BS: What made you crabby today?

Subject: BS: What made you crabby today?
From: Liz the Squeak
Date: 17 Sep 07 - 10:17 AM

I have just confirmed that a Family Tree disk containing my entire family history, covering over 300 years, Dorset, Hampshire, London and parts of Australia, America and Canada, entries upwards of 1000 names, associated notes and trees, research from all over the globe, has mysteriously turned up blank.

I haven't lost everything, I'm not that stupid, it's mostly all on paper somewhere but everthing that was on that disk is gone. Trees that went back to the early 1700's and had hundreds of entries... personal notes including military service and family legends, in one case, almost the entire population of one village... all vanished into the ether.

The disk has not been damaged, it's been stored in its case, nowhere near magnetic sources - the other disks in the same rack are fine - the computer was recently moved from one room to another but nothing major happened - it wasn't wiped or dropped or subjected to anything out of the ordinary... it was fine last time I used it a few months ago.

I had hoped it was just a case of upgrades not recognising the old files, but alas, using 'open with' has failed, it didn't recognise a thing. It now asks me 'what do you open this with?', in the manner of someone who not only has lost the plot, but wasn't aware there was a plot in the first place.

Reinstallation has resulted in the retrieval of the trees it came with (Royal families of France and England, not found any link yet), but none of the information I have been entering for the last 10 years.













I am now unbelievably crabby.

LTS

Subject: RE: BS: What made you crabby today?
From: wysiwyg
Date: 17 Sep 07 - 10:20 AM

Oh Liz.... [sympathy] Be crabby enough to pay someone to re-enter it!

~S~

Subject: RE: BS: What made you crabby today?
From: Peace
Date: 17 Sep 07 - 10:20 AM

Yeah? Well, after spending seventeen years to trace my family tree back NINETEEN generations, I found out I'm adopted.

Subject: RE: BS: What made you crabby today?
From: Liz the Squeak
Date: 17 Sep 07 - 10:26 AM

Peace - only 17 years? This disk had the fruits of nearly 24 years worth of my research on it... 10 generations, 8 major family lines, cousins removed to the Nth degree and that was just my researches! Add together what others have shared and it comes to about 100 years collectively.

Crabby doesn't even begin to describe how I'm going to be when I stop being stunned!

LTS

Subject: RE: BS: What made you crabby today?
From: Peace
Date: 17 Sep 07 - 10:28 AM

Liz,

The material is still in your computer. Somewhere. When the computer wizards see this they'll help you out. In fact, start a tech thread on it. There are a few people on Mudcat who will know what you should do and how you can go about it. BUT, they have to see this thread.

Subject: RE: BS: What made you crabby today?
From: Liz the Squeak
Date: 17 Sep 07 - 10:32 AM

Peace - I live with a computer programmer.. if he can't find it (and I've a very strong suspicion it was deleted as an unrecognised programme, because of its total lack of recognition by Microsoft), no-one can. It's sort of what he does for a living, but thank you... I'll try a tech 'blonde moment' thread.

LTS

Subject: RE: BS: What made you crabby today?
From: John MacKenzie
Date: 17 Sep 07 - 10:51 AM

I once traced my ancestry back as far as the Suez crisis on my Father's side.
Just what it was doing on my father's side is a mystery!
G.

Subject: RE: BS: What made you crabby today?
From: Bee
Date: 17 Sep 07 - 11:53 AM

As far as I can tell, everything is still on my computer. Despite rigorous and regular use of AVG, Spybot, Ultra Window Cleaner, cache clearing, temp file deleting, cookie clearing, and so on, I noticed yesterday while running AVG that it was referencing, among other ancient web pages, forum pages I looked at three years ago. These are legitimate large forums that I never even joined or posted to: I just looked at them.

But Liz, I feel your pain - I lost a huge slew of real 1900 to 1960 family photos, negs and all, about thirty years ago and I'm still cranky about it.

