If one had been predicting the state that would follow Massachussets in allowing homosexual civil marriages, one might not have predicted Iowa. (It’s just one judge’s decision at the moment, and it is being appealed.)

It never fails. I come up with a cool idea for a website - one I know others will agree with me is cool - and just to be sure I do a google search, and yeah. It’s already being done.

Chapter 1

1 In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth.

2 And the earth was without pie, and void; and “cream” filling was upon the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the twinkies.

3 And God said, Let there be pie: and there was pie.

4 And God saw the pie, that it was cherry: and God divided the fruit from the non-fruit.

Current text from chapter 1 of the WikiBible as of today at this minute.

Stlbloggers Blog Carnival #2 requires me to write about the most significant day of my life.

I interpret this as a day where if the events occurred differently, my entire life would be changed.

We’ll ignore January 21, 1969. It is a sine qua non, by definition, but everyone has that day in their life.

Days that compete
1) January 9th or 10the, 1986
2) June __, 1988
3) Feb 26, 2002

I’m going to drop #3 from the list. It was depressing being laid off from work, and the year that followed was equally depressing. I have a new career, but I’m still young and may even have more careers ahead of me.

#2 occurred a couple days after my brother graduated from college. The graduation was in New Jersey, and the family took a trip to New York afterwards. I attended my first Broadway musical. Les Miserables. Two years later, I was in Washington DC, and I bought the book. I have definitely become obsessed with Victor Hugo. I like mentioning that both the Christian Science Monitor and the Australian radio network ABC interviewed me during Hugo’s Bicentennial in 2002. (Coincidentally, the exact date of his 200th birthday was Feb 26th. A day I should have been celebrating, I was in shock from losing my job.) However, it still isn’t the most significant day in my life, so I’m not going to bother looking up the exact date.

That goes to January 9th, 1986 - when I first started feeling weakness in my arms and legs and in the afternoon entered St. Louis Children’s Hospital, or January 10th when I woke up paralyzed from the neck down. Both happened within the same 24 hour period.

I’ve blogged about my experiences with Guillain-Barre Syndrome here, here and here.

Missouri appears close to legalizing scalping (tickets, not heads).

The supply/demand arguments make a little bit of sense. (With legalized scalping there should be a greater supply, so prices will go down.) But that is dependent upon demand remaining steady. And I suspect there are people who refrain from buying scalped tickets — not because the price is higher, but they know they are ‘abetting a crime’ as the article puts it. Demand could go up as well. Maybe, as is so often the case on Ebay, supply will go up more.

It certainly falls in the category of ‘victimless crime’

Last year at the Carondelet YMCA mega-booksale I purchased 16 books. Today, I purchased 13. You could argue I am being more selective. But not really. I have too many books. I know this. That doesn’t stop me from getting new ones. It’s a problem. It’s not the cost. Combined, the 29 books last year and this year cost me $14.50. I’m running out of room to put them.

So I decided to institute a book tax. And as taxes go, it’s pretty high. 100%. For every book that comes in, another book must go out. And the books I got today weren’t grandfathered. Which meant I had to find 13 books to give away.

Surprisingly, I had a stack of 13 in under two minutes. It wasn’t difficult.

Incoming 13:

1) The Book of Lists by David Wallechinsky, Irving Wallace and Amy Wallace

Purchased soley because I remember it fondly from childhood. Though I suspect it won’t be long for my shelves with this new rule.

2) After many a summer dies the swan, by Aldous Huxley
3) Fifth Business by Robertson Davies
4) Watch the Northwind Rise, by Robert Graves
5) On Poetry and Music, by Aristotle
6) Parodies: An anthology from Chaucer to Beerbohm and After, by Dwight Macdonald
7) The Greek Myths by Robert Graves
The Bedbug and Selected Poetry by Vladimir Mayakovsky
9) Ninety Three by Victor Hugo (Lowell Bair translation, with introduction by Ayn Rand)
10) The Lottery (and other stories) by Shirley Jackson
11) The True Believer by Eric Hoffer
12) The Big Time by Fritz Leiber
13) The Best of Cordwainer Smith

Outgoing 13

1) Eyes of Darkness by Dean Koontz
2) In the Night Room by Peter Straub
3) Man and Superman by George Bernard Shaw
4) Judas by Suu Minazuki (Vol 1 - Manga)
5) Elephantasm by Tanith Lee
6) Angels and Demons by Dan Brown
7) Love’s been good to me, by Rod McKuen
Scuse Me While I Whip This Out by Kinky Friedman
9) The 5th annual Best SF (1971)
10) Swann’s Way by Marcel Proust
11) Everything We Had: An Oral History of the Vietnam War - by Al Santoli
12) Dangerous to Know - by Barbara Taylor Bradford
13) Fletch and the Widow Bradley - by Gregory McDonald

Those of you who live in St. Louis and who know me are going to get first dibs on the books. If you want one - speak up. I’ll carry them around in my car for a week or two and then any that remain will be given to Goodwill.

