Saturday, August 9, 2008

Genea-Blogger Games Diary: Day Two

Dear Diary,

Well the Opening Ceremonies after-party must have been very successful - that's all I'll say. I woke up very late, not knowing if it was morning or evening as I pulled open the shade and shouted, "Gosh that moon is bright!" It was the sun. Note to self: find out what footnoteMaven was drinking last night. Vague recollections of a conversation with her include my asking, "What did you wear to the Opening Ceremonies?" and her response was, "Something simple. A fur coat over a nightgown."

As for progress, despite having survived the festivities, I did in fact get some tasks completed or partially completed as I was up until 3:00 am CDT:

- Organize Your Research!: I added 20 entries to my genealogy database along the McEntee line. Having started the Surname: McEntee group in Facebook, I wanted to extend a few of the lines down to the present day which I did. Note to self: continue to complain to Ancestry about the poor transcription job on many of the census sheets. Frustration abounds when you have a 15 year-old son entered as being 75 years old and when the last name McEntee appears as McEster. One shouldn't have to search all women named "Caroline" living in New York but born in Canada in the 1900 census to find these errors.

- Go Back and Cite Your Sources: With the 20 entries and their respective citations, I was able to get to the Silver medal level. I have much more to do, especially since I stumbled on some cryptic citations along my Austin line. Note to self: your thrice divorced Aunt Susan's story-telling fueled by "Riunite on ice" at the last family reunion does not constitute a source. That's nice.

- Write, write, write!: I will be participating in the Shades of the Departed carnival entitled Smile for the Camera with a deadline tomorrow. I am still researching how the subject of my photo died when struck by a car in the Bronx in 1925.
Note to self: I still think footnoteMaven is a goddess - I love her blogs and her wit.

- Reach Out and Perform Genealogical Acts of Kindness!: I spent about an hour finally entering information on the McEntees buried at the New Paltz Rural Free Cemetry. This included uploading the photos of headstones that I took last month on my trip home. I made 10 entries and now I need to enter all the McEntees at Montrepose Cemetery in Kingston, New York. Not sure into which task this info falls but I will go with indexing project. Note to self: start thinking of a witty epitaph for my headstone, the McEntees can be so conventional sometimes. I may opt for Dorothy Parker's "Pardon My Dust."

So my standings, so far:

Go Back and Cite Your Sources - Silver
Organize Your Research - Bronze
Reach Out and Perform Genealogical Acts of Kindness - Bronze

2 comments:

Miriam Robbins said...

Ahem! From the rule "book":

3. Start competing on August 9, 2008 at 12:00 noon, PDT.

Thomas MacEntee said...

oh - silly me - I thought it said 12 am. See, with my sleep patterns I can no longer tell day from night!

so, I'll just have to do more work. OK - I'll wait until 3pm my time today!