Delusional Niece

This is who my niece thinks I look like. Bless her. She must need glasses but I love her. Thank you, Erica! Please remain from smarmy remarks, let me have my moment of delusion. Lol... :-)

First Wedding Gift

Our very first wedding gift. It's from Alex and has our wedding date engraved on it. It's a plate for family to sign. Very cool gift. Thank you, Alex! Last night we met with Ryan to go over the ceremony. Getting all the details finalized. And afterwards picked up my ring. Can't wait to wear it! Very excited for this Tuesday. Thank you, Terry and Karen, for opening up your home for our special night.

Patient Gifts

Photo is of our Christmas tree tonight. Gifts are patiently waiting to be opened on Saturday. It's tough waiting three more days for Christmas. :-)

Christmas Walk

Merry Christmas! We just finished walking our dog at the river park. Beautiful, cold Christmas Day. Almost 40 degrees! Photo taken at English Landing Park in Parkville, MO, on Christmas Day 2013.

Snow Walk

Yeah, we're awesome, the cold doesn't stop us. Alex and I just finished walking Lilly at the park. Beautiful, cold day for a stroll in the snow.

New Programmer

Hanging out with my daughter at a downtown coffeehouse (Quay Coffee). I'm coding a program for one of my projects. She's becoming a programmer herself so was showing her the program, what parts of it means (file def, SQL, etc). Her eyes just glazed over. Combination of it being over her head and the computer language being mainframe. Lol...

Eskimo Girl

My 'cool' daughter, @utasora - No, seriously, she's freezing. It's 10 degrees right now and below zero with windchill. My little Eskimo girl. :)

College Transcript

Finally finished enrolling for the January Java class. Woot! And I looked more closely at my college transcripts. I rocked. My last semester at SFCC (2000) I took 6 classes, 18.5 credits. Four A's and two B's. Classes were: Advanced COBOL, DB2 Relational Databases, Advanced C/C++, Systems Analysis, Business Communications, and US History. And here I was nervous about this upcoming class...

Strangers

Opened myself up and introduced myself to strangers over the weekend. Made four interesting friends. Three at the Rime Center (Danny, Erica, Terrin) and one at the coffeehouse (Avreil). People are friendly, warm, interesting, and interested in making friends if you open yourself up to the experience. Trust that most people are nice and your expectations will be met.

Alan Wallace

Next two days are going to be a killer but totally my fault. Friday 7:30am meeting (I scheduled it) then don't get off until 6pm (oncall). Buddhist retreat with Alan Wallace 7:30-10pm Friday night. Then the retreat 2nd day Saturday 8am-6:30pm. And logging into work Saturday night at 9pm then again around midnight. Sunday Alan talks at our service at 10:30am. Pretty excited to spend the next three days with him. He's a well known Buddhist author and teacher. He's been to the Rime Center before but this is the first chance I've had to attend so it'll be worth missing a little sleep. Lol... http://alanwallace.org http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/B._Alan_Wallace 

Genome Results

Results of my genetic testing from the 23andMe:

Ta da! I’m average! Warning: The following blog entry will most likely be boring. Nothing fantastic, for better or worse, was found. Except ancestry is a bit interesting. But that’s later on. This entry is composed of ramblings and not my best writing. Mostly a dump of information.

No major negative traits nor conditions were discovered. No breast cancer, Alzheimer’s, none of the biggies. I’m mostly average in all ways. I’ll take it.

Average predisposition for sweets (have a sweet tooth, actually), can taste bitter (agreed), average non-verbal IQ (I beg to differ), hair slightly curlier than average (yep), earwax type is wet (ewww), birthweight lighter than typical (I was over 8 pounds), iris patterns (um, ok), higher odds of photic sneeze reflex (nope), higher pain sensitivity (another one I beg to differ on). Just a few things they test for.

