Thick, creamery blood...

Dear son,

I went to the doctor today for a follow-up visit. About a month ago I had a physical. This morning I finally went in to see what was what. Everything was fine, the doctor told me, except for my cholesterol, which the doc pointed out was higher than Bill Clinton's. (At the time of this writing, Clinton had recently had heart bypass surgery because his arteries were so clogged.) So the doctor advised me to start taking the statin medication Lipitor and one baby aspirin a day. What strikes me as unfair about this situation is that both my parents' cholesterol levels are off the chart, which means that I get the benefit of receiving a high-cholesterol gene from both of them. I don't smoke. I exercise. I try to watch what I eat. But my genes predispose me to having high cholesterol. Luckily for you you're getting some nice mutt blood from your mother's side of the family. By "mutt" I mean her blood make-up isn't so purebreed as my own. Purebreeds tend to manifest problematic genes much more blatantly. Not so with the lovable ol' mutts.

Yesterday your mom was stressed a lot about work stuff, and it really wiped her out. This morning I advised her to try to relax her tendency to control all things by just one item, and when she came home tonight she was in a much better mood because she tried my advice. She's a tiny bit worried because she's not feeling you kick a lot, but I'm thinking you're just resting a lot in preparation for your big growth spurt as a fetus. I think you're okay, but I feel I must apologize for any bad genes from my side of the family. If it's any consolation, I didn't want 'em either.

Love,
Dad