@lkessler re: the DNA question -- I don't have RootsMagic installed. I did try it out briefly in 2006 but I haven't looked at it since then.

@JanMurphy @JanMurphy - See my new blog post about this: beholdgenealogy.com/blog/?p=1627

@lkessler Minor nitpick: I hope you saved the receipts for major purchases. But for the main point of your post, I agree. What's the point of doing all this data entry if it doesn't buy you anything?

The real value of doing data entry, in Quicken or anything else, is that (one hopes) it makes you look at the record you're entering more carefully. In the US we have problems with unauthorized charges showing up on our phone bills. Someone entering the data in Quicken, with an eye to seeing how much they were spending on Long Distance calls, would spot these charges more quickly than someone who had the bill on auto-pay and never looked at the bill.

@JanMurphy - Yes, of course. Early days, we had charge account missteps. Caught 3 or 4 over 4 years. Then nothing. It got to be perfect. But checking your bills when you get them is a different matter than recording them. And checking census records when you get them and just recording the relevant and potentially relevant ones is better than recording every census record you ever get. It's the idea ofspending 95% of your time on the 5% of what will be most useful to you.

My new toy is a Logitech c920 Webcam, recommended by Dear Myrtle, so that when participate in future Google+ hangouts (like Dear Myrtle's on Wednesday nights), people will be able to see me. It'll also be great for Skyping.

Last night, I ordered a Western Digital 4TB MyCloud that I'll connect to my router and it will do continuous backups of all my data and make it available to me when I'm away from home. That will replace my manual monthly backup procedure to a 750 MW USB drive.

Sorry. 750 GB.