What I Did Last Week

By Paul VanRaden

In 2025, HR@opm.gov required me (and all other US government employees) to report each Monday what I did the previous week and I continued reporting after retiring. I schedule what to do in future weeks and then transfer what I got done into this report. The current page will be updated again in 2026 each Sunday by noon eastern U.S. time. Make it a favorite and click the reload button every 7 days. This page, similar pages, and the weekly reports I posted in 2025 are now stored in:

Solutions To Personal Problems

What I Did In 2025

 

July 12, 2026

During the 7 days of July 6-12, I:

Further tested harmonic orbit time ratios. The moons of Jupiter and of Saturn have simpler ratios when expressed relative to the largest moon instead of to each closest neighbor, as I previously discovered among the planets in our solar system. I also tested dividing all planet orbit times by Saturn’s orbit instead of Jupiter’s orbit and found that inner planets are slightly more in tune with Jupiter, but outer planets are slightly more with Saturn. Differences are very small because Jupiter and Saturn are nearly harmonic with a 5/2 (actual 2.48) orbit time ratio. I added about 10 more slides to the Planet Orbits report.

Added a section on charity into How To Live after reading Adam Smith’s theory of moral sentiments from 1777. He said in Part III, Chapter II that “Man, according to the [ancient] stoics, ought to regard himself, not as something separated and detached, but as a citizen of the world, a member of the vast commonwealth of nature… We should view ourselves, not in the light in which our own selfish passions are apt to place us, but in the light in which any other citizen of the world would view us.” Ideally, governments find and fund the best causes and support people who need help using our taxes instead of each of us trying to guess who needs help, how much, and how to deliver help. The new US tax rules on deductions for charity will reduce my tax by only $150 on the first $1,000 because I have few other expenses to itemize. The charity CARE said it would multiply my gift by 5X but that sounded like just a mathematical trick. Later they offered to multiply my gift by 2X, so I gave them half as much as last year. I will give more charities smaller gifts this year.

Went to the baby shower at Rocco’s Tacos restaurant where Angel is a manager. They gave us a 50% employee discount and I bought lunch for 60 relatives and friends who came to wish the new family well, give baby Cyrus a good start, and have some fun. Pictures from the shower are posted here plus 3 more photos of our family here.

Posted 140 baby pictures of Angel when she was 1 year old. Next will be 2 albums of her newborn photos to do before her baby arrives and after that finish the family vacation albums.

Went to Volcano Bay water park with family and went on many rides with grandsons BJ, Brandon, and Jeremiah. The next day we played tennis and BJ drove us there after getting his driver’s license this year.

July 5, 2026

During the 7 days of June 29-July 5, I:

Got twice as many visitors per month (2,700) to this website in the first half of 2026 as the average of 2025 and 50% more web page views per month (now about 5,000). May and June had big increases after lecturing to 30 scientists at University of Georgia, so getting out more might promote my retirement research. This page (What I Did Last Week) is again second most popular with 587 views in 2026. The most popular page is again Simple Calendars with 1,162 views and in third is Cones can be Greater than Pyramids with 431, both using Egyptian ideas from several thousand years ago. Fourth is Masses are Pushed, not Pulled, Toward Each Other with 429 views, and fifth is Editorials for Migration written by the Wall Street Journal in 1973-93 with 422. Those editorials show that Americans thought more clearly in earlier decades. The Indians did not make America great, immigrants did, but many Republicans now hate what made America great. I updated my website management report with the mid-year stats above.

Exercised 51 minutes per day in the first half of 2026 compared to a 37-minute average during 2025. Biking increased 25% by an hour per week and tennis plus basketball increased by half an hour per week. Running, swimming, and weightlifting are about at last year’s pace. I also do about 3 hours of walking (90%) and running (10%) the dogs per week. My exercise meets the Physical Activity Guidelines but 90% of U.S. adults and 50% of children get less than recommended. Research has found that exercising 5-10 hours per week continues to improve your physical and mental health but at a cost of extra calories and taking more time away from helping others improve their lives. I added some calculations on that to my Keeping Fit report.

Heard that my former USDA employees must commit within a month to move to Madison, Wisconsin by Oct 5 or lose their jobs. But 1/3 of my former laboratory (AGIL) instead must move to Clay Center, Nebraska only 4 years after USDA built new offices and relocated us within Beltsville, Maryland. Our 3 projects in AGIL that together won a Service to America (Sammie) award in May will be split up in October and our laboratory name will disappear. At least 6 of the 9 scientist positions in AGIL are vacant or will become vacant in October. My interview with Science magazine is in:

         USDA accelerates plan to close its flagship scientific campus | Science | AAAS

Wrote a Declaration of Dependence listing benefits of global governance, added it to the United Earth Rules page, watched the tall ship parade from New York, and went to our Independence Day party and fireworks show within this retirement community Solivita. Florida, Texas, New Mexico, Arizona, Utah, Nevada, and California were part of Spain’s empire in 1776. The only languages spoken west of the Mississippi river were Native American, Spanish, or French as documented in this animation of US territory.

Picked up granddaughter Samira at Orlando airport. She lives near Dallas and then we will meet her Mom and brothers from Baltimore at the baby shower on Monday.

June 28, 2026

During the 7 days of June 22-28, I:

Remembered that in 2004 I predicted the United States would rewrite its Constitution in 2026 to improve the rules of our 250-year-old democracy. I did not predict that we would instead elect a president who promised to be a dictator on day 1 and now acts as an emperor trying to run the world with hardly any rules. Few Americans are aware of the many voting system options so to find those I read the 250-page Electoral System Design written 2005 by the International Institute for Democracy and Electoral Assistance in Sweden. Their best advice was “The electoral system should hinder the development of a ‘winner takes all’ attitude which leaves rulers blind to other views and the needs and desires of opposition voters” and “the electoral system should err on the side of including all significant interests in the legislature.” 

Studied the 1966 UN International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights that 175 countries formally adopted. From 1921-1965, the US had strict immigration limits based on national origin but switched to immigration based on skills and close family ties to comply with Article 2, Section 1 that gives the same rights to all individuals “without distinction of any kind, such as race, colour, sex, language, religion, political or other opinion, national or social origin, property, birth or other status.” Article 6, Section 2 demands that the death penalty “can only be carried out pursuant to a final judgement rendered by a competent court,” not by blowing up boats in international waters. The UN rules are much more detailed and a little better worded than the US Bill of Rights. Articles 28-45 set up the UN Human Rights Committee which issues reports but does not enforce the rules that all nations agreed on. An effective world government should pressure nations to follow and to improve their rules instead of nations acting independently using 250-year-old rules.

Revised my proposed rules for a United Earth to replace the United Nations. Since posting the ideas in 2023 only 330 people read them, but more will need to understand and help improve the plan if the whole world wants to use it soon. Democracies must not let an elected leader steal power away from the people, like many leaders did and the U.S. president is doing. Limits on power are much more important for world government because no outside government will be available to remove a dictator who takes control, like the outside powers who ended Hitler’s rule in 1944. The next best chance to revise the US Constitution may be in 2039 after 250 years, if our democracy and Constitution last that long.

Noticed that U.S. immigration policy is now a cruel joke. The Refugee Act that Congress passed unanimously in 1980 was repealed this week by a Supreme Court decision. They also decided that refugees from Haiti and Syria could all be deported even while the U.S. government warns us: “Do not travel to Haiti or Syria (or 19 others) due to life-threatening risks.” South Africa is listed as a safe place to be, but this year the only refugees coming to America are 7,500 white people from South Africa who earn 5 times more than their black neighbors. The Court declared that Trump’s immigration policies are not racist, and even the dissent opinion of Justices Kagan, Sotomayor, and Jackson ignored the most obviously racist policy possible.

Met with Jason Graham of Holstein USA and Joao Durr of CDCB at the Holstein Convention in Orlando. One of the Young Distinguished Junior Member Finalists this year is Emma Hutchison who with her sister Lily helped me preserve historic USDA photos and documents from exactly 100 years ago. That’s when USDA began sending transmitting abilities for milk production to farmers across the country. I am very glad Emma and Lily (and Jana) helped because this year USDA is ending all research at Beltsville.

June 21, 2026

During the 7 days of June 15-21, I:

Went to the Juneteenth parade 3 miles (5km) away to celebrate Americans ending slavery on June 19, 1865. I read pages 90-305 of book Twelve Years a Slave from 1853 by Solomon Northup this week after seeing the excellent movie and then reading the first chapters in about 2018. Reading Solomon’s own words can convince you that events in the movie all really happened. His life story sold 30,000 copies in its first 2 years and speaks for millions of slaves who never got a chance to write about their lives. On previous Juneteenth holidays I read Lincoln’s speeches such as his 1858 debate in Freeport, IL where I was born. People talked about ending slavery, and then they ended it.

