We are still having very warm weather and it is beautiful. The Maple growers are really in a bind because they had to start earlier than usual and then the snow all melted and the days got really warm and the nights did not really cool down and the sap has run and they are sugaring off already. If the trees go to bud then they say that the maple sap/syrup is not good to bottle or sugar off. I guess the long time maple growers and syrup makers know what they are doing. This weekend is the Maine Maple Growers Maple Syrup weekend. We won’t get to it because it is on a Sunday. But we can buy maple syrup all year round here so it is no big deal to miss the Maple Growers weekend.
I have been noticing that there are many bags of rubbish out on the side of the road and I was wondering if this is the spring clean up time for Augusta – like they have in Prescott. I know that the bags do not hold leftover snow and ice, because that is already gone and they tell me that this is Mud Season. So far I have not seen any mud. But then I live in an apartment with a paved parking lot and driveway and I do not have a garden to tend or a lawn to mow or take care of. I am waiting for the Dandelions to appear and then I will know for sure that it is spring.
Last night we ordered David’s shoes for him. I suspect that these will only last him 6 months too and then he will want another pair. That kid is hard on shoes - always has been.
The Lockyer genealogy questions keep popping up. There is a man from the UK asking about a Joyce Lockyer who lived in Western Australia. That is a fur piece from Queensland to be sure. So I sent him tips on where to look and how to research this problem. Then I got an email from one other researcher and he said that I have different Joyce Lockyer than he has – so how many are there using the same name? In an earlier connection with this second man, I had to correct his one ancestor’s death date by furnishing him with the death certificate…….and so much for documentation and sourcing. I just watched a webinar about that with Rootsmagic…………….
We have had a real roller coaster ride this past week and a half. The weather has been unseasonably warm – even to the point that I have gone without a hat……….and that is a rarity for me. To not have to wear my heavy coat is a real blessing – I love my coat, but this warm weather makes it feel like I am walking around in my personal hotbox.
The roller coaster also could describe our latest efforts with the digitizing. Last week we discovered that the bottom right hand corner of our digitized records were blurry or fuzzy and not clear. So we turned in our shuttle last week in the hope that it would all pass. We do that every week and then we wait with baited breath for the other shoe to drop and see if we have reworks which are the bane of our existence as records preservation missionaries.
On Thursday this week the report came in with 7 reworks – all due to the out of focus bottom right hand corner of the page. This was ultimate devastation for us. We have never had 7 reworks in one batch and there were only 10 folders in the entire submission. It was hard work because the books are over sized and presented a problem in capture at each page. We did our best, but our best seemingly was not enough to pass the scrutiny of the examining algorithm that they use in SLC to examine the submissions. We left the Archives and headed for Walmart to get a sympathy card for a friend whose father passed this week. We also ventured into Home Depot to buy a piece of pipe insulation to put over the handle of the cradle. The cover put on there by former missionaries had broken up and was worn off and not doing my hands a favor as I used it. While we were up there in that area, we decided to eat at the Olive Garden and use the gift card sent to us this Christmas. Usually this Olive Garden here in Augusta is just jammed with people and at 5pm on a Thursday they were just beginning to fill up with diners and so we got in just at the right time. We ate ourselves into a hole trying to cope with the thought of doing 7 reworks. We drove home in silence and much sorrow at the task ahead of us. I had a Rootsmagic Webinar to listen to at 7pm and that was very informative. It was on recording sources of genealogical information into the Rootsmagic program. I bought the book that goes with the program and was able to follow along and it made more sense to me that way. After a while we got ready for bed but we still had heavy hearts over our report.
I could not sleep. I went out into the living room around 11.30pm and watched the traffic passing up and down Riverside Drive. Where are they all going at that hour of the night? Who knows? I decided to take my problem to my Heavenly Father. In my prayer I asked for inspiration to know where we could improve and what could we do to eliminate the out of focus problem we were having? I also asked for a good night’s sleep because we have to go in again on Friday to do more digitizing? I went back to bed and the next thing I knew, it was 4.30am and I had been totally oblivious to the world for about 5 hours. Heavenly Father heard the prayer of a very tired, very frustrated lady missionary and He answered her prayer. The first thing on my mind when I woke up was seeing a thread stretched from corner to corner across the top of the glass of the cradle and there at the middle where the threads crossed, was the answer to my prayer last night. I had to fashion a homemade plum bob from thread and pennies taped to the thread and the top of the thread taped to the camera. It became clear that the camera was not in the middle of the cradle area but rather that it was favoring the right hand side of the cradle. We moved the cradle so that the camera was in the center and then we measured the distance of the cradle to the edge of the table and marked that, and then we measured the distance of the stand for the lights from the edge of that table and so geometrically we had everything straightened up and on target.
