Happy Thanksgiving!

Well, here's our answer to the question of whether parrots will eat mealworms -- yes! One of our local ring-necked parakeets happily settled in yesterday and fed on the coconut stuffed with mealworm suet that I bought earlier this week. You can see a starling on the suet balls just below the parakeet, too.

Happy Thanksgiving, everybody! Dave and I are off today and tomorrow -- one of the perks of working at an American school. (The British schools are all still in session, because Thanksgiving isn't a holiday here.) Today we're going out to dinner with a friend of Dave's from the states who's visiting London, and then Saturday we're having some of his music department colleagues over for a traditional meal. As we speak, Dave is salt-brining a big ol' turkey in the refrigerator.

Yesterday we only worked half a day, and there were no students -- we attended staff and faculty training sessions. I went to one on cyber security and one on British sign language, both of which were fun and interesting. Turns out British sign language is very different from American sign language. Who knew?

Our weather is pretty dismal at the moment -- there's an 80 percent chance of showers today -- but I'm hoping to get some gardening done this weekend. Those aren't potatoes in the bowl above -- they're dahlia tubers! I unearthed my first pot of dormant dahlias yesterday and found these massive round roots -- I had no idea they'd be so big and well developed, considering I grew them from seeds planted in March. I was shocked. Anyway, I lifted them and now I'm waiting for them to dry before nestling them in dry compost to overwinter in the shed. I'm going to do the same with the other dahlias and I also want to lift my amaryllis bulbs.

Feeling very organized, I bought travel insurance the other day for our Egypt trip -- I found a policy with all kinds of medical coverage and additional special coverage for our gadgets (camera, computer) and it all cost about £70, which seemed pretty reasonable. And then one of our coworkers reminded me that we already have travel insurance that we buy every year through the school. Argh! Of course I should have thought of that, because I've never bought travel policies for our other trips for specifically that reason -- but Egypt seems potentially dicey so I wanted to be extra cautious. I could cancel the policy, but as long as we have it I think I'll just keep it. Better too much coverage than too little, I suppose.

My Malian Roots

You may remember a couple of years ago, Dave and I had our DNA analyzed by Ancestry. We thought it would be cool to see where we're from genetically, just for curiosity's sake.

At the time, Ancestry said I was mostly British and Irish, with smaller amounts of Scandinavian and Western European DNA, and trace amounts from other regions including the Iberian peninsula, Italy/Greece and West Africa. My analysis also correctly pinpointed my genetic "communities," where people sharing similar DNA profiles live, in North Carolina and Missouri -- where my parents both have family roots.

Well, the other day, I got an e-mail from Ancestry saying they'd revised my profile. Apparently as more and more people get DNA testing, they have more data with which to work and they can narrow down the areas our DNA matches. So I checked out my new genetic identity (top).

It remains predominantly English, Welsh or Norman, now at an astonishing 73 percent (the brighter yellow regions above). Ireland and Scotland provide an additional 24 percent, meaning 97 percent of my DNA comes from the British Isles or northwestern France. The amount of Scandinavian DNA in my profile dropped from 20 percent to just two percent, now specifically said to be Swedish. And I still have a mysterious sliver of DNA identified as West African, specifically pinpointed to Mali.

So what does this mean?

Well, I guess not much has changed. I knew I was mostly English, based on family trees and genealogical work done by my father and grandfather. If I remember right, my Dad traced us back to Normans not long after the Battle of Hastings in 1066 -- and reportedly part of my family originated in the English region of Ely in Cambridgeshire. My profile still shows me connecting to genetic "communities" in North Carolina and Missouri, and even pinpointed my paternal cousin Linda, who is a total stranger to me but who apparently also used Ancestry, as a close relative!

The Mali thing, though, blows my mind. When my earlier profile showed West African DNA, I figured it was a prehistoric remnant of early man, or maybe just a blip, an inaccuracy. And indeed, the trace bits of DNA from regions like Iberia, Italy/Greece and Russia/Finland in that earlier profile have now vanished completely. But West Africa is still hanging in there, and to have it narrowed down to a specific part of West Africa makes it somehow seem even more certain to be a real thing.

Do I really have a tiny smidgen of African blood? Could one of my ancestors have canoodled with a slave, maybe? It seems if that happened, at least in colonial or Antebellum America, I'd have more than just one percent of that DNA, though. Maybe it was an ancestor from much farther back, a sailor or trader or crusader?

Or is it possible that my Norman DNA was also present in Frenchmen who went to serve in Mali in the Foreign Legion and canoodled there? Maybe my Malian DNA, in other words, is really French DNA transplanted to Mali? Or North Carolinian DNA transplanted to Liberia via resettled American slaves?

Or maybe it's just a mistake. My profile says that although it shows 1 percent Malian DNA, the actual level could be 0 to 1 percent.

Who knows.

But I hope I have African roots!

Dave, on the other hand, got a disappointment with his revised profile. We were tickled to learn in 2017 that he had 6 percent European Jewish DNA -- it seemed amusing given his strict Lutheran roots. Well, the Judaism has vanished completely with the latest revisions -- he's now 89 percent German and Czech, which conforms to his knowledge of his family, with a smidgen of British/Irish thrown in. (His 1 percent Finnish DNA is a curious mystery -- like my Malian DNA, it could be a mistake, or a remnant of a mysterious traveler far back in the mists of time.)

