I just haven't felt well for months now. First a battle with an adjustment in meds, just getting that worked out and now I have COVID. Oh, I'm fine. Thank God for vaccines. I'm double boosted which is what I attribute my mild case to. Honestly, I've gone to work much sicker than this back in November when I had, what I think was a sinus infection and that too high dose of medication. I'm a little underwhelmed really. This is COVID? I feel worse with seasonal allergies. You mean everyone doesn't feel like this September through May? I'm lucky.
In any case, I'm finding myself extremely annoyed by some of the genealogy groups I follow on Facebook so much so that I have nearly dropped them all.
With not much else to do in my room, I'm spending a lot of time reading and scrolling through social media. Just bored.
There are some things that novice genealogy researchers are asking that just grate on me. I know they are new and learning.
I know, I know, I'm a librarian. I'm supposed to be all wide-eyed and bushy tailed waiting with baited breath for your very personal question, all too eager and delighted to direct you to what - the stapler? Like Julie Andrews twirling on some mountain top of information or a bespectacled Snow White with little woodland creatures gathering about me ready to flit off at my startling notice of you. "Oh, why, yes. How can I help you?"
My New Yorker comes barreling out, "Yeah, over there with the pencil sharpener. Open your eyes, buddy."
I'm cranky but also despite what your grade school teachers told you, there are dumb questions.
I know, I know. I'm an educator gearing up for another summer course. And I know that if you're new at something and you don't ask, you'll never learn. That's what you think, right? But actually that's not true. You don't have to ask to learn. You can read. Oh yes you can. You can read to learn. I do it all the time. Day 4 of my quarantine. 9 books into my to-be-read pile. Reading teaches you tons of shit!
Like....
No. You're not going to find your 7th great grandfather's birth certificate from the 1720s. New York State didn't issue certificates until 1881. Look it up.
And No filing a FOIL request won't change that. (Jesus, save them.)
No. You can't edit the way your family's race is recorded in the 1860 census. You're not an enumerator and this is not 1860. Enumerator? Look it up.
No. Your parents aren't related just because you have a single 10 centimorgan match to some random dude in the middle of Great Britain that Ancestry says matches parent 1 and parent 2.
Ugh, God, no. Parent 1 isn't always the farther.
Oh the DNA questions. People, read.
No. You're not adopted just because your ethnicity estimate says you are 24% Welsh and your sister is 2% Welsh. She matches you right? Estimate? Look it up.
And some of these Facebook group admins. I've left a few groups because the admins shut down posts just because the author asked a question barely outside the parameters of the groups intent. But oh..oh...why don't they turn off comments for the post that already has 500,000 replies all saying the exact same thing.
Yeah, I'm cranky.
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