Going paperless in 2010 as much as possible.

We've enjoyed some great weather here in Whitehorse for August.  August 16, 2010 probably marks the last time that we'll get up near 30 degrees Celsius for 2010.  The next 24 to 36 hours are going to see us return to normal temperatures for this time of year.  Alaska did not fair well for weather this summer. Summer in Whitehorse is most excellent indeed.

Since the year 2000 I have attempted to move towards technology is some specific and significant way.  These changes were not New Year's resolutions.  These were choices made after spending some time considering what these changes would mean in terms of how those around me and myself would be affected.  This year I have decided to get rid of paper as much as I can.  I decided it's time to get with the 21st Century and go after the one "old" thing that I have not attempted to get rid of .  Books, magazine and newspapers are my prime targets for removal from my life.  I don't actually mean I'm ridding myself of books, magazines and newspapers.  I will no longer be purchasing the paper versions of these thing from now on.

Bills in paper form have been relatively easy to rid myself of.  A fair number of companies that can be found on the web offer (and actually prefer that customers use because it's way cheaper) paperless billing via e-mail.  Will I be fully free of paper?  The realistic answer is no.  That may not happen in my lifetime as paper is still a mandatory requirement for many things in life.  Take passports for example.  A rather important paper based document that will probably remain paper based for decades to come.

Sony Reader PRS-600

But, with books, magazine and newspapers the answer is yes.  It's fairly easy to do these days.  I have tried reading from a computer screen and even a netbook screen but, that hasn't been convenient because of the size of the screen, position of the computer display and my posture while reading have been issues.

I chose to purchase a Sony Reader PRS-600 last week.  Besides purchasing books, magazines and newspapers in a digital format  I have been interested in Google Books ever since Google announced it was scanning books with the idea of making the world's largest collection of digital books or e-books available on-line.  The cool thing is that the Sony Reader does a good job with presenting PDF files also.  I can now add manuals and instruction guides to the list of paper items I am ridding myself of.  With the choice of using a Sony Memory Stick Duo or SD cards up to 32 GB, I don't think I'll run out of storage any time soon.

I enjoy audio books from Audible.com and when I have a mildly mindless chore to perform or want to go for a walk I'll listen to an audio book.  I confess that this has become the major way that I "read" books these days.  Audio books aren't the full answer to my needs so my Sony Reader will function as the main device by which I will read all manner of things that I use to read from paper.  As much as some may think this is about going green and I guess it kind of it.  I mean I know that I have killed a lot of trees in my life when it comes to the amount of paper that I have collected.  It's not really the "Green" thing that motivates me.  I am tired of paper.

I took a look at the iPad from a distance and am not interested in it at this time.  I have never had one in my hands and that may change towards the ends of this month.  I'm sure it's a fine piece of technology.  It's just not want I'm looking for at this time.  The applications I have in mind and the things that I do and want to do just don't suit what I think the iPad could be used for.  It would probably make a good e-reader but, it's not a cheap e-reader!  I also don't believe the iPad is a computer killer yet.  I know it's not the only gadget that I'll ever want because I don't want it.  It's not the iPad.  It's just me.  I'm picky like crazy!  Just ask my wife.

Another thing that I have decided is that I don't want an all-in-one gadget.  Yet, the tech industry tells me that I do.  I want my phone to be my phone.  I want my PDA to be my Personal Digital Assistant and not my phone.  I want my ebook reader to be my ebook reader, etc.  I may eventually get myself a smart phone but, it won't be the only communications device that I will have.  What happens when the all-in-one gadget fails?  You've got nothing.  Don't tell me I'm old fashioned because I know that's not the case.  Having an all-in-one gadget may be cheaper but, again, why would I want to have all my important communications resources and functions in one gadget?  I believe I am not the only person in the world with this view.

GPS receivers are an excellent example of all-in-one gadgets that do some really amazing stuff in terms of navigation and provision of navigational information.  I will always carry a compass and map(s) with me.  Maps are another paper based thing that I will probably always have.  Why?  Because maps and a compass don't require batteries.

Northwestel's fibre optic cable has been in the news a lot this month.  Construction types with digging equipment love digging up cable.  This leave us Northwestel customers north of 60 degree North kind of knackered up when it comes to telephone service, Internet service and all manner of other commercial services that require any kind of network for transactions and the like.  As I write this post Internet bandwidth here in Whitehorse is still rather narrow.  Sigh!

