Monday, June 30, 2025

Internet restored yesterday morning - just a couple of hours later

 My internet was restored yesterday morning with just a couple of hours offline (in time for the Church Service actually although I was nearly late as I did set the service up but was busy doing a couple of items and already the entrance of the clergy and small choir was in place when I finally sat down to watch). I had watched the Church Service in England on the phone. Both services had lovely music although we are into summer time now without choirs here although the soloist was excellent at Christ Church Cathedral. Internet is such a wonderful addition to our world as it allows for one to visit around the world without actually going anywhere. I have traveled enough to last a lifetime for sure and it was fun. My husband Edward and I very much enjoyed our many trips to the United States hunting out his colonial ancestors and visiting with his many many cousins there; attending many many conferences and he presented at some. Being part of many many family reunions particularly in the Rathbun  and Williams family (his latest American ancestor to come to Canada in the 1820s) and his family mentioned that he had an "itchy foot." Although he came with his wife and family to Canada he didn't bring the stories of his family with him which turned out to be amazing including the Reverend Valentine Wightman, the Reverend Jonathan Holmes, the Reverend Obadiah Holmes, Reverend Joshua Rathbun, Roger Williams, John Sayles, Hannah Feake, John Bowne and the list goes on and on back into the very early days of the American Colonies. Although his Kipp family arrived in October 1800 in Canada there too the knowledge of his Kip family of New York also not passed down in very great detail. So it was, for Edward, a wonderful journey into the past as he learned more and more about his American ancestry mostly patriot actually although he also had Loyalist ancestry - but I found it intriguing that two very obvious Loyalist and Patriot lines married here in southwestern Ontario! Life makes many changes in families. The Internet has certainly made it possible to not only track them but also to meet descendants and enjoy swapping stories that had been passed down. 

Another beautiful day and thank you God for the sun and the wind, the rain and the blue sky. Another day under the beautiful sun which God created. Yesterday we walked at Mer Bleu and it was a lovely outing in the woods. Not really busy but busy enough that the woods will be maintained for use for all having a pleasant walk on a Sunday afternoon. There were some bikers as well so perhaps we will take our bicycles another time. 

I spent some time collecting material to work on the cross over points for the five siblings as I move forward towards the goal of all this collecting of information in the Living DNA site. I have not yet completed the fourth siblings' page 8 and will work on that today and perhaps tomorrow begin the fifth sibling. So an even shorter time than predicted to reach this point which is rather nice. Generally July is a hot month and rather dry but a couple of good rains has given us a good start into the new month to begin tomorrow on Canada Day. July 1 1867 the Dominion of Canada became official. I had meant to buy a big flag to put on the Garage Door but did not get that done but do have a Canadian flag on the front door. 

Today is cleaning day and it is the top floor. Soon time to begin that but first breakfast and before that drinking my tea which is in the process and doing my solitaire puzzles. 

May peace be more than a futile wish and may the peoples of the world find a path that brings us to that uplifted plain of peace and good works which will lead to a wonderful future for the grandchildren and great grandchildren of the world. Thank you God for another beautiful day in our world.  

The Bible Reading for today did speak to me I must say (Psalm 85):

A Prayer for Peace

Our Lord, you have blessed
    your land
and made all go well
    for Jacob's descendants.
You have forgiven the sin
and taken away the guilt
    of your people.
Your fierce anger is no longer
    aimed at us.

Our Lord and our God,
    you save us!
Please bring us back home
    and don't be angry.
Will you always be angry
    with us and our families?
Won't you give us fresh life
and let your people be glad
    because of you?
Show us your love
    and save us!

I will listen to you, Lord God,
    because you promise peace
to those who are faithful
    and no longer foolish.
You are ready to rescue
    everyone who worships you,
so that you will live with us
    in all your glory.

Love and loyalty
    will come together;
goodness and peace
    will unite.
Loyalty will sprout
    from the ground;
justice will look down
    from the sky above.

Our Lord, you will bless us;
our land will produce
    wonderful crops.
Justice will march in front,
making a path
    for you to follow. 

Sunday, June 29, 2025

Internet down

Always an interesting event with a world so interconnected, an absence of internet connectivity in the usual manner. Anna, Rogers vigilant helper, quickly identified the problem which is helpful. 

Drinking tea and planning my yoga drill and breakfast. Yoga precedes breakfast. Then the leisurely breakfast and it is Sunday. Church on the phone is great so that works. Thankyou God for the beauty of the day.

Saturday, June 28, 2025

Looking forward to moving

I continue to look forward to moving and downsizing has to continue to be on my mind as I simply have too much of Edward's material not yet placed. All of this material meant a great deal to him and so I will strive to place it and perhaps this summer will see me organize all the Allen material and all the Kipp (old) material and get it placed. My daughter will help me with it but she is also busy with her research. Her retirement days though are coming and although she has thoughts post-retirement slowly developing they will I know involve moving perhaps even before she does retire. One of the people who did some replacement work and repair was telling me that there is a consortium which wants to purchase sets of carriage homes along the road behind us to build condominium apartment buildings (low-rise) I think he said. An interesting idea and I certainly do not have a problem with that. It would house many many young people and the train is so handy to go to work wherever in the city.  But if someone with a family comes along when I am ready to sell I will sell it to whomever. We have lived here since the 26th April 1978 (and to date the family that has lived the longest on this rather long street!) when everything from here to the river (including no houses across the road) was just farmland (unused). Orleans Blvd as it is now just a dream on a map although some parts already existing. 

 I remember when the girls were young and Edward took them and went househunting when the houses were first built up on Chapel Hill but the yards were too small and the bedrooms also rather small as these rooms are generous in these carriage homes on the second floor. The living/dining room is small but the kitchen also not a bad size. But he decided not to move as gardening was something he loved to do. Myself at nearly 80 find the gardening a lot and mostly just weed putting a bag out to the front or into the bin at the back. I definitely prefer winter! But my not cutting down everything in the fall is showing this year as the hostas are huge and healthy looking. I lost quite a bit of flower at the fence when they were replaced on the one side but the hostas survived along with the gooseberry bush.

But Edward's material continues to be important to me but I do not know anything about the Kipp family so can not carry on with that work except for the yDNA study which I took care of for him. He was very much into autosomal DNA and proving his lifetime work  was a fascinating pastime those last years when autosomal DNA testing became the way to go. Not long after his pacemaker was inserted he asked about a dozen of his cousins to test and their results along with his own (and my daughter and I surprised him by having her tested to give him a close match since none of his close family other than his nieces survive) and that pretty much occupied him the rest of his life. The colonial matches with his cousins in New England/New York/Pennsylvania/New Jersey were a delight to him as they poured out of the various databases. 

It meant a lot to my brother next older in age to me to test and I said to him since he didn't have any children of his own this was his gift to the family which he very much loved to have me say. I tested him anywhere that I tested myself since we were the least alike it gave along with the three others a very robust look at our DNA. DNA is the fascinating tool of genetic genealogy in particular autosomal although I have found both the yDNA and mtDNA fascinating.  

Continued with the Living DNA  pulling of matches and I am on page 8 now working on the 1 segment entries and will progress as on the others to 2 and 3 (I do not actually see any 4 or 5 on this page which is nice as this work is long and for the most part other than assigning perhaps 50% of the entries I do not learn anything new with the 4 or 5 segment matches. Just the last sibling to do and then I can complete the crossover points and create the new phasing for my grandparents based on the Living DNA results and most importantly my known file of cousins. 

The Blake Newsletter is growing in my mind and I will also get to that. Tea being enjoyed and solitaire games are next. 

Friday, June 27, 2025

Continuing with the matches

 Yesterday more matches and interesting results on occasion as I reach into data now that is less and less data rich for the study but nonetheless mostly because of endogamy continues to delight my thoughts as various lengths of chromosome come to the surface and are examined against the existing grandparent phasing chart. The Living DNA results do give me the opportunity to look at my 100% British Ancestry within England as opposed to looking at it within databases that encompass primarily the population of the United States which is partially descendant of colonial English Ancestry in the 1600s but also a great amount of European/African primarily into the 1700s and beyond and recently Asian Ancestry. The 1600s English colonial ancestry in the United States only really exists for my Blake line - I seldom find a really colonial family with any of the others although Buller is also known to be there and I do find the rare Buller match but I do not believe I have any endogamy in the Buller line (two distinct areas came together in the 1830s the one from London/Surrey and the other from Warwickshire/Staffordshire/Leicestershire and centering in Birmingham in the 1830s on.  There is a third area for this line which brings in the Ayrshire/Argyllshire area of Scotland and Northern Ireland but I also appear to have Republic of Ireland from the charting which I could only really believe was also from this third area in Buller. 

Nearly 200 new matches to work into my database although some of them are solely extracted for their pinpointing of endogamy and hence somewhat smaller but none the less interesting for my intended work on the great grandparent's phasing work. This breaking down of chromosome into eight lines will be intriguing for sure and I look forward to that challenge sometime later in this year perhaps. That takes me back to the spread of years from  1837 to 1859 which is within British census time and will mark the end of any genealogical charts that I produce for the books. From that point forward one can use the material to then work to the present quite readily using census and family records. 