James Bond Super Go Cart

I went to Homebase on Sunday evening, right after Dave's concert, to pick up some fresh potting compost (for overwintering our dahlia tubers) and a suet ball for the local parakeets. I didn't find suet with seeds, but I did find half a coconut containing "mouthwatering mealworms." (At least, according to the label -- I'll take their word for it.) I don't know whether parakeets will eat mealworms, but I guess we're about to find out.

I was amused to find several pigeons inside the store, chowing down on birdseed that had fallen on the floor. Pretty enterprising, those pigeons. I don't know how the store managers will ever convince them to go back outside -- a warm, dry big-box store with a ready supply of food sounds like heaven for an urban pigeon in winter. However they get removed, I hope it's humane.

Dave and I got our vaccinations for Egypt yesterday. In my case, that meant tetanus (actually DTP, combined with diphtheria and polio) and typhoid. Dave got those plus a Hepatitis A shot. (I'm covered for that one already.) We went to a local pharmacy and travel clinic -- no doctor necessary! I updated my trusty WHO card to reflect my boosters so I won't forget I had them.

This morning I have a mildly sore upper arm, but otherwise, no ill effects.

I found these drawings lying in the rainy street around the corner from our house. The one above, of the James Bond Super Go Cart, reminds me a lot of something my brother would have drawn when he was little -- an incredibly detailed vehicle with all sorts of gizmos. It looks like we're also seeing Ben's rendition of a guitarist, dated March 29, 2003. Apparently these drawings have been hanging around for a while. I wonder if Ben himself finally decided to throw them out?

Here's David Beckham's Ferrari, from a rather complicated angle. I admire the ambition involved in drawing it more than the ambition required to purchase it!

The B&Q Shopping Cart Repatriation

For weeks now, this shopping cart (or "trolley," as the English say) has been sitting in a forgotten corner of Fortune Green, next to a wall at the dead-end of Ajax Street, behind the playground.

It's been sitting and sitting, filling up with leaves and trash. A week ago Sunday, while walking Olga, I took a closer look at it. It was from B&Q, a home supplies and hardware store, and there was a number on the handle to call if the cart turned up lost somewhere. The nearest B&Q store is in Cricklewood -- not exactly next door -- so I dialed the number.

A confused-sounding operator answered and said she would try to find out who I was supposed to call in order to report a lost cart.

"I'm supposed to call YOU," I told her. "I took this number right off the cart handle."

She put me on hold and went to consult someone about what to do with my clearly unusual call. Finally, after a few minutes, she came back and promised she would relay my message to the appropriate people.

A week passed. Saturday morning, walking past Fortune Green again, I looked to see if the cart was still there. Of course, it was. I tried to call B&Q again, but when I got through, another operator told me their systems were down and he couldn't take a report of a lost cart.

As you know, stray shopping carts are a pet peeve of mine. So yesterday morning, Olga and I decided to take care of the problem ourselves.

We retrieved the cart and set out for the B&Q in Cricklewood, rolling the rattling, clattering contraption beside us.

We rolled it along the footpath past the cemetery and the rugby fields.

We rolled it up the uneven sidewalks along Farm Avenue.

We rolled it along busy Cricklewood Lane, and beneath the train tracks that carry the Thameslink trains into London.

And finally, 1.1 miles later -- according to Google Maps -- we deposited the cart in its homeland, B&Q. I parked it next to a door where other carts were clustered. Job done!

We passed several people on the sidewalks during this adventure, but no one gave us so much as a second glance, which surprised me. I thought we made quite a spectacle. But I suppose in the grand scheme of things, a 50-ish bald guy with a rattling shopping cart and a staffy isn't that unusual in London.

Olga insisted on walking back along Cricklewood Broadway (chicken bones!) before settling in for a quiet afternoon of recovery on the couch.

I, on the other hand, had to zip out to see Dave's high school students perform their winter concert. It's early this year -- last year it was Dec. 9. That put a bit more pressure on the kids by depriving them of a couple of weeks more rehearsal time, but they did well! One of the pieces they performed was called "Endless Rainbows," a title that Dave mocked relentlessly -- in fact, he sampled the piece online on a lark, expecting it to be syrupy and awful, and was surprised to find it's actually good.

Oh, and I finished "The Story of Harold." I remain underwhelmed.

Express Dairies

Looking at this picture, which I took on Olga's walk yesterday morning, you can get a sense of why dogs (and other animals) evolved with spots. They're pretty effective camouflage. Doesn't she blend in with the urban jungle?

We had a fairly lengthy walk, around the nearby council estate and along the Black Path, and eventually to Fortune Green and the cemetery. It's a good thing we walked so much so early, because by the time we headed home, rain was coming down and it pretty much continued all day.