Have a fun and safe remainder of August.  I'll write again when the leaves are even more yellow and almost totally gone in September.

Back on Facebook and some summer pictures. Oh yeah and GPS.

I am amazed at how difficult starting something like a new post on this blog can be at times.  I have had lots of ideas flow through my head but, when it comes to sitting in front of a keyboard and actually putting ideas to words in a manner that makes sense is more of a challenge that I give it credit for.  This post is breaking away from the genealogical bent that my blog has represented to this point.  There in lies the difficulty that I encounter.

Writing something about my past or that of my family seems easier than forming sentences around my current or day to day activities.  As I sit in front of a computer and consider this, I find that I am still wrestling with the privacy issue in my head.  The fact is that anything on the Internet is pretty much not private is something I understand.  This is the one reason why I took so long to get into blogging in the first place.  This is not a private blog.  This blog is in place so that others come to know what I, Kelly David Quocksister, do and think.

I am back on Facebook.  I was not surprised that the readership of my blog fell off last month because I didn't advertise a new post was available for reading as my Facebook account was deactivated.  Facebook has significant value in many ways.  That was never this issue or issues for me.  The issue for me has been and always will be Facebook security.  The thing that has me floored is that there are people who don't seem to worry about security on Facebook or any other web site or application that uses the Internet.  Why does this concern me?  I am friends with some of them on Facebook!

Parents with young kids on Facebook: Get on Facebook and watch what you kids are doing.  By young kids I mean children that live at home with their parent(s).  Kids need to be accountable to their parent(s) on Facebook or things could get out of hand in ways that will take years to get over if at all.  It's kind of a sad fact that I write "parent(s)" but, the fact is it's sadly the truth.  Facebook is cool, fun and potentially really dangerous for children.  Facebook is not a baby sitter.  You don't let your kids sleep on the road because that is just flat out foolish!  Common sense says that would put them in harm's way.  Don't let your kids be on a social network where you don't know what they are doing.  That, at least in my mind, is similar to letting your kids sleep on a road.

I'm done with my rant.  It's time to get to something way less heavy.  Well almost less heavy.  My wife and I decided to take my mother-in-law out for a bit of a tour of the southern Yukon July 6th.  I stopped on the hill and corner above Johnson's Crossing on the west side of the bridge because I thought it was a scenic location for taking pictures.  My mother-in-law asked my wife to take some pictures using her (digital - what else?) camera.  In the process of my wife doing so the camera froze and stopped operating.  Lens out and not moving and the images of the image viewer frozen.  My wife handed the camera to me and after minutes of attempting to get the camera functional again I was unable to.  I removed the batteries from my mother-in-law's camera to do a hard reset.  Upon returning the batteries to the camera and turning the camera on 300 images missing!  Yep, gone in the blink of an eye.  Should I have removed the SD card as well?  Probably but, I didn't.  My mother-in-law was terrified and my wife was giving me the "Your sleeping in the dog house tonight even though we don't have a dog house" look.  Remember the blog post I wrote January 31st, "Running with a sharp implement."?  The good news is that I back up all the pictures from my mother-in-law's camera July 4th.  She hadn't used the camera since then and the images my wife, mother-in-law and I took on July 6th were all intact.  Nanay's (word for mother in Tagalog) image data was and is safe!

I attempted to assured my wife and mother-in-law that no data images been lost as we have back ups at home.  This put them at ease and the remainder of the day went well.  The nagging question of what happened to cause the loss of the image data in the first was discussed several times the rest of the day.

The evening of July 6th I presented my mother-in-law with an SD card of the more than 400 images that she ad on her camera since her arrival in the Yukon April 28 with room for lots more.  The smile on her face and my wife's "Who said anything about the dog house?" look were well worth it.  Why my mother-in-law's camera and more particularly the SD card on board lost images is a mystery.  Again, the good news is all of the images were backed on multiple drives as well as the Windows Home Server.  Windows Home Server are really cool.  There appeared to be nothing wrong with the SD card I checked it out several times withe software specifically for the purpose.  I reformatted the SD card in my mother-in-law's camera and I'm going to keep an eye on it for future failure(s).