Various genes can play a role in aging and longevity. One report said I inherited the gene for being about 4 years younger. Not sure what that means. I tend to look younger than my age. Is that it? But for all the ones for longevity, I have the average odds, nothing interesting, on living to my 90’s or to 100. There are a few genes that play a role. Though my parents didn’t, most of my grandparents lived to their 80’s. One grandmother lived to 96. She was driving and active until 94, when things went downhill. So there’s family history showing I could have a long, full life.

One report where it stated I did inherit a gene where genetics play a strong role? Restless Leg Syndrome. I may have inherited the gene but don’t have it. I had a sleep study done less than 10 years ago. This is what they try to tell you when you get tested: You may have inherited a gene but it doesn’t set your fate.

23andMe tells you how certain researchers are that the gene plays a role on each thing you inherited. Some research strongly proves out how certain they are that the gene can be a cause of a condition or a trait. Some research shows that that they ‘think’ it plays a role but need more research to be certain.

Then they tell you what research has found how much genetics plays into getting the condition such as diabetes. Genetics may only play a 20% role in developing a condition. Or 80%. So they tell you the odds and how certain they are about what they’ve found. They provide citations for the research used for each gene interpretation.

It’s $99 to get a wealth of information. It did exactly what I hoped it would do: Verified I most likely won’t get Alzheimer’s or the other biggies. Both parents died of cancer. But I don’t think genetics played a part for my mother. She was a heavy smoker and stopped getting pap smears 15 years before she passed. She died of cancer of the uterus. Genetics most likely did play into why my dad developed cancer. But if he hadn’t quietly suffered the severe acid reflux for years, and hadn’t waited so long to get medical attention, he may have been alive today. I had acid reflux though not severe. Took the antibiotics that kill the bacteria which cause ulcers (though I never developed ulcers) and haven’t had many problems since. Plus my diet, other than coffee, is mostly conducive to avoiding tummy troubles. I did inherit a slightly higher chance than average for stomach cancer (what my father’s sister died of) and cancer of the esophagus (what my dad died of). But my dad and siblings were a much older generation (my dad was 40 when he had me and his sister was much older than him). There are so many more ways to take care of your tummy today than they had available back then. We have scope tests to check out your stomach and esophagus. Strong meds to reduce the acid. Antibiotics to prevent ulcers. My inherited numbers weren’t much higher than average. My lifestyle and being aggressive about my health gives me confidence I won’t get the cancers my mom, dad, and aunt developed.

If I had inherited the biggies? I would have started to become aggressive in learning everything I could about the disease and how to prevent it.

The testing gave me so much interesting data. 

The results of the ‘biggie’ reports don’t pop up on your screen when you log in. You can know about tons of other stuff and choose to never learn about the biggies. They force you to individually unlock those reports, giving you all kinds of warnings to not freak out. But I’d strongly recommend you do else you’ll always wonder. Not knowing and living in fear is worse than knowing and making a plan of action. But then this is from someone who didn’t inherit the biggies.

However I’m not immune to freaking out. My heart was pounding when I opened up the report on breast cancer despite no one in my family having it. I was so wired that I initially read the report wrong and thought I had inherited the genes. Thoughts started zooming through my head, what it meant to me, would I have to have a mastectomy as a precaution, would I die early. Then I took a breath, re-read the report to be sure, and I realized I didn’t develop any of the genes tied to breast cancer. It was an eye-opener how much I had emotionally invested in knowing the results of those reports. I wasn’t as big and strong, immune to freaking out, as I had I thought.

Now for where are my ancestors from. Some of my family has been here since the American Revolution. Even fought in the war. America is a stew of many migrants. The longer your family has been in America, the higher odds of various seasonings. My mom’s side of the family is from the south, Louisiana. However, I’m purely European. No strand of Asian or African. Due to family from the south, I was always positive I had a smidge of African even though I had no physical characteristics. No seasoning of anything else. 

The biggest parts of my stew are Irish/British and French/German. 

But no Jewish. Not that I have a specific reason for thinking I would. But being German, I thought I’d have a smidge. The odds of being purely European from a line of family that has been in America for a few hundred years is outstanding. My fiancé didn’t think it was possible due to the odds when your family has been in America for such a long time.