I found another interesting old bottle along the Black Path -- this one an Express Dairies milk bottle. I have no idea how old it is -- from some online research I learned that Express (which apparently no longer exists) used that E trademark for decades, from the '70s right into the early aughts. Here, for example, is a photo from 1978 showing trucks outside a loading dock all bearing that same logo. So I'd guess it's at least a couple decades old. It has joined the bottle parade on the kitchen windowsill.

Thanks for all your input on the mystery plant in yesterday's post. I've decided that it's borage. I was confused by that strong stalk with no basal leaves -- all the borage we have elsewhere in the garden has a bunch of leaves at the ground, with flower stalks rising up in spring. But here's what I realized during some late-night Googling: the plant I thought was borage, and which we have all over the garden, is actually green alkanet, a close relative. So the mystery plant, then, must be true borage.

I'm not sure it's going to survive for long in that pot, because apparently borage forms a taproot and doesn't do well in enclosed containers. But I'm going to let it go as long as I can, just to see what happens. The passionflower vine is mostly dormant now anyway, so I don't think it will suffer, and in spring we can pull out the borage and give the vine back its pot.

I spent almost all of yesterday afternoon reading "The Story of Harold" -- the book I suffered so much drama ordering from Amazon. I'm not sure it was worth it. It's kind of a yucky book, and George Selden's writing style -- with lots of asides, parentheticals, exclamations -- gets a bit exhausting. He was much more focused in his children's books, like "The Cricket in Times Square." I use the word "yucky" because "Harold," published in the early '70s, is definitely a dated expression of the free-love, swinger culture of the time, with a fair amount of vivid sexual adventurism. Like leisure suits and sideburns and key parties and Hai Karate, it seems kind of gross now.

A Few Blooming Things

We had another curious parakeet visit our bird feeders a few days ago. It wanted to get to those suet balls but was frustrated by the squirrel-proof cage. The parakeets' heads are too big to fit through the cage, poor things. I should hang an uncaged suet ball just to give them something to snack on.

We still have a surprising amount of activity in the garden, even though the days are getting shorter, colder and darker.

Our Mahonia is blooming for the first time this year. Dave moved it last February and it seems much happier in its new location. It typically blooms in the fall and winter, which is pretty unusual. You can see some of the fallen leaves from our Japanese maple sprinkled over the top like jimmies on a cupcake.

Those leaves are picturesque wherever they land -- in this case on the hostas. They've just about all fallen, though.

We also have a rose that sent up a bud for some reason. It's definitely an odd time for a rose to bloom!

And the volunteer cosmos on the back patio is still going strong, though with smaller flowers than usual. When we finally get a good frost that will finish it off. The other cosmos have all died back already, but this one got a late start.

Here's the mystery plant that's growing in the pot with our passionflower vine. It's getting bigger and bigger -- that stalk has to be half an inch thick. It looks like nothing else in our garden. What on earth is that thing?

This weekend I'm planning to lift the dahlia tubers from their pots -- at least the ones that have died back -- and I'm going to lift the amaryllis bulbs too. I'll store them all in the dark shed over winter and replant them in early spring. I'm eventually going to treat the amaryllis bulbs and try to subdue the fungus that left them so unhappy this year -- but if that doesn't work we'll just have to toss them out. Time will tell!

Our Christmas Adventure

Have I mentioned that Dave and I are going to Egypt?

Some months ago we cooked up this idea for our winter holidays. Dave has long wanted to go there, so he did some research and found a tour that takes us to Cairo and then on a boat cruise up the Nile, with stops at Luxor, the Valley of Kings and a few other places. We end the trip at Aswan.

It's only seven nights, so it will all happen pretty quickly. But we'll get to see everything from Giza and the Sphinx to the temples at Karnak and Luxor and the Aswan High Dam.

When we bought this trip several weeks ago, it seemed so far off -- almost an abstraction. But now the reality is settling in, so I'm trying to get us ready. We're supposed to have some vaccinations for travel to Egypt, so I booked us in to a travel clinic on Monday. I'm not sure how essential they are -- it seems incredibly unlikely that we'd be exposed to typhoid, for example -- but why take chances, right?

Fortunately, I had a raft of vaccinations when I joined the Peace Corps in the '90s, and I've had boosters for various trips since then, so I think I'm probably in pretty good shape. In fact, I still have my World Health Organization vaccination card, which I've tried to keep up to date. (A coworker of mine saw it on my desk at work yesterday and said, "A WHO card! I haven't seen one of those in years!") Here's what it looks like:

(That's just the first page. There are plenty of shots beyond those!)

Dave, on the other hand, doesn't have the vaccination history that I have, and he's not sure if or when he's had some shots. So he may need more, but with his Crohn's there may also be some he can't take, so we have to get some advice on that.

Otherwise, I don't think we need to do much. It's still a month away, but I've already been debating whether to take the camera and/or the computer. It was awfully nice traveling in DC with just my phone. But I'm pretty sure I'll want better quality pictures from Egypt, so the camera -- heavy as it is -- will almost certainly come along. We can manage with just one computer, either his or mine.

Olga will stay with Simone, our dog boarder, during the trip. She loves Simone, who takes her with a pack of other dogs to the Heath every day, so she'll be fine.

(Top photo: Graffiti along the Grand Union Canal, last Sunday.)