You would think that spending 40 years in a deadline-oriented business would eventually cure a case of raging procrastination. But you’d be wrong.

My 40-year anniversary in newspapers is sometime in October. But after all those years of deadlines and commitments and determining what to leave in and what to leave out — apologies to Bob Seger — the notion of “why do today what you can do tomorrow?” is still sometimes problematic.

So it took me more than six months to actually make use of the Ancestry DNA kit that The Princess got me for Christmas. It wasn’t so much laziness that kept me from handing over my DNA for analysis. You see, I was pretty sure I knew all that there was to know about how I came to be. But it turns out I was missing some important information.

I always considered myself Hungarian and that isn’t just because I will shovel chicken paprikash, nut rolls and kolachy into my mouth like it’s my job. There has always been — in my mind — DNA to back up my taste for Hungarian food and my ability to hold a grudge longer than any character in all three “Godfather” movies.

My paternal grandparents were born in Hungary and emigrated to America like many Europeans did in the early 1900s. They raised several children, including my father. So I just always thought of myself as Hungarian. How deep did it go? Two of my favorite MLB pitchers were Charles Nagy and Al “THe Mad Hungarian” Hrabosky.

I took this Hunky thing seriously for most of my life. But I knew deep down there was more to learn.

It’s a long and somewhat personal story, so I won’t bore you with the details, but I knew precious little about my mother’s family, particularly beyond her closest relatives, most of whom are now gone, just like many paternal relatives I grew up during parts of six decades.

But now, about six weeks after spitting into a small, plastic tube and sending that bodily fluid off the Ancestry folks, I have the exact numbers.

My heritage is more Hungarian — or central / eastern European — than anything else, but just barely. My DNA report shows 31% of what I always presumed was my dominant heritage, but I’m a surprisingly strong 30% of Irish descent. It’s OK, though. I still don’t like Notre Dame.

In all, my profile shows seven ancestral regions. Beyond the top two, the others are Germanic Europe (13%), Russia (8%), The Balkans (7%), Scotland (7%) and Ashkenazi Jews (4%).

I was somewhat surprised by six of the seven ancestral regions in my DNA, but they all began to make sense as I began to explore what was suddenly a wealth of information.

The Irish DNA, of course, comes from the maternal side. I’m still exploring the information Ancestry provided, but it seems my grandmother’s parents on that side came from Ireland. Her husband appears to have strong German ancestry.

It’s no accident that The Princess, otherwise known as my daughter Erin, was given that name at birth. There are Irish roots on her mother’s paternal family tree and after exhaustive pre-baby discussions, Erin was one of the few names her mother and I agreed upon. If she’d been a boy, your guess is as good as mine what we’d have named her.

I have to thank Erin for thinking of that DNA kit over the holidays. I needed another hobby and diving into my ancestry has been even more motivational than I expected it would be. Golf and fantasy baseball can only do so much, especially considering I continue to be awful at both endeavors.

I’m either last or next-to-last in both of my baseball leagues — thanks for nothing (again) Mike Trout — and while I love playing golf, I’m no better than I was at 16. I have an easier time keeping the ball in bounds, but it doesn’t go nearly as far as it did in the 1980s. Neither does my money, which is why I’ll probably never realize my dream of visiting Hungary. One place in particular I want to see is Puskas Arena, a 67,000-seat soccer stadium in Budapest. The place is named for Ferenc Puskas, the greatest Hungarian footballer of all time. He’s also considered to have been the best left-footed player who ever lived.

The best part of that is that I didn’t need a DNA test to learn about my namesake. The worst part? I don’t really like soccer. I guess that’s one gene I didn’t get.

Now I have to try to figure out how to get to Ireland, Scotland and a slew of other places in my family tree. If nothing else, I guess I have a built-in excuse to drink a couple of green beers on St. Patrick’s Day.

ED PUSKAS

Ed Puskas is editor of the Tribune Chronicle and The Vindicator. Reach him at 330-841-1786 or epuskas@triboday.com.