This article goes into detail on the history of the theory that Francis Bacon wrote Shakespeare’s plays. It has some unorthodox origins.

The many faces of the Bard

I wish some of my theories could gain such traction. I wish someone would fund a 4-year vacation for me so I could prove them through atmospheric osmosis. (You’ve got to read the article.)

In case you haven’t seen it yet this year, here’s Beloit College’s Mindset List for the graduating class of 2011 (Those entering college this fall.) A list of 70 items defining the 18-year-old mindset by what they’ve never witnessed directly, or what has always been around. Beloit does this every year. If you haven’t seen these before, go a few years back, and experience how old you really are.

#1 on the list is definitely jarring.

(and when you’re done feeling old, and need a laugh, here’s a parody: the mindset list for the class of 1918.)

I’m supposed to be miserable. I’m supposed to have been miserable for the last 3 years, but fortunately nobody told me.

Discovered this book while doing a search online for the surname “Newmark”

Why you may ask? There’s a character in the novel named “I.D. Newmark.” Not too surprising, since Victor Gold (a ‘Republican flack‘) is cousin to the late Dr. ID Newmark, who passed away 1 year prior to the book’s publication. Both of them are nephews of my great-grandfather Barney who I’ve spoken of before.

Most bios of Gold say he grew up in Louisiana, which is true, but he was born in East St. Louis. Despite my disagreement with his politics, it’s nice to see he ‘Tuckerized‘ a relative. I might have to buy the book. Since it is out of print, and I would be getting it used, none of my money would be going to Cheney, or Gold.

If I were really interested in torturing myself, I’d buy the autobiography of George HW that Vic helped out with Looking Foward; at least The Body Politic is fiction. Vic’s latest non-fiction, Invasion of the Party Snatchers suggests he might have some common sense.

And I must admit, I find the below funny:

A joke told at a book festival is mistaken for the truth, and even the Washington Post falls for it.

Click on the below thumbnail and you can read a bio for Victor Hugo which appeared in the Classics Illustrated comic edition of his novel, The Man Who Laughs. There is a significant biographical error made within the text. See if you can spot it.

I’ve always had difficulty coming up with names for characters in fiction I write.

Some people advocate opening the phone book and picking names randomly.

Another source just occurred to me.
I’m probably not the first person to notice this.
But my spam box is filled with some great names.

So if you ever see a story written by me with the characters Exxon Mobils, or Jodie Vanncxvmh…you know where I got the names.

Remember how I was saying back in July that the Cardinals don’t suck?. I should have added that anything can happen in the National League Central division. As we enter Chicago for a four game series, we’re now 2.5 games behind first place, and both the Brewers and Cubs are collapsing.

We could easily end up in the playoffs, even with the season we’ve had. Which is a testament to how bad our division really is. Not that I mind.

Oops, I think I misread the headline…

Mary’s house has burned down.

You know Mary. She was born in 1806, and one day she was going to school, and a lamb followed her.

You didn’t know it was a true story?

Ebay Auction: Bid on a “Six Degrees Swag Bag” autographed by Ben Newmark. 100% of all proceeds go to chairty. Bidding starts at $9.99.

(He was the star of the Academy Award winning film, West Bank Story)

A few other autographed swag bags are also being auctioned, including two signed by Kevin Bacon, and one by Kevin Sorbo.

It’s time for the Aug 15th Carnival of Genealogy. I was sure I wouldn’t be contributing to this one. The topic is Genealogy conferences and seminars, and I’ve never been to one. If I’m going to blog about something, it should be something with which I’m familiar. So I was content that I was going to sit this one out, and see what others had to say.

Then Janice at CowHampshire, admitting she had never attended a conference, posted her “Genealogy seminars I’d like to see” The list was humorous, I was listed as a host of one of the seminars, and I realized I could come up with a humorous list, too, but now it would be redundant, or worse, copying, unless I came up with my own unique twist.

Then Jasia, at Creative Gene, posted her suggestions for conferences from the perspective of one who had attended…and I realized there were some vague familiarities, and I had my topic.

What to expect when your favorite genealogical conference merges with a local SF convention.