Read the Declaration of Secession of South Carolina again. Southern white men gave up their U.S. citizenship in 1861 because some black people were voting with their feet and escaping across the border like some immigrants do today. Sanctuary cities and sanctuary states do not like paying more tax to deport more people back to plantations or to countries that make life bad and complaints illegal. The U.S. Supreme Court ruled that slavery was good until more U.S. voters said it was wrong and made it illegal. In 1865, the U.S. stopped catching black people and instead gave U.S. citizenship for free to all men born in America and later to women in 1920. In 2026, we could stop catching immigrants and instead give world citizenship for free to all people born on earth. That amendment would pass if we counted world votes today. Then you could vote with your feet like slaves did after 1865 and my ancestors did in earlier years.

Remembered that all nations agreed in 1948 to stop slave labor and to end government control over your movement in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights: “Article 13. (1) Everyone has the right to freedom of movement within the borders of each state. (2) Everyone has the right to leave any country, including his own, and to return to his country. Article 14. (1) Everyone has the right to seek and to enjoy in other countries asylum from persecution. (2) This right may not be invoked in the case of prosecutions genuinely arising from non-political crimes or from acts contrary to the purposes and principles of the United Nations. Article 15. (1) Everyone has a right to a nationality. (2) No one shall be arbitrarily deprived of his nationality nor denied the right to change his nationality”. United Nations General Assembly. In 2026, the Supreme Court may undo citizenship by birth, refugees are being deported to the worst prisons in the world, the U.S. president hopes to deport Americans there also, and talented referees in the world’s most popular sport cannot step foot on U.S. soil for the crime of being born in Somalia. America now sends planeloads of immigrants from many nations to prisons in 27 other countries like Germany sent trainloads of people from all over Europe to concentration camps in Poland. We should be more free, not less, and you can change your citizenship, as all nations already agreed in 1948.

Made the final payment on granddaughter Samira’s student loan as a present for her 25th birthday.

Bought a new air conditioning unit for the house after a second major part failed in the last year. Old equipment might not keep up with a warming globe.

June 14, 2026

During the 7 days of June 8-14, I:

Posted 180 more pictures of Angel from ages 2-3 and added 30 larger, formal photos that I had forgot to process into displays from her older ages. Also, I reviewed the very nice photos and videos that Angel and Cesar posted 1 year ago from their honeymoon in Italy after visiting London and Paris.

Added 9 more paragraphs to my processed food report after hearing news about harmful effects correlated with ultra-processed foods (UPF). Most recent studies define ultra-processing more by political than by nutritional terms: “Common attributes of ultra-processed products are hyper-palatability, sophisticated and attractive packaging, multi-media and other aggressive marketing to children and adolescents, health claims, high profitability, and branding and ownership by transnational corporations.” They say that American diets average 58% UPF and I computed that my diet has 57% UPF. The breakfast cereals that I eat are called UPF, even if made only from oats processed into circles. Some UPF are very good for your health.

Studied a 2025 review of nutrition and health after a cow nutritionist asked if consuming more than the recommended minimums could further improve health. Recommended Dietary Allowances are intake amounts sufficient to meet the needs of 98% of healthy adults, but recent studies on avoiding long-term diseases often use linear regression, implying that 200% of recommended would be twice as good and 300% even better. This video describes how health improves the most from the first few grams of each nutrient, then health plateaus before the recommended intake, and might decrease if your intake gets too high. I was surprised that I could not find graphs showing health curves for each nutrient but added discussion and a few further details on nutrient needs into my Human Nutrition report.

Heard that lawyers paid by our taxes argued in federal court that a U.S. president can tear down the Statue of Liberty any time he wants. Our government now hates the immigration and the liberty that America used to stand for.

         Can Trump Really Tear Down the Statue of Liberty? His (our) Lawyers Say Yes.

Was interviewed by science writer Joanna Thompson about the end of research at Beltsville, MD and I found a thoughtful update on that topic from my former hometown newspaper:

          Decommissioning Begins at BARC; Reportedly to Move by September 30 - Greenbelt News Review

June 7, 2026

During the 7 days of June 1-7, I:

Graphed the Sun’s ‘orbit’ as it gets tugged around by the large outer planets, graphed how ellipses can create harmony, and added those graphs to my report on harmony with Jupiter. Jupiter and Saturn give the Sun an interesting motion but then Uranus and Neptune further shift its pattern across many years.

Further automated the simulation of orbits to make them elliptic instead of only circular and to start the central body off center to counterbalance the starting positions of all outer bodies. That keeps the whole system balanced around 0 as the center of gravity for simplicity. Then I plugged in each planet’s size, orbit time, and orbit distance to allow simulating the solar system. The coding was not difficult, but my program is not as nice as this actual Orbit Viewer from NASA.

Watched an interesting 7-minute documentary about costs and benefits of manned vs. robotic space exploration. The video is more optimistic than its title because it predicts a 50% probability of success to colonize the moon, 30% for Mars, but 0% for other planets: Space colonization is a lie: Why Mars, Venus and Mercury are impossible to live on.

Reviewed a long, technical article on genomic prediction for the Journal of Dairy Science.

Congratulated the happy couple living with me on 1 nice year since their fun wedding at the beach. Travel restrictions for women more than 6 months pregnant limited their anniversary trip options this year, but tennis is still permitted so we played that for more than an hour to stay in shape.

May 31, 2026

During the 7 days of May 25-31, I:

Posted 170 more pictures of Angel from ages 4-7.

Revised and expanded the Thinking and Computing report with a new section on hardware and processors, a link to a video on computer chip design and manufacture, and a paragraph on how humans may combine information from separate sources. My final slide at U Georgia recommended that students studying computing might like that report.

Reviewed genetic correlation estimates from Interbull for the revised U.S. fertility traits scheduled for August. Seeing how well genetic rankings from many different countries agree is often a useful final step to ensure that the revised national methods all make sense.

Learned that ARS is now hiring Research Geneticists for plant breeding after paying many experienced researchers 5 months of salary to do no work and leave USDA just a year ago. Also learned that many other USDA staff will be relocated and studied their new organizational charts. Their words all sound so nice, but their goal seems the same as last year – to make more staff quit. When they force the remaining Beltsville researchers to leave, USDA will convert the computer programmer (Gary Fok) to a general information technology job apart from the project. My genetic computing project had 5 programmers in the 1990s but will have 0 next year.

Wrote a letter of support for an immigration visa application. Hard-working, talented, or rich people may still have a tiny chance to pursue happiness in America, but the Statue of Liberty since 2025 has not welcomed any tired, poor, huddled masses yearning to breathe free.

May 24, 2026

During the 7 days of May 18-24, I:

Found that harmony ratios with Jupiter, the heaviest planet, are simpler and fit observed orbit times of other planets better than the pairwise ratios from this 2018 study: Self-organizing systems in planetary physics: Harmonic resonances of planet and moon orbits. Using Jupiter’s orbit time as a common denominator is like my linear tuning for music. The piano has relative ratios 4:5:6:8 but is missing 7 that also gives nice harmony. Surprisingly, Uranus, Neptune, and Pluto have ratios with Jupiter close to 7, 14, and 21 to 1. Jupiter’s orbit ratios are close to 1 to 12 with Earth, 20 with Venus, and 50 with Mercury. I studied planet orbits for clues on how to model atomic orbits but instead found that my music math can explain overall harmony more simply across both planets and pianos:

         Planet Orbit Times are Tuned to Jupiter’s Orbit

Practiced explaining the planet orbit research to my 3 sisters, daughter, son-in-law, and some scientists at the meeting in Georgia. They all said the topic is much easier to understand than my nuclear orbit research which also assumes harmonic orbit times.

Lectured for about 2 hours to 60 students and faculty at University of Georgia including many international students who traveled to Athens for their 3-week BLUPF90 (Best Linear Unbiased Prediction using Fortran 90) course. Genetic evaluation software was the main topic of my research for 40 years, so I was happy to offer the students some free advice. I also discussed specific research projects with individuals and groups at the course.

Drove to Athens, GA and back to Florida 480 miles (770 km) each way. My driving in 2026 had totaled only 260 miles (420 km), but the university paid expenses for this trip so the CO2 might not count against my personal total. This year I am taking global warming more seriously. If we all use less carbon, earth could be cool again.

Had another interview about our Sammie award published at: A USDA cow scientist won an award for helping dairy farmers produce more milk. He’s worried about the future of government research under Trump - Government Executive

May 17, 2026

During the 7 days of May 11-17, I:

Posted my slides for the University of Georgia short course in a new page because my previous cow genetics research was all published in scientific journals or posted on the Animal Genomics and Improvement Lab website at USDA. For easier access to my previous USDA slides, I copied those from the AIP Presentations page into my new page. I worry that USDA may soon lose public access to all my slides when they relocate, merge, or discontinue my former laboratory. Few projects post all their presentations, but since 1999, my project posted ours because many more people can view slides online than can attend the live talks.