Subject: RE: BS: What made you crabby today?
From: GUEST,rock chick
Date: 17 Sep 07 - 01:53 PM

Well taking 2.25 hours to cover 21 miles, normally I don't get fed up as I just listen to some good music, but I have a very sore back, which was aggravated by sitting so long, also I am still working and its 6.50pm....Oh well I will post on what made me happy today......when I stop work.

rc

Subject: RE: BS: What made you crabby today?
From: GUEST,sinky
Date: 17 Sep 07 - 02:34 PM

our lasses mate,dirty cow

Subject: RE: BS: What made you crabby today?
From: Sorcha
Date: 17 Sep 07 - 02:49 PM

I was making batch #2 of Faux Woody's BBQ sauce, had it all jarred and everything....remembered that I had not put in the carmelized sugar. DAMN. Dumped the jars, re heated it, added the carmelized sugar, re jarred it. DAMN. Woulda been a lot less messy the first time.

Subject: RE: BS: What made you crabby today?
From: Liz the Squeak
Date: 17 Sep 07 - 02:58 PM

To add insult to injury, in pursuit of further family history researches, I find a possible family member living next door to bloody Thomas Hardy in 1851... Ah well, explains him using the name Dunford in 'Under the Greenwood Tree' (John Dunford is the friend whose funeral Dick Dewey is going to).

I am now monumentally crabby and have stiff neck to boot!

LTS

Subject: RE: BS: What made you crabby today?
From: akenaton
Date: 17 Sep 07 - 03:04 PM

I am never crabby.

Subject: RE: BS: What made you crabby today?
From: pattyClink
Date: 17 Sep 07 - 04:20 PM

Before tossing the offending disk ---if it was small, proprietary software, it might be worth telling the sad story to tech support, see if their programmer will have a look at the disk, perhaps he could recover a slightly corrupted file. Just a thought.   Or was it in big anonymous Microsoft application?

Anyway, we feel your pain and crabbiness!

Subject: RE: BS: What made you crabby today?
From: Rapparee
Date: 17 Sep 07 - 04:33 PM

I tried to trace my ancestry back beyond me, but everyone denied it. When I asked my mother who my father was she replied, "Who the hell are you and how did you get in here?

Subject: RE: BS: What made you crabby today?
From: John MacKenzie
Date: 17 Sep 07 - 04:55 PM

When I was born I was so ugly my Father asked my Mother why I didn't look anything like my 2 siblings. He said to her "Have you been fooling around?" she said, "No, not this time"
G.

Subject: RE: BS: What made you crabby today?
From: Peace
Date: 17 Sep 07 - 04:59 PM

I was so ugly they tied a pork chop around my neck so the dog would play with me.

Subject: RE: BS: What made you crabby today?
From: Helen
Date: 17 Sep 07 - 05:01 PM

I'm still crabby from someone running up the back of my car and writing it off, 2 weeks ago.

My father's crabby about it too, because it was his car and then I bought it from him. He is a motor mechanic and had it running like a dream.

The insurance company is giving me just enough money to buy a bomb which will last me a couple of years if I'm lucky.

Helen

Subject: RE: BS: What made you crabby today?
From: kendall
Date: 17 Sep 07 - 05:01 PM

Jeez Liz, that's a monumental bummer!

I had a "go round" with my computer, but it is all better now.

Subject: RE: BS: What made you crabby today?
From: GUEST,pattyClink
Date: 17 Sep 07 - 08:40 PM

Okay, one more thought came to me, and then I'll shut up.
You changed computers. If the new one has different drive names, then it's possible the new paths you are using are not yet 'approved' by the software, might be worth a check by your expert. It's a longshot, but I've had it happen with some obtuse software.

Subject: RE: BS: What made you crabby today?
From: Peace
Date: 17 Sep 07 - 09:07 PM

"The insurance company is giving me just enough money to buy a bomb which will last me a couple of years if I'm lucky."

Hoimeland Security reads that post and YOU are gonna be up Shit Creek!

Subject: RE: BS: What made you crabby today?
From: Rapparee
Date: 17 Sep 07 - 10:29 PM

Shit Creek is near the Montana/Alberta border. Folks on the way to Ft. Whoop-up from Ft. Benton used to cross it. I am unaware if they used paddles or not.