There are lots of wild strawberries in the Teslin River Valley in the vicinity of Johnson's Crossing and so my wife and mother-in-law enjoyed picking the abundant but, tiny strawberries.  My mother-in-law, being from the Philippines, was amazed that strawberries grow in the wild here in the Yukon.  She thought the strawberries tasted so good that they were poisonous.  My wife and I reassured her that she would not get sick and the all would be well in the morning.  It was kind of funny!

The image on the left is of the "Outer Sanctum".  This gazebo and the area it covers is where I do my outdoor computing when the weather is warm and dry enough.  We also use the area for eating but, that is a minor function of the Outer Sanctum.  The major function, of course, is for outdoor computing.  I could compute out in the Outer Sanctum in the rain as well because the gazebo doesn't leak.  The issue is warmth of one's fingers when one is using the Outer Sanctum during cooler temperatures.  I love sitting in the gazebo on warm summer days mainly in the later afternoon and evenings.



Remembering back to June briefly and Father's Day in particular: I sent my dad a GPS receiver (TomTom XL 330 if you were curious as to which GPS receiver it was exactly) for Father's Day.  Being a GPS-centric kind of guy myself I thought that, at my dad's age of 75, it was time I stopped letting he and his wife twist in the wind when it came to 21st century navigation.  The funny thing is the NavStar Global Positioning System is a U.S. Military navigation system that was conceived in the late 1970's.  The interesting thing is that this system is the only satellite navigation system that is fully operational at this time.  The uses for GPS are many and most of them are really well worth getting interested in.


So dad (and anybody else that is interested), the two YouTube video links that I have included here are for you.  The first YouTube link is from the U.S. Air Force Space Command unit that manages the NavStar Global Positioning System satellite constellation.  Lots of interesting information in a little more than 5 minutes.

The truth about GPS: How it works.

This next YouTube video link is specifically about the TomTom XL 300 GPS receiver.  I have one too, dad.  It works great.  When it comes to family and in car navigation one of the guys I work with put it this way: "The cost of a GPS receiver is cheaper than the cost of divorce."  If you plan on taking a trip to a city like Vancouver or Toronto having a GPS receiver makes navigating a way less stressful process for everyone in the vehicle.  If you follow the turn by turn navigation instruction faithfully without getting cocky it's a blast.  My wife likes GPS navigation so much she won't go to a big city without a GPS receiver.  It's easier to use than you think, dad.  Go for it!

TomTom XL 330 video.  You GPS receiver is new, Dad.  Not refurbished.  This was the best video on YouTube that talked about the feature set associated with the product.

Have a good month of July.  I may write again this month,  If not, you'll see something new here in August for sure.

The blogging is here to stay. My Facebook account is deactivated.

I should have put up a blog post in May but, failed to do so.  I really have no excuse.   Life has been getting in the way.  This is a good thing.  We've had company and completed a prolonged Grade 12 graduation process with everything going well.

I started this blog in November 2009 and I have decided that the blogging will continue.  That's sounds kind of funny doesn't it?  The blogging will continue until moral improves.  That sentence has nothing to do with anything.  It just popped into my head and out my fingers onto the keyboard.  Ahem!  I was initially concerned about privacy but, I'm way less concerned about the privacy of this blog than my privacy on Facebook.  The solution was easy.  I left Facebook.  I enjoyed my time on Facebook and I may go back but, the idea of advertisers having or gaining access to my Facebook profile did not appeal to me.  I realize that there are something like 400 million Facebook users and my departure will only have my friends wondering what I'm up to.  The fact is Facebook users should be concerned about their profile data.  I mean seriously concerned.

Facebook appeared (and still appears) to me to have more problems or issues than they have solutions.  Facebook also has issues here in Canada with the Canadian government due to privacy concerns.  I chose to deactivate my account.  I miss the friends and family that I was connecting with on Facebook.  I may go back but, not right now.  The downside of leaving Facebook means that I am no longer connected to family members that I was just getting to know.  It turns out I have dozens of cousins that I've never met.  My father had 13 brothers and sisters!  My dad was child #12 and there are only 4 of his siblings including my dad that are left.

I also decided that I have a lot of other things that need my attention.  Like this blog for example.  I started this blog by writing about my family.  By that I mean my entire family!  Genealogically speaking I just found 12 more ancestors on my mother's side of my family today.  That was two fun finds.  I chose to look at two of my ancestors differently and searched based on the new paradigm. 12 more people showed up in search results and have now been added to my family tree.  The Internet has made genealogical searches easier and genealogical web sites make locating and organizing data easier as well.

