In the afternoon they called him at his office with an update.  They changed the oil.  They think the squeak is just some bushings than need some lubrication.  But the mechanic wanted Jeff to come down to talk in person.

Uh-oh.

How bad is the news going to be if you have to go in person?

Turns out my 2007 Dodge Caliber is no longer structurally sound.

The mechanic found a hole in the frame and he said it will definitely not pass its biannual safety inspection in September.

He said it is the third Caliber he has seen this month with the same problem.

ACK! I knew we should have undercoated it! But we thought we were going to turn it in at 5 years so we hadn’t bothered. Do you think the winter road salt is to blame? Or is it the manufacturer’s fault?

The new piece of the frame is $800 plus labour.

For review, here is a post I wrote two years ago today: Worse Zeus update

For two years Zeus has been getting 1 prednisone steroid pill (5mg) with his dinner and it has kept whatever large tumour is in his chest a reasonable size so he can enjoy life.

He’s 14 this year and is doing great!

Here are a few more interesting facts:

So far I have 991 DNA relatives in the 23andMe database.  I have no close family, but I do have 85 third-to-fourth cousins that have had their DNA tested by this company.

Countries of Ancestry:

I have large pieces of my DNA that are identical to other people from these places:

• United Kingdom
• Ireland
• Netherlands
• Finland
• Germany

Surnames:

Among my 991 DNA relatives, these surnames are the most common:

• Osborne
• Holt
• Ford
• White
• Burton

I can see a list of my closest relatives on here. Some just say if they are female or male, but some people choose to share their information, especially if they are looking for relatives. Imagine the information this can give a person who is adopted and doesn’t know anything about their family history!

My closest relative on here is a girl named Tracy from Wisconsin who is my 3rd to 4th cousin. We share 0.76% of our DNA, and 3 segments.

It also shows I have a 5th cousin in their database from Nova Scotia!

The relatives are based on similar DNA so both sides of the family are shown here. However, unless one or both of my parents get their DNA tests at 23andMe, their system can’t distinguish which side of the family the relatives are on.

I have a lot of relatives in North America, several in South America, some in Europe, especially Holland (not surprising since my dad’s parents are from Holland), and the rest of the 991 are scattered worldwide.

There is a feature where you can message any of them if you want to learn more than what they are sharing, or if you want to compare family trees.

I can’t wait to get a match closer than 3rd cousins.  This is FASCINATING!

Explore your DNA with your family. Now 20% off on all additional kits.

I’m looking over all the health information.  Some of the ancestry information is still being processed and will be a day or two away.

There are pages and pages and pages of interesting information here!  I’ll share the most fascinating.

According to my DNA:

Eye Colour: Likely Blue
Hair Curl: Straighter Hair on Average
Earwax Type: Wet

The average European shares 2.7% of their DNA with Neanderthals.  I share 2.8%.  Jeff said that explains a lot.

I have an 80% chance of being unable to taste bitter flavours. I have no idea if this is true because I have never tasted bitter food with anyone else’s tongue.

I am not resistant to HIV/AIDS or malaria. I have slightly higher odds of severe malarial anemia if infected with malaria.

I have an increased sensitivity to the drug Warfarin (Coumadin®) and may require a lower dose.

I have a greater tendency than the average woman to overeat.  I also am likely to consume more sugar daily than the average person.

My DNA will vary from my siblings, but Brian and Julie, if you don’t want to know about possible health risks that appeared in my results, stop reading NOW.

Decreased Risks:
Coronary Heart Disease: 0.59x average risk
Venous Thromboembolism: 0.72x
Age-related Macular Degeneration: 0.68x
Restless Legs Syndrome: 0.44x
Rheumatoid Arthritis: 0.40x
Melanoma: 0.75x
Parkinson’s Disease: 0.73x
Exfoliation Glaucoma: 0.80x
Multiple Sclerosis: 0.69x
Ulcerative Colitis: 0.78x
Crohn’s Disease: 0.79x

Elevated Risks:
Alzheimer’s Disease: 1.98x than average chance
Type 1 Diabetes: 2.10x average risk
Celiac Disease: 3.34x average risk
Esophageal Squamous Cell Carcinoma (ESCC): 1.21x average risk
Stomach Cancer (Gastric Cardia Adenocarcinoma): 1.22x

One of my Tuberculosis Susceptibility genetic markers shows a slightly higher odds of developing tuberculosis if exposed.

The interesting one to me is the increased risk of Alzheimer’s, which is known in my family tree. I apparently have “has one copy of the APOE ε4 variant. APOE ε4 is not the only factor contributing to Alzheimer’s disease. Although it is associated with increased risk of Alzheimer’s, many people with the APOE ε4 variant never develop it. ”  The report says, on average, 7.1 women with European ancestry out of 100 will develop Alzheimer’s between the ages of 50 and 79.  14.1 women of European ancestry who share my genotype out of 100 will develop Alzheimer’s between 50 and 79.  This is only looking at the genetic aspect of Alzheimer’s.  Environment and lifestyle may also play a role.

I also looked at the information for asthma. 2 of 3 reported markers in my DNA for asthma show that I have moderately higher odds of asthma, and slightly higher odds of having childhood asthma.  I’ve never had bad asthma, but it does cause a bit of trouble from time to time.

Inherited Conditions:

There are many inherited conditions listed, but I only have a variant for one of them.

I have one mutation in the HFE gene linked to hemochromatosis. A person with one of these mutations is not typically prone to higher levels of iron in the body, but can pass the mutation to offspring.

