Shooooo-gun
Did some of my ancestors live in a place like this? Naw. I’m sure they were peasants or whatever they call them in Ireland. I know the most about the folks that emigrated from Scotland but I have Irish ancestors too. And maybe in six weeks or so I might have more insight into what I’m made of because I (finally) did a saliva spit-take and dropped my sample off at the post office early this morning.
What do I expect to get out of this? I dunno. I don’t really expect any surprise siblings. My parents were really tight with each other for all the years they were married. Butchya nevah know. I also did not select to share my results with others in Ancestry. I have friends who have done that and they have made wonderful connections. I’m not sure I’m ready for that. I can change that if I want to. And… The GG (thinking of conspiracy theories I guess) was like don’t they ask you a lot of questions? Well… They do OFFER questions you can answer BUT you can opt out of them and I did. Again, it’s a setting I can turn on later if I want to. Or not.
So I guess I’m just curious about what my DNA says about my heritage. I will take the results with a systems analyst’s point of view. Like, I dunno, I might need more data. In other words I am not taking this all that seriously. That said, I am probably mostly northern European WASPy stuff.
Okay Shogun. I finished Shogun today. Or so I thought. Nope. There is a second half of this book. (I am not reading a “brick book”, I am reading it on my phone.) As I approached the end of the book, I was starting to realize that there was NO WAY it could be wrapped up in the next I dunno five pages. And of course it wasn’t. The book I downloaded was the FIRST half of the book. I downloaded the second half but I think I will read a couple of quicker books before I do the second half of Shogun.
It was our beach community friend Barb who got “us” (beach folk) into Shogun back in the 1970s when it was first published. She also taught every kid on the beach how to swim but that would be a whole ‘nother story. So she got us into Shogun and a lot of us are readers so we read it.
There was a Shogun TV mini-series umpteen bazillion years ago. I’m not sure I watched all of it or not but I remember the actor Richard Chamberlain playing the part of the “anjin-san”.
That was then, this is now and there is a new series (not a mini-series) and I am geared up to watch it. Maybe the GG will like it when we are finished with the newest version of Fargo? So I am reading the book first. I gather that the series does not exactly follow the book. That’s okay. One of the reasons I’m re-reading the book is so I can compare it to the series.
Love y’all KW
May 5th, 2024 at 7:33 pm
James Clavell was the author? I don’t know why that popped into my head. I remember hearing about Shogun but never read it.
May 7th, 2024 at 7:21 am
Do you remember when I had a conversation with Bill in the bank chairs about “Mirrors and Windows”? This is the concept that young readers should have access to books about people like them, as well as books that open their minds to other cultures and ways of thinking. Bill snorted and made some remark about liberals being so… whatever. (I don’t remember his exact words.) I wished later that I had asked him whether he had read “Shogun”, as that is a perfect example of a “window” book.
You needn’t bring this up to him, but this post reminded me of that experience. There are so many things I like about Bill, except for our politics being so askew.