July Ruminations

I saw these very cool power-dudes at Greta's Genealogy Bog and fell madly in love. They're available from Amazon, so I've added them to Ye Olde Genealogy Shoppe.

I'm enjoying Dr. Daniel Hubbard's blog, Personal Past Meditations, which was new to me this month (although celebrating its first blogoversary on August 1). It's the perfect place to take a break from what you're thinking and see what someone else is thinking, because Daniel is an excellent thinker.

Speaking of thinking, July Ruminations doesn't look like a very good place to find much of that going on! It's been too hot, muggy, and stormy to think of anything besides how hot, muggy, and stormy it is. I'm not a fan of Michigan weather, and this summer seems worse than any I can recall.

Nevertheless, I've been juggling several Blurb book projects all month. The ones getting all the attention right now are those which don't require thinking, i.e., old (non-genealogy) blogs which just need to be slurped and edited. I finished and ordered my second book; the third is done except for the jacket flaps (thinking required!); the fourth is a bit less than half finished; and the fifth has been slurped and a few posts edited.

Because I'm actually posting this a couple days late, I've been giving some thought to something that happened "in the future" so to speak, on August 2. One of my Facebook friends had her account hacked. The hacker, pretending to be her, contacted me via Facebook's "chat" feature. The conversation started with a simple "hi... how are you?" In many instances this would seem normal enough, but I was immediately puzzled. I have never met this Fb friend, I know her only through the GeneaBloggers group, and can't recall ever having had anything like a conversation with her. After trying to figure out whether I'd commented on her blog or something, I decided to respond in an equally harmless manner... I replied with a complaint about the weather and asked if hers was equally muggy. "Not good here... in some kind of mess," she answered. "The weather? or you?" I asked. "I'm stranded in London, United Kingdom... was mugged and robbed at gun point last night."

Yeah, I'm sure the first thing I would do after being mugged and robbed at gunpoint in a foreign country would be to instant-message a virtual stranger for idle chit-chat. Another line or two and there it was: "I need your help."

We all want to believe everyone is honest, but hey, I was not born yesterday. I advised calling to report the credit cards stolen, and then closed my browser and called it a night.

This morning (actually August 3), I checked her profile. She had already posted a status update saying that her account had been hacked, that she wasn't in London and had not been mugged. Other GeneaBloggers reported that they, too, had been instant-messaged by the hacker with the same bogus story. Many had already heard about a similar hacker scam recently. I hadn't, so my own suspicion was that this particular Facebook account had been set up by a scammer right from the start to target members of this community. That I was wrong on that particular point doesn't comfort me much though. In an open group as large as GeneaBloggers has become, there certainly is plenty of opportunity for clever scammers. Fortunately, GeneaBloggers is also a very interactive group, and awareness of last night's scam attempt was shared very quickly among group members.

In any case, I've been reconsidering the way I use Facebook, and will be reducing my Friends list in the coming days to family members and friends with whom I interact on a regular basis. Fellow GeneaBloggers, please don't take it personally if you find yourself unFriended! I look forward to reading your blogs, participating with you in GeneaBloggers activities, blog carnivals, etc. Honestly, I'm betting you won't even miss me, as I'm not much of a Facebooker anyway!

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July Accomplishments

I bought the car wax.

And in the other column . . .

I did not apply the car wax to the car.