After Killing My Plant, Jones Discovered Toilet Paper
18 days - has it really been that long? Forget it, let’s talk about the Blue People of Kentucky. There was a show on Discovery Health about people whose skin is a bluish/ silver color, but that was due to a medicine containing some sort of silver that those people had taken. This is entirely different.
- Methemoglobinemia is a disorder in which one has an abnormally high level of methemoglobin (metHb) in the blood.
- Methemoglobin is a type of hemoglobin that does not bind with oxygen.
- Through process of oxidization, lack of a certain enzyme and such, the red blood cells become overwhelmed and the ferrous ion is oxidized to the ferric state. (I cut a lot out of there but what does it matter, right?)
- Hemoglobin becomes methemoglobin and people turn blue (though the blood in their veins is dark brown).
- The disorder can be treated with methylene blue.
- The Fugates were a family that lived in rural Kentucky in the early 19th century.
- The man of the house, Martin, was of French descent and carried the recessive gene that causes methemoglobinemia.
- I bought a french press today.
- Martin married a lady who carried the gene as well.
- He was an orphan. She was a redhead. Neither were blue.
- Coincidentally, the family that lived nearby, the Smiths, also carried the gene. (Note: “The Smiths” - it wasn’t lost on me, don’t worry. I’m just not going to say anything more about that, a very common last name.)
- There was intermarriage between the two clans, resulting in 25% of their progency being blue and 50% being asymptomatic carriers. (To be fair, I wouldn’t call it inbreeding. There were 2 different families and how are you to get around if no roads run by your house?!?!)
Appalachia! Love of my life, Appalachia! Geez, who would have thought? I would, I guess. By that, I mean I’m not surprised. People tell me that Appalachia isn’t all it’s cracked up to be. No one’s told me that, actually, I always knew it. It was always a thought in the back of my mind.