Subject: RE: BS: What made you crabby today?
From: Liz the Squeak
Date: 17 Sep 07 - 11:19 PM

The computer hasn't been changed for at least 3 years, the disk ran perfectly well when I used it last (definately in the last 12 months and probably in the last 6), when the computer was in another room. It runs on Windows 93 and 3.1 which is probably the trouble. I suspect that upgrades and automatic cleanups have deleted the programmes we use least - 93 being one of them. Only one disk uses 93 and I'm trying to access it.

I've run a search and there are plenty of these particular files cached, but when I try to open them, it comes up as an unrecognised format. All attempts to open them have failed to come up with a programme so I guess I have to accept that they are lost to me.

To heap more coals onto the flame of disappointment, Raven kitty hasn't been seen for nearly 24 hours now. I hope he's just shut in a room somewhere in one of the houses down the street, rather than anything more sinister.

LTS

Subject: RE: BS: What made you crabby today?
From: Cluin
Date: 17 Sep 07 - 11:27 PM

It's probaly where they filled up the barrels of "fire water" they sold the Blackfoot. Just before they added the turpentine, chewing tobacco and cayenne pepper. No wonder they went batshit when they drank it.

Subject: RE: BS: What made you crabby today?
From: Liz the Squeak
Date: 18 Sep 07 - 08:44 AM

Raven kitty turned up safe and knackered.

LTS

Subject: RE: BS: What made you crabby today?
From: maeve
Date: 18 Sep 07 - 08:55 AM

Liz, I'm so glad for you that Raven kitty is safe.

maeve

Subject: RE: BS: What made you crabby today?
From: bfdk
Date: 18 Sep 07 - 09:02 AM

Glad to hear kitty's back in one piece. Sorry to hear about your troubles with your genealogy files, though. I can imagine what it must be like, as I'd be in the same fix if I suddenly couldn't access mine.

It's possible to put it all together again, but it represents hours and hours of laborious toil doing so.. I hope you find a way to get to those files. As long as the files are still there, keep trying and DON'T delete anything until you're sure you've tried every trick in the book.

Best wishes,

Bente

Subject: RE: BS: What made you crabby today?
From: Alba
Date: 18 Sep 07 - 10:55 AM

Nothing.........yet
Jude x

Subject: RE: BS: What made you crabby today?
From: SINSULL
Date: 18 Sep 07 - 01:53 PM

A colonoscopy. Yuck! But all is well. A perfect asshole - there I bet you to it!

Glad the kitty is home safe. Freddie goes walkies every once in a while and I sit and worry the same way I did when my son came home late.

Subject: RE: BS: What made you crabby today?
From: Captain Ginger
Date: 18 Sep 07 - 02:00 PM

Some boy racer bastard killed my beloved dog this morning. I am more than crabby.

Subject: RE: BS: What made you crabby today?
From: Little Hawk
Date: 18 Sep 07 - 02:50 PM

"What made you crabby today?"

You mean I have to have a reason?

Subject: RE: BS: What made you crabby today?
From: Catherine Jayne
Date: 18 Sep 07 - 03:24 PM

Sorry to hear that Captain ginger (((hugs)))

Subject: RE: BS: What made you crabby today?
From: wysiwyg
Date: 18 Sep 07 - 03:38 PM

What's making ME crabby is FLIES, the end-of-season desperadoes in my house that can't find anything to eat but ME!

~S~

Subject: RE: BS: What made you crabby today?
From: Captain Ginger
Date: 18 Sep 07 - 03:44 PM

Ta. It's ripped the stuffing out of me and I'm in bits. Only a scruffy terrier, I know, but he was my best mate.

Subject: RE: BS: What made you crabby today?
From: Desdemona
Date: 18 Sep 07 - 04:03 PM

I narrowly missed an accident on the way home from picking my kids up from school...some idiotic moron on a motorcycle sliced across two lanes of traffic at top speed (no signal, of course), ostensibly to cut in front of me in his hurry to get to the red light first. Thank heaven there was no-one immediately ahead of me, and for the speedy acceleration of my intrepid Volvo; if I hadn't been able to hit the gas HARD he would certainly have hit us. As soon as the light changed he passed me--on the right--amid a roar of exhaust (how small can some people's penises BE, one wonders??), presumably on his way to cause an accident somewhere further up the road. Asshole.

