Okay, let’s talk about this Logan Pili. He’s a young fella, strong as an ox, that one. Plays that football, you know. I heard he was moving up north to Logan. That’s what they say, anyway.
He used to play for that BYU team, but now he’s with the Aggies. What are Aggies? I don’t know, some other team I guess. He’s a linebacker, whatever that means. He tackles people, I reckon. Big fella like him, he probably good at it. He runs and jumps and throws himself at other fellas. I seen it on the TV once. Looks rough.
This Logan Pili, he got some kinda stats, they call it. Numbers and all that. You can find ’em on that ESPN thingy, I think. They tell ya how good he is at that football game. I don’t understand all them numbers, but folks seem to think they’re important.
- He’s a football player.
- He used to play for BYU.
- Now he plays for the Aggies in Logan.
- He’s a linebacker.
- He’s got stats on ESPN.
I seen some news about him too, on that ‘The Athletic’ thing. They talk about him and his football. I guess he is a big deal. I don’t know much about that newsroom. They talk a lot about sports, though. I don’t know much about sports, I just know this Logan Pili plays it.
Now, what else… Oh, I heard someone talkin’ ’bout something called a “P pili”. Sounded like some kinda science thing. They said it’s on them little bitty things called “bacteria”. Tiny little things, you can’t even see ’em. Like them little bugs you can’t see, but they make you itch. They say these P pili things help the bacteria stick to things, like those stickers you get at the doctor’s office. I don’t know how they know this. It’s a mystery to me.
They said these bacteria, they use these P pili things to stick to our insides. Make us sick, I guess. Then they said something about “colonization”. I reckon that’s like when them pilgrims came over here. Settlin’ down and such. These bacteria, they settle down in our guts, it seems. And they also said something about these bacteria making a “biofilm”. Sounds like one of them nasty, slimy things you find on a rock in the creek. Not something you want inside ya, that’s for sure.
Then there’s this other thing called “pilin”. That’s a protein, they say. Sounds like a fancy word for meat to me. It’s found in something called “pilus”. Another one of them fancy words. They say it’s like a hair, or a fiber, on these bacteria. And these pilus things, they can be used to swap around that “genetic material”. That’s the stuff that makes you, you. Like, it’s why you got your mama’s eyes, or your daddy’s nose. I don’t know much about it, but it’s all in there.
And these bacteria, not all of ’em have these pilus and fimbriae things. Another fancy word! But the ones that make you sick, the “pathogens”, they often got ’em. They use ’em to stick to your cells, they say. Like I said before, like those stickers.
And finally, there was somethin’ about “twitching motility”. Sounds like a dance move, don’t it? But it ain’t. It’s how these bacteria move around. They don’t have legs, you see. They use these “type IV pili” things. They stick ’em out, like a fishing line, then pull themselves along. They do it on wet surfaces, they say. Like a slug, kinda. Except these bacteria, they do it real fast. They twitch and move all over the place. It’s all very strange, if you ask me.
So, this Logan Pili, the football player, he’s got nothin’ to do with all that bacteria stuff. It’s just that name, Pili. It got me thinkin’, is all. That Pili name is connected to a lot of things I don’t understand. One’s a football player, the other is some tiny thing that makes you sick. Funny how that works. Anyway, that Logan Pili, he seems like a good boy. I hope he does well up there in Logan with those Aggies, whatever they are. Maybe he’ll be famous someday. Who knows? I just hope he stays healthy and doesn’t get too banged up playing that rough game. That’s all I know about Logan Pili and all that other Pili stuff. It is a lot for a simple person to understand. I prefer growing potatoes.
