Spring Fog

 This morning the world around me is shrouded in fog; not so heavy that you can not see but fog none the less. Another good sign of spring as the snow both melts into the ground and saturates the air around it. It is minus 4 degrees celsius at 7:00 am and we are promised 6 degrees celsius later in the day with rain and snow showers. A typical March day it would appear. I do love the Canadian weather but suspect you have to be born into it. I think my grandfather found this to be the worse time of the year as he waited to garden. By now in England one would likely be preparing the ground for summer crops. I just think that because there were flowers there in February and it was so green in April when we were there on two different occasions in that time of the year. He so loved England; he gave me that love as well but I am firmly rooted in Canada - my birth country. And in the end so was he; he loved Canada too. He could have gone back any time after the Second World War but choose to stay here with his grandchildren and son plus his brother and family were still living in Toronto. 

Yesterday cleaning all accomplished. I do that more because that was what I was trained to do; not because I feel the need to be constantly cleaning. It is a routine that makes up my life and always has. This is God's world and we should do the best that we can for it. 

Today continuing with the Ancestry matches although will stop when I reach 25 centimorgans as there are just so many matches and not knowing the actual placement of the matches does limit the possibilities somewhat. With the four of us there are 843 matches shared by at least one of the four and of these 843 there are 476 shared by one or more at 4th cousin or closer looking at my matches (I have perhaps 50 to 75 matches that are not shared by anyone else). I inherited quite differently from my siblings on many of the chromosomes. This chart does bring that home as well as the phasing of my grandparents. If I could be different then I was! Probably a profound statement that they would agree with I suspect. Since I started this chart right at the beginning (we tested over ten years ago now and I did a repeat on mine a couple of years ago and the differences are negligible) I have a lot of very small matches (where the sharing is smaller for particular matches although one of us would have tested at 4th cousin or less) which can no longer be seen. 

I need to finish the Blake newsletter as another member of the study is taking on one of the subgroups of Blake which is most exciting. There are really two subgroups left that do not get managed - Irish Blake that is not Galway and Irish Blake in Northern Ireland. The Blake family in Ireland is quite large and has at least three founders - there are a couple of other lines there that have not yet yielded sufficient testers. Perhaps over time more people will test and there will be a wonderful picture of Blake. 

The budget yesterday was interesting here in Canada. I really like the luxury tax on alcohol and would like to see the GST go back to 7% (that was a mistake to make it 5%). Those with low incomes will benefit from the increase in the rebate. Coming from a family of nine I do know that it is expensive to manage food and clothing for everyone. Funding the military is expensive and we need to do that; our military helps us in so many ways here in Canada plus serves around the world for the United Nations, NATO and NORAD as well as being available for the many co-operative groups to which we belong. NATO and NORAD are the necessary groups created after Russia overran Eastern Europe and created the Iron Curtain which stood for fourty five years and we had no idea of Russian intentions. I believe we now see those intentions at play. So we must protect those countries that obtained their freedom with the fall of the Soviet Union (the Soviet Union went into bankruptcy when they attacked Afghanistan and collapsed). Really Russia did nothing for those countries that they enslaved at the end of the war; basically they had not moved beyond the level of living style that was present at the end of World War II and that really doesn't make any sense. It didn't at the time actually but people have to decide to be free and be ready to fight for it; sad that it has to be that way. Those countries definitely earned the right to be free sovereign nations so that they could take better care of their people and become greater supporters of the world in that they would be able to bring in better means of living for their people which benefits everyone around the globe. Ukraine has been a powerhouse for food production and would like to continue doing that if Russia would just get out of their country and stop destroying it.  

The latest news about water on the moon has been shared by one of the Chinese scientists. Great work and plans are afoot to learn even more about the ice trapped in the polar regions of the Moon. Research is so much more interesting and productive for mankind; a good expenditure of money.

Although we share a huge water border with Russia we do not have nuclear weapons on our soil; having them only in central locations is smart. Although they may serve us well to defend earth; rattling the nuclear war saber is foolish. You do not need to be a genius to understand what Armageddon is but expertise and proper control is needed to handle nuclear weapons. Certainly our military is trained with such devices. Containment is important! Look at North Korea constantly bombing the ocean and killing off the fish stocks and destroying the ecosystem. It does seem rather a waste with people starving in some parts of the world. Plus it destroys the economy of people who depend on the fishery resource for their livelihood in that area. Perhaps the United Nations will deal with that to help protect the countries that border on this area.

On to breakfast and the day awaits although still somewhat foggy but the snowdrops are blooming. Yeah spring! 

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