Riverbank Bed & Breakfast Website
I have just completed a new website for Riverbank Bed and Breakfast. Please take a look and let me know what you think.
Normally for this type of site I would use Rapidweaver, a web development program for my iMac. This time I produced the site directly in WordPress. WordPress seems to be moving away from the simple blog program it was originally designed to be and is quickly becoming a sophisticated website development and publishing program.
With the plugins now available it is possible to produce a very professional looking website for free (other than the host provider charges and the domain name).
If you are happy to spend a small amount of money on your website then very versatile and feature rich themes can be purchased. With the vast online WordPress community nearly every question you might have will have already been answered.
The days when you needed to know program codes and language or invest in an expensive website development program are over. If you want a good professional website which is simple and stright forward to produce then look no further than WordPress.
The latest website for Riverbank B & B I have produces is an example of what can be accomplished with a few hours work.
Help Needed With The Rapley Family Tree
For a while now I have been working on the Rapley family tree which I have managed to get back to 1595. (click here for the tree)
My aunt and a cousin started the tree many years ago. They handed it over by my father who worked on it for several years before passing it on to me.
I recently joined a project on www.familytreedna.com which is researching the Y-DNA links in the Rapley family. This was started by a Rapley in the USA who was trying to establish their family links back to the UK. From the records it seems probable that I should have been related to them and it would confirm the vague records. To our surprise however the Y-DNA tests did not show a family link.
The only way this can happen is if there was an unrecorded adoption probably sometime in the 19th century. To confirm this we need more Rapleys to join the project as there are not enough to see where the break is.
So if you are a Rapley and are interested in the family tree and the origins of the Rapley family please consider joining the project. Click here for details
If you have any questions please contact me
So What is Y-DNA Testing? (Taken from MyFTDNA)
- You can discover the origin of your paternal line with a Y-DNA test
- Connect with genetic cousins and uncover the deep ancestral origin of your direct paternal line (your father, your father’s father, etc.) though Y-DNA testing. This is available for males only.
- Results Include:
- genetic matches, paternal ancestral origins, paternal haplogroup, haplogroup migration map, haplogroup frequency map, and test results certificate. Family Tree DNA will continue to update you about new matches and other information regarding your result.
What Level of Y-DNA Should I Test?
The level of Y-DNA testing you choose determines how closely you are related to your matches. The more markers you test and match, the more closely related you are to the person you match.
There is a discount when you join a Surname Project!
Before placing an order, search for the Rapley Surname Project, which will entitle you to a reduced price when you order a test kit as a member of the Project.
I do hope you will consider joining and help with furthering the Rapley family tree project for now and future generations of Rapleys.
Natural Beekeeping: Success and Disaster
Looking back it has been a long time since my last post where has the time gone? I have not touched my latest book for months either! I really must knuckle down and stop being distracted by life.
Anyway Late last year I ordered two Apis M.M. queen bees (Northern Europe/British Bees). One to re-queen my weak hive and the other to do a split from my strong hive which also has an A.M.M queen. (The weak hive had an Italian mongrel queen).
Unfortunately the weak hive despite having plenty of stores did not make it through the winter it was very sad. I could not see a reason for the demise so I assume the weak queen died and they just lost the will to live.
Anyway the strong hive with the A.M.M queen built up quickly. It is surprising when her girls fly it can be cold wet and windy and there is still a queue at the hive entrance. Nothing the like the Italian strain which would be well clustered in such weather!
I kept my order for two queens open as I figured I could easily take two splits from my remaining hive without any problem. Due to bad weather the delivery was postponed several times, as the queens had not mated. When I finally received notice that they had been posted to me the weather forecast could not have been worst rain cold and gales It was the last week of May for havens sake!
On the Friday the day before the queens were due to arrive there was a break in the clouds sufficient for me to split of six frames from the strong hive and install them either end of one of my empty Horizontal Top Bar Hives. I had the hive reversed with the main entrances blocked of and the single entrances either end also blocked off. I used two feeder follower boards and a single follower board in the middle of the hive so three follower boards isolated the splits.
One of my Horizontal Topbar Hives reversed to take two splits
The following day when the queens arrived it was dreadful weather so I gave them some water by smearing a wet finger over their cage and put them in a cool quiet place in a cupboard drawer.
The next day was little better however I did get a break in the constant rain so I dropped the queens into their respective hives the cage hanging from a top bar on a short wire. The entrances I half opened with a cut cork.
Reduced entrance for the hive so it is easy for the small split to defend
It was another four days before there was another break in the weather. I just lifted the topbars with the queen cages to check if they had been released. All was OK so I removed the empty cages topped up the feed in both sections and left them to it.
Several days later I noticed one side was quiet while the other was busy with bees coming and going. I checked the quiet hive and found the bees lethargic and queenless. They had either rejected her or something had befallen her.
I stapled some newspaper over my frame follower I had built for combining bees and slid the queenless ones up to the busy section of the hive with the newspaper follower separating them.
A couple of days later I checked and the bees had shredded the newspaper and all seemed calm and happy. So despite it being the coldest and wettest June since records began over two hundred years ago I have at least managed one successful split. I do wonder if I had been able to manage things a bit better rather than having to hurriedly do things between breaks in the torrential rain whether I would have had 100% success rate. Oh well I will never know but at least I have replaced my winter failure.
Bees Foraging From My New Hive
iPhone Unlocking Scams.
When I was investigating the possibility of unlocking my new iPhone I was dismayed to find many scammers offering an easy online unlocking service.
There are a large number of websites that look genuine and have a lot of positive customer feed back offering an easy unlock service for $17 to $25. They all have one thing in common, they supply step by step instructions and a couple of download links where you can down load “their” jailbreak (unlocking software). The thing is the links are for software that is freely open source and available to download for nothing.
