The Quest

I've often wondered whether the technology effect is good or bad. By the technology effect I mean the fact that you can readily find information on just about anything online, and you can use your devices for almost everything. For the most part, I love it. What I don't love is the fact that I don't seem to really know things anymore. I rely on Google to give me answers to my questions, my digital calendar to remind me of appointments, my phone to wake me up and do basic math, Facebook to tell me when there's a birthday and remind me what I was doing at this time last year. Growing up, my parents always encouraged us to find answers to our questions. Any time we asked them something, they'd say, "Look it up." What they really meant was that we should consult an encyclopedia or a dictionary. We had about four different sets of encyclopedias (maybe five?), which are now sorely out-dated. I miss looking things up in a book. Searching for subjects in Funk...

If you're looking for a good book to read, I'd like to introduce you to Steve Robinson . He's no relation to me (my mother's maiden name is Robinson), but my love of his books does have a genealogical connection. Steve writes genealogical mysteries. The hero of each book is Jefferson Tayte, JT, who is a genealogist. JT gets into a lot more trouble than most genealogists I know, but it sure makes for a fun read. One of the things I love about Steve's books is that I always come away with a new idea about where I could look for missing information. New research tactics abound in each of his thrilling books. If you love suspense and you love genealogy, I think you'll be hooked. I just finished the last book he released, Letters from the Dead , and have already pre-ordered the next one, The Penmaker's Wif e. They are all available on Amazon , some even in multiple languages. Although I saw on his Facebook  page that they were all on sale for .99 cents for a ...

I've just finished reading American Gods by Neil Gaiman for the next gathering of the Novel Ideas Meetup. The first meetup and the subsequent reading of this book has made me realize some things about myself. I love to read. I read a lot. But I'm not an avid reader. I'm not a bibliophile. I pay precious little attention to the names of authors, books, genres and such. In short, I'm not a reading fanatic. But I'm a fan of reading. I had no idea who Neil Gaiman was when I started reading this book (or when I finished the book part of it). In the e-edition, the contents of his online journal are included. It shares his perspective on the editing process. It wasn't until I read the journal that I knew he  was somebody  (i.e. not a first-timer). In the journal, he refers to lots of authors who are obviously supposed to be known to the reader. The only name I recognized was Stephen King... and that not because of reading his books, but because of his pop icon status...

Until a few years ago, I didn't know anyone who was gay. Or at least I thought I didn't. When one of my best friends from college "came out" I had a dilemma on my hands. I had always heard that homosexuality was a sin. We were Christians and were supposed to avoid sinning, or at least not do it intentionally. So I didn't know how to handle the presence of a gay person in my life. Should I tell him that he shouldn't be doing that? Or keep my mouth shut and risk him "going to hell"? (seriously, that's what I thought) It was around this time that I first heard the phrase "love the sinner, hate the sin." For a while, that seemed like a good idea to me. I could latch on to that mantra, not question the beliefs I'd been taught, and rest easy at night knowing that I'd solved the problem. After all, I had plenty of other people in my life who were sinning in different ways... and I still loved them. And I didn't "call them...

This is how my morning started... I posted the following as my status update on Facebook: I tried really hard to sleep in late this morning... but my thoughts kept drifting back to that man who's living in his truck while waiting for his first paycheck from a new job (that probably pays minimum wage). My privileged mind just couldn't keep laying in my queen-sized bed, in my air-conditioned house, with my better-off-than-most-people dogs. Issues are weighing heavily on me after the the past week of blog-reading, listening/reading about political platforms, and sitting in my office trying to imagine how that homeless man is living with such a positive attitude. I feel some blogs coming on. Not that writing will change anything, but it will help me get my thoughts out of my head. Time to get started. A few things happened this week that have me pensive. Here's the list: In staff meeting we heard about a book called One Thousand Gifts by Ann Voskamp. We also heard abo...

I've been reading this book - The Rapture Exposed - and have started pondering the beliefs that we take for granted. A few years back, when the Left Behind series of books came out, I read the first few, along with most of my evangelical Christian friends. I thought they were based on truth, because I had always been taught that the Bible explicitly described the Rapture... that it was TRUE. I'm not a historian, nor a theologian. I'm a consumer of history and theology. So I don't have the breadth of knowledge required to identify what is TRUE vs. what is HISTORY. Do you understand the difference? TRUTH - in it's purest form - is not dependent on what a person says or does or believes. Outside of seeing something first-hand, none of us really know what is TRUE. We only know what we believe to be true based on our personal experiences and the particular version of history we've been taught. As eye-witness accounts reveal, even first-hand can be iffy. And...

So I was browsing Kindle books for what I might read next and came across author Alice Zogg. Of course, I saw the name, saw that she was born in Switzerland, and I had to know more. After contacting Alice, I found out that she had married a Zogg, who was also born in Switzerland. They live in California now. She also shared this little tidbit: It is unlikely that the many Grabs Zoggs and the numerous Walenstadt Zoggs are closely related.  The family line of Zoggs from Grabs (and surrounding area) are mostly of protestant ancestry, whereas the Zoggs from Walenstadt (and surrounding area) derived  predominantly from people of Roman catholic faith.  In addition there is another group of Zoggs in the state (Kanton) of Graubünden. Interesting! I haven't read the book I purchase yet, but if you're interested in finding out more about Alice and her books, check out  www.alicezogg.com .

I just finished reading The Hangman's Daughter  by Oliver Pötzsch (Lee Chadeayne, translator). The book in itself was interesting, but what I found to be particularly of note was the postscript. Apparently the inspiration for this book was the author's own ancestry of executioners - the Kuisl family. I have not yet found such a shocking occupation in my own family's past. We were doctors, teachers, preachers, farmers. But who knows what we would find if we delved back into the medieval past! The author notes: "In the past few years, genealogical research has become increasingly popular. Perhaps one of the reasons for this is that we are trying, in a world of increasing complexity, to create a simpler and more understandable place for ourselves. No longer do we grow up in large families. We feel increasingly estranged, replaceable, and ephemeral. Genealogy gives us a feeling of immortality. The individual dies; the family lives on." Maybe this is why I find g...