Is there a slow march to peace starting to galvanize in the world? Peace, it does appear, can only happen when we are forever ready and able to do war.  The NATO meeting seemed to be sounding the first drum beats to denote that. Peace in our time was the galvanizing expression just before World War II but already the drums of war were beating and we went into the worst war that was ever fought in this world. But one can feel the desire for peace by so much of the world. Enticing people to be part of a larger country will continue long into this century I am sure and will be successful in some cases when honey is used instead of mortar. Satan and all its evil must be gone from our world so that we can face the really tough issues that lie ahead as we move away from global destroying economies to regeneration of the world in a way that the grandchildren and great grandchildren of our children can swim in the lakes and the oceans and enjoy fresh air. Greed and Hate must disappear from our world. As I approach 80 and look back on the times as described by my grandparents - the world has changed so very very much.

So today continuing with the match extraction as I am now working on the 4 segments section of the 7th page and most will just be looking for names that have been collected earlier and extracting that information into those already established pages. I simply add in a section for Living DNA results. This tends to be my endogamy search for the most part. Then on to page 8 and check once again for the 1, 2, and 3 segments which tend to be of value for original work and then looking at 4 and 5 for any repeats of earlier files. The fifth sibling will be next. I also need to think about the Blake Newsletter as it is due 1st of July. The months move very quickly actually and we are well into summer now. 

Tea drank, solitaire puzzles completed and I need to do a bit more weeding and put that bag out to the front. The birds are back looking for their berries - currant, raspberry, gooseberry and we will have to be quick to get some as well. The elderberry will be a little later. Put the feeder out in the front tree once again and the chipmunks are very grateful as they have been fed here by my husband for probably twenty years since he retired and discovered them in the backyard although they live elsewhere they came here to eat! The squirrels too are eating away as well as the birds. The cardinals who have come for years and years checked out the fruit bushes the other day.  

 

Thursday, June 26, 2025

Working on the matches

The matches that I am putting into a file are few now that I am into pages 5 to 8 of this siblings matches. I have 194 new matches thus far but some of them were selected solely for their demonstration of endogamy in the Knight family rather than as good matches for my database. As I reach towards the last sibling there will be some accountability for the matches designated suspicious as I work my way through them - I needed all the results to really make a decision on them. Given my 100% English heritage looking at my (our) matches in a database which has a large percentage of UK testers is a different picture from looking at my matches in the United States located databases where the largest number of testers tends to be American. There my matches unless they are one of my 2nd/3rd/4th cousins tend to be small and the testers are early Colonial American families. In the past I have not paid a great deal of attention to these testers but they will actually prove the distant endogamy in the Blake family as particular lengths are handed down in the Blake line of Andover on particular chromosomes enabling this thought. But it was an interesting morning of working on the matches that saw me complete page 5 and most of page 6 leaving just 7 and 8 likely although I will glance at page 9. Then I can work on the fifth sibling's matches and this will clarify some of these suspicious results that I found in matches that show higher amounts of shared chromosomes but not a logical pattern that lets me place them readily into a grandparent line until I can look at all the results. I could have looked at them all along but I wanted to work through each siblings matches from beginning to end only using the knowledge of those already completed as it will give me a picture more easily gleaned overall from each set of matches. The advantage of having already phased my grandparents based on the other companies (namely GedMatch and 23 and Me but using the FT DNA results (I did most of this work before My Heritage became as large as it now is) was a picture of how each sibling inherited percentagewise from each grandparent so that I was able to focus on their likely percentage when I looked at each new match. It has worked pretty much but perhaps as much as 2% to 3% of the matches in this new acquisition show some discrepancy (not unexpected to be honest) which can now be addressed with this newer rendition of the phasing based on all of these databases. One of the main reasons of course is the actual testing regimen of each company is or can be different slightly in what they select to use as their testing points. 

Off to kayaking and walking later in the day and was most interesting. When we arrived back at our car there was a car parked behind us (and two beside us and no way out in front!) with a small group of people just lounging about with their car. So I flashed the lights of the car to unlock it to let them know we wanted to leave but they didn't leave strange really. Then suddenly they did! I think they thought we hadn't paid for our parking but we have a parking pass and do not have to go to the machine and pay each time. The parking pass is great. A few minutes later I suppose the meter person came by to check on the parking they generally ignore our car as they know we have a parking pass hanging  in the front window; that did send them running and we were off and on our way. One would think that young people had better things to do with their time really; the parking attendants are very efficient at Petrie! We had done some shopping earlier as well before going off to the park. The parking attendants at Petrie have a huge amount of ground to cover and do a great job for sure of ensuring that people do pay which helps to maintain the park for everybody. It is a very large beach area and was pretty packed last night although there were a lot of parking spaces in the boat launching area so no excuse for parking behind us; we just happened to be in a crowded spot!

Off for groceries sometime today and I do hope that the cashier doesn't pack our bags so full when we provide so many. It only takes a second to grab another bag from the bag of bags. When you see them grimace picking up the bags it seems strange that they do not get the hint on that for sure. I have told them many times but with my daughter here for a bit she can pick them up easily and put them into the cart. The cloth bags are flimsy and tear easily so not overfilling them would be appreciated for sure. 

Cloudy today but the heat spell is gone for a few days and rain is coming. The NATO commitment to 5% is welcomed for sure. We always need to be prepared to protect our countries and it is good to see that happening. NATO is not an aggressive group - they have proven that time and time again over the past years since their creation. We want to have a peaceful world not one where the extreme wealthy of countries, where they basically hold the people who live there in servitude much like the days of serfdom, create wars of aggression trying to steal even more money and land (Ukraine is definitely an example of that as the Russians slowly take more and more and kill more and more Ukrainians). We want to have a world free of hate and Iran is the great hater in this case creating legions of soldiers - Hamas, Hezbollah and the Houthis - to try to destroy Israel. What logic there is to that I fail to see but then this same country Iran shot down an airplane headed for Canada from Tehran full of children, women and men (no combatants) over Tehran itself all because they hated these most Iranian (or Iranian descendant) people on the airplane for not supporting their satanic hatred of the West. We all need to get rid of hate and greed for sure. Then we can have that peaceful uplifted plain on which to live on this earth where our greatest struggle will continue to be degradation of the environment due to excesses which have created Global Change which is astronomical in the polar regions of the world but will also impact the rest of the world. 

The day beckons, tea is drank and time to do the solitaire puzzles.  

 

 

Wednesday, June 25, 2025

Cleaning completed and back to the matches

Cleaning easily accomplished yesterday morning and I was back to the matches in the afternoon.  I have completed the 4th page of 50 and the next four pages will be a pick and choose beginning with 1 segment and working up likely not collecting anything beyond 2 segments but will check the 3s as there may be some plus it can be a correction point with the last sibling results worked in where I could not choose one of the four grandparents but had two (and that has proven to be the case as the morning is passing). Then just the last sibling to do completely. I did not work on the phasing charts yet as I am still working out the crossover points and that will take a bit of time - no rush. I already have two sets of crossover points that are pretty much the same (Gedmatch and 23 and Me). Hoping that 23 and Me goes back to providing the DNA details and time will tell when this new company takes it on. I realize that their aim will be research but I have no objection to that - DNA will rule medicine in the years to come. Our lives are already changing because we now know if we need to avoid some things because our genetic complement doesn't allow for trangressions into things like smoking and drinking, excess eating etc. That will control our lives in the future for sure as we become a more disciplined people. Actually that is one of the things I like about Prime Minister Carney - he is a very disciplined person. I actually did vote for the Conservatives as I knew I would but the Conservatives need to re-find their progressive conservative roots and not get lost in social conservatism (it is a losing side of conservatism and needs to be put aside in favour of good management of the government particularly finances and support of the military). Following the words of Jesus in my case and other religions have other beliefs is the important part of our moving forward in time in a productive way that brings humanity forward and gives us peace. 

I am thinking about the Blake Newsletter and not a lot to write but will note that there are not as many Blake tested in the Living DNA as I anticipated (my 2x great grandparents John Blake and Ann Farmer had 54 grandchildren and hundreds of great grandchildren and a great many remained in England (but perhaps not but I am not seeing them particularly in the United States or in other parts of the Commonwealth)). However, the losses in the Blake family during both World Wars was large - they did live in London and Hampshire (both areas bombed heavily during the war). On the other hand the number of Pincombe descendants in England is very large but George Pincombe's children did stay in the London/Surrey area, Philip's children also stayed in the United Kingdom and Richard does not appear to have had children. That covers the three sets of descendants of the children of Robert Pincombe and Elizabeth Rowcliffe who remained in England. Robert (third son of William Pincombe and Mary Charly) had five siblings and Thomas (4th son) remained in England and the preponderance of Pincombe testers does probably indicate some of his descendants (Thomas Pincombe married Philippia Williams 8 Aug 1803 at Winsford Somerset and they baptized 12 children of whom all but one appeared to have survived to adulthood). My Pincombe family here tended to correspond with the Rew side of the family (John Pincombe married Elizabeth Rew (my 2x great grandparents)) for the most part although they did go back to Devon at least once to bring Devon Reds to Canada. In general (except for my matches) my siblings had twice as many Pincombe matches as any other (mine were about equal for the four lines (Blake, Rawlings, Pincombe, Buller)) which did surprise me. I haven't made any attempt to link them back to their ancestral line and will not. The book will only come up to the census for the most part (likely the 1851 since it had more information). So it has been interesting doing the matches finally with the Living DNA results. Excellent setup for doing the work that I am doing extracting the matches for five siblings. I just never took it on before because I knew I had endogamy in three lines overall with the time period for the close cousin marriages being two hundred years ago now but you can see the effect into this generation where there appears to be very long lengths of Knight passed but they actually represent (bits of Knight, Butt, Arnold and Ellis). In the case of the Routledge this cousin marriage goes back to the 3x great grandparents so looking at the marriage of Thomas Routledge and Elizabeth Routledge 1785 in Bewcastle Cumberland. The Routledge family appears to have been in this area back into the 1400s having quickly departed the Highlands of Scotland about this time period (long story and have written about it before). My Routledge were of the Oakshaw family and there was a tendency in this family to marry cousins (to keep the properties intact generation after generation). The Blake endogamy goes back into the 1500s and 1600s so is less apparent but the matches for Blake in the United States are likely part of that endogamy as one doesn't generally see a match that is likely 8th generation difference (these matches tend to look like early colonial on their part in the Ancestry database) but the passage of particular chunks of chromosome does appear to indicate this Blake endogamy (looking at 23 and Me (where the results are (were!) visible) for Americans and especially when they had a tree to accompany their results)). 