1) Possible panel/seminar topics:
a. Homer Simpson’s Family Tree
b. Genealogy references in Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: from Nature’s Nobility to graveyard visits.
c. Did your great grandparents read science fiction? An introduction to First Fandom for Young Adults.
d. Did your ancestors get eaten by Grendel? Where would they be buried if they were?
e. Making whoopee in the 17th century, were there any differences? (midnight panel)
f. Podcasting for the Genea-blogger.
g. Heraldry – What your local branch of the Society for Creative Anachronism has to offer your local genealogy society – and vice versa.
h. The 1891 and 1901 England Census are online? Is HG Wells listed? (Yes - ancestry.co.uk, image)

2) Genealogy Guest of Honor: Alex Haley. (live via time machine) Huge line for autographs, but a smaller subset of attendees will turn their nose up, claim the writer was a hack, and refuse to get in line, even if they’ve read all his books.

3) There will be a masquerade. A chance to dress up like your ancestors – or your future descendents! Prizes will be awarded.

4) Art Show will have new categories for Coats of Arms and family photographs.

5) Free alcohol in the room parties after hours will lead to genealogists logging on to OneWorldTree and adding entries to prove they are descended from Isaac Newton or Beowulf.

Note: I’ve started to post genealogy stuff here, so that those interested in just genealogy don’t have to wade through my other mishmash, and those interested in the mishmash, don’t have to wade through my growing interest in genealogy. But this post definitely belongs in both places.

Back on March 29th I referenced a feature Google had added to their Google Maps. They were telling you how to get from New York to Dublin - by swimming. It appeared they had programmed three swimming ports - one in France, one in England, and one in New York.

I am shocked it didn’t cross my mind that that would be a temporary feature. I actually thought they might expand upon it and add the Pacific Ocean later on. Alas, they obviously thought it was just a humorous joke, because it no longer exists. I’m not sure how long it lasted past April 1, because I think this is the first time I’ve tried it since then.

It was a cool feature. I want it back. It’s not as if there aren’t permanent bits of humor already in Google’s offerings. For example, you can conduct searches in a whole bunch of languages, including, Klingon, Pig Latin, Elmer Fudd, and Bork! Bork! Bork!. Apparently they decided that swimming across the Atlantic wasn’t a funny enough joke to keep alive.

You can still find your way from Warsaw to Dublin, of course, since you really can drive that route in a car.

We may have a new homerun hitter for the Cardinals. Rick Ankiel.

For those who weren’t in St. Louis, or baseball fans, in 2000 when his promising pitching career took a Bermuda Triangle nosedive, you can read a summary on Wikipedia.

I’ve added a few filker-blogs to my links on the left (under artists, authors and musicians). To remind those who need reminding, filk is sf/fantasy themed music, often song parodies, often folk melodies, but not necessarily either.

FilkerTom is the livejournal of the filker Tom Smith. Some in my writer’s group will need to be told that this is a different Tom Smith, with equal amounts of funny, but with less horror. The member of my writer’s group with this name tells a story of being called up and being offered a plane ride to Santa Fe, NM to talk with someone who liked his work. He was gracious enough to inform the caller that they had contacted the wrong Tom Smith. Lots of fiction by the St. Louis Tom Smith can be read here. He’s also written song lyrics, but the songs haven’t appeared on the Dr. Demento Show, like FilkerTom’s has. Nor has he recorded cds (to my knowledge.) This paragraph really should have been more about FilkerTom, but you can follow the link and read more about him. He’s also had several posts in the past couple days about a dispute between LiveJournal owners and Livejournal users over their definition of Harmful Content.

MoFilker is the livejournal of Missouri Filker, Gary Hanak. He’s attended over twenty Archons and is a fixture at St. Louis conventions. He ran the Filking track at NASFiC. He can play the accordion, and has 2 cds.

Porcupine Burrito is the Livejournal of Blind Lemming Chiffon. His name, and his blog’s name, pretty much tells you everything you need to know, doesn’t it? Met him for the first time at NASFiC. Enjoyed his music. After returning from NASFiC he’s begun a song-a-day project on his livejournal.

the great Luke Ski’s livejournal isn’t new to the list, but he also is a filker, and he likes to tell audiences that he is the most requested artist on the Dr. Demento show for the 21st century. He is actually quite well-known for his promotional skills, starting with the name he chose for himself. He does have a talent for good lyrics, which in filk/dementia music is important. A lot of his selection is Rap parodies, but he parodies non-Rap music as well.

Row, row, row your boat, gently down the stream.
Throw your teacher overboard and listen to her scream!

There were eight contributions to the initial StlBlogger Blog Carnival, and I consider this a great turnout, considering the theme I chose probably disappointed some people.  I found all the entries interesting reading.  Thanks to everyone who participated!

Homemade Sin welcomed us to the Freak Show as she talked about her experiences as a non-native St.Louisan, and dealing with The Question she kept getting asked.