Imagine our surprise when we began to digitize again that we found that the bottom right hand corner of the page was still out of focus. Now we did not know what else to do – we had done everything we could think of or knew how to do so we sent off the email below to see if there was something else that we needed to do that we could do under direction of those who were our supervisors. Their answer appears under the email.
good Morning to you both,
We have done all we can to rectify the situation. Even to determining if the camera is situated center of the cradle by using plumb lines and other means to determine the middle of the glass.
All this week we have noticed that the bottom right hand corner of the right hand page is out of focus and have done 9 folders worth of work that will probably be rejected.
Last week and this week mark the two weeks we have had this new camera.
could the problem be with the camera?
the camera is level.
We have raised the camera
We have also lowered the camera
We have taken a focusing every 25 pages.
The lights have been checked for correct placement
the cradle has been situated as geometrically correct as possible and aligned with the edge of the table.
We noticed that even with right/left capture the lower right hand corner of the page is fuzzy.
We explored the problem with the Camera Setup Tools menu and reproduced the bottom right hand corner of the right hand page fuzzy images.
We have new glass in the cradle - the old one was scratched and had been since before we arrived on this mission. The new glass was installed 2 days ago.
Recapturing the failed folders under the same conditions as they were originally captured will probably not rectify the bottom right hand corner fuzziness.
We have absolutely no other suggestions and wonder if you might have some input.
Where do we go from here.
the Markhams
The upshot of this is that the 7 folders were taken off the rework list and a new lens will be sent to us next week for the camera. It pays to do your homework then complain coherently and with accuracy in description of the situation in hand.
I shared this experience with the young elders when they came to our house for the weekly missionary correlation meeting. It was a good experience to share and one that would bolster the faith in our Heavenly Father.
During the course of the meeting we fell to talking about missionary experiences and we have a new Elder in our midst. Elder Ashcroft has finished his two year mission and gone back to New Mexico. His Junior companion described his last night with Elder Ashcroft as being very difficult. Elder Ashcroft was in a daze over the fact that the next day he would be on a plane back to New Mexico and Elder Hill was furiously copying down all the things he needed to remember to do daily for the next week because he was getting a new Elder as a companion. As a brand new Senior Companion and trainer, he was much like a deer in the headlights. It is pretty scary to be a trainer when you have only been on your mission for 5 months. I am sure that Elder Hill can handle it. Elder Hill mentioned to his new companion that I have served a mission in Japan many years ago. The new elder found it hard to believe 1) that I was now on my second mission 2) that I still speak Japanese some 40+ years later 3)that I was in Japan during the time of the Viet Nam war 4) that there was NO MTC in Provo at that time but that the missionary home was in Salt Lake city and has since been torn down to accommodate the new conference center 5) that our Language Training mission was in Laie on the CCH campus 6) that I was a 2 year lady missionary and that during my time in Japan, in 1970, they shortened the lady missionaries time to 18 months 7) that I talked to a Japanese Policeman for 40 minutes before showing him my missionary certificate to say that I was who I said I was and not a part of the Beheren group that was a subversive foreign group stirring up the Japanese University Students to riot over the Viet Nam conflict. The new Elder took me to task for wasting the Lords time talking to a Policeman and not showing him my missionary certificate at the outset. I brought the house down by turning to him and saying “elder, are you calling me out for something I did 40+ years ago?” For this Elder, the MTC has always existed in Provo, the Viet Nam war is something he has read about in history books and sisters have always only served for 18 months and Japanese Policemen are always on the lookout for a coup that will give them a promotion – putting me behind bars as a Beheren groupie would certainly have given him a leg up. Times certainly have changed.
After the missionary meeting I hurriedly made something for us to eat and then we went up to Cony High School to see the Chizzle Wizzle variety show. We did not know how much they were charging for entry to the show and we were out of cash pretty much so we scooped up all our quarters that we had for the laundry and cobbled together all the paper money we had and we told the girl at the ticket counter that we were senior citizens and that this was all we had and it was our laundry money. She took pity on us and gave us two tickets for the price of one ($10.00) and in we went. We only stayed for t he first half because we were so exhausted from the week’s digitizing and the worry over 7 reworks and the relief for not having to do them. There is a pond on Cony Street, and as we passed by, we were almost deafened by the sound of the peepers – the frogs that come out in the Spring. We stopped at the supermarket to get some food for this week ahead of us and then we went home and fell into bed. We are looking forward to going home to sleep in our own bed in Prescott where the traffic stops pretty much around 9pm and we can sleep in peace all night………..Riverside drive may as well be an Interstate with the amount of traffic that uses it 24/7.
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