The Guy Upstairs and his DNAs

Mike has what seems to me to be a very cool job and yet it can get very morbid. I first met Mike the Spring before 911 when he and his wife moved in upstairs. Mike works for a DNA lab/consulting outfit and it was his firm that ran the mammoth job of trying to identify via DNA the remains of all the poor souls that lost their lives on that horrible day. Well, that took what seemed forever to me but the gory truth is that there were a lot of samples to identify. Then the Tsunami hit which dwarfed the death toll of 911 and yes Mike was sent to Thailand to help with that. A different problem though the DNA was really spread out and most of it at sea.

I bumped into Mike yesterday as I was taking off my shoes before going into the house after throwing the ball at the park with my Rhodesian Ridgeback. I said to him , “ I noticed you all took a little vacation last week.” “Oh no” he replied , “I was sent to London to work on the bombings” . “What is this with you following death” , he smiled “death follows me”.

And yet I would love to build an app to help with this. Ever since I read about Watson and Crick’s work I have been fascinated with anything related to DNA.

As far as Mike I wonder if he has nightmares or is he now just jaded?