Kathy at Five Dollar Camera talked about her high school years in fashion.  She had me hooked with the Catholic Schoolgirl uniform.  Especially since it was illustrated.

High School brings back Autumnal memories for many.  Fluidpudding wrote about four separate fall memories..

Kat of Plays With Yarn, another non-native, writes of making up an answer to The Question.

HK Muse of Cat and Muse in Farming 101 talks about a shock she received, which led to a bout of paranoia, and ultimately a realization about her friends.

Rev Matt  in I’m Losing Status at the High School  recalls the music he used to listen to, and how he finally came to his senses.

Sarah Lynn  at Yeah, But Houdini Didn’t have these Hips, also writes about The Question from a non-native point of view as well as addressing her concerns as a parent and picking a school district for her children.
 
And I, at TransylvanianDutch  recall a handful of my high school experiences, from a four month stay in a hospital, to 4-years in the National Forensic League.

Thanks to all who participated.

The winner of a free packet of hot sauce is Kat of Plays With Yarn.  If she is interested in receiving the packet she should email me an address for me to send it to.

STLBlogger Carnival #2 will be hosted by HK Muse, and the topic will be “What was the most important day of your life.”  She’ll be responsible for posting the details.

She will post them at StlBloggers.com.

Playbill.com article on the MUNY production of Les Miserables

No, they didn’t interview me. (Unlike the Christian Science Monitor on the 200th anniversary of Hugo’s birth)

Yes, I have tickets for one of the performances, and plan to attend in the free seats a couple times over the next week and a half.

Update: Post Dispatch review

Alamasu, Romania
County: Salaj
Hungarian alternate names: Varalmas; Nagyalmas
Jewish population 1900: 51
Jewish population 1910: 35
Jewish population 1930: 30
Most of the decline in those twenty years may be attributable to one 8 member family. However, there may have been more than three births, and additional departures.
Jewish population after 1944 transport to Auschwitz: 0 (source)

For personal reasons, I’m glad that family made it out. The year was 1912. My grandfather was 4. He remembered little, but an older brother, Ted, had obtained a sixth grade education before leaving. At least, that’s what he claimed in a note to the government that provided a translation of my grandfather’s birth certificate which they had obtained from Nagyalmas, and which revealed the information my grandfather had previoulsy given as his birth date was incorrect.

I recently discovered a school report I did in fifth grade on my grandfather’s immigration. I opened it without thinking I’d find much of interest. My sister had done a similar school report for the same teacher, and I knew we had been allowed to ‘make things up’. The purpose wasn’t to find out information about our family, but to show we had an understanding of the ‘immigrant experience.’

But, unlike my sister’s which was a pseudo-diary of my great-grandmother, and even the ‘real information’ would have been entirely secondhand from my grandfather, mine was ‘written’ by my grandfather, so I had the direct source, and mine also included photos and documents which he must have provided. In it there was a copy of the birth certificate, and the translation.

At least, that was my thought at first glance, and then I did a doubletake. The birth certificate wasn’t on white paper like the rest of the report. It was more yellowed than the rest of the pages. I talked to my mom, and she didn’t remember the birth certificate. I’ve decided it’s not a copy. Well, a copy of the original, but the copy that the Nagyalmas government sent, and I put it directly in my school report, to be discovered 27 years later. Brilliant.

About 6-8 weeks ago I ordered the SS-5 for an ancestor of mine. The SS-5 is the Social Security Application form. It finally arrived this weekend. (Link describes what the SS-5 is, and how to order one.)

The SS-5 has a lot of useful information, including where the individual was employed, their address, and names of boh parents, but I ordered it primarily because it is supposed to contain as detailed a place of birth as the applicant knew. I am trying to figure out the town in Russia he was born in. Every other document just says ‘Russia’. He’s one of my Dudelsack ancestors, though he would have had his name changed at age 4.

Unfortunately, by 1936 when Social Security began and he applied, both of his parents were dead, and it turns out he didn’t know the town, so I am still in the dark.

Had a few minutes to spare this afternoon:

If asked, I wonder how many people would guess the American League team that has gone the longest without finishing dead last.

One needs to go back to 1973 to have one team standing in the American League, and they don’t fall until 1933.

Here’s a hint: They were in the World Series lin 2004, and supposedly broke a curse.

Hoover Awards for the American League

1973 to 2006

New York Yankees 1
Toronto Blue Jays 4
Baltimore Orioles 1
Tampa Bay Devil Rays 5
Minnesota Twins 4
Detroit Tigers 5
Chicago White Sox 1
Cleveland Indians 3
Kansas City Royals 1
Oakland Athletics 2
Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim 2
Texas Rangers 1
Seattle Mariners 5
Boston Red Sox 0