Remembered the US Agency for International Development (AID) whose whole website disappeared except for a few updates from their Office of Inspector General. The State Department website has only a few recent press releases about foreign aid but at least Wikipedia preserved some USAID history. Government employees must preserve federal records so that tax dollars are not wasted, but the administration can now delete anything they do not like. Also, during government shutdowns, the administration openly violated the Hatch Act by putting Republican political advertisements at the top of all government web pages.

Noticed that government business now gets posted on the president’s privately owned website. At their 2016 convention, Republicans chanted “Lock her up” because Hillary Clinton had stored government emails on her personal hardware. Most news stories now freely advertise the president’s personal, for-profit social media company by repeating its name several times per day when he posts official government statements on his own hardware. In 2025, his media company had $4 million in revenue but $716 million in expenses and a $712 million loss. Much of the money to start his media company came from China and Russia and is one of many ways they can buy the friendship of our president.

Celebrated my birthday by visiting the Kennedy Space Center about 1.5-hour drive to the east with Angel and Cesar and posted our pictures in my Recent Vacations display. We saw the main rocket launch pads and the retired space shuttle Atlantis. IMAX film Deep Sky showed recent images from the James Webb telescope launched in 2021 and managed by a NASA team in my former hometown of Greenbelt, MD. The film was mostly excellent except its beginning and end talking about the beginning of time and beginning of the universe. The universe is infinite even if our eyes and our best telescopes will never see objects infinitely far away and we will not live forever to prove that time is also infinite.

Found a series of 4 videos closely connected to my research on nuclear physics, pushing gravity, and the infinite universe. Those topics help form a clearer theory of how the world really works but that knowledge may not help one bit in your daily struggle to survive and prosper.

May 10, 2026

During the 7 days of May 4-10, I:

Reflected on 1 year since retiring to Florida by rereading What I Did In 2025. While reading I moved some ideas into other existing reports and shortened some news-related comments to focus on thoughts with more lasting value. I enjoy having a deadline each week for making progress on topics worth talking about or linking to the most useful or interesting reports I can find. My goal is to share ideas that might make the whole world a little happier.

Found my hand-written 7-page report from 1988 with title “The United States, a Productive Nation?” and typed its text into Make America Twice As Great. It also showed graphs of how many people can be supported at different multiples of subsistence and how much happier each person might be with more resources. By combining those, total happiness per unit of land is maximized when each person lives at 2.7 multiples of subsistence. From 1985 data, I had estimated that U.S. citizens were living at 12 multiples of subsistence compared to 1.5 in Bangladesh and Indonesia. Their citizens were less happy per person but produced more total happiness per unit of farmland because of more people per hectare. Most countries changed rank little using either happiness per hectare or people per hectare, so I reported the latter in The Right To Migrate for simplicity. Thank you to the people who use fewer resources so that others can enjoy life more.

Recorded a very nice 10-minute interview broadcast by Federal News Network and had an interview with Government Executive magazine about our award-winning genomics research. I also drafted a 90-second acceptance speech for our Service to America Medal (Sammie) that my former boss Randy Baldwin gave for our group award, 1 of 4 federal government projects the Partnership for Public Service honored this year. The speech and pictures are now in my awards display.

Studied how to improve democracy by reading a 170-page global summary of election methods. Then I studied the European Parliament for further ideas on how to govern a United Earth. Europe and most nations use proportional representation voting to elect candidates whose views represent their voters better than the U.S. rules written centuries ago. This month, the U.S. Supreme Court, the President, and many state governments are hurrying to make U.S. elected officials less representative of our people this November. Many other countries have improved their election rules while U.S. democracy is stuck in the past and going backward quickly. The 2026 Democracy Perception Index ⁠survey of people in 98 countries found that US favorability fell by 38% from 2024-2026 and now the United States beats Russia as the top answer to “Which country poses the greatest threat to ​the world?”

Watched documentary The Civilization the World Forgot for 4,000 Years about the Sumerians who invented much science and an alphabet which preserved their culture in thousands of clay tablets that survived long after their ancient cities in Iraq were gone. Every day we still use many of their ideas.

May 3, 2026

During the 7 days of April 27-May 3, I:

Heard that my 4 former employees at the Beltsville Agriculture Research Center got letters saying they and all staff will be relocated to other parts of the U.S. or their current jobs will be eliminated, even if ARS has not yet decided where to purge them to or if projects within the same laboratory may be shipped to separate locations. ARS ignored the 92% of public comments urging them not to close the research center. Some text in their letter to employees seems like a cruel joke: "The work you do is essential to advancing agricultural research" after asking me and all employees to resign last year and paying many people to not work for 5 months and then leave. I added this news to my report Defend Your Government: Trump’s Attack on Ag Research.

Studied how abortion access affects fertility choices and maternal health and added recent references to my report on abortion ethics. The most harm is to poor women, and pregnancies are much riskier in states with abortion bans than in other states and countries. The U.S. has a record low fertility rate after declining for many years and may have net population loss with fewer American babies born and more foreign citizens leaving.

Did some calculations for Angel’s baby shower now scheduled for July 6 at restaurant Rocco’s Tacos where she is a manager. We wondered how many diapers will be needed and found an estimate of about 10 per day for the first couple months reducing to about 5 needed after 6 months of age. Soft packs may have 50 diapers and boxes about 100 or 200, for an average of maybe 100 and require 20 boxes or packs if baby Cyrus needs 10*60 + 5*300 = 2100 for the first year. This article advised putting diapers in a registry instead of guests wrapping, bringing, then hauling home, unwrapping, and storing them: How Many Diapers Do I Need?

Converted about 150 pictures of Angel to digital and posted a first display of her events starting with her 8th birthday party and more recent pictures in ppt file Angel Age 8+. Cheryl took most of the pictures, and about 700 more from Angel’s younger years are yet to process.

Caught up on some genealogy by viewing ancestor pictures and stories that niece Hillary recently added in Ancestry and copied some of those into my online ancestor displays. Also, I added more German ancestors discovered in a German language pedigree of a distant cousin.

April 26, 2026

During the 7 days of April 20-26, I:

Began converting my poems for immigrants into songs for immigrants 32 years after writing the lyrics. About 25 years ago I wrote and recorded a tune to accompany one poem (Our State: Stay Out) and this week I drafted tunes and tempos for 11 other poems. Those could make very thoughtful songs but perhaps not a popular album.

Ranked the popular, thoughtful albums that I always listened to from my shoebox of 25 cassettes, all purchased or compiled in the 1980s and 1990s. My favorite album was James Taylor’s Greatest Hits released in 1976 which I played and sang every Sunday in earlier years. Now while showering and shaving, I still play those albums to help organize my thoughts. They are now the final table in my Songs by Topic page.

Realized on Earth Day that climate change was not a concern in the 1990’s when I wrote The Right To Migrate, but migration will be needed more as Earth warms. I added 2 paragraphs of explanation and more references into the “How many will migrate?” section of Make America Twice As Great. Future Earthlings may instead prefer northern Canada, Greenland, or Antarctica if more deserts, summer heat, floods, storms, or rising sea levels make our current homes less livable. Earth should still have many nice places to live without everyone needing to move to the moon or Mars, which have stable but less pleasant climates.

Received my federal income tax refund and a notice of income recalculation. I reported 5 sources of income but somehow forgot to add interest from Treasury bills into the total. That made my federal tax due increase to $27,000 and my refund was $5,000. Retirement income made tax calculations a little trickier in 2025, but my tax form will be easier next year with no salary this year.

Sent the final signed and notarized forms from Charlee, Angel, and me to the probate lawyers to close Cheryl’s estate so the court can transfer the house title.

April 19, 2026

During the 7 days of April 13-19, I:

Made 14 more slides for the U GA course on genetic prediction software. My 2 lectures will summarize what I learned from 40 years of writing and running programs. The students and new scientists will learn how to use or write programs for estimating the combined effects of genes on traits.

Read Black Hawk’s autobiography written in 1833. In northwest Illinois, I grew up often seeing the very large statue of Black Hawk across the river from our county fairgrounds. This week was the first time I read the very educational words from a previous owner of our land. Others listed their favorite quotes from Black Hawk, and I added my favorite quotes and other history into my previous report Make America Twice As Great, including this quote: “I found by that treaty [of 1804], that all of the country east of the Mississippi… [northern Illinois and southwestern Wisconsin] was ceded to the United States for one thousand dollars a year. I will leave it to the people of the United States to say whether our nation was properly represented in this treaty?” After the Black Hawk war in 1832, immigrants from Europe took the remaining land from Black Hawk’s nation. I inherited 20 arrowheads that my grandfather collected while plowing their land that became his farm. In Black Hawk’s final paragraph, he asked for FRIENDSHIP and said the immigrant, though of a different race, “will always be welcome in our village or camps, as a brother.”