Ancestry:

This is just a very small sampling of the information.  I’m really excited for the ancestral results to be added, but I am unable to get anything from my father’s side because I am a female so I don’t have a Y chromosome.  Now I’m very keen on convincing more of my relatives to sign up to be tested, especially my father or brother, so I can learn more about my paternal side’s origins.

Haplogroup:

So far, I do know the Haplogroup of my maternal line.  It is “H1e2″.  I can’t find much specific information on it yet, but countries of origin will fill in when the rest of the results appear. It appears to be not so common.

What I can tell so far, is that  my mother’s people came from Europe, Near East, Central Asia, or Northwestern Africa.  H1e2 is a subgroup of H1.  25% of the Spanish population includes the H1 haplogroup.

H1 appears to have been common in Doggerland, an ancient land now flooded by the North Sea.

Explore your DNA with your family. Now 20% off on all additional kits.

Every time I’ve planted them at this house they never seem to bloom very long. Last year finally figured out why. It is those sneaky bunnies! Those rascally rabbits hop their not-so-innocent little bouncy hop out of the forest and sneakily munch away at my pansy flowers! They are even conservationists – they eat the flowers and leave the of the plant intact so they can grow more flowers!

Now I’m all for supporting the rights of wildlife, but come on, isn’t it bad enough the deer eat my tulips? Do the bunnies have to eat my cheery little pansy flowers too?

This spring I think I have outwitted the bunnies for sure this time. I’ve planted pansies in the containers on the rail along the top of the of the side porch. No bunny under 6 feet tall will nibble on ‘em now!

Here are a few pictures I took with my iPhone quickly before dashing off to work the other morning:

I can’t remember how I stumbled upon it, but some how I ended up watching a recording on YouTube a few months ago of a lecture Stuart Wilde was delivering called the “Mastery of Money”. It is an old video recording, possibly even from the 1980′s judging by the some of the hair styles and fashion styles in the audience. (–confirmed, 1986)  Here was this English man talking at the speed of light.  But his words were exactly what I needed to hear.

His lecture completely decluttered my mind about business, work, life, money, karma, happiness, and self-esteem. It was just 100 minutes long and it thoroughly changed my life.

Here is the lecture I’m speaking of:

I’m currently reading one of his books, The Trick to Money is Having Some! and am really enjoying it.

Thank-you Stuart.

AHHHHH the itch of the first bite of the season is torture!  Like amputation worthy.

I see I “celebrated” the return of the blackfly on this same day last year.

Now where is that deet.

Best part…. No black flies!!

(Don’t worry, it is just an Instagram filter on the photo, my legs are really so white they are blue. I’m not burnt.)

Jeff cut the grass today with the dethatcher.

Then we went to town and picked up the usual spring supplies: grass seed, soil, lawn fertilizer, Round-up, Pansies for the porch containers, steak for the BBQ, and a couple more big pots for planting veggies in another month.

Still going down to 0° Celcius tonight – that should kept those damn black flies and mosquitos away for a bit longer.  Really, there aren’t even signs of leaves coming on the trees yet

Last evening when Jeff let Monty outside before dinner, Monty went crazy!!

There was a DOG on the other side of his fence!

Monty doesn’t get to see too many other dogs since Trooper passed on.  And living in the woods here, not too many dogs stop by for a visit!

It was a black lab.  Young, excited dog. They took turns lifting their legs and peeing on each other through the fence. What fun!

Monty was yipping like a little yorkie. It was almost embarrassing to hear such noises come out of a 70 lb dog.  They ran along the fence together, then the black lab would run around and around the whole house, peeing on the bushes and anything else he could find.

Eventually we got Monty inside.  I didn’t want to let the black lab just walk off. We’re on a 90km/hr road with lots of curves. I couldn’t risk the chance he’d get hit so I eventually convinced him to come to me and sit down and I was able to make out a name and a phone number from his tag.  His name was “Aussie”.

Jeff grabbed the phone and called his parents to come and get him.  His owner was visiting people just a few houses down. We put him on a leash and waited for him to come over.

He said he’ll stick by him no problem, unless he smells another dog.  Most people don’t know we have a dog because Monty is usually quiet, but I guess he has a dog scent that travels a long distance!  He had been looking and calling for him and was grateful we called him.

Exciting day for Monty!

The cute bunny I spotted on the driveway this morning when I got up was now INSIDE Monty’s yard.

Monty took off yipping and barking chasing the bunny in circles in the yard.  The poor bunny kept banging himself into the chain link fence, trying to squeeze through.

I ran out, trying to make Monty “HEEL” so I could stop the bunny from hurting himself trying to get out.  I was out in the grass trying not to slip (it rained over night), or worse yet, slip on a fresh dog poop!

Monty, a Golden Retriever, seemed to realize at some point that he had no idea what to he was going to do when/if he caught the bunny and he slowed down. I don’t think there is a killer instinct anywhere in this dog.

I got Monty up on the deck and closed the gate at the top of the stairs, then I had to open the gates in the fence and try convince the poor rabbit to get out of the yard.

It didn’t take too long before he hopped his way to freedom!

When Jeff gets home this morning from working over night, I’m sure he’s going to wonder why Monty is soaked head to toe.

There was a bigger bunny on the driveway when I was leaving for work, so I think the rabbit population is finally on the rebound!

PS. Did I mention I saw a black bear on the weekend? He was across the lake in the open field. I think he was looking for the honey bee hives the neighbours have over there.