On those DNA things, take the percentages with a grain of salt. To begin with, the percentage of something in your genes isn't the same as the percentage of it in your ancestry, and secondly, especially with the parts where they tell you you've got 2% or something like that, there's a lot of guesswork. The commercial services want the percentages to add up to 100%, so they'll fill in gaps with whatever seems the most likely. People using the same kind of technology for scientific research will identify what they can and label the rest "unknown." If it tells you you've got more than 10 or 15 percent or so of something, then you probably do have that ancestry, but the percentages themselves don't tell you that much. There are a bunch of webpages where four or five siblings took the same test and compared their results, and they all had the same big pieces, but in different amounts, and the 1% and 2% things were completely different.

I found my DNA results pretty interesting. I'd been able to trace mostly English heritage on my family tree and knew I could trace back to the 1600s from England to the U.S. on both sides of my family, but it turns out I'm mostly Irish (29%) and Scandinavian (22%). I do have about 15% Great Britain and 13% Western Europe, but the big surprise was 11% European Jewish. My dad tested 22%, so that clearly comes from his line. We had no idea, but we suspect now that it's from the Dutch part of his heritage. I also have, in theory, trace amounts of Iberian Peninsula, Italy/Greece, Finland/Northwest Russia and South Asian, but I take that with a grain of salt, as you say, Hil.

Sounds lovely, Connie. Starting over in a new place is stressful, but can be unburdening, too.

I wanted to share this with y'all, especially the teachers & librarians. A friend of mine is a professional archaeologist frequently annoyed at the quality of education her kids are getting in public schools, and since her daughter read the entire 8th-grade history textbook in the first week of school, she decided to, um, prepare some supplementary materials.

[link]

Check it out!

That is awesome, Consuela. It's unfortunate that it's necessary, but awesome nonetheless.

Nom, dinner. Orzo, ground pork, peas, onions, corn, and feta.

That's very cool, Consuela.

Exciting, Connie!

(Where's Theodosia with something?)

Timelies all!

Just got back from daytripping Intervention, a local con. Alex Kingston(subbing for Arthur Darvill) and Rene Auberjonois were the two big guests.

Tomorrow we're hoping to get to the Renaissance Faire.

OK, so opposite of how I felt about the outfit I work for (after them raising the starting pay of people doing my job without raising mine), One of the other things they do is called Camp Noah, a portable day camp experience that goes around to places where natural disasters or other traumatic things happened, focusing on teaching resiliency skills to kids who have been through the wringer. I helped make tie blankets to give to kids the year they went to Sandy Hook. They sent Camp Noah to Ferguson last summer. I am so proud.

That's wonderful, WS.