To unlock the phone you first have to jail break it using free software called Sn0wbreeze. Once it is jailbroken you have access to a directory of applications called Cydia. Here you will find the utility to unlock your phone to any carrier.
I investigated at least ten different websites offering to unlock your iPhone immediately all charging you for the service and without exception the download links and instructions used the free software I mentioned above.
The disadvantage with jailbreaking your phone to unlock it is you have to repeat the process every time Apple releases an update. This is because when the phone was first registered the Apple servers have a record of the service provider and ensure the correct system is downloaded each time the phone is updated.
The best way to unlock the iphone is at the end of the contract, contact the carrier and request the phone is unlocked. The carrier is obliged to unlock the phone for you and update the information on the Apple servers.
The advantage is you can keep the phone updated with the latest system with no fear of it being re-locked.
The disadvantage is depending on the type of contract you have with the particular carrier you may have to pay an administration fee. It is also not instant as the update on the Apple servers can take up to fourteen days to be activated.
Which ever way you decide to unlock your phone don’t be tempted to pay for it using the many ‘instant ‘ services listed on Google. Do it for free using the same system the scammers are charging you for or do it officially through you existing carrier.
If you do get tempted and pay for your phone to be unlocked, check to see if the process involves down loading a free app from Cydia. If they instruct you to do it that way you have been scammed and paid for something which is free!
NASA Telescope Confirms Alien Planet in Habitable Zone
As a Sci Fi writer I felt I just had to reproduce the post below. Sci Fi and reality grow ever closer! The times people have spoken to me when they have found out I write Science Fiction and say Sci Fi and aliens are a lot of rubbish, I wonder if they will be as confident now?
MOUNTAIN VIEW, Calif. — NASA’s planet-hunting Kepler spacecraft has confirmed the discovery of its first alien world in its host star’s habitable zone — that just-right range of distances that could allow liquid water to exist — and found more than 1,000 new explanet candidates, researchers announced today (Dec. 5).
The new finds bring the Kepler space telescope’s total haul to 2,326 potential planets in its first 16 months of operation.These discoveries, if confirmed, would quadruple the current tally of worlds known to exist beyond our solar system, which recently topped 700.
The potentially habitable alien world, a first for Kepler, orbits a star very much like our own sun. The discovery brings scientists one step closer to finding a planet like our own — one which could conceivably harbor life, scientists said.
“We’re getting closer and closer to discovering the so-called ‘Goldilocks planet,’” Pete Worden, director of NASA’s Ames Research Center in Moffett Field, Calif., said during a press conference today. [Gallery: The Strangest Alien Planets]
The newfound planet in the habitable zone is called Kepler-22b. It is located about 600 light-years away, orbiting a sun-like star.
Kepler-22b’s radius is 2.4 times that of Earth, and the two planets have roughly similar temperatures. If the greenhouse effect operates there similarly to how it does on Earth, the average surface temperature on Kepler-22b would be 72 degrees Fahrenheit (22 degrees Celsius).
Hunting down alien planets
The $600 million Kepler observatory launched in March 2009 to hunt for Earth-size alien planets in the habitable zone of their parent stars, where liquid water, and perhaps even life, might be able to exist.
Kepler detects alien planets using what’s called the “transit method.” It searches for tiny, telltale dips in a star’s brightness caused when a planet transits — or crosses in front of — the star from Earth’s perspective, blocking a fraction of the star’s light.
The finds graduate from “candidates” to full-fledged planets after follow-up observations confirm that they’re not false alarms. This process, which is usually done with large, ground-based telescopes, can take about a year.
The Kepler team released data from its first 13 months of operation back in February, announcing that the instrument had detected 1,235 planet candidates, including 54 in the habitable zone and 68 that are roughly Earth-size.
Of the total 2,326 candidate planets that Kepler has found to date, 207 are approximately Earth-size. More of them, 680, are a bit larger than our planet, falling into the “super-Earth” category. The total number of candidate planets in the habitable zones of their stars is now 48.
To date, just over two dozen of these potential exoplanets have been confirmed, but Kepler scientists have estimated that at least 80 percent of the instrument’s discoveries should end up being the real deal.
More discoveries to come
The newfound 1,094 planet candidates are the fruit of Kepler’s labors during its first 16 months of science work, from May 2009 to September 2010. And they won’t be the last of the prolific instrument’s discoveries.
“This is a major milestone on the road to finding Earth’s twin,” Douglas Hudgins, Kepler program scientist at NASA headquarters in Washington, D.C., said in a statement.
Mission scientists still need to analyze data from the last two years and on into the future. Kepler will be making observations for a while yet to come; its nominal mission is set to end in November 2012, but the Kepler team is preparing a proposal to extend the instrument’s operations for another year or more.
Kepler’s finds should only get more exciting as time goes on, researchers say.
“We’re pushing down to smaller planets and longer orbital periods,” said Natalie Batalha, Kepler deputy science team lead at Ames.
To flag a potential planet, the instrument generally needs to witness three transits. Planets that make three transits in just a few months must be pretty close to their parent stars; as a result, many of the alien worlds Kepler spotted early on have been blisteringly hot places that aren’t great candidates for harboring life as we know it.
Given more time, however, a wealth of more distantly orbiting — and perhaps more Earth-like — exoplanets should open up to Kepler. If intelligent aliens were studying our solar system with their own version of Kepler, after all, it would take them three years to detect our home planet.
“We are getting very close,” Batalha said. “We are homing in on the truly Earth-size, habitable planets.”
You can follow SPACE.com senior writer Mike Wall on Twitter: @michaeldwall. Follow SPACE.com for the latest in space science and exploration news on Twitter @Spacedotcomand on Facebook.