They tell you what they know for absolute certain, then accepted standard evaluation, then the speculative odds (they think you are but can’t say 100% sure). Now that you know my ‘certain’ (Irish, etc.), below is my ‘speculative’. The Scandinavian and French are from my father’s side. The Irish, definitely from my mother’s side (though my dad could have had some as well). The Iberian is most likely from my mother’s side (going off the tales of our family history).

100% European

            Northern European

58.3% - Irish & British

14.6% - French & German

   1.1% - Scandinavian

22.8% - Nonspecific Northern European

            Southern European

  0.5% - Iberian

  0.7% - Nonspecific Southern European                    

2.1% - Nonspecific European

< 0.1% - Unassigned (Everyone has some ‘Unassigned’.)

What 23andMe provides:

Health Risks (Restless Leg Syndrome – Inherited the gene but don’t have it)

Drug Responses (Metabolize PPI rapidly – good to know if ever needed)

Inherited Conditions (Variant absent, for me, for all inherited conditions they check for)

Traits (Caffeine Consumption – Higher than average. That’s a shocker.)

Ancestry Composition (100% European)

Maternal Line (Mine is H3a which is a subgroup of H3. Haplogroup H, the parent of H3, originated in the Near East and then expanded throughout Europe toward the end of the Ice Age. H3 likely branched off the rest of H in Iberia and expanded across most of western Europe after the glaciers receded. Today, H3 is distributed across much of Europe and is rare elsewhere.)

Paternal Line (paternal line of all women traces back to one man, but you knew that)

Neanderthal Ancestry (I’m 0.2% more Neanderthal than the average person of 2.7%)

That’s it. I’m very average. Most likely will live a full but average life span. I inherited various genes on eye color. One for brown and another for blue. I have green eyes. I inherited a slightly higher chance to be blonde but just have average chances of having red hair. I was blonde as a little child but now have brown, slightly reddish hair. It’s all very fascinating but is not your finalized blueprint. It is just odds, chances, where you ‘might’ have gotten your green eyes (maybe from my Irish side?), what you might want to consider when managing your health. Environment plays such as huge role. Live your life fully, walk often for not only physical but mental health, eat a veggie once in a while, laugh and smile often, and, most importantly, get your checkups as recommended, not just when things go wrong. I strongly believe that my mother would be alive today had she continued to get annual pap smears. There’s a reason why preventive care is often free by health insurance companies. Staying ahead of it all has huge paybacks. Don’t you want to enjoy life when you’re 70 and not be in the process of falling apart, a burden on your family, them watching you decay and no longer can enjoy your life? Then take care of yourself. Glance at the report, use it as a guide, and then take responsibility for your health and your life. And move on.

Random Life Thoughts

Random thoughts: I don't have a great life. Just choose to celebrate the small positive moments. Anyone can do it despite their resources. My life is sometimes rough (right now is an example but as it's someone close, it's not my info to share with the world). But I try to not let those times become who I am. 

Get out of the house often and enjoy the free things every town has to offer. Housework can wait. Go to parks and take tons of pictures and talk to people. Take enough pics and a few will come out awesome. People are fascinating and most have an interesting story. Having a dog is a great conversation starter. 

Don't share to brag but show the smallest things can bring happiness. Well, you can brag a little - nothing wrong with sharing the good moments and your talents. :)

Tell others how wonderful they are, give specific compliments and be sincere.

Don't judge. You never know someone's full backstory, why they do the things they do, and everyone has a tragedy somewhere in their life.

Nursing a cup of coffee in a coffeehouse with a laptop can make for a great afternoon - if you're brave enough to do it by yourself sometimes. I still feel awkward sometimes but love it enough to not stop doing it.

Take tons of selfies & post the ones you like. You're beautiful/handsome! Share it on social media. Enjoy the compliments! You deserve them.

Be vulnerable and share yourself with the world. Trust most people are good and won't be hurtful when you do. 

