KINFOLKS?????

Geneticals has always fascinated me!

Well, it seems that some researchers in Denmark (that's a country) have decided that all folks with blue eyes have a common ancestor...they're all kinfolks (supposedly). You can read the whole article here in USA Today

Remember this old joke? The final Starr Report has concluded that the stain on Monica Lewinskys' blue dress can not be conclusively identified as belonging to President Bill Clinton. The report concludes that it is impossible, due to the fact that everyone from Arkansas has the same DNA.




Heck, I have a good Redneck buddy from Fordyce, Arkansas, Paul William (but they call him "Bear") that is married to a cute little gal, Jessie. I asked him one time, "Hey Paul William, if you and Jessie ever get a divorce, will you still be cousins? He studied on it awhile and said, "That's a good question. I'm not sure. I'll have to ask the preacher that tied the knot."

But that's another story. The point of this study is that this Denmarkian dude thinks all blue-eyed folks have one fellow that was the source of it all. I'll bet the blue-eyed folks are not upset about it at all. It seems like folks with blue eyes do real good in politics, show business, and other things.

If you have blue eyes, you may be related to every other blue-eyed person in the world.

Here are some quotes from the article:

Researchers in Denmark have found that every person with blue eyes descends from just one "founder," an ancestor whose genes mutated 6,000 to 10,000 years ago. Before then, everyone had brown eyes.

It has been suggested that blue eyes and the lighter coloring that often accompanies them might have given an advantage to people in colder climates because they could absorb more vitamin D from the sun. Others have suggested it's simply a roll of the historical dice, with the original group that had the blue-eye genes coming through a genetic bottleneck.

And:

Blue eyes, though somewhat rare in the USA, are common in countries near the mutation epicenter, which previous researchers have pinpointed as probably somewhere in the Balkans or near the Black Sea.

And:

In Estonia, 99% of people have blue eyes, Eiberg says. In Denmark 30 years ago, only 8% of the population had brown eyes, though through immigration, today that number is about 11%. In Germany, about 75% have blue eyes.

I just found this interesting. I have always been observational of geneticals. It has always astounded me how much kids look like their parents...how much puppies look like their mommas...and how much Steve Bridges and President Bush resemble. If you've got 10 minutes to spare, this is worth the look.

This means that Frank Sinatra, Paul Newman, Meg Ryan, and Bill Clinton are all kinfolks...even though I think Bill is the only one from Arkansas. Kind of makes you think, huh?