So another busy day in genealogy land where I appear to have decamped for the remainder of my time and will choose to remain there as I attempt to accomplish what my Blake grandfather wanted and what my mother wanted for her Pincombe family. It is a slow process but a rather fascinating one actually. Time is a gift and one must use it wisely to carry on the thoughts of a family into the future (my parents had seven children, nine grandchildren and eleven great grandchildren thus far and none of them carry the Blake or the Pincombe surname). This material would be lost and I know it meant a lot to my mother for the Pincombe material not to be lost that she had in her possession and the same for my grandfather as he felt the loss of England for us most deeply and I realize now that as that young child he kept telling me all that information in different ways every day that I spent with him (days that I treasured all of my life as I loved him very dearly as a child) so that at some point in my life it would come to the forefront (as it has). It is wonderful to put to paper some of these memories that he had. 

Breakfast is next, honey lemon tea drank and the solitaire puzzles completed.  

Tuesday, June 24, 2025

First day of cleaning accomplished

 Yesterday I completed the basement and main floor cleaning and will do the top floor today - I am somewhat speedier because my daughter is here doing her summer research so helps me with some of the cleaning. 

As well I worked on the matches and I now have  182 new files to put into my database. I am almost 3/4ths through the third page of 50 matches for the fourth sibling so moving along very nicely. More on that today as I clean. I also want to work on preparing the crossover points for a re-phasing of my grandparents based solely on these results and compare it to the earlier rendition using 23 and Me as well as GedMatch for the phasing. Collecting these new results I did find a couple of discrepancies where I had a good idea of how particular matches worked into my database although would actually need to do the research to prove that (or ask them!). Usually I do not write people that I match for the most part as my intent was not so much to gather cousins but rather to work my way backwards and that is pretty much on me to do as my families have not had a great deal of research done on them in particular other than the Pincombe and the errors in the earlier Blake line. 

Another warm day and already at 6:00 a.m. 26 degrees celsius and will be the hottest day I think of this heat spell. The house is still at less than the 24.5 degrees celsius  needed to turn the cooling on although it has been dehumidifying quite steadily the last few days which also cools the house. I keep it all closed up at the back during the morning and early afternoon and then close the front from the mid afternoon on with the back opening up somewhat so I do not have to turn the lights on. I keep my monitor turned off unless I am working. The air purifiers have been running on full (three of them) since early May and so far that has worked very well. I think though all the trees around us do help to keep the house cooler as well. But the summers are definitely getting warmer and warmer. 

Drinking my lovely hot lemon ginger tea and solitaire puzzles to do.  

Monday, June 23, 2025

Two more interesting sermons

 I do love to listen to people talk about the Bible that have made it their life careers. Their intricate thinking is really quite fascinating as they have delved into various repositories of knowledge pulling together interesting sermons/homilies to present at Sunday Service. It is all about how you have spent your life really and for them the pursuit of knowledge of the Christian Religion has been their goal and it is exciting to listen to them discuss their chosen calling. Did I learn anything new? I always thought that the man with the demons was Lots but he is now mentioned as Legions and I found the change in my thinking to be much more picturesque of the events that followed namely the casting out of the demons and Jesus giving the demons permission to enter into a herd of swine and the resultant of the loss of those swine over a cliff. Legions gives this a much larger image and perhaps in our day and age much larger does help us to understand how demons actually work in a society and effect so many people to do things that we fail to understand looking in on various areas of the world from the outside of what is happening inside. My mind definitely wandered today during both sermons as the world issues make themselves felt in everyone's living room as we watched the events of the past few days on the television. I do not really think we are approaching Armageddon to be honest I think this is a blip in the road where evil has tried to raise its ugly head in the world these past couple of years in particular and thrust away good. The existential battle of good and evil has plagued humankind for all time really but Jesus did bring us a message to eliminate evil - Love one's neighbour as oneself (one could easily insert respect as love just to give it a meaning that fits into today's thinking) but respect is what one needs for a neighbour. But enough of the contemplation as there are much greater minds than mine working on this very issue and I shall listen to the words that come from those in charge as I did do my duty as a citizen and vote. 

Yesterday was another good day on the matches  I completed the second page of the fourth siblings matches and I now have 177 matches to work into my database (a number of them clearly show the endogamy in the Knight family which was one hoped for goal). A couple of areas that had poor Buller representation has certainly been filled with new matches although unknown to me and likely I will not do the necessary research to try to trace them back. I do not really need that information as the trees will only come down to the time of census collecting in the British Isles (or anywhere else if I happen to look carefully at the actual matches). But this fascinating passage of DNA from parent to child through the generations is certainly the new and exciting knowledge of the 21st century. A couple in particular yesterday caught my eye. Again with this sibling as with all the others except me have nearly double the number of Pincombe matches to any of the other three. Mine just happen to be more equal although higher on Rawlings which was my largest percentage gained during the transfer of DNA from grandparents to parents to myself. That is why I am different from all of them particularly my brother Douglas who matches me the least. But by the standards it is actually a good sibling match none the less. 

Today is cleaning day and with my daughter here willing to carry the vacuum from the top floor to the basement every week I will begin in the basement consistently week after week and do plan on doing the first floor as well today since we are in for a scorcher with temperatures in the mid 30s degrees celsius. It is already 24 degrees celsius and feels like 31. The air quality is 40 and we are just plain lucky that the smoke has diminished with the heavy rains helping to put those fires out.  The fires in Saskatchewan were actually set by vandals which really should carry a long prison sentence for the danger that it created. Tomorrow is also predicted to be 32 degrees celsius as the high. We are having a heat spell and global warming in the polar regions is really showing up this year once again. The Robot is doing the vacuuming and I shall soon make my breakfast. The air conditioning is working very well although mostly dehumidifying as it is set to come on at 24 degrees celsius and the house has not heated above 23 yet and that was yesterday but today for sure it will turn the air conditioning on. 

The sunflowers are reaching ever upward as the rains helped them with that. My daughter hoed some of the big weeds but left smaller groups in the hopes that the rabbits eat that instead of the tougher sunflower plants now that they are well through the ground. We do have fencing that we could put around but would like to avoid that if we can. Certainly my hands will say thankyou as even with gloves on my hands took a beating on golf day with the old skin being rubbed off in many places but only two tiny actual cuts. One's skin does rather thin out in old age. 

Drinking my hot lemon ginger tea and it is very tasty this morning. Solitaire puzzles next and then breakfast.  

 

Sunday, June 22, 2025

Sunday and two services once again

I have always loved Sunday and going to Church and online services have brought that into a possibility again with two Anglican Services within reach of my television once again. Although the people involvement doesn't move from the Church the beaming into the entire world of the word of God  from whatever religion you prefer is a wondrous happening of this 21st century. It was something my father missed being in a nursing home but the priest used to come and see him quite regularly which meant a lot to him in those six years that he spent there after his stroke took away his ability to walk. The last time I visited him the priest had been there a little earlier as he mentioned that to me. He liked it that I had continued to be part of his beloved Anglican Church although I also attended my husband's United Church with him and the girls. There is a wondrous nature to religion that still flows through the lifeblood of so many on our planet. The ideals of God and Jesus for Christians have built a society rich in caring and although abused by some seeking to justify their deeds of wrong for the most part the goodness of God flows through the human race in many ways but evil lurks with the satanic peoples of the world who continue their hatred towards peoples simply to keep themselves in power by giving them someone to hate and fear. Interesting really that century after century people still buy that - definitely it is a lack of education in freedom and rights. 

More work on the matches and I have moved to the fourth sibling. Some of the large matches of the other three are starting to come together and also be used rather than suspicious but I did anticipate that might be the case because of endogamy. I do not know these people that have large matches (i.e. many small generally) but gradually I am shifting through them and linking them to a grandparent line although still two on occasion (either one of the other). Still there are few uploads for people that we are matching as most are generally new matches in the British Isles which tells me that this time of redoing the phasing of the grandparents will solve some of the ambiguities in the phasing already done - for the most part this appears to be very clear cut but occasionally a match will arise that simply does not quite work although it is generally a small amount that is contestable. 