I may move away from the genealogical interests occasionally to other topics of interest.  Summer is almost here and that means I'm going to go fly fishing and such.  Fun will be had and I will attempt to capture some of that here.  Pictures may appear as well.  Geotagged ones even!  This time last year when I was visiting my family on Vancouver Island I found the Sony GPS logger that matched my Sony DSC-H50B.  I now geotag my images whenever it is reason for me to do so.  Through the magic of the black box my camera somehow lets the GPS logger know that a picture has been taken and data is created.  I don't know how it works.  I didn't have to link the GPS logger and camera manually.  They appear to talk to each other wirelessly automatically.  This process is supposed to work with the Sony DCR-SR47 camcorder we have also.  I have not used the GPS logger with the video camera yet.

Yes, I know.  Ask me what time it is and I'll tell you how to build a clock.  More on that later.  I'm off to enjoy June 2010.  I'm off Facebook but, I'm still on Twitter.  If you use Twitter look me up.  VY1CA is my username.

Has Laichkwiltach Nation history been revised?

I choose to start this blog post by telling you that I have not lived on either of the reserves of my people and therefore did not receive the benefit or disadvantage that living in community has to offer.  As a child I was made to feel unwelcome because of my pedigree.  I stayed away as a young adult because of that.  The things I have learned of my family and my people has been done at a distance from Campbell River.  This is not necessarily a bad thing.  What I have picked in the process of continual learning and life experiences is that native people's across Canada were not and, still are not, treated in a similar way.  I have the benefit of looking from the outside in.

I have been asking myself the title question of this post for many years.  The question: "Has Laichkwiltach Nation history been revised?"  I believe the changes that have been made to my family's last name are an example of revising history.  My greatgrandfather's name was changed to the extent that I don't know what the exact spelling of his last name was.  Changes to my family's last name will ripple through time.  This create's a genealogist's nightmare!  Fortunately for my family someone knew where to find documents and ask the right questions.  Having an accurate family history and family tree in place makes a big difference.  My family members have been very fortunate in that regard.  Information that would have been lost has been recorded so that generations that follow will know from whom they have descended.  Very valuable stuff for a lot of reasons.  Land claims being one of them.

Members of my family will tell you, "Yes!"  The Laichkwiltach Nation's history has been revised time and again.  When I was a child I was told my family was Kwiakutl.  (Don't worry.  I couldn't pronounce it either.)  Through the process of research and family knowledge it was determined that this was not correct.  There are others in my family that are more knowledgeable on this issue than I.  My point here is that the Laichkwiltach Nation could well have disappeared in name without anyone being the wiser without the knowledge of my family's roots and the nation to which we belong.   The stroke of an Indian Agent's pen could well have remain unchallenged and well, thankfully, that is not the case.

Why would someone want to change the name and value of another person?  Why would the history of a people be altered?  The answer to both questions is the same: To take what the original occupants have and minimize potential claim to what was taken.  This kind of exploitation has been going on for so long that it sadly is considered the norm.  I have come.  I see what I want.  I will build upon what I have taken.  It's mine without agreement or negotiation with the original owner.  What about the people whose land it was before you showed up?

As strange as that may sound this is part of my family's story.

What was my great grandfather's last name and how did he spell it?

Most of us have heard the phrase, lyrics or idiom, "Stick and stones may break my bones but names will never hurt me."  Turns out that's not true!  Names have been injuring and killing people for millenia!  Yes, names hurt!  I knew that when I was a kid.  It's the whole reason why people insult each other by name calling.  There are so many lies that are told to children for reasons that make entirely no sense in any way whatsoever.  It's really rather sad.

I was 7 years old before I could finally, without assistance, spell my last name.  I was pretty proud of myself.  Quocksister - "Q-U-O-C-K-S-I-S-T-E-R".  There it is!  All eleven letters of it.  Four vowels and 7 consonants.  Being able to spell my last name ranked right up there with being able to tie my own shoes and going to the bathroom without assistance.  Laugh all you want.  A time in your life is coming, hopefully when you are a senior citizen, when you will have to go to the bathroom with assistance, again.  Oh, yeah!  Someone will also have to tie your shoes for you eventually as well.