Noticed that the U.S. government increasingly uses our tax dollars to prop up far right governments, but Hungary instead voted out their authoritarian leader Orban this week. Last year the U.S. promised to bail out Argentina only if they reelected a candidate the right wing favored. The U.S. put very high tariffs on Brazil to benefit their former right-wing president who had attempted a coup and pardoned the right-wing former president of Honduras convicted of trafficking cocaine to the U.S. The U.S. president also got impeached in 2019 for halting funds to Ukraine unless they helped him win his election. Most previous presidents used our tax dollars to promote democracy and the rule of law in other nations.

Looked up the definitions of terrorist and patriot and added some recent examples. Terrorist (noun): a person who uses unlawful violence and intimidation, especially against civilians, in the pursuit of political aims. Example: A terrorist threatened to kill an entire civilization tonight.” Patriot (noun): a person who vigorously supports their country and is prepared to defend it against enemies or detractors. Example: A patriot stood all night defending the civilian infrastructure that a terrorist threatened to destroy. Explanation: Patriots in Iran sometimes say “Death to America” but have no way kill our civilization, whereas the American terrorist has 3,748 nuclear warheads, a trillion-dollar military budget, and wants 50% more War funding next year. Has America elected the Great Satan that Iran’s leaders always feared?

Expanded my United Nations vs United States report on Gaza with more history and a link to President Truman’s 1945 speech about how the United Nations began as World War II ended. Peace with Japan has lasted 80 years because they and many countries formally agreed on how the world could peacefully cooperate.

April 12, 2026

During the 7 days of April 6-12, I:

Examined DNA test results for Angel and Cesar from Ancestry.com. Test kits were ordered on Feb 15 for $39 each plus $15 shipping, arrived on Feb 19, returned the next day, and results arrived in 5 weeks on April 4. Angel has 62% DNA from Europe, 37% from Africa, and <1% native American. Her percentages from regions in Europe were about half of mine as expected plus some from Denmark, Scotland, and Ireland that I did not have. Those must be from Cheryl’s ancestors, estimated to be 75% from Africa, 24% from Europe, and 1% native American by combining results for Angel and me. Cesar has 39% DNA from Europe, 49% from Africa, and 12% native American. Combining twice of Cesar’s percentages minus his mom Jessica’s percentages, we also estimated that his Dad had 26% DNA from Europe, 66% from Africa, and 7% native American. I added those and a few further details to the Remembering Ancestors report.

Was disappointed by Ancestry’s new geographic regions of inheritance separate by chromosome they sent recently, pretending that my whole chromosomes are always from 1 region or another. About half of my Mom’s ancestors were from England and half from Germany and their chromosomes mixed for several generations in America, but according to Ancestry’s graph, no crossovers ever occurred. My Dad’s ancestors and chromosomes were German as expected, but his chromosomes 1, 11, 12, and 21 were fully Dutch after 4 generations of mixing. I asked Ancestry.com’s chat bot if they understand that chromosomes recombine during meiosis. Chat bot replied that many regions are so similar that their Chromosome Painter prefers keeping 1 color instead of switching back and forth many times per chromosome. At USDA we color-coded chromosomes in slide 8 of this 2010 presentation to correctly show actual chromosome recombination across 3 generations of genotyping for the first bull that had both parents and all 4 grandparents genotyped. Few humans yet have genotyped grandparents, but some calves now have 8 generations fully genotyped.

Updated my nutrition report to include sodium intake which I had not previously tracked after discussing the topic with Cesar. I eat few salty foods, but my main sources were hot dogs, spaghetti sauce, and the small flavor packet in ramen noodles. Using only half of the flavor packet, discarding the other half, and switching to a different flavor of spaghetti sauce with 10% less sodium cut my sodium intake from 2.6 to 2.4 grams per day, close to the 2.3 recommended maximum. My sodium intake is much less than averages of 3.3 for the U.S., >5 for China, and almost 4 globally. Lower sodium reduces blood pressure and heart attacks, but eating <1.5 grams per day as recommended by some is difficult and might reduce health.

Did emergency pressure washing of our driveway to satisfy the homeowner’s association. They had sent requests to my wife’s former email address that were unanswered and threatened to sue. We cleaned it the next day after hearing their request.

Saw and heard alligators mating in a nearby lake on my way to the swimming pool. Trying to find a partner may explain why one walked across our back yard last week.

April 5, 2026

During the 7 days of March 30-April 5, I:

Calculated that the total cost of my food, drink, and snacks remained below $3 per day for the 39th consecutive year. My cost is now $2.86 compared to $2.93 a year ago for a diet that provides 2,382 calories per day and all nutrients needed. This year I saved 10 cents per day by taking a B-vitamin pill twice per week instead of 1 multivitamin pill every day and decreased my bread intake by switching back from multigrain to whole wheat with smaller, more affordable slices. To make future updates simpler, I moved the graphs of historical trends into a presentation separate from my updated 2026 report in:

         Human Nutrition for the Hungry

Began drafting slides on genetic evaluation programs for my upcoming talks at the University of Georgia short course in May. Last year I had to speak remotely at their in-person conference because USDA did not approve any travel for scientists, but this year I will drive up.

Checked on the status of Venezuela and Cuba since much recent news is about Americans using high-tech bombs to force Iranians back into the stone age. Venezuela’s economy was very bad but has become more terrible as their currency further collapses. This week Cubans were reminded that Americans are still their enemy, and Russians are still their friend by delivering much needed fuel during the crisis we created. Cubans had good healthcare, but we are destroying that and many other services that require electricity by forcing Cuba back into the dark age. I watch PBS news and read MS Now reports almost every day, but most news channels (ABC, CBS, NBC, and BBC) waste too much time repeating the U.S. president’s useless words. This week I subscribed to Reuters and hope to get more sane words from the rest of the world. Many people live there. Few people live here. Improving the lives of everyone on earth should be easy.

Watched astronauts leave Florida to go to the moon again. Then I sang Rocket Man from 1972 and Walking on the Moon from 1979. Those songs were inspired by people from earth visiting their closest neighbor decades ago. Earlier NASA rockets were designed mainly by Wernher Von Braun and his team of German immigrants. Traveling to the moon or Mars is still difficult, but moving from country to country should be much easier now than centuries ago when my ancestors left Germany and England to go to America. Also, I watched a nice simulation of the collision that formed the moon 4 billion years ago. That was a rough day for everyone on earth at that time.

Saw a large alligator walk across my back lawn after it rested under a nearby tree. We will remember to keep dogs and grandkids away from gators.

March 29, 2026

During the 7 days of March 13-29, I:

Studied electrostatic and nuclear force factors needed to model both electrons and nucleons. Most people interpret the force of gravity as a pull, but I and many others believe gravity is a push from all sides except where nearby masses block that push. The math of quantum mechanics models small-scale forces and their effects very well, but nuclear, magnetic, and electrostatic forces have push-pull effects that also might better be explained as differences in push instead of assuming that electrons, protons, and smaller particles all issue constant pulling forces. Different models could better reveal what physically happens at very small scales while giving similar predictions, which is a reason to study those forces.

Modified my nuclear orbit simulation program to also mimic a stable molecular bond using 2 separate, almost stationary masses acting as nuclei plus 2 smaller bodies acting as shared electrons orbiting around the 2 nuclei. The goal is to check if a very elliptic orbit can keep the 2 nuclei apart by transferring forward momentum from the 2 electrons into outward momentum for the 2 nuclei each time the electrons turn the sharp corner just beyond the other nucleus. The outward force needs to counteract the inward force that naturally pulls (or pushes) the 2 atoms together. I did not yet find a stable electron orbit around the 2 nuclei but am getting closer.

Signed and got more forms notarized regarding Cheryl’s estate, closed her bank account, and gave Charlee and Angel 4 forms they each needed to sign and notarize to finalize the estate.

Filed estate tax form 1041 which was very simple because we inherited and are living in Cheryl’s house and driving her car and so the items we inherited did not generate any direct, taxable income.

Filled out a vital information form listing my financial accounts, important documents, and end of life wishes in case those are ever needed. Also drafted a will but did not sign it yet until the house gets transferred to my name, maybe in April.

Realized that Trump’s goal is to break Congress and block all legal paths forward by refusing to negotiate and asking for voter suppression in a budget bill. Then the only option left is for him to rescue us using illegal executive action such as paying for airport security without a budget. He used a similar strategy of blocking United Nations actions, so that their only option was to make him chairman for life over Gaza. The Supreme Court finally overruled his tariffs last month because Congress must set taxes, but the president’s new theory is that if Congress cannot even pass a budget for homeland security, he can just move funds on his own. Also this week he decided to advertise himself on all U.S. paper money later this year, as kings and emperors did.

March 22, 2026

During the 7 days of March 16-22, I:

Rewrote Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address to prepare for the 250-year anniversary of U.S. democracy on July 4. The battle at Gettysburg was the closest the United States came to falling apart. I wanted the speech to say more clearly why fighting against a king is different than fighting against democracy. Also, I wanted to test if revising and improving upon excellent words is possible after 163 years of hindsight and language drift. Lincoln’s original speech and my revised version are now in my Easy English document.