It poured with rain last night which was desperately needed as everything is drying out. Today is to be a record high temperature but I will keep the windows shuttered to the sun all day and that helps to keep the house cool along with the air conditioning. It is mostly the dehumidifier running actually that keeps the house dry and cooler although the air conditioning will kick in if it gets warm enough inside.  The Air quality is at 43 and the humidity 94% and the high predicted to be 29 degrees celsius with a high of 35 degrees celsius predicted for tomorrow. 

Probably inside most of today and tomorrow until the heat breaks and then back to kayaking and walking once again. Drinking my lemon ginger tea and doing solitaire puzzles and then some more matching before breakfast and then church.  

Saturday, June 21, 2025

An afternoon of golfing

 We did eighteen holes of golf yesterday (well I only did 14 by then I had had it and didn't want to be in the way so just watched as my daughter played her last four holes. We didn't golf last summer at all so it was two years but it was a lovely day for a walk and I thoroughly enjoyed my walk and what golf I did do. The golf course was very busy yesterday but kept moving along. 

Looking out this morning at what little of the sky is actually visible. The one side of the window is pretty much completely blocked and about 95% of the other window although it is bright enough to type without turning on the light at 5:30 a.m.   

Perhaps today some kayaking and walking (the walking for me) as I do enjoy a walk along the beach in the summer. It was very busy last weekend and pretty much every parking spot was taken up. We have a pass which allows us to park for that minimum fee but does not promise a parking spot but it is handy not to have to stand in line and collect your parking pass plus we generally go three or four times a week so is probably cheaper. 

Worked on the Living DNA matches yesterday and I am on page 7 of the third siblings matches. Hope to complete that set of matches today and move on to the fourth sibling. I also want to start to work on the files to be used for phasing of the grandparents and great grandparents. I anticipate a few changes here and there mostly created by the endogamy in our lines particularly the Knight family and the families that feed into it namely Butt, Arnold, Ellis and a couple of other ones. But also the Routledge family which tended to marry second cousins or greater through the generations (my 3x great grandparents were 2nd cousins once removed - Thomas Routledge and Elizabeth (Routledge) Routledge. The Oakshaw branch of the Routledge family were particularly known for their close marriages through the centuries. But also Nicholas Blake married his first cousins Margaret (Blake) Blake and later Richard Blake married Joan (Blake) Blake but their relationship is less obvious (she could be a Blake from the Andover Blake family or from the Calne Blake family.  Then further back the Blake name itself in the Andover Blake family was acquired likely in the late 1200s/early 1300s when I postulate that a daughter of Richard le Blak married a John (no surname known) of Knights Enham. To me it is a logical statement as choosing the surname Blake when it was already held by several different well known families in the British Isles seemed rather strange but the advantage to a Norman marriage would have been huge for sure in now-Norman England having been conquered by William of Normandy in 1066! By the early 1300s most of the large land holdings were in Norman hands although the actual property holdings further down remained basically the same and many of the large landowners under King Harold retained their lands in return for swearing fealty to the Norman Kings. 

Perhaps outside and more work on the weeds - I need to weed the bricks along the sides of the laneway and a little weeding out front. One bag of weed pullings went out to the garbage yesterday. That cleared out the rhubarb patch and raspberry patch in the back right garden patch. Never an end of weed pulling for sure. The hostas keep the weeds down along the right side but the left side needs a lot of work. The sunflowers are growing now and very visible - my daughter hoed out the large weeds but left a little greenery with hopes that the rabbits wouldn't eat up all the sunflowers before they get to grow!

Up early and will have a nap a little later so that I am ready for a good long walk in the afternoon! Slowly approaching 80 and a nap on some days might just be beneficial. Tea to drink and solitaire puzzles to do.  

Friday, June 20, 2025

Shopping Day

To the market, to the shopping plaza and then to the grocery store and by the end of all of that I must admit to having been tired. As I waited for my groceries to be all packed, I found my mind wandering a bit but rapidly back when I realized that this clerk had remembered to email my receipt and I didn't have to wait for it to print with everything all packed up and we were on our way. It was a long afternoon but then I am nearly 80. I must admit I have toyed with the idea of just having groceries delivered and not bothering with going to the store but it is nice to pick your own produce and of course going to the market is such a treat in the summer with our farmers there selling their produce to us locally. The shopping plaza was collecting up a few birthday presents and some success some failure there so will have to do a little more shopping. I can shop in the early afternoon most of the year and it is very quiet and I am done very quickly. But definitely the clerks ringing up the groceries and packing up in the store should be older people as $205 worth of groceries was jammed into 5 bags when I provide about 20 bags to do that. If my daughter wasn't with me I couldn't have picked up three of them. 

We had a lovely meat loaf for dinner - fresh beef and fresh pork. I cook the chopped up vegetables in just a little butter for five minutes and then mix it into the beef, pork and oatmeal along with two eggs, salt and pepper, worcestershire sauce and then pack it into the glass meat loaf dish and cover it with a mixture of ketchup and mustard to keep it moist for the hour of cooking. Along with small potatoes on the side and a couple of salads we had a beautiful dinner and then cold slice meatloaf for a few days. I prefer jellied cold cuts and they are hard to find these days (at least the kinds that I prefer) so the meat loaf will be a nice treat. 

Worked on the matches yesterday and completed the fourth page for the third sibling. There are 154 new matches to enter into my databases. Will carry on today with the fifth page checking to see if it is time to go to 2 segments and 1 segment only. I found that five segments on the 4th page did not have any significant matches and four just a couple and the same with three so will check that out first and see how it goes.   

Life is slowly settling into the summer time and yesterday I pulled yet another bag of wild flowers this time out of the rhubarb/raspberry bed at the back which also hosts tulips in the spring.  Gardening is definitely not my thing but my daughter's sunflowers are springing up (about eight rows of them) which will be lovely to watch in the fall if they survive the bunnies eating up the fresh green. 

Early today and will have a nap in a bit after I drink my tea. I think my one room concept continues to come to me these days as the house is too big but not when my daughter is here; I do not need a car actually although it is handy to go and get groceries a couple of times a month when I am alone but that is it; I do not drive anywhere else except to have the tires changed twice a year which I may start to leave for my daughter when she comes at break times (Christmas) and summer research break. But I could just take a taxi back from the grocery store for sure. 

A bit of work and then my tea and then a nap! 

Thursday, June 19, 2025

Continuing on the matches

 As I reread the Pincombe-Pinkham Newsletter I found a few unclosed brackets and a couple of other tiny items so will fix that. My mind is on my extraction of matches and it shows. Either that or I am nearly 80 and that shows. 

Continued with the match extraction  and the growth will be slow now that I am into page 3 of the matches with 144 extracted into separate files. When page 4 is completed in the extraction process (50 matches to a page) then I will check page 5 and see if it is time to go to 2 segments and 1 segment as I do want to get into the last two siblings match pages. The middle of the month is past and I am heading up to the Blake Newsletter for the first of July. Keeping up the regular work seemed easy in the winter but somewhat difficult in the spring and summer with the garden beckoning although I do not follow that beckoning very often to be sure. The rabbits and other four legged mammals are enjoying the products of my non-attendance for sure. 

Continuing today with the matches extraction and it is raining. Not so bad actually as one really can not easily garden in the rain and my mind can be totally devoted to the matches. 

Drinking my tea now somewhat cold as I was busy working the solitaire puzzles for the day! but is lemon ginger which still tastes really quite good even cool. One of these days I will get back to my green tea but I need to wait until I can manage all of that caffeine. I am a hyperactive person normally and do not need the added caffeine in my bloodstream at the moment - life is busy. 

We are moving along here in Canada with our new way of doing business with the provincial barriers pretty much resolved by the first of July - free trade between provinces with no restrictions will make a huge difference here and some companies are really prospering where the products came up from the United States in that north south pattern that has existed on this continent for thousands of years. But time changes and so must we. Canadians do not generally institute change that is noted on the world scene; we are a helper country for the most part doing the best that we can do to help the peoples of the world when that help is needed. But we are a strong ally to our friends and neighbours which indeed include both hemispheres since we share a border with the European Union through Greenland and with the United States here. I think Prime Minister Carney does bring the strength of Canada together in a way that is good for us as a country. I also think that once Pierre Poilievre returns to the house he too will bring forward the conservative part of this country in a good way supporting the initiatives which both parties (Liberal and Conservative) put forward during the past election and which received 85% of the support of all Canadians voting. The mandate is strong and a party in opposition can do as much good as the party in power in these instances when much change is needed. It is good to see so many First Nations in the house as well and as Premiers in the Provinces/Territories. We need to keep having the voice of the First Nations in our decision making to keep change flowing as quickly as is possible. 

 

 

Wednesday, June 18, 2025

Last day of cleaning for this week

Today the top floor and then the cleaning will all be accomplished. The weather looks like rain today so perhaps not a walk on the beach which we enjoyed last evening although rain had been promised yesterday but it was still okay to walk after all. 

The Pincombe-Pinkham newsletter was completed and perhaps the next one will have more exciting details as this was merely a summation of items and ideas for where I could obtain needed material for the next chapters to come. 

Continued with the matches and about half way through the third page of 50 matches. Still some new ones although not very many but I am now up to 140 new matches to put into the system. Not all of them will go in but I will put them into my interesting file but not entered so that I can look at them in the future. One feature of the Living DNA bookmark is looking at the chromosome results for everyone in the box which I have not yet looked at very thoroughly other than to note that it was possible. That will be interesting to work with as well. I am pleased with the Living DNA setup as it is a time saver for extracting the information for a set of siblings. Although I am not actually using that to a great degree I could do so and likely as I check the account in the future after this very first go through on my part years after I tested has been most interesting. I could see back when the chromosome browser first came out that I was showing endogamy quite extensively in some of the results and just avoided it at the time as life was pretty busy. 

