Genealogy

Some genealogy documents I’d ordered from the Ohio Historical Society came in the mail today. Death certificates, to be precise. Even though the family information on them isn’t always precise, they always tell a story, and I love that. A few of the ones I got today are absolutely heart-wrenching.

There’s one woman whom it turns out I’m not really related to, after all, but her story is still a rough one. Helen was widowed in her mid to late-twenties. Shortly after her 29th birthday, she died by carbolic acid poisoning—suicide.

Then there’s Harvey, the youngest son of my great-great grandfather. His clothes accidentally caught fire from the fire grate, and he burned to death. He was two years old.

And we have Edna, the eldest daughter of another great-great grandfather. Not long after she married, she developed tuberculosis. She died after about four months of illness. Edna was almost 21.

Of course, there are always the standard “this is the way death should be” records, like my great-grandmother Margaret. She lived the last 25 years of her life as a widow, and died at the ripe old age of 90, while living at the home of her eldest son.

Still, though, just those few words and dates on a page can really bring to life (so to speak) the person they’re about, despite the fact that they lived and died generations ago. I think—no, I know that this is why I do genealogy. It’s my own weird form of religion and ancestor-worship. Think about it: how often do we console ourselves and one another by saying, “He’s not really dead, as long as we remember him,” a la Dr. McCoy in Star Trek? Part of me believes and acts on that premise. I could be the only person on the face of the Earth who has thought about a given ancestor for years and years, and they deserve better than that. They deserve to be remembered. These people didn’t leave any lasting legacy besides their own progeny, and I owe them, if not respect, at least acknowledgement.

I wonder what my descendants will think of me, someday…?

Neener, neener, neener…

Well, I did really well getting to work on time for the past two weeks. Then, yesterday and today, I came in at ten minutes after eight. And, of course, when my boss brought me into his office to give me a couple projects to do, he called me on it. He tried to be “friendly” about it, asking if there was something that was holding me up in the mornings, maybe dropping someone off somewhere or something… but no, it’s just me being late. *sigh* Finally he said that, if necessary, he would look up the procedure for giving verbal and written warnings, but that he didn’t want to go there. He’d rather just keep it a friendly reminder. I agree wholeheartedly.

That really put me in kind of a pissy mood all day. Matter of fact, it kind of felt like High School, to tell the truth, and it kind of gave me a new perspective on my recurrent attitude problem when I realized that. I felt kind of put-upon, like he knew that extra five minutes wasn’t a big deal, and hadn’t I been doing well for two freakin’ weeks straight? And hell, I see all sorts of salary people coming in at the same time I come in, so how is that fair? And on and on.

But, finally, I realized that I was feeling unreasonably oppressed. I mean, hell, who’s the one who’s coming in late? Me. All I need to do is get the fuck out of bed fifteen minutes earlier, and I’ll be just fine. I think I get feeling like that when I know it’s my fault, and I know I could have done something simple to remedy the situation, but I didn’t because I was a lazy-ass, and I resent myself for it, but I don’t want to admit it, so I turn the resentment outward.

Or maybe I’m just overanalyzing. I’ve been known to do that.

So, I’m just going to set myself a goal to a.) not be late for the rest of the week, and b.) clock in before 8:00am at least once next week. We’ll see. I’m going to have to get up much, much earlier when we live in Toledo and I actually have a commute, so I’d better get used to it.

In other news, I faxed a 28-page monstrosity to John from NOIC, containing all our little worksheets, landlord info, W2’s, bank statements, and pay stubs. Aaron, meanwhile, finished calling around and comparing prices for homeowner’s insurance, and ended up going with Allstate. Incidentally, no one seems able to beat our auto insurance with Progressive, since most of the insurance places wanted to try to give us a deal on both. Anyway, we’re pretty much set on the house thing, and just need to wait for everyone else to do their jobs and schedule a final date for the closing.

I’m also beginning to liquidate all the crap I’ve been meaning to eBay for a while. Check it.

Edit: I found the notes I’d scribbled at work about my plight, and here they are, unedited and without grammatical additions:

Start times were fine last week—late last 2 days. Got called on it—hate it, but probably good for me. Feel all high-school again, resentful

Oh, yeah, and my computer won’t cooperate.

All this has really put me in a pissy mood and unfortunately, since I get pissy so seldom, I tend to almost revel in it. Part of me doesn’t want to shake it.

I’m beginning to remember why H.S. [High School] was such a big deal. Little things grow in your brain over the course of the day and make you think too much.

Rollins in Ann Arbor

Need to get my shower and get to sleep, but I just felt the need to update. It’s been a few days.

Went to see Henry Rollins do his spoken word thing in Ann Arbor on Sunday. I was worried that the drunk bastard sitting behind us would ruin the entire show instead of just the first 20 minutes, but he mercifully passed out and didn’t wake up until the show was almost over, nearly three hours later. I swear, we can’t get away from the drunken fucks even when we pay for reserved seats. —But drunken debauchery aside, Rollins was on top of his game, as always, with tales of his recent USO tour in Afghanistan and of a would-be burglar “running like a scared bitch,” as one Abe-lover I know would say. 🙂 Gotta get a Rollins fix every couple of years, just like Clutch.