Would you be surprised to learn that this name, Quocksister, is a relatively new name?  It has only been in existence for approximately 130 to 140 years plus a decade or maybe two.  The name Quocksister was given to my great grandfather by people that couldn't spell his last name.  Go figure!  Changing one's last name occurred in the 1800's and I'm know it still happens today.  People that have arrived in Canada have changed their last names because, like my family's last name, may have been difficult to spell or pronounce and sometimes the name change was done to hide something in the past.  Is this revisionist history in the making?  That's a question I am going to leave for another blog post.  I can tell you as an amateur genealogist it makes for finding one's family members and discovering one's family history a challenge.

My name is Kelly David Quocksister.  My father's name is David John Quocksister.  My grandfather's name was John Quocksister (no known or apparent middle name).  My great grandfather's name was George Kwaksistala or, George Kwocksistala, or George Quocksistala or George Quocksister.  There are several other variations of my great grandfather's last name before it was changed to Quocksister.  If I was alive during the time of my great grandfather I would have asked what name he preferred.  I already know the answer.  I still would have asked.

Two years ago I learned that the name Quocksister sounds similar to the name of a South African pastry.  I wasn't really sure how to take that when I learned of it.  So here I am.  A child of two races with a last name that almost got me seriously injured in elementary school thinking my last name is a desert?  I can tell you that I know the value of a name.  For better, or for worse, with God's grace I have made a name for myself with the name Quocksister.  I choose to keep this name.

The name Kwaksistala is a powerful name.  How do I know that?  I've noticed that over the years people have attempted to take this name and use it as their own for personal gain.  Get your own name!  This one is in use by the true descendants of the original owner.  Some members of the Quocksister family have chosen to change their last name back to Kwaksistala.  I believe that is a good thing.

So you may be wondering why I bring this issue up.  Knowing my great grandfather's name is important to me.   It is well known that natives in western Canada are fighting for the return of ancestral lands.  There are debates about the wisdom in this.  I'm not sure if land claims are a way to solve problems.  I do know that land that was and I believe still is my great grandfather's is being disputed over today.  This land should be returned to my family.

George Quocksistala passed away December 23, 1921.  I am his descendant and I can prove it, as can my cousins.

Genealogy and the grandfather I knew.

I have been busy studying and reviewing my family and the families that I represent as a descendant.  I was very fortunate to have a lot of excellent material available to me.  That is due in part to technology and the Internet in specific.  Computers now are cheaper and more power than they ever have been.  The digitization of vital statistic records as a result of computers and the Internet linking all this data together has for me made genealogy a fun pursuit.  I strongly believe that genealogy and archeology are going to help my family win issues that have been outstanding for far too long.

In 1998 while visiting my father and his wife in Campbell River, British Columbia I was given some really cool information about the native side of my family by Candy-Lea Chickite.  This really cool information was in the form of a GEDCOM file.  Please click on the GEDCOM link to learn more about what a GEDCOM file is.  The file that Candy-Lea gave me was about 50 kilobytes or maybe a bit less.  My point here is that this small file of digital information about a part of my family has changed my life.

Researching my families genealogy has help me use the technology I love to study something that I am learning to love even more.  My family.  I will be referring to my family as families from this point on in this blog post because most of us come from more than one family.  As stated in other blog posts my families aren’t perfect.  I found out some things about my families that have caused change in my families and mostly for the better.

On February 25, 1909, 101 years ago today my grandfather, Ronald Douglas Bartlett was born in Victoria, British Columbia.  No!  He’s not 101 years old.  He past away February 22, 1992.  Today I choose to celebrate my Granddad’s birthday because of what it was that he meant to me and what he still means to me as my grandfather and ancestor.  When I was born in 1960 and as I matured in the years that followed it was my grandfather, Ron Bartlett, who was one of the people that helped shape my life.

Sadly, I don’t speak of my grandfather, John Quocksister, as I have no memories of him and little knowledge of him until later in life.  Grandfather John Quocksister passed away August 4, 1944 a little more than 16 years before I was born.  My dad was 10 years old at the time.  His wife, Susan (Ne: Assu) Quocksister passed away December 23, 1938.  The loss of my grandparents in the Quocksister family and the impact(s) of their departures is something that I am still coming to understand in being rather large.  That is why I do not speak of my Quocksister grandparents.  I never had the pleasure of meeting them.  From what I understand and am told, they were excellent people.  I just realized that my dad was 12 of 14.  Heh!  So much for "7 of 9" from Star Trek.  My dad is "12 of 14".  So there!