The weather today does look a little gloomy so will be a good inside work day which is my favourite - gardening is never going to be something that I eagerly go out the door to do. At least I recognize most of the plants that have survived my not recognizing them. The Hosta does dominate the garden as Edward found they were less work for him and occupied a lot of space keeping the weeds down as they are much more aggressive than the smaller weeds. 

The sunflowers are doing well and the rows are very visible now. I think it was a good plan to just turn the garden patch into a sunflower garden. It will be lovely when the flower heads form. The many animals who run through this yard will enjoy the seeds. The larger birds might also nip down and clip off a plant head perhaps. There is a good clear run down into the garden. I shall watch for that as well. The raspberries are doing very well and all this rain will give a lot of berries for sure. 

Tea drank, solitaire puzzles completed and time for breakfast. I am a bit late today. I was working away on a couple of projects before I went down to make my tea. The time does pass quickly.  

Tuesday, June 17, 2025

The commitment of time

Cleaning of the basement all accomplished yesterday and today it is the main floor. I shall begin after breakfast as usual and should be all accomplished around 11 or so. The routine of cleaning is so very helpful and the exercise is also very good. 

Yesterday good work on the matches and I have nearly completed the first 200 for the third sibling. A few surprises here and there but for the most part this was smoother going than the first two because many of them are repeats so the page for them is already set up and just have to add in the new result for that sibling. Endogamy though does appear to be seeping through the results and particularly in the Blake line which I anticipated although it is actually the Knight/Butt/Arnold line because Maria Jane Knight married Edward Blake in 1870 at Upper Clatford but also the parents of Edward (Ann (Farmer) Blake and John Blake had 54 grandchildren and hundreds of great grand children but that didn't cause endogamy!

I must get outside though and do some weeding and I also need to finish the Pincombe-Pinkham Newsletter. Perhaps I should tie myself to the Newsletter first thing and get it done. 

Lovely morning at 7:00 a.m. and it is 18 degrees celsius and we are expecting rain and it is always handy to keep everything green. The Air quality at 46 is high for this time of year but is considered to be good.  I do not see rain in the forecast online but time will tell. Certainly it is cloudy. 

Yesterday another lovely walk on the beach and I have to start getting ready to do my driver's license renewal. I only use it to drive to the local grocery store a couple of times a month but I will read the rules book and be ready. I booked my Optometrist appointment and I need to book my Driver's License appointment so will look into that today. Since I will be 80 there is extensive testing I think so will prepare for that. I do not see myself driving other than to the grocery store though. For one thing our roads are still are in disarray with the new train coming and I just do not want that hassle although I do, twice a year, drive to have the tires switched which is the only other time that I drive. Otherwise I just take the bus as it is easy and gets me where I am going without any need to figure out the parking or anything else. 

Cleaning today and the newsletter and the matches and must try to keep that order until the newsletter is completed. 

Drinking my tea and doing my solitaire puzzles. 

Monday, June 16, 2025

Two Thought Provoking Sermons

Yesterday I did attend both Anglican Services - one here at Christ Church and one at St Peters and St James Hereford. Both had two extremely thoughtful sermons which provoked a good deal of thought in my brain throughout the day and this morning I found myself going back to the thinking pattern and contemplating Solomon and his wisdom once again (although the sermons themselves looked at the Trinity but one of the readings in the week was about Solomon and his talk with God). Greed and hate have raised their ugly heads once again in our world and although it has been sitting as an undercurrent for quite a while especially in the case of Iran's hatred of Israel but the Russian desire to commit genocide against the Ukrainian people is also a long lasting plan on their part dating back over the century past. Iran has created three sycophants to carry out their satanic plots against Israel namely Hamas, Hezbollah and the Houthis. This satanic murder of six Palestinians who were helping with the US food distribution group is just the continuing usage of the Gazan peoples as collateral damage in the Iranian war against Israel which has been relentless throughout the last couple of decades. That a people would allow themselves to become willing to be the collateral damage and even allowing their children to be killed in order to satisfy the hatred of the Iranian government for Israel continues to confound the world (why did they not send them to safety!). Palestinians need to destroy Hamas not the other way around - they must stop being willing victims. Then the equally satanic leadership of Russia has destroyed the glory of the Russian people for their extreme sacrifice during the Second World War as they fought night and day to cast off the Nazi invaders in their country. Satanism must be gone from our world - the Iranian leadership and the Russian leadership (and North Korean leadership for that matter); so long as it endures then there will be useless waste of people and property namely the Israelis, the Palestinians and the Ukrainians. The picture is constantly coming into clearer and clearer view of the need of the world to eliminate these satanic peoples so that we can have peace.

More work on the Living DNA matches yesterday and some interesting ones that have three out of four of my grandparent lines appearing to come together in another family (very occasionally generally just two lines). Given my own lack of first cousins, few second cousins but all known to me and hundreds and hundreds of third cousins I do anticipate the possibility. However I always find this a little suspicious but I must remember in England in particular many of my lines became quite large in the 1800s (John Blake and Ann (Farmer) Blake (my 2x great grandparents) had 54 grandchildren many of whom had large families). The Buller families in Birmingham (particularly the daughters marrying into other lines) had a dozen children in some lines. The Knight/Butt families that went to Lancashire in the late 1800s also had large families (again my 2nd and 3rd great grandparents). So it is possible but some of the lengths are quite long but again I do have endogamy in those Knight/Butt lines where two different Knight/Butt lines come together as sticky lengths of chromosomes giving me longer lengths than one would anticipate in third or fourth cousins. The possibility of marriages between my lines is much greater in England than here where the proportion of English descent is smaller and in particular 100% as mine is.  But I will continue with that today along with the cleaning. Basement today and it is already set up to run the Robot vacuum cleaner. I have to establish the perimeter for the vacuum to remain on the rug which I must set up each time and that takes perhaps four minutes give or take. 

Drinking my lemon ginger tea and will do my solitaire puzzles.  

 

Sunday, June 15, 2025

Living DNA Results

 I have been intent on the matches but today I noticed my map on Living DNA. In the past I have had a bit of colouring outside of the British Isles but the latest result shows 100% Great Britain and Ireland with 

23.3% from South Central England; my father was born at Eastleigh and his father at Upper Clatford and going back in time about four generations this male line was in Andover and back into Knights Enham (part of Andover) and by yDNA thousands of years in the British Isles which bears the comment from my grandfather - we always lived in the Andover area. But there is a 50% other side of every story in his line with my father's mother born at Kimpton and her line going back to her mother born near Enford, Wiltshire where the Rawlings line is found for a number of generations and then Netheravon, Wiltshire back to Steeple Ashton, Wiltshire. The wives of these men were always from local areas to Enford. My father's father's mother Maria Jane Knight was born at Turnworth Dorset and both sides of this family lived in the areas around Winterborne Stickland, Dorset including the Arnold family at Milton Abbas, Dorset the Molton family at Winterborne Whitchurch, Dorset, the Butt family near and at Winterborne Stickland. 

 14.9% from Lincolnshire was a bit of a surprise actually as I do not have anyone actually born in Lincolnshire.

11.9% from Devon and my mother's father's family were from Bishops Nympton, Devon (and area) going back to the late 1500s. 

11.8% Central England and I am thinking of Leicestershire looking at the map which is the area where my Welsh and Cheatle families lived (the parents of my 2x great grandmother Anne (Welch) Buller born at Longdon by Lichfield, Staffordshire and baptized at Ashby de la Zouch, Leicestershire. My maternal grandmother's grandmother.

 9.7% Southeast England and this includes London and particularly Bermondsey where my Buller and Beard families lived in the 1700s into the early 1800s. My maternal grandmother's father's family. Henry Christopher Buller married Anne Welch at Birmingham in 1838. 

8.1% South England and this area captured above with my Blake family at Andover and my Knight family at Turnworth, Dorset and their areas as mentioned above. 

5.8% East Anglia is a teaser as I do not have anyone from this area.

5.4% Ireland and just family lore about my maternal grandmother's mother being of Irish descent (only  the Republic of Ireland is coloured for this percentage).

4.1% south Yorkshire which is the area of the East Riding of Yorkshire which was home to my Gray family found at Holme in the Wolds and before that Cherry Burton which is close by. 

 3.3% Northumbria which is also a teaser as I do not have anyone from this area but do have my Routledge family from nearby Cumberland.

1.7% Cumbria which does seem very small as my Routledge family were at Oakshaw, Bewcastle  back into the 1500s and likely earlier. This is my maternal grandfather's maternal grandmother's line (Elizabeth Mary Ann Routledge was the daughter of Thomas Routledge and Elizabeth (Routledge) Routledge. 

I must look at my four siblings to compare their map to mine. 

Yesterday I continued drawing out the matches to a third sibling and did get a bit bogged down with one which I shall quickly resolve today having given it some thought. 

It was a busy day though with grocery shopping and then a walk on the beach which was lovely. It was busy enough but soon will be packed with people enjoying the swimming, boating and picnics on the beach. 