Read another famous speech from Athens, Greece in 431 BC after reading Lincoln’s 1863 speech. Pericles made much more sense 2,456 years ago than any words the current U.S. president ever said. From Pericles’ Funeral Oration: “Our form of government does not enter into rivalry with the institutions of others. Our government does not copy our neighbors' but is an example to them. It is true that we are called a democracy, for the administration is in the hands of the many and not of the few… Neither is poverty an obstacle, but a man may benefit his country whatever the obscurity of his condition. There is no exclusiveness in our public life, and in our private business we are not suspicious of one another, nor angry with our neighbor if he does what he likes… While we are thus unconstrained in our private business, a spirit of reverence pervades our public acts; we are prevented from doing wrong by respect for the authorities and for the laws, having a particular regard to those which are ordained for the protection of the injured as well as those unwritten laws which bring upon the transgressor of them the reprobation of the general sentiment… Because of the greatness of our city the fruits of the whole earth flow in upon us; so that we enjoy the goods of other countries as freely as our own… Our city is thrown open to the world, though and we never expel a foreigner and prevent him from seeing or learning anything of which the secret if revealed to an enemy might profit him. We rely not upon management or trickery, but upon our own hearts and hands.”

Simulated 3-dimensional orbits that could better match the published nucleus sizes but those orbits were very unstable. Intersecting X-Y and X-Z orbits did not remain orthogonal because their spins in different directions interacted poorly. The 2-dimensional nucleus that I simulated previously is consistent with actual images of atoms from particle colliders and with most solar and galactic orbits.

Devised a plan to process Angel’s childhood photos after copying her sister’s and nieces’ photos first. Sharing electronic pictures with family was easier since we live in 3 different states. During the last year I processed about 1,200 family photos into about 700 slides in 11 powerpoint displays and posted those. Cheryl was the photographer for most of the originals taken about 1980-2010. Many landscape originals can convert to portraits by excluding some scenery so that 2 or 3 photos on a similar topic fit onto 1 landscape slide. About 1,000 more photos of Angel are yet to process including about 200 loose or kept in the original packets from developers but most photos are already stored in 16 nice album books. This year those may get processed into 6 new electronic displays, each with about 170 pictures and 100 slides, sorted by age.

Had a cold and cough for a few days so I got some extra rest. That may be the first time since moving to FL that I had any sick hours after retiring last year with 1.5 years of unused sick leave.

March 15, 2026

During the 7 days of March 9-15, I:

Studied properties of molecular bonding and took notes on the distances and forces involved before trying to compute orbits or shared orbits for electrons. Quantum mechanics articles say that electron locations cannot be known, only their probabilities, but examples would be useful of paths where electrons travel and how atoms form their shared bonds. For more than a year before we got any DNA genotypes with 50,000 genetic markers, I simulated those and that simulation became my most referenced paper. Atoms are mostly only a little smaller than molecules, but chromosomes are very long molecules averaging ~120,000 base pairs in humans or ~100,000 base pairs in cattle and I simulated 30 pairs of chromosomes, each containing different genotypes for thousands of bulls and cows. I hope to spend less than a year simulating nucleons and electrons, but atoms may be easier than whole chromosomes.

Learned that the width of a nucleus is proportional to the cubed root of its atomic mass number such as 4 for helium or 20 for neon, implying the nucleus is 3 dimensional. Widths of the 2-dimensional (flat) nuclei that I simulated grew with the square root of mass. Similar math can simulate 3-dimensional orbits using spherical instead of polar coordinates. Helium orbits may have 2 nucleons in the X-Y plane and the other 2 at the same distance from center but in the X-Z plane, rotated 90 degrees to be in perfect phase so they never collide when crossing the X axis. Two perpendicular nucleon orbits would still allow 4 holes thru the nucleus at 45-degree angles. The next nucleon orbits for carbon, neon, etc. can have orbit time ratios of 1 to negative 2 and opposite spins as I previously tested to generate the hexagon-shaped orbits seen in nucleus images. I updated the Fortran program to simulate 3-dimensional orbits but have not tested those yet.

Learned that my former research project on genomic selection of dairy cattle will receive a Service to America Medal from the Partnership for Public Service in May. I enjoyed reading their excellent report on how badly our federal government was damaged in 2025. Their report is much more complete than my similar report of specific damage to our USDA research project that had 9 employees a year ago but now has 4. Republicans let the administration defund even the most valuable projects. If the government hires again, applicants can now be asked political questions and judged by political appointees instead of expert panels. They also want to return to the system used in the 1800’s that let presidents fire any employee for any reason at any time. Being honored for past work is nice, but more importantly, our government should start valuing science again.

Decided that while retired I need a better definition of hours worked after claiming to work 70 hours per week last month. Work includes things we do mostly to help other people whereas leisure hours are what we do mostly for our own enjoyment. Sleeping, eating, and exercising are in a third category for maintaining our health. Work can include watching or reading the news if that helps us better understand what problems need solving. Researchers need to read or listen to scientific reports and study problems before solving them. Students learn how to solve problems, partly for their own use, but also to benefit society by being more productive, earning more, and paying more taxes. Taxpayers paid for most of my education (grade school, high school, and subsidized college) and for my 37 years of research. Selling our labor to the highest bidder helps us buy food, clothes, and shelter, or pay off student loans, but learning and sharing ideas for free can benefit more people instead of just one employer or ourselves. Finding the best free ideas or thinking of new ideas can help more people now and in the future, if those ideas work.

Took my long-sleeved shirts to the office closet because I will likely not need those for 6 months and traded them for my other short-sleeve shirts. Years ago, I started seasonal trading even with 2 closets in the same room, 1 near the door and 1 a few steps farther. Saving 10 seconds per shirt seems small but can save a few hours per year at a cost of a few minutes twice per year. Before moving I donated or threw away clothes because having too many takes too long to decide which to wear. A rotation works fast, taking from the right-most hangers or the bottom of the stack and putting clean clothes on the left or the top. Many people have too much stuff because modern advertising is too effective. See Netflix documentary Buy Now! The Shopping Conspiracy.

March 8, 2026

During the 7 days of March 2-8, I:

Reviewed maternal-fetal incompatibility caused by Rh factor after blood tests revealed that my daughter is Rh- but my future grandson is Rh+. Karl Landsteiner from Vienna, Austria discovered the ABO blood groups in 1901, a laboratory test for Syphilis in 1906, the virus that causes polio in 1909, moved to New York in 1923, and discovered the Rh factor in 1940. Decades ago, many babies from Rh- mothers were born with anemia or died, so some couples stopped having babies after their first affected child was born. The Rh- mother is never affected but any later babies that are Rh+ could be. That genetic condition is very safe now because 2 immunoglobulin shots of RhoGAM before and after delivery can easily prevent Rh- mothers from making antibodies against their baby’s Rh+ blood. About 15% of people have Rh- blood type which is recessive, meaning that in gene RHD located at 25.3 million bases from the left side of human chromosome 1, Angel got that less frequent allele from both Cheryl and me. About 20 years ago I studied Rh factor as a possible explanation for a bull whose daughters had 10% stillborn calves whereas his mates had only 4% stillborn calves, but we did not find a factor such as Rh in cattle.

Discovered that many of my nuclear orbit ideas make sense because similar theories have been published and are in use, indicating I should have done more literature review earlier. Previous nuclear orbit models also assigned orbits in the nucleus matching the periodic table. Heavier elements seem to be built around the Helium 4 nucleus, as I modeled. Helium has a hole for the 2nd electron orbit to pass. Heavier elements also have a density gap at the center, and some pictures of atoms show that linear up-and-down orbit, but quantum mechanics does not yet model the electron’s linear orbit thru the center. The general term nucleon is often used instead of protons and neutrons. Nucleons are paired with opposite spin, like electrons and as I modeled. Computation of stable nuclear orbits is difficult, as reported in this summary. If all bodies return to their initial positions, speeds, and angles after 1 full cycle (orbit) of the system, that could demonstrate nuclear stability with much less computation.

Graphed the helium orbits, updated my nuclear orbit presentation to include those, and updated its flow a little.

Found another nice talk about the non-existence of God while watching videos on the science of nuclear physics.