I think Grandma Susan should have received a medal like the Order of Canada or something.  She gave birth to 14 children before she passed away!  Like I said, I think the lady should be decorated and now, posthumously, of course.  I wonder how many more kids she and Granddad John would have had if they both remained alive to be old together and die after living 80 years or something like that?  Frightening!  I mean wow.

My Bartlett grandparents I knew well.  Back to Granddad Ron Bartlett whose birthday is today.  My grandfather Ron Bartlett was one of the fairest men than I have ever known.  He treated everyone and I do mean everyone with respect.  I believe from my own observations as a child that he showed respect and grace to people that did not ever treat him so well.  I found that to be truly amazing as a child.  My respect for my one remaining grandfather was huge!  He was an impressive man.

My grandfather was Postmaster of the Campbell River Post Office until I think is was 1972 or 1973.  He served 55 years with in what is now called Canada Post.  I don’t believe that my grandfather worked the whole 55 years.  He was accredited with time as I recall that worked out to 55 years.  I know that he worked well over 50 years.   I remember he received a medallion and a Seiko watch along with a letter of citation or some such thing.  I don’t know where any of that stuff is now.  Hopefully someone in the family still has the medallion.  It was impressive.

My favourite times with my Granddad were when he and Grandma would take my brother and I (and later my baby sister) along with them on summer holiday camping trips that normally occurred ever year in August.  We would load up my grandparents camper, say good bye to my mother and down the Island Highway we would head to Nanaimo to catch the ferry to the mainland.  One of the few times that I saw my grandparents fight was navigating through Vancouver.  I love GPS receivers.  They really are relationship savers.  Ask my wife.

Grandma would have the map sprawled out on the dash on the right side of the truck cab.  My Granddad was fuming and driving on the left side of the truck and my brother and I sat very quietly in the middle.  Scary times then and funny memories now.  I think the funniest part is that husband – wife navigation changed little before the advent of Global Positioning System satellites and receivers.  If Granddad was alive now and saw how Girlie and I travel he would just shake his head, laugh to himself and says something like, “Kids these days”.  “Turn right in 800 metres”, says the TomTom GPS receiver and Girlie reads the GPS screen, tells me the cross street and we turn right, in 800 metres.  No arguing and no fussing except, when I miss the turn.  It happens!  Ask anyone with any experience in GPS navigation and they’ll tell you the same thing.  Trust the machine.

On one trip my brother Kirby and I were travelling with our grandparents and I recall the time was about 9:30 in the morning.  Kirby and I were sitting between my grandparents in the cab of the truck and we couldn’t keep our eyes open.  We both sat their with our eyes closing involuntarily in the bright morning sunshine.  Our grandparents were not impressed.  They promised us that beatings would soon follow if we youngster didn’t open our eyes!  Kirby and I burst into tears immediately telling our grandparents that we weren’t sleeping and we wanted to open our eyes but, we were having serious problems doing so.

My Granddad was the calmer of my grandparents and recommended to my Grandma that my brother and I should go see a doctor and find out what’s wrong.  We stopped in a town in the Interior of British Columbia (I don’t remember where.) and my grandparents found a doctor that would see my brother and I.  It turned out that my brother and I had pretty much sunburned our retinas playing on a lakeshore the day before.  Our reward?  Sunglasses!  We had no problems keeping our eyes open with sunglasses on.  Kirby and I took it easy on our eyes after that day.

Later in my grandfather’s life a sad tale played itself out that was very hard to watch.  I remember being told in 1987 by my grandfather that he had Alzheimer’s Disease.  What an amazing man!  He told me so that I would understand what was to come.  It was difficult for me to watch one of my heroes in life lose his mind and he was the only one that didn’t know it.  There were fun times even with the Alzheimer’s and my grandfather.

In 1988 my grandparents were living in Westbank which has since been swallowed up by Kelowna and I was driving my grandparents Volkswagen Jetta.  We were almost in Vernon.  My grandmother was navigating on the right, as she always did ever since I was a knee high kid, and my grandfather was sitting in the back seat.  It was nearing lunch and all three of us were expressing hunger issues.  Grandma and I were looking for a restaurant to stop and have lunch at.