Sunday and two Church Services to attend online. Soon I will do that. The Bible Reading today was about Solomon and one would wish that all the leaders of the world would be wise like Solomon and bring us to a peaceful co-existence where hate no longer rules and no one goes hungry.  

 

Saturday, June 14, 2025

What is Freedom?

 Freedom is the right of everyone to exist in this world in a country that supports its citizens unless you are breaking the law. At least that is how I do see it. Under such a system worldwide hunger would disappear unless we are all hungry; hate would disappear and it does need to and respect would be the first and most important rule. The United Nations had all of those desires when it was formed in 1945. But I think the most important part of the United Nations is the ability to stand back and circle the wagons and provide a place where discussion can happen. That is why we formed the United Nations to provide a sounding board for grievances. We all can listen to what each side can say and we need to do that; everyone needs to be at the table that is involved. Only then can we find that peaceful uplifted plain that God wants us to reach. But most importantly blatant aggression whether it be by proxy (Iran using Hamas, Hezbollah or the Houthis to attack Israel) or by one country (Russia) invading another country (Ukraine) has to stop and retreat has to happen so that there is a forever deterrence to such actions. Then peace can flow like a gentle river but this time Canada has to keep its eyes on military support; it must not diminish. I do like the approach of our Prime Minister Carney and we will see. He is a money manager for sure and that to me is probably the most important item in the government - the careful scrutiny of how the finances are spent. The days of bonuses in government work need to be gone (brought in by Prime Minister Harper). You are paid to do a job in the Federal Service (the personal credit which you obtain especially from a job well done will have to be a sufficient award because that is a place where your value in a service is noted publicly and congratulated); that is a sufficient bonus and if that doesn't work for you there are jobs in private companies that might suit you better. This giving of bonuses can be abused much too easily. More money would remain in government coffers to spend on defense and other items as needed. On the other hand, companies that are awarded contracts and given support by the government owe the Canadian government and the people of Canada and their support for Canadian projects should be first in their minds not making a profit for their shareholders at the expense of Canadian projects. When we help to fund a company they owe Canada first and foremost. 

Good progress yesterday on extracting matches from Living DNA and I now have completed myself and one of my brothers to the end of page 8 of the matches. I do need to look at the three new ones and will do that before I begin the third sibling's matches. I think another couple of weeks or so should complete the process although there is a lot of gardening to do. Still the Pincombe Newsletter is in its stages of development and must spend time on that today. After a lovely walk in the afternoon I cut the front lawn as it did need doing. I am becoming entranced by the wild flowers but eventually the lawn needs to be cut and will try to keep it trim for the rest of the summer. The back lawn will be today; it is another beautiful day. The sunflowers have broken through so we need to weed that as well. The hostas are beautiful this year; huge plants possibly because I left all the wilted greens from last year to rot away and improve the soil. I need to pick up branches from the maple tree at the back as it has shed a few more. 

Another beautiful sunny day; thank you God for the beauty of this day. I was thinking about lifestyle of the two Hemispheres in our world. In the Western Hemisphere where I live the First Peoples lived in unison with nature through the centuries and in the Eastern Hemisphere where my families came from (100% from the British Isles going back many generations) the desire to acquire seemed more important than living in unison with nature but time has been kind and this desire to live in unison with nature has taken a hold in the Eastern Hemisphere where Canadian Beavers are carefully increasing the providing wetlands to help protect the environment. It is wise to look to the ways of the First Nations to make the most of Canada for all of its people. 

Tea drank and now solitaire puzzles and the day begins.  

Friday, June 13, 2025

Down with the Satanists of the world

 I made my first train trip yesterday on the light rail from here to South Keys where I was meeting the train from the airport. My daughter made five trips back and forth in May/June to accomplish a number of items that needed to be done. Normally she has a quiet May after all the marking is done and then out kayaking every day that it is possible just for a brain refresher while getting into her research term. But this year there was just a lot to do culminated by her first PhD student completing her thesis defense and attaining the pinnacle of achievement in her chosen profession - a PhD. She has been on a lot of committees for PhD but this was her student that she was chair of her committee from day one and it was wonderful to see that happening even if from afar. Congratulations to her student for all her hard work. So yesterday I decided to meet her train at South Keys and I had not taken it to date. I walked to the bus as our train is not yet ready to function out this far. Then on to the train after the bus ride and change to the train to the South Keys line and there I was quite quickly actually waiting for the incoming train from the airport. She landed just a few stops before I reached South Keys so the wait there was just a few minutes. Worked very well and look forward to the completion of all the lines crisscrossing our city and out into the country. Ottawa is finally catching up with major world cities with our light rail. The ride was excellent and the views of the city spectacular as we moved along.

But it was a huge day around the world with so many happenings as Iran finally got what is coming to it - after all they killed nearly 100 Canadians (many children, women and men) when the plane they were on returning to Canada was shot down as it left Tehran all those years ago now. Iran is a Satanist country along with their sycophants Hamas, Hezbollah and the Houthis. Hamas has just shown their  satanism when they murdered in cold blood the six members of the staff of the food group (Palestinian hires) that the US set up to deliver food in Gaza. Hamas does not realize their time is past; they have spent these last twenty years grooming the population of Gaza to die for their satanic cause and it is ending finally one prays as these people realize there is more to life than hatred of Israel. Hamas is using this fear tactic to try to bring the Palestinians back under their control. It mustn't happen - Hamas must go from Gaza. The Palestinians for three to four generations has been in this hate mode and they murdered Jewish children in the school yards when I was a child. The world needs to be free of Satanism and that includes Russia attacking the free independent country of Ukraine which is into its third year. The Russian ignorance goes on and on and they too are Satanists unless they get rid of Putin and his adherents all of whom are Satanists. There is hope for Russia if they just rid themselves of these ignorant savage satanists that lead their government.  Satan always comes with sick promises hoping to lure away the honest good people of the world. One must be wary. 

Prayers continuing for all the lives lost in the crash of the plane in India yesterday both in the plane and on the ground. How sad for India and the countries that all these people belonged to including one from Canada who will be very missed I am sure.  

Some work done on the matches yesterday and I have begun the process of looking at the matching data between siblings at Living DNA to compare it with the data from Gedmatch and 23 and Me that I have used for phasing in the Past. I have a different population in the Living DNA results - one that better compares to my actual results as I am 100% English descent in the last six generations at least with Scot and Irish working their ways in earlier and in the 1400s French Huguenot some of which show endogamy with my matches which I knew would be there in both sides of my family particularly in the Routledge (Scot Highlander) and the Knight families in the modern era and Blake (two distinct lines back into the 1500s and likely into the 1300s) from earlier times which does show up surprisingly in American colonial lines as a few Blake members came to the American colonies very early on. Having the five siblings makes it a lot easier process and so many 3rd cousins have tested over time. Would love to have more 2nd cousin results but testing is a personal thing so I do not ask anyone particularly to test although I will mention it to them especially if they ask about it. However the endogamy in the lines is very particularly situated and exists back in the 3x great grandparents lines particularly so that the pieces that come down may sometimes be large and sticky with two different Knight pieces coming together in particular.  So the work continues but when I do do the genealogy of the Blake and Pincombe families I want it to be as accurate as possible. I worked pages 5 to 8 of my matches to extract the 2 segments and 1 segment people that I had not yet looked at and I am up to 102 new matches now to insert into my database along with the perhaps 20 existing matches that I updated with the Living DNA results (people who had tested at other companies earlier). Not that many really most of the testers appear to be new tests that are matching us.

I do need to put the revised version of the original Siderfin book into the repositories as I discovered some errors when my eyes had cleared from surgery and I need to upload the Charting book for Siderfin. A few tasks to get caught up on as this time has passed quickly the past year since I completed the books. It is nearly six months since I started writing the Blake and Pincombe books. Today I must finish the Pincombe Newsletter - it is very late this month. Other than that the gardening is constantly in my mind but my love of gardening is very slight - the flowers are lovely but I love wild flowers too and they do not need my help!

Drinking my tea and solitaire games to play. The day is a little late starting but will be a sunny one. Perhaps kayaking and walking - we will see. The air quality is 39 today. It is 11 degrees celsius and it has been a cold June here but that hasn't kept the forest fires down but the rain is finally helping with that. 

 

 

Thursday, June 12, 2025

Back to work

It seemed I did not accomplish a lot of work this week just cleaning. But today I return to the Living DNA matches and I will go back to my account and search for 2 segment and 1 segment matches from 5 to 8 and see what I glean from that. I decided I should do it as I have already noticed that there are still some matches I am missing. 

Still not reading the news very closely as life has been incredibly busy. A slow time must be coming as it usually does by July as the heat/dry spell will be upon us. The gardenias started blooming with the rain but they are nearly one month late. My husband Edward commented on the seasons shifting maybe ten years ago as he was truly a gardener in his spare time and noted such items with respect to the blooming of the flowers in particular. The hostas are huge this year no idea why but I did not clear away last years leaves but let them rot in place. I wonder if that improved the soil and encouraged them to grow larger. Interesting. I mostly did it because I thought in the forest no one clears away the prior year's growth; it just rots away and maybe the result is the beautiful forests that we have full of plants and flowers as well as trees. 

A few more items to do around the house and then the cleaning is done for another week. It is soon time to begin again. A never ending cycle for sure but it is part of the tune of my life and I am enjoying it. Just the quiet and the work and the life around me. 

Late playing the solitaire games today and that is next.  

