I feel slightly calmer. It's like rage, with extra freshness.

Great t-shirt: [link]

Interrupting this Natter to bring you tales of people whose lives are Not Like Mine.

My brother tells me he's missing the GF's family vacation this year. In part because of work, but also partly "the fact that they are going to Abkhazia.... a breakaway region of Georgia where apparently there are US soldiers stationed to keep the peace...and all westerners are advised to stay the hell out or risk kidnapping... they're going because [GF's] mom wants to buy a place there... "

So instead, he's going for the aforementioned work to do some kind of training sessions in Sarajevo and Belgrade. Um, good?

because [GF's] mom wants to buy a place there...

Can I ask why?

I did.

"would be very cheap (and it is not dangerous for Russians, somehow)"

Can I ask why?

Heh. I suggest your brother not eat her cooking, Brenda...

A story especially for the Birthday Boy:

Domestic cats have common ancestor

Inside the cells of your pet cat lies a history book, a story that stretches back to when humans first settled into civilizations and discovered agriculture.

Using DNA from modern house cats, researchers have traced the origin of domestic cats to a specific time and region that coincided with the settlement of humans in the Middle East known as the Fertile Crescent.

The finding, to be published in Friday's edition of the journal Science, adds clarity to the evolutionary history of cats, a domestic animal unique in its persistent similarity to its wild ancestor. This ancestor was a particular species of wildcat native that still lives in the same region, which is now Israel.

"The evidence tells us that cats from throughout the entire world have a single common ancestor," said study author Carlos Driscoll.

Scientists have long debated whether cats were independently domesticated at several regions and points in time, or whether they were first kept as pets in one civilization before being spread around the world. The identification of a single ancestral species for modern house cats supports the single-origin theory.

...Earlier theories speculated that Egyptians were responsible for cat domestication, roughly 4,000 years ago, based on the animal's appearance in art and tombs of the era.

Dating the origin of domestic cats earlier and placing this process in the Middle East suggests that cats played a role in the lives of the first farmers.

"Mankind settled down into agricultural villages for the first time about 12,000 years ago, developing many domestic cereals and plants," said Stephen O'Brien, another of the study's authors. "That's about the time and exact same place that cats walked out of woods and did something unusual: act friendly."

They're all just so strange. "Hey, we're all going on a family vacation, and if you come with us you'll be killed. Probably. Oh, and did we mention we're buying a summer home?"

My crazy is supercrazy. I just wrote to my city councilman about the situation.

I'm listening to Molly Ivin's Political Animals I have Known. Too bad Molly isn't around to take Ann to the wood shed.