My deep ancestry

So we got my dad a National Geographic DNA testing kit for a Father's Day present. Apparently the results are in. My Dad writes:

Everyone that has my DNA belongs to Haplogroup R1b (M343). A haplogroup is a series of markers that defines the mutations in your DNA and is shared by your ancestors (the men in my case). According to the information I received, my earliest ancestor emerged in Africa about 50,000 years ago. About 5000 years later they moved to the Middle East. About 5000 years later they moved to Central Asia. They moved further into Asia during the next 5,000 years. This was during an ice age and survival was difficult so they moved to Northern Europe and later to Western Europe. This is where our ancestors got the M343 marker – the defining marker of our haplogroup. We are direct descendants of the Cro-Magnon man that did all the cave paintings in France.

Internet explorations

I was playing around with Google Trends today when I should have been working. Google Trends allows you to see what people are searching for on the internet and when. I typed in the name "Warnick," not expecting any results. Here is what I found. Apparently, in Late October, 2005, there was a huge surge in people searching the name "Warnick." I wonder what the heck was going on at that time to make people interested in searching for the name "Warnick." The surge in searches did not seem to correlate with any significant news involving Warnicks. Anyway, the most popular search regions for the name "Warnick" are:

1. Salt Lake City, UT, USA

2. Boston, MA, USA

3. New York, NY, USA

4. Seattle, WA, USA

5. Chicago, IL, USA

6. Toronto, Canada

Funny that the good people of Toronto should be so interested in Warnicks. What's up Toronto?

Another cool site is Pandora.com, which helps you find music that you like. You simply type in a group or song that you like and the site matches the characteristics of the group or song with other groups. My favorite rock and roll song of all time is "Until the End of the World," by U2. Typing that in, I found that I like music with subtle harmonies, mixed acoustic and electric guitar, extensive vamping, repetive melodic phrasing. The list of music this has generated has been great so far. From other searches, I found that I like folk roots, minor key stuff, and, um, "breathy male vocals."

Bryan

Mean t-shirt

Ellie and I saw a t-shirt the other day that made us wince. It simply said:

NOBOBY CARES ABOUT YOUR BLOG

My response to Bryan's list. (For the record, I knew all those things about him.) Items are in random order. . .

Favorites
1. Homemade rootbeer
2. Going to the fair
3. The sizzling sound a sparkler makes when you douse it in a bucket of water
4. Eating a handful of freshly fallen snow
5. Sleeping in a cold bedroom
6. Getting an unexpected letter in the mail
7. Washing a floor on my hands and knees (it’s nuts, I know, speaking of which - )
8. Hazlenut-flavored chocolate
9. Endorphins after running
10. Reading a good book on a rainy afternoon
11. People who aren't afraid to use big words
12. Clean bedsheets

Least Favorites
1. Getting into a hot car
2. Books with dumb endings
3. Finding a bleach stain on my new clothes
4. Cleaning my room – or my daughter’s
5. Little yappy dogs
6. Finding out they don’t carry ______ in my size
7. People who play dumb
8. Beauty pageants and/or popularity contests
9. Being called “Sweetie” by salespeople my age
10. Days with no ice cream
11. Our deathly slow computer
12. Shaving my legs (it's so dangerous!)

Ellie