Wednesday, June 11, 2025

Main floor completed and top floor today for cleaning

 Today the top floor remains to be cleaned. The week is passing quickly. I also worked on the matches completing the first four pages of the sibling that I am working on currently. I will now sort of breeze through a few pages picking up the low number of lengths of chromosome counts and looking at them. 

Also worked on the Pincombe Newsletter and perhaps will complete that today. Time will tell. 

Other than that the smoke does appear to be slightly dissipated today although the count is still high but in the "safe" range. 

Short blog today; not really reading too much on the daily happenings. Life really busy at the moment with the gardening.  

Tuesday, June 10, 2025

Basement cleaned and main floor next plus 2% GDP for our military this year

The good news yesterday was Prime Minister Carney following through with his commitment to bring Canada's military up to scratch. There will be in this year's expenditures an increase in the spending to a full 2% of GDP.  Thank you Prime Minister Carney. The last good Prime Minister with regard to the military was Prime Minister Brian Mulroney and it went downhill very rapidly when the Liberals dominated the government for most of the time after that except of course when Prime Minister Harper was in power from 2006 to 2015. He had promised money for the military but in his constant desire to balance the budget he let that slip and I shall be forever on my guard watching to make sure that the Conservatives do not do that again. So thank you Prime Minister Carney for this very important announcement. I still say the ultra-wealthy could support the military with ships as a donation or other equipment. I love to hear that the corporations that they represent are doing such good work for Canada. 

 The rhythm of my week does centre around the cleaning as it occupies Monday to Wednesday most weeks although I also do just Monday and Tuesday. It depends on what I want to do mostly. So today is the main floor and I shall begin around 9 or so. 

Yesterday I did spend time on the matches for the brother that least resembles me and I am on the third page of 50 results  and I have now reached 87 new matches. There will be fewer new ones as I work my way forwards through the results of five siblings but on the other hand because of the layout I am missing some of the singleton matches where the results are within the range that interests me (i.e. 20 cM or greater). But a lot more results with the total still quite high because of endogamy in some cases or simply the frequency of my particular grandparent's surnames coming together has a greater chance in England where all of my ancestors were either born or descendant of English born people. Interesting really and the ethnic results for each of the five of us are slightly different (primarily English of course) but the mixture of Scot and Irish is always very surprising but shouldn't be after all they lived (most of them) in those Isles for millennia perhaps. I do have the Question family from France as Huguenots in the latter part of the 1400s but does it actually show up and yes that is the answer it is there as a small percentage in the ethnicity. There is also German and I have no idea which ancestral line has German although tempted to think it is there in the Buller line perhaps. There is also Scandinavian and the Gray family of the East Riding of Yorkshire is perhaps that particular bit of interesting ethnicity (they were tall people I would say by the picture of my great grandmother Grace (Gray) Pincombe). It is the only picture that I have of that family. The Routledge family as Highlanders may also contribute to that Nordic ancestry not sure. 

I wondered if there would be a lot of transfer between the databases for Living DNA from Ancestry, from My Heritage, from FT DNA and from 23 and Me. There is some although people could have just bought new kits as I did for this brother I am looking at right now and myself. At every testing company I wanted to have at least two new kits where you could upload and for most I have more than that. The results are always similar although will shift about somewhat because of the particular data points that are chosen within the chromosomes by a particular company but it is quite small as an effect. The number though of people from my current database that I am adding Living DNA results to is quite small actually. I was surprised and actually it is great as most of the people are living in the British Isles and the results show the endogamy I anticipated with both the Knight family (my great grandmother Maria Jane Knight married Edward Blake at Upper Clatford but introduced this huge line from Dorset into the results) and the Routledge family tended to marry their cousins in Bewcastle giving me endogamy there. They were my first Canadians - the Routledges. Elizabeth Mary Ann Routledge was fourteen years of age when she arrived in Canada in 1818 and it would be another fourteen years before she married Robert Gray from Holme in the Wolds, ERY here in Canada. He emigrated to Canada in the early 1830s (I know where he was on the land in 1831 and then he was here marrying Mary Ann at St Pauls in London Ontario, now St Paul's Cathedral (Anglican)!).  

So today the cleaning and more extraction. Great fun! I did start the Pincombe Newsletter yesterday and will also work away at that today. My mind is flighty at the moment but will soon settle. 

Monday, June 9, 2025

Continuing with accessing matching on Living DNA

 I continued yesterday extracting matches from the Living DNA account of my brother least like me and it was quite successful. He would be pleased actually and is I am sure. Doug found the entire business of DNA quite fascinating especially the yDNA of the Blake line to which we belong. Having it recorded somewhere was the aim of the entire process and as long as the databases exist he is recorded in pretty much all of them as I bought tests for everyone of them for him. He was always trying to pay for them but I said it is for a book I will write and he decided that it was a venture for me and agreed to my paying for them. He was a lovely person my brother and I miss him of course but life became very challenging for him. Doug survived a heart attack in his late 30s but lived to be 77 years of age and approaching his 78th birthday. He had his own accounting business (I think in retrospect that he followed our father's designated profession that his parent's preferred but my father decided to be a Master Electrician and have his own company) although eventually had to retire from that due to ill health. He was very active in the Boy Scouts of Canada all of his life from boyhood following once again in my father's footsteps (my father had been Chief Scout of London, Ontario in the 1930s at some point (that knowledge I never really knew until later and I would need to look up the date). During the floods there in the 30s he and my mother were very active in the Scouting/Guiding movement helping to rescue people. 

I do rather like the way that Living DNA has recorded all of the matches details in their charting which you can override using the checkbox to eliminate anything under 7cM. I think it is good to look at all the data although smaller items can often just be the effect of ethnicity with particular pieces of DNA being inherited by most members of different ethnic groups. The ease of capturing all the match material and putting it into the database (I can just eliminate the ones that I actually use but I retain the material so that I can see it every time I look at the account without increasing the length of my recorded information. 

 I will continue with the extraction today although I really must write the Kipp (I keep reminding myself but when I went in and checked I announced in February that there would just be one single issue per year on the 1st of February) and Pincombe newsletters. The Pincombe Newsletter will be short actually as the  the Pincombe Will just an update on the book and where I am heading. 

This is basement cleaning day and I will begin presently. We have smoke once again although when the rain arrives that will take it out of the air (the best scrubbers in the world are rain). 

Breakfast complete and need to do the solitaire puzzles; this day is a little bit of a switch around.  

Sunday, June 8, 2025

Pentecost and new life

 I love Pentecost and will always remember my Confirmation in the Anglican Church when I was 11 years of age. I was really rather young; most of the others were one or two years older than I was but there I was being confirmed. I was being confirmed by my school year - I was in Grade 7. I was always too young for everything it appeared so now I am very happy to be old like everyone else my age! But Pentecost was about a gift; a gift of the Holy Spirit. God has given us many things - the world we live in, His son Jesus Christ and now the Holy Spirit. We are reminded every year that this gift is given to us at our Confirmation as we take on the responsibilities of adulthood. Except at 11 I wasn't an adult far from it but it was a wondrous happening when the Bishop placed his hands on my head and the newness of life filled me at that moment. The Service of Confirmation is quite beautiful when one takes on the commitments of our godparents and becomes one's own person. No idea why I felt this so deeply at the time but it led to a life direction I never lost; following the word of God and His commandments. Thank you God for another beautiful Pentecost. 

 Working through the matches and discovered I can move between siblings with the Living DNA system of search but will do not do it excessively at the moment as I am liking working my way through the list of matches (genetic distance) and observing the frequency of particular grandparent results in each sibling. I would miss that if I try to do anything too different. My brother least like me continues to be primarily Pincombe in these matches outnumbering the others 2 to 1 for the most part. Interesting really how one receives the DNA from one's parents. I must work out his percentage of Pincombe in his 23 chromosomes. Interesting though that he received intact the Buller 23rd chromosome from our mother just as she received it from her mother who blended Cheatle with the likely Taylor/Roberts chromosome. This Buller chromosome is very interesting as a singleton and includes the Cheatle from my grandmother's grandmother  as well as the Brockhouse/Lea family. This solid line of ancestry back into Leicestershire is most interesting actually. I will continue with searching out the matches today. I have acquired 72 new matches thus far that will have to be placed into my database from my Living DNA extractions. I have assigned all of the matches to one of six categories (sometimes a match does have two categories as I can not separate them out at this moment in time). 

The smoke continues into today. Tea drank and solitaire games played. Breakfast next but first yoga. 

 

Saturday, June 7, 2025

Homebound with smoke

 Staying home with the heavy smoke in the air outside although it is not swirling about yet so not as bad as two years ago but still a danger to those with chronic health conditions like asthma. It just looks hazy outside this morning but the contaminant is very real in the air. At least we got in four trips to the beach before this arrived!

Working on the matches for the brother least like me and they are interesting as overall Pincombe predominates in his matches (19 in total) but he most resembled the Pincombe line of all my siblings tested.  The other three (Buller, Blake and Rawlings) are at seven, eight and nine. We were close as small children and he taught me how to tie my oxfords when I was just four years old; I can remember that as clearly as if it was yesterday. He taught the proper way and then he taught me (when my mother wasn't watching) how to just tie the two loops as it was quicker. He was a lovely person and it was my mother who got us back together on a regular basis asking him and myself to do DNA work on the family as it interested her that we would do that. So we did testing at all the available companies at the time and collecting vast amounts of information on the family lines. He liked to hear about all the discoveries and we met several times a year in London (my home town) to discuss results. He was especially excited by the yDNA results which I said was his contribution to the family since he did not have any children. He liked that. 