Learned from Rachel Maddow why the U.S. president declared war on Iran. Negotiator Jared Kushner, with no formal title except son-in-law, pretends to speak for the U.S. after personally taking $2 billion from Saudi Arabia, another $1.5 billion from Qatar and United Arab Emirates, and receiving hundreds of millions in ‘management fees’ from Arab leaders while using our tax dollars to please those countries, not us. The president received a $400 million airplane gift from Qatar. His family and his other negotiator Steve Witkoff also receive huge cryptocurrency income from those Gulf states. Kushner’s father Charles was convicted of several crimes and went to prison but later got pardoned by Trump and then appointed U.S. ambassador to France. The Gulf states do not need to fight a war. Instead, they can pay our president and his family to make the U.S. military fight Iran for them. I asked former Iranian Hossein Jorjani, “Will historians look back on this week as a good or a bad U.S. decision?” He replied that he is very pessimistic about the situation in Iran: “What we have there is a fanatic, doomsday religious sect that has taken a nation hostage. Based on my understanding, they have a habit of turning every ‘difference’ into a ‘confrontation’. Unfortunately, they do not act ‘rationally’ by our standards. And of course, war does not solve this problem. It just accelerates destruction.”

March 1, 2026

During the 7 days of February 23-March 1, I:

Advanced from simulating 2 orbits and 4 bodies (protons plus neutrons) in helium’s nucleus to 4 orbits and 12 bodies in carbon’s nucleus, then to 20 bodies in neon’s nucleus and 36 bodies in argon. Orbits 1 and 2 each contained 2 bodies (like helium) whereas orbits 3 and 4 each can contain 8 bodies to get neon or 8 more in 5 and 6 to get argon. Time required per orbit always had ratios of 1 : -2 : 4 : -4 : 8 : -8 for orbits 1 to 6. Positive spins for orbits 4 and 6 were slightly more stable and easier to imagine being formed than the negative spins, but electron pairs have opposite spins, so I simulated opposite spins within the nucleus also. All bodies were in the X-Y plane, like our solar system, but all elements above hydrogen have an open center, like binary stars, to let the second electron pass up and down in the Z direction. Unfortunately, stable orbits require launching all bodies with speeds and angles differing slightly from perfect circles to account for forces from all the other orbiting bodies. The program needs to optimize those because trying to perfectly juggle many bodies by hand will take too long, even if they are very small and move very fast. The Fortran code is now 350 lines including 100 comment lines, but choosing better starting options will need much more automation.

Learned that small asteroids in positive harmony with Jupiter (2:1, 3:1, 4:1) get moved out of those orbits in the asteroid belt. Bodies of similar size may find stable harmonic orbits while those of very different size are unstable because the smaller body gives very little feedback to the larger or may be disturbed more by the other planets in motion. I also found a very nice picture from the Brookhaven particle accelerator of a gold atom’s orbits. See: This is the most accurate image of an atom. That picture also shows electron orbits matching the shapes of the nuclear orbits I am simulating. I did not yet try simulating electrons, but electron orbits could be in harmony with nuclear orbits with both having no net spin, matching current quantum theory. Real bodies in real orbits may obey 1 simple force of attraction among protons, neutrons, and electrons much easier to understand than quantum theory which says that particles move magically from one place to another instead of in simple orbits.

Helped cleanup and reorganize the house to make part-time room for a baby in 6 months. In 1997, Angel’s Mommy convinced me to build and move into a 20% bigger townhouse (208 vs. 174 square meters, or 2,244 vs. 1,870 square feet) only 2 months before Angel was born. Our cleanup this week was less work than that move 3 blocks away into the new 1997 townhouse that Cheryl and I had built for $154,000 and out of our previous 1994 townhouse we built for $124,000. After 30 years, estimated values of those houses have more than tripled to $470,000 and $410,000, while inflation has only doubled the prices of most U.S. goods. The stock market (Dow) is now 6 times higher than in 1997 and 12 times higher than in 1994, so maybe we should have invested in stocks instead of houses.

Showed my 4 siblings during our weekly zoom meeting the family pictures I converted from slides. They enjoyed seeing sights they remembered but had not seen for about 60 years. Those pictures included about 10 from the farm in Forreston, IL where we grew up. I added those to the end of Desegregation on the Farm and others into various photo displays. I also added about 25 pictures of Cheryl from the 1980s and 1990s to her photo display.

Decided not to watch the State of the Union speech last Tuesday. A Nobel Peace Prize winner would remind us of these facts: Congress must declare war, not a president. After Osama bin Laden’s 2001 direct attack, the U.S. began 20 years of Afghanistan war and killed him 10 years later, but the Taliban (our enemies) now control all of Afghanistan, all women there, and last week began a new war with Pakistan. In 2003, the U.S. quickly and easily removed Saddam Hussein followed by 8 years of Iraq war. In 2011, the UN asked NATO to remove Muammar Gadaffi, followed by 14 years of failed state and anarchy in Libya, with Russia now taking it over. In 2015, Congress did not approve a U.S. president’s request for war, and instead Syrian people rose up and finally replaced their leader after 13 years of Syrian civil war. In 2025 while working for Trump, I watched his March 4 speech to Congress and was very upset by his vicious lies about the Social Security Administration because a complete review in 2023 by his own appointee had already disproved his lies. The Social Security database uses methods like those we developed for measuring cow longevity, so last year I compared and presented those methods in Births, Deaths, and Presidential Lies. Some people poison their brains with Trump’s words, but since 2017, I block his lies and hate from entering my ears and instead fill my brain with truth and kindness. Keep your mind healthy by keeping his lies out of your brain.

February 22, 2026

During the 7 days of February 16-22, I:

Found out along with 27 other people in Miami and about 15 more on livestream that the grandbaby will be a grandson. He does not know his gender yet, but someday we will explain that many people think learning new information is fun whether you inherited 2 X’s, 1 X and 1 Y, or other unusual chromosome combinations.

Remembered that the infinitesimal universe was why I got started on nuclear physics. Everyone believes that stars, galaxies, and large-scale objects all differ in size, but current models of physics imagine that small particles such as protons, neutrons, and electrons are each identical to all other “fundamental particles” across the whole universe. Those theories are likely wrong, but my current calculations preserve that part of nuclear theory which makes the math easier to do and explain. Fundamental particles may not all be created equal, and I would be pleased if future scientists prove that soon rather than hundreds of years after I retired. We cannot know what happens infinitely far away or understand exactly what happens inside the smallest detectable particles, but we can improve the lives of other bodies that we meet or that we create without knowing everything about everybody. We each started when a microscopic sperm met a microscopic egg and each combined their 3 billion letters of DNA to form a new body like ours but each a little different. Understanding tiny processes is useful even if the tiny bodies all differ slightly.

Made the computer simulation of helium’s nucleus twice as stable simply by using more digits of pi when converting X-Y coordinates to angles and back again. At first, I used the 9 decimal digits of pi that my calculator provided, then typed in 20 digits found on the internet, but Fortran double precision only stores 14 and used 5 extra digits. Those instantly allowed 16 complete orbits instead of 8 previously. For each time increment, the simulation now uses an average of the previous and new positions of each other particle instead of computing the attraction force and direction only from their previous positions. I also revised the Fortran program to automatically calculate starting positions for heavier elements with more protons and neutrons in the nucleus. Instead of using only trial and error to find input options that create stable orbits I derived better methods using derivatives but have not programmed those yet.

Converted 3 old VHS cassettes from 1994-2002 to videos and converted 20 old slides from 1950-1995 to photos for a total cost of $144. The files were restored onto DVDs, so I also had to buy DVD reader for $31. The 2-inch by 2-inch slides were mostly family pictures and are now loaded into the online photo displays. The VHS tapes were videos of Angel’s sonogram from 1997, her dance recital from 2002 when she was 4 years old, and my 1994 speech at USDA on Greater Employment Opportunity. In October I posted my slides from that 55-minute talk and now the video is posted in 3 parts. The ideas I shared at USDA in 1994 are all still correct today, explaining how all of us on earth can and should have equal rights. You may want to give this speech a standing ovation even if nobody will hear your hands clapping or see you smile at the idea that we should all have equal rights.

Noticed that U.S. taxpayers will contribute $10 billion to a Gaza fund even after the U.S. president decided we are too poor to pay our $2 billion share of United Nations’ expenses for the whole world. In 1948, 85% of the Arab families were deported to Gaza from the land and homes they had owned for generations before Israel took their land. Over the last 3 years, the U.S. gave Israel more than $10 billion for bombs and military equipment used to destroy Gaza. In November 2025, the UN security council approved the new fund because every leader knew that Trump would veto any other action the UN tried to do or he would raise their country’s tariff rate if they voted against him. At least the Supreme Court finally read the U.S. Constitution and realized that Congress is supposed to vote on tariff rates after taking a year to decide. Unfortunately, the U.S. leader can still break laws 10 times faster than the courts can stop him.

