Thea's Ramblings

Why is Y (the chromosome)

I was listening to Sabrina Carpenter, as you do, and a some of the lyrics caught my brain. In Juno she sings

Whole package, babe, I like the way you fit
God bless your dad’s genetics

and then I read an article which isn’t worth referencing here, but it said (paraphrased)

You have 23 chromosomes, 22 pairs plus X and Y which aren’t a pair, but act like it in some specific circumstances

which jumped out to me because of the common viewpoint that “the Y chromosome contains all the ‘male’ genes”, which is just plain wrong.

Read more

Beginner, Intermediate, Advanced... Biology!

Short post time!

Basic biology says that having an XX or XY karyotype determines reproductive organs.

Intermediate biology says it’s the SRY gene, which is normally on the Y but can be on the X.

Advanced biology says we have no idea and it could be anything!

SRY-negative 46,XX male with normal genitals, complete masculinization and infertility

Living with (undiagnosed) ADHD

This is a post I’ve been trying to write for months, but it’s difficult to actually finish, or at least figure out the point I’m trying to make…

So I have ADHD. I was diagnosed 18 months ago, which at 38 makes it a rather late in life diagnosis. However now I actually know why my brain doesn’t work the way most people expect it to I have a whole new way of managing my life which has really changed things.

Most of my school years were in the 90s, and the prevailing perception of ADHD at the time was children, almost exclusively boys, being hyperactive and disruptive. This of course lead to the counter view by some groups of it being caused by “bad parents who just want to drug their children”. Neither of these views are correct, and both are very unhelpful. Needless to say despite it being suggested from a young age I never had any formal assessment or support.

I don’t have many symptoms of hyperactivity - though my psychiatrist did raise an eyebrow about that when I showed my health tracker reading over 4,000 steps on a work from home day when I didn’t go outside - but mostly inattention. The inattention side of ADHD is quite insidious as hyperactivity at least has external signs, but inattention is invisible to others, and yourself, until too late. For me this made school and university some of the worst times of my life, no matter what I tried from the ‘conventional wisdom’ I just got told over and over again to pay attention and work on time management skills, but nobody ever thought to teach me how. It turns out that that’s because most people just have those skills at some level, who knew?

And that’s the crux of ADHD for me - I’m not running around disrupting things, and I’m not just distracted. ADHD is an executive dysfunction. The executive - much like in a business - manages priorities. It doesn’t actively do them, but it determines what should be done when, for how long, and what the expected outcome is. If a business has a dysfunctional executive then supplies don’t arrive on time, they don’t make the right products at the right time, and important documents aren’t filed properly, or if these things are done they are done at the very last minute.

Read more

Other business types in New Zealand

As I’m a software developer I love edge cases… well, when I don’t have to deal with them anyway. Over the years I’ve learnt about the various types of business that exist in New Zealand. It’s a bit esoteric, but interesting to me so I’m going to write about it!

The most common businesses are sole traders - a person, partnerships - several people, and limited liability companies - a legal entity that pretends to be a person until you try to put it in jail. So here are some examples of none of the above!

Read more