~D

Subject: RE: BS: What made you crabby today?
From: Desdemona
Date: 18 Sep 07 - 04:13 PM

Captain Ginger, I just read your post, and now I'm embarrassed by my comparatively trifling (yet not wholly unrelated) entry. I am completely devoted to my own doggie, and there is just nothing I can say except that I am SO sorry...please accept my heartfelt sympathy.

~D

Subject: RE: BS: What made you crabby today?
From: Sorcha
Date: 18 Sep 07 - 04:20 PM

Oh, Captain, all of our sincere condolences. The Corgi Herd plus Uncle Max, Sorcha, and Mr. Been there, done that. Doesn't get any easier.

Subject: RE: BS: What made you crabby today?
From: Donuel
Date: 18 Sep 07 - 05:01 PM

I had a $2000 dentist visit today and they hit a nerve. They did not offer pain medication so what is now standard office procedure I had to go back and plead for pain medication 2 hours later when the novacaine had worn off. I have witnessed about 6 people having to ask for medication at the front counter in a crowded waiting room. I assume some suffer needlessly since they are to ashamed or timid to go through the humiliation and condesending attitude with strangers watching and listening. They are so niggardly with pain control nowadays it is nearly criminal. The front desk is not the place to practice good medicine.

If all goes well the nerve will recede, if not a root canal will be indicated.

but...I'm feeling much better now.

Subject: RE: BS: What made you crabby today?
From: Little Hawk
Date: 18 Sep 07 - 05:29 PM

"How small can some people's penises BE, one wonders??"

Well, judging by the daily spam in my bulk email...it seems to be a problem on a lot of people's minds...or so the spammers hope, anyway.

Subject: RE: BS: What made you crabby today?
From: SINSULL
Date: 18 Sep 07 - 08:05 PM

Captain Ginger, I am so sorry. Poor little bugger desreved better. It doesn't matter if they come with expensive papers and sires or just turned up on your door step, when you lose them it hurts.
Mary

Subject: RE: BS: What made you crabby today?
From: Captain Ginger
Date: 19 Sep 07 - 03:47 AM

Thanks for your kind words, and sorry to hijack the thread. It's just that yesterday I was still very raw having just buried the little bugger.

Subject: RE: BS: What made you crabby today?
From: bfdk
Date: 19 Sep 07 - 04:30 AM

Captain Ginger, there's no such thing as "Only a scruffy terrier", when you're talking about your best mate. And saying goodbye to a four-legged friend hurts like hell, as those of us who have been there and done it know all too well.

I'm sorry to hear about your loss, sincerest condolences from here.

Best wishes,

Bente

Subject: RE: BS: What made you crabby today?
From: The PA
Date: 19 Sep 07 - 06:30 AM

The cost of an MOT for the monster car.

It failed on two bolts which hold the rear seatbelts. I said nobody uses the back seats - he said that dont matter, £50.00 please. So £50 for the test, £70 for the repair, and £25 for the re-test.

Bugger!

Subject: RE: BS: What made you crabby today?
From: GUEST,punkfolkrocker
Date: 19 Sep 07 - 08:31 AM

waiting in the house on my own for a guitar delivery from ebay

which may or may not actually be delivered today, or any time this week..

..i've been desparate to go for a shit for hours..

but trying to hold it in beyond bursting point
cuz its 'sods law' that our usual miserable lazy parcelfarce delivery driver
will arrive just a few moments after i sit on the bog;

tap the door once, then stick a 'sorry we missed you' failed delivery card
through the letter box before swiftly buggering off to his next 'victim'

ooh.. the pressure from my nether regions is giving me a headache
and making me very irritable...

Subject: RE: BS: What made you crabby today?
From: Becca72
Date: 19 Sep 07 - 10:26 AM

First, let me say how sorry I am for your loss, Captain Ginger.