Ignore or standup to those that are. Don't let them convince you that their words are true. Avoid them if you can. Negative exposure is toxic. You can appreciate someone's struggles without allowing them to hurt you. You don't owe it to them to endure it.

Don't feel sorry for yourself. The attention you get from it is hollow and short-lived. But do confide in friends and let them help you through it and baby you. 

Don't stop saying please and thankyou to everyone, not just those you like. It means more to people than you think. Know you have a ripple effect to even strangers. Choose to make it a positive one with no expectations of payback. 

Ask yourself when you're unsure of trying something new. Or when deciding about taking a job (or stay in a job) - "Will this matter when I'm 90?" Or "Will I regret, when I'm 90, not have done those types of things?" You may feel stupid or awkward or unsure but if you go forward with sitting in a coffeehouse by yourself, volunteering, skydiving, or trying a new career - you are being brave. Bravery is doing something despite fear. 

Please, please, please try even one tiny thing out of your comfort zone once a month. Look back, after a year, and you'll be so proud of yourself. I want to try Toastmasters but am afraid of a) looking stupid and b) failing miserably. Therefore, sometime in the next month, I plan to attend a meeting. Notice I said 'try'. It's not a commitment but simply stepping out of my comfort zone to try it.

Always be gentle with yourself. Imagine you are talking to the five year old girl/boy you were. You wouldn't say hurtful things to them, would you? Then don't do it now.

Christmas Knitting Gift

Starting my third knitting project. Shiny 'spring green' cotton, dragonfly pattern washcloth. Christmas gift for Alex for her new apartment.

Suicide

I'm not suicidal but know someone who is. If you are, please read this page. It may save your life. Never doubt your life is worth saving.

http://www.metanoia.org/suicide/

Bad Day

When having a bad day, let a little bit of snowman into your life. 

My Mother's Passing

Yesterday was the 5th anniversary of my mom's passing. A difficult day that only gets a little easier to bear with each passing year. She fought a hard but short and ugly battle with cancer that took her within months of her diagnosis. Leif stayed by my side through the whole weekend, kept me laughing and feeling very loved. I came home yesterday, after errands, to these flowers waiting for me. I am thankful to have such an understanding, caring, and loving man, to always be there for me through both the happy and difficult times.

Amateur Radio This Morning

Photo is of fiancé, Leif, listening to Scotland this morning, ready to jump in and make contact. Very cool to talk to people from all around the world. Amateur ham radio operators rock! Not only does Leif have his license but so do I and our daughters. Geeky families rule.

Sephora

Got a makeover at Sephora. More color than I'm used to but it was fun to play dress up for the afternoon. I absolutely love this place. Kayla was awesome, so helpful and really listened. 

Saturday Break

Listening to the Killers, eating a pumpkin danish, & sipping on an iced mocha at Parkville Coffee. Taking a few moments before starting on my Saturday errands. Life is good.

Sunday - So Far

Photos are of the Rime Tibetan Buddhist Center this morning. One is of the shrine room, including Lama Chuck giving Sunday service. The second composite is of their adorable gift shop. The Center is so beautiful, the people so welcome and kind. And non-denominational / non-sectarian. Christians, Buddhists, and others sometimes come for the meditation alone. And the occasional yoga class. :)

Currently at Quay Coffee with Leif. Finally found a coffeehouse where he loves their espresso and I love their mocha latte. Atmosphere is nice but not fantastic. Service is awesome, though, with their coffee amazing.

Trick-or-Treaters

Parkville Downtown is doing their Halloween today. Town is filled with ghosts and goblins. Love these trick-or-treaters! 

Parkville Coffee

Parkville Coffee on a Saturday afternoon? Of course! Love this place, so charming and relaxing.

English Landing Park in October

October day at English Landing Park. Parkville, MO. 10/26/13 Saturday

Daytime Moon

Snapped this photo of the moon at English Landing Park in Parkville, MO, this morning. Perfect & beautiful fall day.