February 15, 2026

During the 7 days of February 9-15, I:

Continued refining the code to simulate nuclear orbits. Numerical stability is a problem with repeated recalculation of positions accounting for the new position of all other orbiting bodies. Even with double precision for all variables, rounding errors accumulate after several rotations of recomputing at each degree of rotation or smaller intervals. The starting positions are always symmetrical, equally spaced, with identical speeds and angles but become asymmetrical across orbits due to rounding. Instead, the correct orbit can be verified after only 120 degrees of the inner orbit and negative 60 degrees of the outer orbit with opposite spin if the 4 bodies (protons and neutrons) line up again with the same speeds and angles of direction that should recur every 60 degrees of the outer orbit. NASA already has shown that harmonic orbits spinning in the same direction are stable and self-correct back to harmony after small disturbances of any body. Harmonic orbits with opposite spins may also be stable or even more stable. For example, noise canceling headphones generate a pattern of negative pressure waves to match and cancel the positive pressure waves detected. My search for stable starting speeds and directions has used only trial and error, but due to rounding errors I may need to derive exact formulas for those using methods (such as arcsine) that I last used in 1979 college calculus, but I threw that textbook away last May before moving to Florida. The helium orbits are not easy to simulate but I am getting better at them.

Filed my Federal and my final Maryland part-year income tax returns. Of the $32,000 federal tax withheld, $7,000 should be refunded, so sometimes it pays to file early. I needed several extra hours to read the rules for all my changes that happened in 2025, but the extra calculations were not complex. The state of Florida does not tax income but gets most of their income from property tax, such as $3,400 per year on our house recently purchased for $369,000. Avoiding Maryland’s 8% state plus county income tax in one benefit of retiring here.

Watched an excellent 26-minute video Why the Rich Don’t Pay Taxes and 14-minute video The “Borrow Until You Die” strategy the IRS does NOT want you to know. U.S. tax law now almost ensures that the rich will get richer and the poor get poorer. Rich people give large campaign donations to and become friends with politicians who then reward the rich with tax breaks. People can now insert cash directly into the crypto wallet of the U.S. president to get even better treatment. Life is excellent for the rich, while our government uses tax dollars it gets from us middle-income people to deport poorer people back to the poorest places to make their lives much worse. Deportation is a horrible way for our government to spend our taxes.

Added 25 more early pictures of Elexys, Samira, and Angel into the online displays including a sonogram of Elexys from May 1999 a month before she was born. The back of that picture said “Hi Grandma” just like the “Hi Grandpa” sonogram I got from Angel last month.

Rode with Angel and Cesar to Miami for their gender reveal party with his family, Charlee, and 3 grandkids also here. I gave them the baby pictures that Cheryl had from decades ago. Previous generations learned the gender when the baby was born. My mom Katie wrote this gender reveal and family planning poem after her final delivery in 1962: “We’re as proud as we can be, with number 6 of our family. Since we don’t plan for any more, we’re glad this guy has evened the score – 3 girls, 3 boys.”

February 8, 2026

During the 7 days of February 2-8, I:

Wrote a computer program to examine orbits in the nucleus of atoms. A few years ago I started with SAS language to compute and graph the moon’s path around the sun for calendar research and to show that pretty sounding harmonic music frequencies also look pretty when graphed. To make nuclear orbit calculations more efficient and portable, I converted the SAS code and expanded it to 210 lines of Fortran code (including 70 comment lines) after generalizing it for any number of objects in any number of orbits, but the results and code are not ready to share yet.

Received and added a third review to my nuclear orbit theory page. Since last week 20 people clicked on it, which already seems more popular than the Copernicus theory of planetary orbits was during his whole life. I wrote to a planetary scientist at NASA in Greenbelt, MD and a student who proved that a figure 8 orbit with 3 bodies could be stable, but I have not heard from them yet.

Made a printable pdf of my Supreme Court poem and mailed it to the Supreme Court for a cost of one 78-cent postage stamp, asking the mailroom employee to give 1 copy to each of the 9 Justices. No Justice may ever see my poem, but mailing a hard copy into their building could raise that chance from near 0 up to 0.1%. They now let our president break almost any law, national or international. If this has badly affected you or your country, mail them a letter or a poem and ask the Justices to enforce U.S. laws again.

Learned that the U.S. government decided not to pay the $2.2 billion it owes to the United Nations for 2025 and 2026. I paid 16% ($28,964) of my salary as federal income tax, and the U.N. got just 0.01% ($23) of my salary in 2022 when U.S. paid its dues. Each nation pays just 0.00002 of its gross domestic product. The U.S. economy generated $27 trillion or 22% of the world’s gross income so the U.S. government should pay 22% of the $3 billion U.N. budget. If the U.S. refuses to pay its membership dues, the U.N. in New York should expel the diplomats from Washington. Then Trump could not veto their plans and later take credit for doing the same thing. The U.N. now seems as useless as the League of Nations was when it closed in 1946. It should be replaced with a democratic United Earth instead of a Board of Peace fully chosen and controlled by a chairman for life. What could go wrong? The same things that went wrong when Trump let Elon Musk ruin the U.S. government so that billionaires could rule the world.

Found another ~120 old family photos in a plastic bag, sorted those by person, time, and subject, converted about 80 of Charlee to electronic, and added those to her powerpoint picture display. Many other photos are yet to process.

February 1, 2026

During the 7 days of January 26-February 1, I:

Discovered that the atomic nucleus is made of paired harmonic orbits of opposite spin in helium and all larger atoms. The innermost orbit takes exactly half the time as the second orbit. Larger elements have outer orbits in that same x-y plane also in harmony with the first two. “Protons” and “neutrons” are really the same thing, analogous to a binary star pair, and pass each other at 6 equidistant points per orbit, making the orbits hexagon shaped around the nucleus’s empty center. Numbers of bodies in each nuclear orbit explain the periodic table of elements. Atoms bond together as molecules by sharing electron orbits that hold 2 nucleuses at a stable distance. One electron has a linear up-down orbit thru the central hole in the nucleus. This model of nuclear orbits is much more sensible than quantum mechanics theory and explains the chemical bonds among elements such as carbon, nitrogen, oxygen, and even DNA. Seeing the orbits and shapes is easier than reading about them. You can now see the orbits within each nucleus at:

         Orbits Within the Nucleus

Explained the slides above on nuclear orbits to my brother and 3 sisters at our weekly meeting and got comments back from external 2 reviewers. Notes generated by AI from our family Zoom meeting and the comments from reviewers are posted here.

Watched Richard Feynman’s 1973 lecture Story of Particle Physics. I was 90% sure that the paired harmonic orbits of opposite spin really explain the nucleus before watching his lecture. At minute 7:17 my jaw dropped and I became 99.99% sure that the orbital math is correct because his 1973 photo of a nucleus showed the paired orbital rings with hexagon shape that matched the theory and graphs that I had drawn by hand a few days earlier. But I still wonder why scientists in particle physics never bothered to derive those simple nuclear orbits that explain the pretty picture of the orbits that Feynman showed in 1973.

Remembered the 1981 song Too Much Time On My Hands by STYX: “I’ve got nothing to do and all day to do it. I can solve all the world’s problems without even trying.” World problems can be solved, but it takes many hours of work. I work harder now than I did while fully employed and getting paid for 40-hour weeks but working many hours of unpaid overtime and using only a small fraction of my vacation time. In retirement, I now average about 70 hours per week because working on new topics is more fun, and I waste fewer hours fighting with anonymous reviewers. This week’s research on nuclear orbits is correct and very useful, but I might not find a journal to publish it or even a physics conference that will add it to their program. Nicolaus Copernicus had that same problem for 30 years after correctly proving that the earth orbits the sun.

Went to a Rock and Roll concert / laser light show only 5 km (3 miles) away. The stage and the excellent band FireFly were under a full moon with Neptune shining brightly a few degrees away to the south, just as Copernicus and Newton’s math had predicted. A 49-second video of my grand finale drum roll using colorful, lighted drumsticks is posted here.

January 25, 2026

During the 7 days of January 19-25, I:

Watched lecture Understanding Gravity by Richard Feynman recorded in about 1962 and then read the 180 short pages of Relativity: The Special and General Theory by Albert Einstein in 1920. Most of that book was easier to understand than I expected until Einstein applied his math to cosmology. He rejected an infinite universe because gravity’s pull becomes infinite from all directions if nothing stops it. If gravity is a push from all directions except where partially blocked by masses such as earth or the sun, that push gets slightly weaker after traveling thru many masses and does not become infinite. Since 2002 I believe that gravity is a difference in push instead of a pull and since 1984 I believe in the infinite universe. Those ideas both still make sense after studying Feynman’s and Einstein’s well-explained research. I added their references and more text into my 2024 updated explanation of the direction of gravity. Those topics are not so important. When you step on the scales, your weight will be the same whether the earth pulls you down, the sky pushes you down, or space curves you down. And I will not visit the whole universe whether it is large or is infinite.

Spent many hours on nuclear physics and a new theory of why snowflakes have 6 sides and why many molecules have hexagon shapes. I plan to reveal that theory in future weeks.

