband

This 75-Year Harvard Study Found the 1 Secret to Leading a Fulfilling Life

David Kalish: I am my dog’s seeing-eye person

Coke: Global ad campaign celebrates inclusion and diversity

Alphabetizing Books

Ruben Bolling won the 2017 Herblock Prize

Now I Know: The Boy Who Captured the Wind and How to Claim Antarctica and The Park at the Bottom of the Lake

MEET APRIL THE GIRAFFE, formerly from Catskill Game Farm!

Sammy Davis Jr. Oscar blunder

Cush Jumbo

Lawyer’s Pants Catch Fire During Closing Argument

Garter snakes can be super deadly

Music

Divenire – Composer Ludovico Einaudi

There’s a Platypus Controlling Me (from Phineus and Ferb)

What are the songs that best capture our moment?

K-Chuck Radio: A dose of Northern Soul

Don’t Let Me Down – The Beatles

10 Beatles Covers You Really Need to Hear

Songs about the moon

J is for Japan, the US and World War II

The visit by Abe to Pearl Harbor comes after many years of debate in the U.S., Japan and elsewhere about how the two nations should come to terms with the legacy of World War II

I was thrilled by a pair of events addressing the historic Japan-United States enmity of the 1940s.

In May 2016, then-President Barack Obama visited Hiroshima, the first American commander-in-chief to do so since the US dropped an atomic bomb on the city over 70 years earlier.

While criticized by those on the left and the right, I thought it was an important gesture. “As he promised, the president did not apologize for the U.S. bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki in August 1945, which killed an estimated 215,000 people. He laid a wreath at Peace Memorial Park in Hiroshima and embraced a 91-year-old survivor of the nuclear attack.”

During his 20-minute remarks, “Obama said, ‘Why do we come to this place, to Hiroshima? We come to ponder the terrible forces unleashed in the not so distant past. We come to mourn the dead … their souls speak to us and ask us to look inward. To take stock of who we are and what we might become.’

“In the Hiroshima museum’s guest book before his speech, the President wrote that he hoped the world will ‘find the courage, together, to spread peace, and pursue a world without nuclear weapons.’‎” Most of the elderly survivors, I imagine, did not foresee an American President in their midst, in that place.

Then, in December 2016, Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe offered his condolences for his country’s attack on Pearl Harbor. “‘We must never repeat the horrors of war again, this is the solemn vow the people of Japan have taken,” he said. The Prime Minister was accompanied by President Obama, making the visit the first by the leaders of both countries.

“Mr. Abe paid tribute to the [2,400] men who lost their lives in 1941 at the naval base, many of whom remain entombed in the wreckage of the USS Arizona, sunk by the Japanese that day, and vowed reconciliation and peace.

How did this come about?

“Just as was the case when Obama visited Hiroshima earlier in the year—as the first sitting U.S. President to go to the site of the atomic bombing—the visit by Abe comes after many years of debate in the U.S., Japan and elsewhere about how the two nations should come to terms with the legacy of World War II.”

Mr. Abe never actually apologized, but as one elderly Pearl Harbor survivor noted, the Prime Minister’s presence was even more important.

Walling ourselves out

“Is The United States Still The United States?”

I came across these two items on the same day, both about New York State: Quiet Upstate Road Becomes a Busy Exit From U.S. and State troopers: Hate-crime incidents are skyrocketing.

Also, I’ve been reading a lot of stories of frustration concerning travel. Canadian citizen going to day spa in US turned away – needs immigrant visa; what, that can’t be right. Due to visa issues, a well-regarded band from Ireland were unable to play their concert recently near here. Even British visitors to the White House have been having difficulty. Khizr Khan said he’s been told his travel privileges are under review; he is the father of a fallen American soldier and huge critic of the regime.

It will only get worse. As a Holocaust scholar threatened with deportation asked, “Is The United States Still The United States?”

With Muslim bans, shunning refugees, purported border walls, cemetery vandalism , bomb threats, and shootings of the other, I worry that the message the world is receiving is You Are Not Welcome here. And THAT is a bad thing, for the United States.

From here:
“Foreign students disproportionately study STEM and business fields. Two-thirds of foreign students pursuing a bachelor’s or higher degree are in science, technology, engineering, mathematics (STEM) or business, management and marketing fields, versus 48 percent of students in the United States…

“Forty-five (45) percent of foreign student graduates extend their visas to work in the same metropolitan area as their college or university.”

Much of the intellectual capital America needs, and has required for a good long while, has come from abroad. For instance, we’re facing a shortage of primary care physicians – and it’ll only get worse. The USCIS Will Temporarily Suspend Premium Processing for All H-1B Visa Petitions, which will hamper American industry.

If you were a scientist from India, and you saw not only bigotry but a blatant disregard for the value of information, and you think maybe that grant that would support your work might be dashed, part of the $54 billion that is supposed to be cut to support more military spending, would YOU uproot your life?

I’ve been told, more than once, that Americans will fill those roles, but there’s no evidence, at least in the short term, that it’s even remotely possible.

Plus there may be a slump in international tourism due to regime policies.

Ha, Mandy Patinkin Thinks He Can Change His Mind on Refugees, but the xenophobia, which hurts the United States, economically as well as other ways, may run too deep.