The folks at AncestryDNA just sent me this information. I was told, while growing up, that I was part Cherokee, on my father’s side, but that is apparently not the case. My mother’s map has nothing from Africa, so I can logically deduce that my recent African ancestors are on my father’s side. Of course, if you go back even further, we’re all Africans, since that is where human beings first evolved.
This is the strangest thing I’ve ever seen on a restaurant menu . . . on the Riverwalk in San Antonio, Texas, at a place called The Sugar Factory. No one in our party ordered it, and I’m glad — due not just to the $150 price tag, but also because this burger contains real gold leaf, and gold is not safe to ingest. The total amount of gold on the burger would be less than a gram, since gold leaf is extremely thin, but it could be a hazard to people who alreadly have heavy metals, such as lead, thallium, or mercury, in their bodies. Heavy metals are not meant to be eaten, so I had a turkey burger, instead.
A much better place to eat on the Riverwalk is Durty Nelly’s Irish Pub — tasty food, live music, and much more reasonable prices.
This is a ball-and-stick molecular image (found on Wikipedia) of an olanzapine (Zyprexa) molecule. It’s the medication prescribed, by my psychiatrist, to treat Brief Psychotic Disorder, which I’ve had, secretly, for years.
When I take my meds as prescribed, I’m an atheist and a skeptic. In this state, I can easily handle many science and mathematics problems, well enough to teach at the high school level in both subject fields. If I miss a dose or two, however, one of the first set of symptoms that appears is religious beliefs, seemingly coming out of nowhere.
Later, when I’m medicated again, it becomes clear that those religious beliefs were actually delusional. I don’t think I’ve ever had a non-delusional religious belief.
I try, hard, not to miss doses.
So we’re watching the latest episode of Star Trek: Picard tonight, as we do every Thursday night, when Bandit the Kitten decides to tear a gash in my leg with his incredibly sharp claws.
I waited until the show was over before pouring rubbing alcohol on it, which, of course, stung quite sharply,
In that moment of stinging, I realized that there’s a song for this occasion. It’s by The Flaming Lips.
My favorite lines in this song, “The Gash,” form a question: “Will the fight for our sanity / Be the fight of our lives?” With this kitten here in our apartment, it just might be exactly that.
For decades, I have been told that one of my great-grandmothers was half-Cherokee, making me at least 1/16th Native American. Recently, though, I sent a DNA sample to AncestryDNA, and these are the results — no Native Americans of any kind. I was also told that I have no Irish ancestors, and that’s not supported by the data, either. Here are the numbers that go with the map above.
The results do support a less precise estimate of my ethnicity: I’m an American mutt. No surprise there.
I can’t tell yet if Mr. Big wants to help or hinder the process of packing, but he sure is in the middle of things. We’ll see when we finish packing, and then the sun goes down, and we head down to Mobile, Alabama (without cats), from central Arkansas. That will be a good place to crash before the second leg of the trip, to the Orlando area. We’re celebrating our 8th wedding anniversary (which was yesterday) with this trip.
I can’t tell if that round thing in the picture our delivery driver texted to us is the Sun, shining through clouds, or the Moon. Either way, we didn’t want our DoorDash order left there.
I found this playful little guy in Hope, Arkansas, today. Spiders are my favorite animal, and jumping spiders are my favorite group of spider species . . . but phidippus audax is my favorite jumping spider! They act a lot like miniature cats, stalking and pouncing on prey. If you ever see a black and white jumping spider, look for green iridescent chelicerae. If you see this distinctive reflective, metallic green, you’ve found yourself a p. audax. Treat them well, and they’ll eat lots of insects that would otherwise cause problems for us.
This particular spider waved at me, and remained very expressive during our entire encounter. He’d study his surroundings, utterly still, until springing into action so fast that my eyes got left behind, in a cloud of confusion. Fortunately, my wife is skilled with a camera, and was able to catch this shot.
Here’s one of the things I found from my recent subscription to AncestryDNA. I’m surprised, because I was told (as a child) that I was at least 1/16th Cherokee, and had a lot of French as well. I was also told I had Scotch-Irish, but no Irish proper.
“Lots of English” is about the only thing where what I was told when young, and what the DNA says, actually match.
RobertLovesPi.net 