Backs of a Park

'Backs' of English Landing Park in Parkville, MO, this morning. Took these photos after visiting the last Saturday for the Farmers Market this year. Yummy apple butter and baklava. My favorite photo is the top left one.

Knitting Lessons

Love this shop, Florilegium in Parkville MO. Owners are so nice and patient, giving Leif and I knitting lessons. We're up to knit a row then pearl a row. Making progress! Next lesson is next Tuesday. Can't wait!

Halo Rainbow around the Sun

Just took this photo of a 22 degree halo rainbow around the sun. Beautiful outside right now.

Powell Observatory and Our Busy Night

Leif (fiancé with hood on) manned the 16 inch telescope last night at Powell Observatory. Carroll manned the gate, welcoming our visiting astronomers. I did crowd control and posted photos on our club's Facebook page. Tom took photos of the crowds and the moon. Plus Randy, Paul, Elizabeth, David and many more club members helped out, including manning the 30 inch telescope! With 400 Boy Scouts next door (leader came over to warn us) and crowds that arrived an hour early? It was a very busy night. Oh, and thank you, Carroll, for the picnic yummies for the Powell team! Fueled us up beforehand for the long night! If you ever have a chance, come check out Powell Observatory in Louisberg, KS. It's operated/owned by our club, the Astronomical Society of Kansas City. It was an awesome night last night! Can you spot David's "UFO" flying toy in the last photo? :)

English Landing Park

Took this photo at the English Landing Park in Parkville, MO, last week. Beautiful day for a walk in October and alongside the Missouri River. Suspect it was one of our last warm days and we're in for a cold winter.

Siri

Siri is a smart ass. She was calling me Cindy. Then I asked her to call me Astrogirl. Then I asked her to call me Cindy again. 

She replied "I figured as much".

Awkward Geek at Heart

I'm such a tomboy and uncoordinated goof. (I hide it better now than I did years ago). Awkward and over eager at times. Way cooler when I write about my life than someone watching me. Don't get me wrong. I have an awesome life. But when you really get to know me, I'm a nerd at heart with all awkwardness that goes with it. I just happen to be lucky enough to have cool friends and do interesting things. Guess you have to not care that people will discover your awkwardness, go forward with living life, and be open to being vulnerable. You get hurt sometimes but the rewards out weigh it all. And, in the end, you get to have awesome stories and wonderful memories. And a life worth living.

Bits and Pieces

Random things going on right now... 

Knitting: Leif (fiancé) is going to take knitting lessons with me starting this Tuesday! Think he's curious about the process. And in his own words he likes spending time with me. How sweet is that? Love Florilegium in Parkville Missouri. Absolutely beautiful shop with awesome owners. They're going to give us private free lessons! I've got my needles ready!

Family and Parkville, MO: Leif and I loved spending the day with his parents, Eric and Sharon, yesterday. We don't get to see them as often as we like with us being 40 minutes away. We showed them all around Parkville Missouri. The Farmers Market, English Landing Park, Parkville Coffee, lunch, and the many cute shops. Sharon finally had a chance to use her gift certificate at River's Bend Gallery we gave her a few years ago. Beautiful and perfect October day!

Astronomy: I manage our astronomy club's Facebook page and a new member posted this on our site. Very proud that our club has such a positive effect and encourages people to check out the night sky more. And stay up late! Right now Jupiter doesn't come out until after 1am and Comet ISON until after 3am!

On the lighter side of my life: My first designer bag! On consignment and on sale so less than one of my pooches physical therapy sessions. Never thought I would even want to own a Coach but it's so cute and love the periwinkle! Bold 'girly' move for me which is probably why it's kind of a big deal. I'm normally such a tomboy.

