First Post

Everybody has to have a first post, I suppose.

Peromyscus leucopus is the White-Footed Mouse. It's mainly known among mice as a vector for Lyme disease. An infected tick bites a mouse, and infects it. Later, another tick bites the mouse and becomes infectious itself. The tick may go on to infect a deer or a human. The mouse itself doesn't appear to suffer from Lyme disease.

No, there is no underlying metaphor or world-view behind the name, involving disease, horrible arthropod-vectored infections, not suffering from same oneself while infecting others, meme transfer or any other such postmodernism. I picked Peromyscus for an email name years ago when I worked in Lyme disease testing, because it was something that wasn't already taken and I could easily spell it. Now it's a blog name also.