Now, what's making me crabby today is that my car failed state inspection and the autoparts place wants $450 to fix it to pass. AND my 1 1/2 year old cat has another bladder infection and needs to go back to the vet this afternoon, meaning I have to take time off from work which cuts into my paycheck which makes the $450 (and the $100 vet visit) a little tight. Grrrr. I feel for the cat and don't blame him in the least, but the mechanic almost lost his head this morning.

Subject: RE: BS: What made you crabby today?
From: JennyO
Date: 19 Sep 07 - 12:42 PM

Sorry you lost your best mate, Captain Ginger. Puts it all into perspective really.

{{{{{{{{{{Captain Ginger}}}}}}}}}}

Subject: RE: BS: What made you crabby today?
From: Joybell
Date: 19 Sep 07 - 07:22 PM

I had several reasons for being crabby -- but they just don't rate with yours Liz. Now I can just be concerned about you and forget my own problems. Does it make you feel better that we haven't had it happen to us? How much lighter is my burden -- happy day.
Just about to print off a bit more of my family tree info. just in case.
Lots of chocolate! Lots of chocolate!
Sending hopeful thoughts,
Joy

Subject: RE: BS: What made you crabby today?
From: Helen
Date: 19 Sep 07 - 08:10 PM

How about you pay about $500 for the car registration and compulsory third party insurance, plus paying $217 having to pay put 2 new tires on before it is passed for inspection, and deciding to get a wheel alignment because you care about your car and want it to run safely and reliably, plus the $31 inspection fee, plus about $45 for a full tank of petrol.

That's $793 to keep your reliable, safe car on the road, the one your father looked after like a baby for 8 years and then sold to you 3 years ago.

Then, 13 days after car registration someone runs up the back of your stationary vehicle and the insurance company writes it off. Says it can't be fixed *for the amount it was insured for* so it's kaput! No arguments or tears or appealing to their respect for a family-loved and cared-for car will change their minds. It's taken off you without any warning, without even the chance to get your father to see the damage and talk to his friends in the motor repair industry.

Then 2 days later you are diagnosed with whiplash in your neck, shoulder, arm, lower and middle back. So now every waking moment is painful. Not 10 out of 10 pain, but just constant discomfort. Then you have to run around, using public transport or making your hubby walk to work so you can borrow the car, to get medical treatment and chase up the at-fault driver's insurance company, hoping you'll get some sort of compensation for treatment of the condition. Not to mention having to use public transport to get to work, 30 miles from home.

Sorry, I can't be more sympathetic about having to pay to keep a car on the road. My father and I are in deep mourning for a car which, although 11 years old, would have stayed safe and reliable on the roads for at least 10 more years. And after the fees and costs and hidden charges are all deducted I'll get just enough back from the comprehensive insurance to buy something unsafe, unreliable, and something which is riddled with another person's bad habits and lack of care and respect for a machine which is almost like an extension of ourselves in life these days.

But it's all all right, because the at-fault driver said he was "sorry for the inconvenience".

Helen

Subject: RE: BS: What made you crabby today?
From: Emma B
Date: 19 Sep 07 - 08:18 PM

OK I lost my faithful old car in the floods but I got a "new" one!

Now while I was overtaking two cyclists riding one behind another some silly sod (sorry male driver/tautology?) decides he doesn't need to slow down or pull over to his side and wipes out my wing mirror!

Would you believe these are not "standard" fittings?

Subject: RE: BS: What made you crabby today?
From: Becca72
Date: 20 Sep 07 - 06:54 AM

Sorry, Helen, but the latest 2 incidents I mentioned above are just the most recent in a horrible year for me. I love my car and take very good care of it. What pisses me off is that I think the mechanic is trying to pull something and at the very least is jerking me on the cost. I had to register my car in July to the tune of a couple hundred dollars, put 2 new tires on it in the last 3 months to the tune of another couple hundred dollars and I pay for full coverage insurance at over $600 a year....all of that is the cost of running a vehicle. I'm angry at the mechanic, not the car. Sorry I can't be more sympathetic to your situation but in addition to the car issue my 1 1/2 year old cat could have died yesterday and had to spend the night at the vet's office (which, incidentally, will cost me about $400 when I pick him up this afternoon).