Calculated progress in milk yield due to better genes or better management in two ways after discussions with Mike Vandehaar. Means of milk yield per lactation were 14,209 pounds for cows born in 1970 and 26,328 in 2020. The published genetic progress is 9,119 pounds and implies 75% of progress was genetic, calculated as 9,119 / (26,328 – 14,209). But the genetic evaluation math includes variance adjustments. Those “predict” that today's genetic differences would be only 66% as large in the 1970 environment. Thus, cows with modern genes might have given only 20,228 if milked in 1970, calculated as 14,209 + 9,119 * 0.66. That implies only 50% of the progress was genetic, calculated as 9,119 * 0.66 / (26,328 – 14,209). Higher means can increase variance, causing better genes and better management to combine with some multiplicative rather than simply additive effects on cow productivity. Also on the topic of cows, I sent comments on a nice paper about redefining fertility traits to my previous employee Jason Graham, consulted with my previous research leader John Cole about selection index updates, and commented on data collection for the two new calf health traits.

Watched 27-minute video How are Microchips Made? CPU Manufacturing Process Steps. For anyone who computes, this video explains how computer designs have increased chip speeds so quickly. They are evolving faster than human brains. Cesar and I both agreed that watching this video was very good for our brains.

Got an eye exam and ordered new lenses for my reading and distance glasses. For about 20 years, both eyes had stable sphere measurements near -1.75 but my right eye worsened to -2.50 in 2023, -5.25 in 2024, and then cataract surgery in 2025. The artificial lens is working fine, as expected, but my left eye worsened from -3.00 in 2025 to -4.00 in 2026 so it may need surgery soon also.

January 18, 2026

During the 7 days of January 12-18, I:

Filled the gap years 2001-2011 that were missing in my Annual Report file. I may have emailed Annual Reports in those years, but AOL deleted my “Sent” mail before 2012. I had paper copies from 1994-2000 when I mailed my reports and found the 2005 report in a sister’s reply. To list events in the gap years, I used my annual planning calendars on paper that I have saved since 1988 and my records of Angel’s activities but labeled those as Summaries since they do not show what I was thinking about at the time. Remembering our past events is fun and may help us predict our futures better.

Updated my daughter Angel’s life story with the latest 3 years of events and started documenting events for the baby she is expecting. That could give us 3 generations of fully documented lives. “Undocumented” people are being deported even if they act like model citizens and contribute much to our communities. People who are documented to be from places where nobody would want to live are forced to return there. Many American citizens have become evil people following an evil leader, as in 1938 when German citizens followed their leader. But the Germans only wanted Austria, Czechoslovakia, and half of Poland, and never officially claimed “This is Our Hemisphere.” Babies with documents proving they were born in the USA are no longer safe here because the President ended the U.S. Constitution’s guarantee of birthright citizenship and the Supreme Court will decide this spring if they agree. Many things to document these days.

Added to my picture biography photos of me at the United Nations building and the Statue of Liberty in 1994, at the Berlin Wall in 2014, and the piece of the Berlin Wall that I carried with me for 20 years. The final slide of my 2014 Interbull / ICAR talk in Berlin quoted Ronald Reagan’s famous “Tear Down This Wall” speech but instead I showed our Texas-Mexico border. You can believe in immigration and international law even if the U.S. government now hates those ideas.

Watched documentary Why is there no B# or E# note on the piano? directly connected to my music and keyboard research which was more advanced in 2002 than youtube videos are in 2026. In October, my Experiments with Standard Piano audio did not play when accidentally posted in .pdf but it plays now in .pptx or .mp4 formats. Files in .mp4 allow autoplay instead of controlling the slide advance manually and are now posted at Music and Math in Harmony.

Finally hiked the full nature trail that begins a mile away from our house and walked 8.4 miles (13 km) to see what our neighborhood looked like before houses were built. A few circular clearings in the forest had grown some trees again, as if settlers tried to farm some land but then gave up. The only other hikers were a group of 3 ladies with 4 dogs, 1 biker pedaling with his dog, and 1 motorized biker pulling a sled with deer hunting equipment and his tree stand. Very peaceful day, except possibly for the deer.

January 11, 2026

During the 7 days of January 5-11, I:

Heard that daughter Angel and son-in-law Cesar are expecting a baby! An online app predicted Angel’s due date of August 17, and we joked that the doctor probably uses the same app, but their prediction based on ultrasound measurement of fetal length is August 24. For cows we predict due dates very accurately using 25.4 million gestation length records, 152 million insemination records, and DNA genotypes of both parents. Gestation length (duration) has 44% heritability in cows and 25% in humans because exact conception dates are known for most cows but not for most humans.

Noticed that when we reported Angel’s news to my sisters and brother, Zoom’s Artificial Intelligence got confused because Angel shared my camera and microphone to announce her news. The AI notes for our weekly meeting generated these sentences: “Paul shared his excitement about his first ultrasound appointment on Friday, revealing he is 6 weeks pregnant… Paul shared that he is experiencing fatigue as a symptom of his pregnancy, and discussed his diet changes to support the health of his unborn child… The group discussed Paul's experience with an AI-generated book gift from his wife, Angel…” Zoom’s disclaimer said “AI can make mistakes. Review for accuracy. Please rate the accuracy of this summary” and then asked for feedback. So, I explained the facts of life to AI.  

Read my 241-page biography book that AI generated as a Christmas present from Angel. Reading it took about 8 hours while taking notes on the content and quality of the text. The book was interesting but did not use other information about me available on the internet. AI had trouble keeping track of family relationships and trouble with timelines, but a few of its best sentences seemed better than any similar sentences I could find on the internet. I added a more detailed summary of its problems and benefits in the Artificial Intelligence section of  Thinking, Computing, and Improving Both.

Noticed that MS Copilot AI can get confused by Trump. After visiting New York City, I asked Copilot: “Is the UN building or Trump Tower NYC taller?” and it replied “Trump Tower. Trump Tower in NYC is taller than the United Nations building. Trump Tower stands at 664 feet (202 meters), while the United Nations building is 861 feet (262 meters) tall.” But 861 feet is the height of Trump World Tower across the street from the 510 feet (155 meters) United Nations building built in 1952. Trump World Tower is 72 stories tall, but the top floor is numbered floor 90. The penthouse suite in Trump Tower is on the top 3 floors 57-58 that are numbered 67-68. It occupies 11,000 square feet (1,000 m2), but Trump lied and officially claimed it was 30,000 square feet to get better bank loans and then lost his resulting business fraud case. Copilot probably gave the wrong height because both buildings are at United Nations Plaza. The purpose of Trump’s World Tower built in 2001 was to prove that he can physically overshadow the UN and international law. He now can veto the UN, veto US congress bills, commit any crime on Government time, and pardon any criminal who breaks Federal laws for him. What could go wrong? Long ago, the whole world was united, speaking the same language, until a developer built a tall tower in Babel and got the whole world confused (Genesis 11:1-9, Holy Bible). Copilot gets confused by Trump’s towers, but I do not.

Gave my Supreme Court poem its own page. I wrote and posted it while still working for Donald Trump but made it less searchable, and that explains the mystery of why I hid it in Holiday History. But I have no fear this year of getting fired while retired.

January 4, 2026

During the 7 days of December 29, 2025-January 4, 2026, I:

Moved my weekly reports from 2025 to a new location (see link above or below) and restarted this What I Did Last Week page to only include news reported in 2026.

Emailed my 2025 Annual Report to family on December 31 wishing them a happy 2026. Several of my relatives have mailed me their annual greetings and stories for many years. I save their paper reports and got to use those in 2023 when visiting my niece Andrea. Her kids took turns reading the 15 holiday reports my sister Judy sent from 1988-2002 plus a few letters that Andrea had signed and sent me as a child. The kids had not heard or seen their Mom’s and her sisters’ and her parents’ life stories before. In 2024 my sister Miriam also reread the letters and reports she had sent me since 1986. In those days we often wrote letters without making copies whereas typed letters and reports now usually get stored. My annual reports going back to 1994 now include my 2025 news in:

Annual Reports to Family

Summarized my website’s visits, visitors, most popular reports, and costs in 2025, compared those to previous years, and described how and why I manage my own pages instead of posting on social media sites. I added suggestions from Hossein Jorjani into my draft report. In 2025, many more people (12,791) visited my web pages and they viewed 34,747 reports in total, 3.7 times more than in 2024. Further statistics and advice on managing websites from 27 years of experience are posted in:

         Website Management

Reorganized my main pages to display fewer items, fixed some broken links, and added some files that the awstats web management software reported missing.

Celebrated the new year with Angel and Cesar at a party and fireworks that also celebrated 25 years since this very pretty, peaceful retirement community Solivita first opened. This planned community took 23 years to build the ~4,000 houses including our house which is 10 years old. A similar sized development Westview one mile away opened 2 years ago and those houses are being built very rapidly. I watch them build every week while biking on their brand-new streets. Both communities were previously pine forests, not farmland. More news from Angel and Cesar next week.

The previous reports from 2025 telling what I did each week are now stored at:

What I Did In 2025