this post was submitted on 29 Apr 2026
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Showerthoughts
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A "Showerthought" is a simple term used to describe the thoughts that pop into your head while you're doing everyday things like taking a shower, driving, or just daydreaming. The most popular seem to be lighthearted clever little truths, hidden in daily life.
Here are some examples to inspire your own showerthoughts:
- Both “200” and “160” are 2 minutes in microwave math
- When you’re a kid, you don’t realize you’re also watching your mom and dad grow up.
- More dreams have been destroyed by alarm clocks than anything else
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- The entire showerthought must be in the title
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- If your topic is in a grey area, please phrase it to emphasize the fascinating aspects, not the dramatic aspects. You can do this by avoiding overly politicized terms such as "capitalism" and "communism". If you must make comparisons, you can say something is different without saying something is better/worse.
- A good place for politics is c/politicaldiscussion
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If you made it this far, showerthoughts is accepting new mods. This community is generally tame so its not a lot of work, but having a few more mods would help reports get addressed a little sooner.
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Ancestry is weird. You've got 2 parents, 4 grandparents and so on. Do the math and you'll have a billion ancestors in like 40 generations. Obviously, we can't all have a billion unique ancestors, so mathematically there must be plenty of people in my family tree that are also in yours. No matter the geographic spread or race nonsense.
However it's also true that you've got 50% of your parents DNA, ~25% grandparents and so on. Which means eventually, you'll have an ancestor that you share no genetic markers with. It's usually about generation 12 where this happens.
So it's true that we're all related and it's also true that your not related to your 12^th^ great grandfather.
As you get back more than 12 generations it is highly likely the same person appears more than once in your family tree.
4 generations if you're european royalty
3 generations for rednecks... Cousin marriage is often legal and not unheard of, though most people try to avoid such close relatives. By 3rd cousins - 5 generations - you often don't even know everyone and so it wouldn't be a surprise if you don't even know you are so closely related until long after you have kids. Generally there is enough separation that this isn't a genetic issue. Even first cousins don't typically share enough genes for issues to be much more common than otherwise. (kids of brothers-sister pairs often have genetic issues).
I think Queen Elizabeth II and Prince Philip were distant cousins of some kind
It wouldn't surprise me, but as an American I have an objection to monarchy in general and so I don't care enough to look it up.
Kinda interesting that at the certain point, only the surname survives
Even that changes. My surname is what it is because English doesn't have the same accents of the old German script (which isn't used in Germany anymore), and so the spelling changed. Then over time how we pronounce it has changed to match the spelling.
Mine also changed a few generations ago. Not drastically, but still.