The Rambling Gene

My grandmother gave me some interesting news while we were visiting on Sunday. We were on the topic of geneology, and apparently, I'm 1/8 Norwegian! Isn't that exciting? I had no idea I was that big a fraction anything. I could totally go to Norway and act like I own the place! And also, some of my ancestors somewhere on my dad's side were some of the first settlers of America back in the 1600's. I have at least three ancestors who fought in the American Revolution, so I'm a true-blue American after all! I thought I was just a western European mutt with no roots or heritage, but no! I have roots! Yay me!

I was also reminded of one of the traits I've inherited from my grandfather. My grandfather loves to hear himself talk, and he usually tells stories about his past (or rants about "society these days"). When he talks, he does a few characterisitic things:

1. He rambles on forever without prompting
2. He goes on tangents and completely forgets his original point
3. He gives WAY too much background information

For example, Grandma mentioned "The Phantom Tollbooth" and Gramps took off talking about some quote from the book. He started in on the background information to set up delivery of the quote, then went off on a tangent inspired by the background info, rambled on for a while about why corporal punishment should be allowed in schools and how society's current problems all stem from the point in history at which corporal punishment was abolished in America's public schools. He never got back to the quote from the book, but no one really noticed anyway.

Anyway, I realized that I totally inherited this from my grandpa. Rambling on forever? Check. Tangents? Check (this is more a problem when I speak, and I don't really do it too much in my weblogging.) WAY too much background information? Check. I'm particularly bad at that one. I had to give a ten-minute presentation for work once, and my practice run was 20 minutes long because I was trying to give too much background info.

I guess I've been kind of self-conscious about this trait, but now that I realize both my dad and grandfather have it, too, I feel less self-conscious about it. I can't help it! It's in my genes!

Wouldn't it be cool to be the one to isolate the gene(s) responsible for rambling?