It’s that time of year again — time to start buying gifts for all your favourite friends and relatives.
This year that task has been somewhat complicated for me, though. You see, Pamela just informed me that she has found quite a few more relatives of ours that we didn't know we had up until now.
It seems we are related to Rollo, the Norwegian. You know, the fella on the History Channel series “The Vikings.” Yes, she has traced our family all the way back to him. He is our 34th great-grandfather on the Pittman side of the family. Banished from home by his father, he invaded France and eventually Normandy was ceded to him by the French. He became the first Duke of Normandy. His successors included William the Conqueror, Henry I, and Robert the Bruce. So, there is royal blood in my veins. Bow down and pay homage to your royal cousin, all you servants.
It seems we are related to Rollo, the Norwegian. You know, the fella on the History Channel series “The Vikings.”
So, Pamela has found our 34th great-grandfather. Now comes the daunting task of finding all the other 34th great-grandfathers. Quite the task when you consider how many of them there are. But I have confidence in her. I know she can do it. She just needs a little encouragement.
I thought I'd help her understand the complexity of the situation. I figured it out — if my math is correct — we have 34,359,738,368 of them. And then there are all the 33rd, 32nd, 31st great-grand-fathers, etc, right on up to my grand-father John Pittman, my mother’s father. So, back to that point in history we have a total of 68,719,476,734 great-grandfathers. Double that to include grandmothers, and we have a total of 137,438,953,468 grandparents.
That means that I have an awful lot of aunts, uncles, nieces, nephews and cousins that I now have to add to my list. Yes, it will be a long list indeed. My biggest problem will be to determine who’s been naughty and who’s been nice.
Oh my. I think I’ll play it safe and order 25 tonnes of coal and two dozen apples.
P.S. Ron Simmons wanted to know who the two dozen apples were for. Wondered if he was gonna get one. No, Ron, boy. They’re for Norma to make a couple of apple pies for dessert on Christmas Day.
Wilbur Dean
Random Heights
Random Island
