DOWNS SYNDROME

Dr. Collins at the NDSS award breakfast

Okay, so this guy Francis Collins is having too much impact on my life.  Here is a picture of him after having received an award from NDSS, which stands for National Downs Syndrome Society. The lady on his right is the head of NDSS.  The lady on his left, who obviously suffers from Downs Syndrome, is employed by NDSS as a community outreach associate.  Her name is Charlotte Woodward.  Charlotte recently GRADUATED from George Mason University, in Fairfax, VA!

That makes my paltry little PhD feel like a booby prize.

And to think we once thought of them as being, somehow,  “Mongoloid”!

https://directorsblog.nih.gov/2018/07/25/honored-to-receive-impact-award/

A GENETIC ANOMALY

Grand daughter Olivia, great grandson Finnegan

Olivia is a nurse, and has just given Finn a shot

This picture is making a hash out of my writing career!  I have it as a screen saver, and every time I sit down to write something, this picture stops me in my tracks!  The question always arises: how could such beautiful people be related to ME?  Several “friends” have commented on this supposed genetic anomaly.  Damned if I buy them any more beer.

KOREAN WAR

Me, in 1981

Got kind of choked up tonight, watching TV footage of the remains of our soldiers from the Korean War being returned to the United States.  Those guys were my contemporaries, I may have played football against some of them.  I missed that war because I was affluent, well connected, and smart.  I'm glad I did, but I wonder now about the morality of it all.  Why wasn't I in one of those little boxes, and one of them sitting here?  The older you get, the less you really understand.

I SURPASS TOLSTOY!

LEO

Google tells me that my next posting to www.ljb.quiltcutie.blogspot.com (Myrl’sBlog) will be # 600.  I estimate that the average entry contains about 300 words.  Thus, I will have written 600 X 300 = 180,000 words over these past six years.  Tolstoy is said to have written War and Peace in the same amount of time; however, War and Peace consists of 587,284 words.  Thus, Tolstoy out-wrote me by more than three to one!   But, as is well known, one picture is worth a thousand words – and all of my blog entries feature a picture!  That adds 600,000 words to my total – and leaves Tolstoy floundering in the dust.

And that doesn’t even count this (www.frivilousessays.blogspot.com) blog.

Nobel people, please take note!

MORE FUN WITH BIOLOGY

A cholera bacterium morphing into something else

Evolution requires genetic divergence – progeny that are not the exact duplicate of a parent.  Mammals acquire this diversity through sex – building the genome of the progeny out of bits and pieces of two different genomes, mom and pop.  Mutations also play an important role.  However, bacteria also evolve (witness all the antibiotics on the market), but don’t enjoy anything you might call sex.  In part they evolve – change – by capturing bits of DNA floating around in the blood stream.  Here is neat video of a cholera bacterium literally reaching out and capturing DNA blobs, then “eating” them.  It reminds me, and Dr. Francis Collins, of Spiderman snatching a weapon out of the grasp of a bad guy.  Pretty cool!

https://directorsblog.nih.gov/2018/07/19/a-bacterium-reaches-out-and-grabs-some-new-dna/

HEROES

This is the sort of thing that's important

Everyone needs heroes. 

To settle on a hero demands that you first determine what is important.  Then a hero can help you to stick to the right path.

Currently I have two heroes.  One is John McCain.  The other is Maya Tisdale.  They are about as different, superficially, as it is possible to be.  What they have in common is, foremost,  courage, They also seem to share a healthy, positive view of life.  Sadly, one’s clock is winding down.  The other’s has barely begun to tick.  I thank them both for reminding me of what is truly important.

http://frivilousessays.blogspot.com/2017/09/an-open-letter-to-john-mccain.html

http://frivilousessays.blogspot.com/2018/07/mighty-miss-maya.html

MIGHTY MISS MAYA

WHAT CAN I SAY?

We all know that life has its distinct stages:  young  adulthood, where life is your personal oyster;  middle-age, when you , realize it’s a clam, certainly not an oyster; maturity, when you can afford oysters, but the doctors won’t let you eat them; old age, when you can’t remember why you liked them in the first place.  Well, whatever stage I am in right now, it fosters penitence, extreme lachrymose behavior, and inquisitiveness.

As to penitence: I have done some bad stuff in my day, but I have been trying hard  to make amends. 

My inquisitiveness lately has mainly involved religion.  All my life I have called myself an agnostic.  As I see it now, there are two kinds of agnostic:  (1) the kind that says “I don’t know” simply because he/she regards themselves as just too damned busy to worry about it; (2) the type that realizes it is an important question, has mulled it over thoroughly,  and simply can't be sure.  Up until the last year or so I definitely was a type 1 agnostic, but now I am beginning to qualify as type 2.

Lachrymose behavior is harder to explain.  Until recently, when confronted with sad stories I would shrug, mutter something like “bummer”, and turn the page.  Now, however, I am more likely to weep.  Especially if little children are involved.  Which brings me to why I wrote this blog in the first place.

Be sure to click on this web address.  You may have to endure an ad at first, but persevere; it is worth it.  If you can watch this clip and not cry, you are a hard-ass indeed.

https://abcnews.go.com/Health/year-cerebral-palsy-celebrates-taking-independent-steps/story?id=56370753

So, I ask myself, if there is a loving and benevolent God, why do awful things happen to innocent people?  I know this is a childish sort of question to those few (those very few) of you who are well-grounded in religious philosophy, but to me it’s profound.  Some of you doubtless will reply: “God’s plan is not our plan”.  My rejoinder would be “Well, if He is so benevolent, why did He equip me with this feeble little intellect, one that allows me to witness pain and to some extent participate in it, but not understand why it is necessary?

I think my inquisitiveness has a long way to go.