My grandfather moved forward from the back seat, reached forward with his right hand and, while giving me a pat on the shoulder said, “I don’t know who you are but, we’re sure having a good time.”  My Grandma and I laughed with my Granddad.  Looking back on the moment now the memory brings tears to my eyes.  My Granddad had a good day and didn’t even know it.  He wasn’t sad.  He was having a good time.  I had accomplished what I had sent out as a goal of helping my Granddad enjoy his later years.

Thank you Candy-Lea Chickite for the gift that I am still very much enjoying in studying my family roots.  Thank you Granddad for the excellent man that you were and always will be to me.

Happy birthday, Granddad.  Before the sand ran out you lived a wonderful life.

Running with a sharp implement.

(I was going to call this blog post “Running with Scissors” but, I didn’t want to confuse what I was writing about with the movie by Sony of the same name and therefore open myself up for a take down notice or legal battle of some sort.  That would suck!)

I have just completed a task that I have been doing every year since I have owned a computer of one sort or another.  I have taken last year’s images and videos that I have shot as well as other data that I have created and collected and backed it up.  Doing this makes room for the stuff I’ll be doing in the up coming year and this action ensures that I have archived or stored my important data somewhere other than my computers at least once.  I have multiple storage devices to minimize complete and permanent loss of my data.

As children, most of us and, I am sure pretty much all of us, were warned as children not to run with unprotected sharp implements.  When one takes a good close look at a sharp implement and knows and understands what the sharp implement is capable of doing one quickly realizes that the warnings given to us by our parents, grandparents, aunts, uncles, brothers and sisters or cousins makes good sense.  If you run with sharp implements that are not properly protected the possibility of getting hurt is quite high.  Is it possible to run with sharp implements without getting hurt or hurting others?  Sure!  But, why would you?  Most reasonable people will think you are nuts if you choose to run with sharp implements that are not probably sheathed or scabbarded.

So then, if you know that running with unprotected sharp implements is dangerous to your health and others around you, why would you not you back up the data you have stored on your computer?

I amazed at the number of people that I know that don’t back up their data.  It’s 2010.  Come on!  “Who should back up their data?”, you ask.  Everyone who uses a computer should.  Not backing up your data is about the same risk level as running with unprotected sharp implements.  And being well adjusted human beings we don’t run with unprotected sharp implements.

“Come on, Kelly!  What’s the big deal?  I think your being an alarmist.  This kind of comparison is just a scare tactic,” you say.  Oh really?  Have you ever had to recover from a hard drive failure and discover, much to your horror, that you can’t recover because you didn’t back up your data or maybe didn’t back up recently enough?  These events happen.  Just because we don’t hear about a lot of them doesn’t make this issue any less real.

You want to know why hard drives are relatively inexpensive these days?  The volume of hard drives sold is a factor but, simply put (and this is an over simplification to save time and space), the reason why hard drives are relatively inexpensive is that hard drives are made with the understanding that they will eventually fail.  Hard drives can be designed so that the risk of failure is very, very low but, then they would cost very much more then they do now.  So the question of a hard drive failing is not IF it will happen but, WHEN it will happen.  Sooner or later you’re going to encounter a hard drive failure or other computer malfunction or, theft and you will have lost all your data and quite possibly permanently.  It doesn’t matter what operating system you are using.  MAC OS, Windows (pick a version) or Linux.  Your hard drive could eventually have a problem that will have nothing to do with operating system.

If you own a digital music player, digital camera, write documents or spreadsheets you should be backing up your data on a regular basis.  If what I am talking about sounds like work that because it is!  If you have gone to the trouble of downloading music, taking pictures, shooting video and all the other things that computers are capable of doing then you should be backing up your data on something or somewhere on a regular basis.  There are fairly cheap solutions out there and others that are more elaborate and not so cheap.

You could pay a data recovery service to try and get your data back off your dead drive.  Know that this kind of service isn’t cheap and it’s also not without risk.  You could pay money that would buy you several new high end PCs and still not get your data back.  It’s cheaper and easier to back up your data now while you can.

USB flash drives are amongst the cheapest way of backing up important data.  I saw some in Walmart today that were under $20.00 CAD for 4GB. (GB stands for Gigabyte)  You could also go for an external USB hard drive and those very in price from about $78.00 CAD for a 250GB drive to as high was you want to go for as much storage as you can think of or need.  You could even put your data on a CD or DVD if you had to.  Most computers made in the last 5 years, with the exception of netbooks, come with optical drives.  It’s a slower way of doing things but, it still works.  It’s way better than nothing!