Slow going once again with the first matches as a couple of them were just strange as I do not expect the results that occurred. Matches with all four of the grandparents are unlikely to occur in people I do not know and so I put them into my suspicious category although they may sort themselves because of endogamy later. But for the moment I do not trust those results particularly as more than likely endogamy but until I can prove that they remain suspicious. A few in the not sufficient even at that high level because the lengths are too short and although they do not necessarily show endogamy they could but I have the two categories and when I am sorting later I will look at them with those two thoughts in mind. A couple of new and interesting and the bulk of the matches continue to be in the British Isles proper which is not surprising given our genetic history with 100% of our ancestors being either born in England (and died there) or descendant of people all of whom were born in England although Scotland and Ireland do appear to play a role there as well but back into much earlier times in terms of Scotland and Ireland is still somewhat of a mystery although the matches with the 1772 people who went to the Carolinas with the Rev William Martin in the mitochondrial line seem to point to truth in the family lore that my maternal gramdmother's mother was Irish but descendant of Scot Planters in Northern Ireland. However my Irish genetic heritage shows up in the Irish Republic so that is interesting but gradually the proof will out itself likely. 

I did like Prime Minister Carney's comment that he was quite willing to sit Parliament through the summer. Given the present situation I think it would be the perfect solution to getting things done. So we will see how that goes. Pierre Poilievre has also stated his willingness once he is returned to Parliament with the by-election. No comment yet from the Bloc although they are pretty close to Ottawa and nothing yet from the NDP returned to parliament and not sure about the Green Party as I may have missed a few comments yesterday. 

Today continuing with the extraction of matches for the brother least like me and I expect that will be a few days. I must also think about the two newsletters and will try to get them both done this weekend. The books do dominate my thoughts to be honest. But the newsletters have been a regular item for years now and I should keep them up. 

Tea drank, solitaire puzzles completed and breakfast shortly.  

Friday, June 6, 2025

Shopping

My least liked outing yesterday as we made the rounds of the Farmer's Market (excellent vegetables), then the grocery store and that went pretty smoothly (a list makes that short work), but then we still had two more places to go. The first accomplished of those two and then the latter one we ended up at St Laurent Plaza looking for a particular couple of items although I regretted not just going to Place as it is closer but we found them and 2.5 hours later we were on our way home again caught in Rush Hour traffic. No more shopping for a bit; I really do dislike shopping. 

Some work on the matches on Living DNA and I have now completed the first 4 of 50 pages of matches sorted on genetic distance. There are four sorts which are probably more than adequate but missing the one sort that I really like on the other sites - sorting by the largest single centimorgan result.  But I do like the features on the Living DNA site and I realize that British people who possibly predominate the site it appears to me look at DNA differently from North Americans likely. Because all of my relatives are going to be British descendant with a few slightly different ones but still primarily have some British ancestry my results resemble those of British people more than say American/Canadian but reading the Living DNA site results is different from the other databases as you have a set of Islands (and when I am referring to British in this instance I am including all of those islands in the British Isles which includes the Irish Republic) that has sent people around the world but in general the flow of DNA is fairly constant in the British Isles with incoming variety that gradually works its way into the population and basically disappears into that population over the generations. I went to page 7 of the matches out of curiosity displayed as genetic distance and the second person on this page is primarily of British heritage likely by the surname but that doesn't always hold true and he matches my Pincombe line on both of his shared chromsome lengths (in total he matches four out of five siblings on both and five out of five siblings on just one). So in theory I still have a ways to go before I run out of data that is meaningful to my search. Plus I have only pulled data for one sibling namely myself but there are far fewer singleton matches to any sibling in this database thus far which is different from the other databases where a single sibling sometimes is the only match out of five for individuals that do not have 100% British DNA inheritance. We all, my siblings, have inherited on occasion an unbroken chromosome from one or other of our grandparents and the number of times this has occurred is striking actually looking at five siblings but that is one of my reasons for wanting to also do my great grandparents as we have endogamy in two lines - Routledge (two 3x great grandparents were 2nd cousins once removed in a family line which tended to always marry cousins) and Knight/Butt where a number of siblings in several generations married their cousins (not always first or second) but it does mean that you have sticky pieces that are actually from different lines of a named family but appear to be solidly passed but not in reality when you really look at the passage of material. Further back we have two Blake cousins marrying in the 1500s and again in the mid 1600s thus increasing the lengths of chromosomes passed. Interesting really as in this generation we have all married into entirely different DNA backgrounds although limited to European inheritance which includes early Colonial America with my husband and my son in law with his 95% French ancestry including early Quebec ancestry and a few links to First Nations through the centuries. DNA is really quite fascinating and will be the centerpiece of medical research in the future. 

Politics here in Canada continue to be interesting as the Throne Speech has now passed the house successfully - given the temperature of the electorate anything else would not have been forgiven and would ensure a Liberal majority. Eighty five percent of Canadians voted to follow the platforms of the Liberal and Conservative parties and they were very similar so lets get the job done and stop grandstanding. The new Prime Minister is very interesting in that (unlike earlier ones in this century he does not grandstand but rather follows the team approach which is rewarding - I just need that approach to be economically sound given the last administrations by the Liberal government under Justin Trudeau). On with the show; shovels in the ground and work happening to build this economy back up after the years of free trade with the United States. I actually had no problem with the free trade (life was reasonable) but it decimated our local industries through the years (the Americans who bought them out then went off shore because they didn't want to pay high wages in the United States to their employees in their greed for more money decimating the American economy) and we need to rebuild our economy along with pipelines and other energy needs to create this national energy corridor and free ourselves from any dependence on any country. Canada is a powerhouse of natural resources and human ability - lets get this show on the road. Parliament could consider working through the summer for a change and speed it all up. Who actually gets three months holidays plus every year! If I see that they are working in their ridings then that works or doing research that is valuable use of the money that I pay in taxes but otherwise they could be in Ottawa getting things done. The situation is urgent. 

Tea drank and solitaire puzzles next then into DNA research once again. Some exercise breaks and no more shopping - done with that for sure for a few days. Perhaps some gardening if the smoke is gone. It descended last night for a bit. 

 

  

 

 

 

 

Thursday, June 5, 2025

It was truly a cleaning day

 Cleaning was pretty much all I accomplished yesterday but done for another week. Doing the main floor and the basement in one day is a challenge but I met it although pretty tired by evening. Went outside to put out the garbage but that was about it. Not really an outdoors person in a city although love being out in the woods especially in Northern Ontario and especially with a 16 foot canoe (cargo type) which I have given away to a lovely family in the north and I imagine them enjoying going down all those lovely rivers in the north. Probably I am past that sort of thing but it was great fun and did help to bring me along in terms of my mental health at the time. Nothing like the wilderness where bears do on occasion appear to be stalking you or just avoiding you not sure which and mostly the latter I suspect unless you interfere between a mother and her young or maybe food. We didn't do either and had no unfortunate encounters in the wild in the eight years that we spent going up to Northern Ontario. 

So today I should continue to think about the two newsletters and get them done. But also I will work on my Living DNA matches. The Buller matches are proving to be most interesting. I have a huge set of matches with Buller on one chromosome which are from all over the world and I have not collected all of them. There are just too many and I have not yet been successful in locating the actual family line there. Other Buller lines went to New Zealand and have been in contact with them as they descend from one of my great grandfather's (Edwin Denner Buller) brothers Clement. Clement had followed Edwin to South Africa to work in the jewellery business for his mother's twin's husband. So an interesting family that Buller line coming down from Henry Christopher Buller and Anne Welch with Henry being the son of Christopher Buller and Mary (Beard) Buller of Bermondsey and Anne being the daughter of William Welch and Sarah (Cheatle) Welch of Birmingham (formerly Welch of Rugeley, Staffordshire and Cheatle of Ashby de la Zouch, Leicestershire).  

 Not really sure why anyone would think of voting against the Throne Speech actually; it was a good plan kindly presented by the King himself to the Parliament and the people of Canada. I think that was the problem with the NDP from the beginning of the Pandemic really they could not see the urgency that existed and became fixated on items that were simply not in the best interest of Canada in terms of money expenditure at the time (the Liberals were definitely bad money managers at that time) and I await the progress with Prime Minister Carney as he has a much more interesting background to bring to the table in terms of management particularly money. Eighty five percent of Canadians voted for Liberal or Conservative and their platforms during the election were very very similar. Not to say that we shouldn't have that type of care available that was being offered to those in need but we need to have the economy to support it and this Throne Speech definitely lays out ideas for that growth in Canada. I think it is a bad time to vote against Canada personally because that is what they would be doing especially if they do it as a block. I can see where the NDP works provincially (although a very poor job in Ontario in the 1990s) but federally I think it just gets in the way of normal progress in terms of a government being defeated when it is time to do that. Too many parties mix the brew up too much; needs to be somewhat more streamlined so that it is effective and if not immediately defeated and the people speak again to elect a government that works. But the punishment for putting this government to election again would be very painful for any opposition party I think. We the people would not appreciate it and it costs a lot of money! Lets get this job done. 

 Tea drank and breakfast next but first Yoga.