DNA Testing: Going to get my genome mapped out with 23andMe. Terribly curious. Nervous? Not really. Suspect it'll put my mind at ease and give a sense of more power over my future if they do find anything as I can then become more proactive through lifestyle and check ups. Huge step in owning my future health. Why am I telling you something so private? Because that's what blogging can be about - your most private parts of your life shared with the world. I can't promise you that I'll share all the results but will on some. I hope through sharing my own experience I can take away some of the fear of 'knowing'. Just because you have a specific gene doesn't mean you'll get the disease or cancer. It just indicates your chances. The company has an excellent reputation and a great promotion going on right now. https://www.23andme.com

A great blog entry on someone's experience with this: http://www.singularityweblog.com/23andme-dna-test-review-its-right-for-me-but-is-it-right-for-you/

Astronomy: Interactive map of the galaxy! "Thanks to the amazing powers of the internet (and super-creative developers), you can now travel through interstellar space without any fear of ending up like Sandra Bullock in Gravity. Click over to the 100,000 Stars interactive map of the galaxy, and fly through space from the safety of your own bedroom! Showing the location of 119,617 nearby stars, you can zoom right in, from the whole Milky Way, to our local star system, and solar system. Clicking on a star will give you more info about it, and there’s also a really interesting interactive tour to get you started."

Star map:

http://workshop.chromeexperiments.com/stars/

More about the project:

http://www.geekosystem.com/galaxy-map/

Star Party 2013 - HOASP

We had our annual Heart of America Star Party this weekend. Much laughter, music, awesome door prizes, great solar viewing during the day, excellent speakers, home cooked meals, and astronomy observing at night. I'm very tired so please forgive any spelling mistakes in this post.

I would post the photos I took this weekend but there are just too many. I manage our astronomy club's Facebook page and, instead, posted all the photos there.

Our Club: Astronomical Society of Kansas City (ASKC)

To check out the the club's page directly and for ALL of the photos from this weekend, check out this link: https://www.facebook.com/permalink.php?story_fbid=10151943328904248&id=334830179247

If this link doesn't work, just go into Facebook and search for our page name: 

Astronomical Society of Kansas City

'Like' us if you would like all our postings to show up in your newsfeed stream.

Or just check out the below links to see the photos from this weekend. 

For those not signed up for Facebook, just follow the below links to each set of photos. You don't need to 'Like' or subscribe to the page to view the photos. Nor do you have to be signed into Facebook.

https://www.facebook.com/permalink.php?story_fbid=10151939740754248&id=334830179247&substory_index=0

https://www.facebook.com/permalink.php?story_fbid=10151941466094248&id=334830179247&substory_index=0

https://www.facebook.com/permalink.php?story_fbid=10151941471664248&id=334830179247&substory_index=0

https://www.facebook.com/permalink.php?story_fbid=10151941476114248&id=334830179247&substory_index=0

https://www.facebook.com/permalink.php?story_fbid=10151941564629248&id=334830179247&substory_index=0

https://www.facebook.com/permalink.php?story_fbid=10151941570414248&id=334830179247&substory_index=0

https://www.facebook.com/permalink.php?story_fbid=10151941596174248&id=334830179247

https://www.facebook.com/permalink.php?story_fbid=10151943074104248&id=334830179247

https://www.facebook.com/permalink.php?story_fbid=10151943110934248&id=334830179247&substory_index=0

https://www.facebook.com/permalink.php?story_fbid=10151943216814248&id=334830179247

https://www.facebook.com/permalink.php?story_fbid=10151943268769248&id=334830179247&substory_index=0

https://www.facebook.com/permalink.php?story_fbid=10151943328904248&id=334830179247

https://www.facebook.com/permalink.php?story_fbid=10151939499924248&id=334830179247

https://www.facebook.com/permalink.php?story_fbid=10151939490279248&id=334830179247&substory_index=0

https://www.facebook.com/permalink.php?story_fbid=10151939465319248&id=334830179247&substory_index=0

https://www.facebook.com/permalink.php?story_fbid=10151939407994248&id=334830179247&substory_index=0

https://www.facebook.com/permalink.php?story_fbid=10151939264294248&id=334830179247&substory_index=

https://www.facebook.com/permalink.php?story_fbid=10151939129864248&id=334830179247&substory_index=0

https://www.facebook.com/permalink.php?story_fbid=10151938943919248&id=334830179247