Ignore the timestamp. It’s shortly before lunch and I’m in the public library downtown, alternatingly writing notes about X Chromosome Inactivation, seeking inspiration for a feature article I’m eventually (soon) going to be penning for our newsletter, and poking my nose into the last few pages of Microserfs. Now I’m writing a blog.

Ideas come from everywhere. Remember?

what.I.see.from.where.I.sit

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Karin and I ran (and walked a bit) the Terry Fox Run for Cancer Research. Before we started the woman organizer made a little speech and then played this recorded bunch of news clips. It was neat, but I caught myself wondering if that was the official Terry Fox recording that everyone who ran — in every city — got to hear. I was (guiltily) thinking that if it was, it was pretty much hacked together and they should find someone who could do a cleaner job. If it was an aberation — if that woman had made it just for us — then I guess it ws pretty good. That would be a good volunteer job for me. Funny how you notice these things — but in the vast scheme of things, and working for a charity I see this — people want MORE than just hacked together. People want slick and refined and don’t take you seriously if you’re not slick and refined. It’s sad but true, and I do feel a bit bad for noticing this.

framed.pleasures

Another IKEA trip on Friday evening resulted in the long-awaited purchase of a mega-frame for my Lord of the Rings poster. It now hangs triumpantly above my desk in the apartment. Horray for cheap mediart.

also.horray.for.large.panels.of.glass

Sitting — thinking — typing — writing — watching 20 meters above the man concourse of the public library is like watching a close-up of some advanced version of SimCity — like SimCity 8000. Everyone is scurrying about, eating, talking, banking, reading, walking, and riding elevators.

Some interesting highlights, adjuncted with a traditional “lemming classification” (LC) naming convention.

two guys on a bench who have been sitting there for like an hour, ignoring each other completely — in fact one has headphones on, and the other looks like he’s sleeping. (LC: climber)

backpack bum digging through the garbage for cans, not slowly, but as if he’s doped on speed or something, doing laps around the brickwork. (LC: digger)

stroller folk including mostly women pushing children usually appearing in herds and moving 63% slower than anything else on the path. (LC: blockers)

sweatered college girls with oversized backpacks, like they’re going on a week long camping trip and not to the library to study. What do you need that much storage for? (LC: walkers)

strolling seniors stopping to look up and take pictures of the inside of the building. Nice building, yes. Picture worthy, maybe. (LC: blockers)

Personal stereos including but not limited to CD players, radios, Mp3 players, mini-discs, IPods, or low frequency subspace receivers: I count at least two dozen. (LC: bashers)

Cellular telephones — the proverbial digital bar code of our time — locks sitters and walkers into conversations in the middle of a crowded causeway. (LC: walkers and blockers)

Delivery guy pushing a cartload of annoyingly bright green milkcrates: all empty. (LC: builder)

I had the demo of PalmLemmings loaded onto Mr. V for a few days until I completed all the levels. I think the game was so popular in the early 90s ecause it was a metaphor for society: we’re all mindless drones trapped in some maze bouncing off walls and tumbling off cliffs without noticing the others in front of us doing the exact same thing. Some higher power grants a few of us special talents to overcome these obstacles, but once we’ve tapped and drained that precious resource we are back to being simple drones ready to tumble off the next enbankment. Or. 5…4…3…2…1…Boom!

[break for lunch]

looking.for.lost.patterns

Or in some cases, for patterns that have simply never been found. The situation thus far: Karin and I were debating — talking — pondering — the best way to find inspiration. She may not see it that way, but the essence is the same. I simply stated that sitting in my cubicle and listening to the practical nature/activity/flutter of normal work is not a good way to seek such things. In other words, needed to write an “inspired” article on any given topic, it is not a good thing to be sitting in a crowd of people listening to idle conversations float around you. Hense: justification for my morning field trip. I go to the library to find peace, and a huge chunk of free space. One may not think that tapping words into this blog is useful to any purpose, but deep down it opens that creative vent and will — I know it will, so believe me — lead to inspiration in some form or another. Try explaining that to an office full of people who have little call for deviation from the standard assigned tasks in their job function. No offence intended.

I find myself here. Reading, writing. Doing other more or less productive things. I’m typing words at random now, trying to make the ideas fall into place. It is an epic.

The topic: manifesting carriers. In other words, sometimes a disorder/disease that is carried as a genetic trait is a recessive disorder. Simply put, you need two mutant genes to make the disease appear in all it’s evil glory. Why is that? Usually — and in the case of the disorder I am writing aout here follows — the disease is not caused by something being there — existing — being created, but rather by something missing. In other words, the cell isn’t making something that is causing damage, it is not making something needed by said cell, and the lack of that something is leading to disease. Following? Maybe, but here it is: You have one good gene you make the chemical — maybe not as much as if you had two copies, but hey, the body is so super-redundant that usually that one copy makes more than enough to go around. But, if you have no copies — the big zero — then you simply don’t make it. You are ill.

Now things get a little tricky: guys have different chromosomes and genes than gals. Specifically, guys have a Y chromosome, which is really just this little piddly thing with not much gusto worth writing aout. We also have a single X chromosome. Why is this important? Think back to the recessive gene thing: if you only have one copy of a chromosome — one go to get the right gene (and by the way women have two Xs) — then you’re playing the lottery of life with one less pair of dice. In this particular disease, mostly guys get it: why? Because, due to what the disorder does to the human body it’s rare — very very rare — for a girl to get two bad copies. Let’s just say there aren’t many dads passing this gene along: mutations aside girls have a tough time getting this one.

Just to make it a it trickier let’s throw X-inactivation into the equation. So guys have one X, and gals have two. That sounds sort of unfair, and nature agrees. Somewhere along the lines of evolution x-inactivation appeared, where one of those lucky Xs shuts off — it’s wrapped up — stored — tucked away in the closet of the cell — saran-wrapped and frozen for leftovers. Why and how? Complex and still not fully understood: but the essence is that girls are really like patchwork quilts when it comes to their X chromosomes. Imagine a little ball of cells making a new baby girl. This is all happening at about the same time that mom.to.be is just figuring out that her life is about to change. Said ball of cells is going through the process of shutting off a random X. Which X? Flip a coin. The result, each of the cells in that little ball have one ON-X and one OFF-X.

Cool. So now what?

Cells divide. Baby grows. Girl forms. Back to the idea of a patchwork quilt: two colors of fabric (say blue and white), and some blind quilters and what do you get? A blue blob here, a white blob there, and other little assorted patterns which don’t really make up any real pattern, but really just grew out of the flip of a coin.

Back to the disorder. If now we have this “mosaic” of cells all over the body — and this mosaic is pretty much invisible because unlike the blue and white, most chemical features of the body are invisible or blendable, or are too trivial to even be noticed — but if one of those x chromosomes carries the disease gene, then what happens? Flip a coin. Pick a colour. Some cells will express the disease, and others will not, right? Sort of. It’s more complex, and there are compensations, and blendings that occur. Things are not always blue and white. Sometimes they are fushia.

So this is manifesting carriers: a patchwork quilted woman, with one faulty gene, who has bits and pieces of disease on her body. The flip of the coin says where and how much.

Now explain that to everyone else: inspired and interested. Why? It’s my job.

back.to.people.watching

A girl comes in and sits across from me at this little table thing I’m working on. She sits down, pulls out a vanity mirror, and starts picking zits. Who does that?

zzzzzzzzzz…

Hmm… two o’clock. When is the point of no return (to the office)? That little genetics tirade just ate up about an hour.