You also may wish to choose an online backup.  A Drive and Sky Drive are two that come to mind.  I know there are others that are free that you can consider pay options for.  DropBox not only backs up your data but synchronizes it across your various computers if you have more than one.  You can start with a free account and move up in storage amount for a fee.

If you choose an external USB or FireWire drive you’ll need to have some software dedicated to the task.  Microsoft has a free and unsupported application called SyncToy.  There are all sorts of free backup programs.  EaseUS Todo Backup and SyncBack are free.  These two programs offer different advantages and possible disadvantages to keeping your data safely stored else where.

The reason why I mention possible disadvantages is that having to back up data can be viewed as being a hassle.  Be careful not to chose a software package that is too complex.  If it’s too complex you won’t use it.  Even if you paid money for it.  Try the free stuff first and see how you like it.

I have been guilty of having everything I need to keep all my data safe and then have chosen not to do it because I wanted to use my computer for something else at that time.  The good news is you can automate the backup process to occur when your not sitting in front of your computer.

It’s up to you to find the backup solution that works best for you.  My data is safe.  Is yours?  Are you running with unprotected sharp implements?

There’s nothing like family.

Happy New Year!

In my first blog posting I said that I may write from the Philippines.  I chose not to.  I decided to reflect on things that were and are happening in my life and chose to save my thoughts for another day.  I was on holiday and enjoyed that holiday.  Was is it exhausting?  Yes, and I wouldn’t trade a minute of it.  I have a bunch of new ideas for this blog as a result of our time away from Canada.  I hope that I can remember them so that I can document what it is I have been thinking about.

Thanks, Dawn, for following this blog and thank you, Ean for your comments.  At least there are two people that read what I have written.  That’s kind of cool!  I am going to try and double my readership to four.  Won’t that be something?

Now, where was I going with this?  Oh, yeah.  I remember.  *Smile*

That’s all I have to say.  Thank you for reading!

Seriously though, I say again, “There’s nothing like family.”  When you live some of the places I’ve lived, and most times by myself, I can certainly tell you that I value my family highly.  The person that I’ve learned a lot about family from has been my wife.  She comes from a different culture than mine and a large family.  We have just returned from visiting her family.  I’ll just say that she has 8 brothers and sisters, all of whom are still alive as well as her mother.

Whether it be the pressures of life or other issues that are real or imagined we (I can replace we with “I” but, for the sake of where I’m going with this I’m going to allow “we” to suffice.) often allow things to get in the way of our relationships and thus the decay begins.  Decay that we can neither afford or allow.  The family unit is under pressure all over the world.  I’ve seen it.  I find it rather amazing that the same pressures the family unit faces in Canada are the same pressures the family unit faces elsewhere in the world sometimes to a horrifying degree.  The good news is most all of us can do something about ensuring the outcome is better instead of worse.

My immediate family has lost two people within the past decade: My oldest sister and my younger brother.  Two siblings are left, me and my little sister.  Our lives have been changed forever by the loss of our siblings.  I believe that my relationship with my remaining sibling is one of the most important relationships in my life.  My remaining sister and for that matter, my parents, though they divorced long ago and moved on to live differently in different places, are very important to me.  Is that weird?  No more weird than being a child of two races.  That would be me in case you were wondering.

Within this past year my sister and I have taken to spending time with another family member.  Our niece.  The child of our departed brother.  Getting to know her has been a wonderful adventure.  She needs family just like everyone else that I have ever met.

My sister and I both plan on outliving our parents!  Does that mean I’ll stop doing some of the crazy fun things that I like doing?  Nah!  It means I’ll be more careful doing what few crazy fun things that I like doing.  It means I’ll think about the relationships with my family members and remember why it is that I do what it is I do in the first place.

I have chosen not to post pictures with this blog post because I want you, the reader, to think about family and whom or what that may mean to you.  It’s not important what my family looks like.  It is important that I love them.  So I do.

Is my family perfect?  Not even close!  My family has had it’s issues and problems.  I have had my issues and problems with my family.  The important thing is that these people, as well as my wife’s family, are still my family.  I am committed to my family and spending time with my family is high priority.  I wasn’t always so interested in my family and I have paid the price for that.  Once I realized the best thing to do was spend time with my family in spite of our differences my life changed significantly for the better.  Funny how that happens!