While we were in Ann Arbor, we stopped by the anime store (of course), a couple record stores, and a couple of book stores. I ended up buying Nichelle Nichols’ autobiography, Beyond Uhura, a book on the making of Star Trek entitled Star Trek Lives!, and a trade-paperback edition of an Asimov-universe book that Aaron had already bought for me in small paperback form for Christmas. I felt kind of bad buying that one, but the size and artwork matched the two hardbacks I have for the other books of the set, and I just couldn’t resist. I may eBay the other paperback, but I may not. It was a present, after all.

Incidentally, I am absolutely hooked on Nichelle Nichols’ book. I can’t put it down.

I ordered some new candle scents that should be arriving soon: ginger, chamomile, green tea… and marshmallow. I also ordered tealight tins and wicks, so now I can pour a bunch of little candles and burn them together to test-mix fragrances. I still need to get some additives and a couple more dyes before I get going full-steam again, but I’m looking forward to it.

OK, my 20-minute session of Pilates kind of whipped my butt again tonight, so I’m hitting the shower and going to bed. Of course, once I’m there, I’ll probably read for a good half-hour before I actually go to sleep…

The future Schnuth abode

4651 Ventura Drive. Three-bedroom, one-bath, tri-level single-family dwelling. Now with a clean bill of health, apart from a few ungrounded electrical sockets and a mishmash of other minor (and easily fixable) flaws. (Photo above taken by Aaron at the home inspection today, with our new-to-us digital camera.)

Now, we have to wait until the appraiser and surveyor do their job, and get all our silly busywork to the mortgage lender… and wait. Closing is on or before March 5th, and as I’ve said multiple times before, I hope it’s before rather than on. I still need to call the Smiths and let them know we won’t be renewing our lease, but I’d rather do that once we have at least a closing date, and preferably a solid date of possession.

Moving on to things-not-house-related… I’ve decided to track the things I should be doing on a daily basis, mainly just to remind me to do them. Thorough tooth-maintenance (brushing, flossing, Stimudent-ing, mouthwashing, gargling, and rinsing), exercise, mellophone practice, and… well… showering.

Yes, everyone, surprize of surprizes, I don’t bathe daily. I bathe every other day or every third day (a.k.a. “European standard”). I’m guessing you all knew that years ago. Especially Amy. 🙂 However, with my excuse of “my hair gets too dry to wash it every day” about to be thrown out the window by—gasp!—actually conditioning my hair, I’m going to make a concerted effort to shower more frequently. I know, you all had that figured out in Junior High. So I’m a late bloomer. Shoot me.

I feel empowered by having admitted my most embarrassing downfall in public. Aaron just found out my second-most embarrassing one a couple months ago, and I’m not sharing that one. It’s just too gross.

Aaron took a buncha pictures of the house during the home inspection today. If I feel saucy, maybe I’ll post them on my main page this weekend. I love our digital camera. 🙂

BTW, my PC is still down for the count. I haven’t really made any sort of effort to resurrect it yet, since I haven’t really wanted anything I have stored on it in the past couple of weeks. Aaron’s Dell and my Mac are doing a fine fill-in job for now… and I don’t have to put up with the damn thing being continually unstable. I think I mucked it up at some point. If I thought it would help, I’d consider installing XP on it… but I’m afraid it would muck it up even more.

Hmm… anything else? Oh, yeah, yay for dead presidents. I get the day off Monday.

The house-buying saga continues…

How sweet. Aaron just called home to see how my trip to visit the Teamster Legal Fund went today.

See, the Teamsters Union has a lawyer on retainer at the Union Hall. Teamsters can consult with the lawyer for free with minor matters—it’s included in Union Dues—and pay only a small co-pay for cases like non-contest divorces and… home closings. And that is the capacity in which I was utilizing the Teamster lawyer this evening.

The meeting was fairly uneventful, and the Purchase Agreement looks perfectly fine. The trip to and from the Union Hall, however, involved me getting turned around and going down wrong streets multiple times. That part of town, up the Anthony Wayne Trail close to downtown Toledo, is a weird place. But I got there in time and got home in the end, and that’s all that matters.

So, we’ve signed the Purchase Agreement. We’ve had it looked over by our lawyer within the three-day period after signing. We’ve paid the appraisal fee for the home appraisal and land survey. The home inspection is on Friday at noon. Closing will be on or before March 5th (hopefully before), after which we are required to give the current owners 30 days to vacate.

Which puts us five days beyond our current lease.

That means that next on the agenda is giving our landlady, Mrs. Smith, a call to appraise her of the situation. We’re really hoping she’ll be nice and extend our lease by a couple weeks or a month. Actually, we haven’t made any provisions for what might happen if she refuses, so I really hope she’s OK with that. 🙂

Once all the boxes are unpacked and we’re in our new house, we’ll definitely be hosting a big party. It may not be until well into the spring, but you can count on it sometime. Oh, yeah, and we’ll have at least one extra bedroom, a big finished basement, and one air mattress, in case anyone gets too… jolly.

*crossing my fingers that the home inspection doesn’t turn up anything bad*