This tickled the Dickins out of me... again!

The exceptional cast of A Christmas Carol

Imagine: it is the Ghost of Christmas Present as you watch 22 talented, energetic middle school youngsters (and all of the behind-the-scenes skill set for sure) bring Charles Dickins' Scrooge alive once more. This was in the Boston area but A Christmas Carol is repeated annually across the country and world time and again as we celebrate this holiday season.

As I sat in wonder enjoying the performance, I saw my grandchildren and others growing richer in their world as they "broke a leg" for seven performances over two weekends. For those fortunate enough to be part of a grand production, be it acting, part of a band or orchestra or any activity where working together is the only way to do it right, skills are polished and life lessons are learned.

This performance was funded privately by a youth theater project but it is the schools that often offer, if they can, more broad based opportunities like this. The tinge of sadness is that more don't have such opportunities as school and personal budgets constrict such broadening activities. With school budgets being pinched to a point of making educational opportunities a lower priority, we often can't even get the basics done right. 

And what is more important? These youngsters are our future and too many of them just miss out on important stuff and more.

It is criminal that most teachers cannot live on a teacher's salary, let alone a broad based scholastic program be implemented.

Enter Stage Left--The Ghost of Christmas Future: "You scare me most, oh Ghost. What can you show me?  What does the future hold? 

When you wake from your fitful dream, will the largest goose still hang in the butcher shop down the street? Will there be a boy, a wonderful boy, there to run and get it for the Cratchit family? Or was it not a dream after all?

 

An athiest's Superstitions... WHAAAT?

su·per·sti·tion
ˌso͞opərˈstiSH(ə)n/  noun
Excessively credulous belief in and reverence for supernatural beings.


What do they do with the 13th floor in many buildings and what happens to all the people who work/live there? As luck would have it, they call it 14. Phew!

All buildings tall enough actually do have a 13th floor of course... but we don't call it that because 13 is unlucky. And Friday the 13th is the most unlucky day. Why it is considered unlucky is conjecture but one popular thought is that there were 13 people present at the Last Supper on the 13th of Nisan (Maundy Thursday), the night before Good Friday, the day Jesus was crucified. Put them together and voila! Get it?

Thank God it is Friday or we might celebrate Easter Wednesday and wouldn't that seem odd?

But since superstition involves some belief in the supernatural, why are some supernatural non believers superstitious? To put it another way, would an atheist step on a crack and break his/her mother's back... or crack a mirror and get seven years bad luck... or knock on wood to keep bad from happening? But many do says the research,  even without anything to lose. Go figure.

The Science of Superstition, an article in a recent The Atlantic magazine reflects on why so many of us, atheists and other non-believers as well, are inclined to attach a higher purpose to natural events.  In his article, Matthew Hutson, author of the The 7 Laws of Magical Thinking says "No one is immune to magical thinking."

Physicist and Nobel Prize winner Neils Bohr was asked if he believed that the horseshoe he'd hung at his country home was lucky. "Of course not," he said, "but I understand it's lucky whether you believe in it or not."

Young children from both believer and non-believer homes prefer explanations like "Maggie's house burned down to teach her not to play with fire anymore." As we age we know that isn't true, but we still seem to attribute such things to bad luck or fate or 'something.' It's hard to fathom that bad things just happened for no reason at all.

"In a study... self-identified nonbelievers began to sweat when reading aloud sentences asking God to do terrible things. ('I dare God to make my parents drown.') Not wanting to 'tempt fate' they stressed out just as much as believers did."

"Subconscious religious belief seem to increase when we are reminded of our own mortality as in 'There are no atheists in foxholes.'

"Magical thinking is not just a result of ignorance or indoctrination," says Hutson, "it appears to be a side effect of normal, socially adaptive thinking.

"Fear is another driver of irrationality. In a British study of non believers, subjects were told to imagine an encounter with a self-professed witch who offered to cast an evil spell on them. An observing scientist speculated that about half of the group would accept the hex without concern, yet each of them said that, personally, they'd decline the offer."

Of the eight separate and independent studies used in this article, observation seemed to show that one of the few true avenues to atheism may be autism: "The more autistic traits a person had, the less likely he or she was to believe in God." Try telling that to scientists who, among their peer group show only one in three (see last post) believe in God.

As for me, I am still captivated by magic and more joyful believing IT IS truly a happening when an assistant is sawed in half, knock on wood.

Oh, and by the way, I really did see a GHOST when I was seven-years-old. I REALLY DID!

It's a ridiculous world out there... and it's nuts too.

Not him but an actor playing the role

A nine-month-old was recently charged with attempted murder of a police officer in Pakistan. So the most logical question is: will authorities try him as an adult?

The police officer made the collar after the boy's father and grandfather reportedly tried and failed to kill him... and since the child was there too, the officer must have figured the infant was the "brains" of the group.

Happy ending, a diaper was changed and the "brains' was released to poop in freedom.

The San Antonio Spurs of the NBA will not be staying at a certain California hotel any more. Ghosts! Several players have experienced the spirit and to make matters worse, Harold Ramis, the man who wrote and starred in Ghostbusters isn't around to save them anymore... he recently died... and may now be part of the problem. Great movie though.

Science marches on: Recent actual and expensive medical studies have revealed that 1) drinking too much alcohol and/or excessive use of cocaine makes it really hard to drive an 18-wheeler; 2) there is a connection between stress and premature aging... stress doesn't help; 3) men like to look at curvaceous women but not necessarily face first; 4) athletes rarely are as smart as brain surgeons; 5) though more people are killed by bee stings than shark bites, most would still prefer to be stung by a bee. All of this raises the question: would you rather have a poke in the eye with a stick or a broken leg? I dunno, surprise me.

Wrigley Field, the home of the Cubs, just turned 100. And even better, the Cubs are ONLY 10 games out of first place on their march to another yet another World Series championship. The Cubbies are anxious to have someone who saw them win their last title--a mere five years after the Wright brothers' first flight--throw out the first pitch in their next championship, but no one living today was born yet... except some really old guy in Italy, and his arm is gone. Just you wait til Next Year!

     A first grade teacher admits to her class that she is a die-hard Cub fan. She asks her students to raise their hands if they 
      are Cub fans too. Not really knowing what a Cub fan is but wanting to be like their teacher, their hands explode 
      into the air.

     There is, however, one exception. One girl has not gone along with the crowd. The teacher asks why. "Because I'm 
     not a Cub fan," she says.

     "Then,"  asks the teacher, "what are you?"

     "I'm a Chicago White Sox fan."

     The teacher, a little perturbed, asks why she is a White Sox fan.

     "Well, My Dad and Mom are White Sox fans, and I am too."

     The teacher, somewhat upset, says, "That's no reason, What if your Mom was a moron and your dad 
     was a moron. What would you be then?"

     "Then," says the girl, "I'd be a Cub fan."
 

It is against the law in Liberty, NY to be annoying. Really! So a lead-footed hot-head, mad about a speeding ticket, sent his fine in with a note: "Bleep YOUR bleeping TOWN!" The town rejected the payment and charged him saying his note was "likely to cause annoyance or alarm."

I want one of those laws for my town too... but I'd amend it to include being a jerk too.

Chicago, in a NYTimes poll, was found to be the funniest city in the United States. No contest... Chicago has the Cubs so a sense of humor is essential. Boston, Atlanta, Washington D.C., Portland OR, New York, Los Angeles, Denver, San Francisco and Seattle were the top 10.

If you live in Virginia Beach, get a life. You were the least funny in all of America. Jacksonville, Miami, Tulsa, Arlington TX, El Paso, Ft. Worth and San Antonio are at the dourest bottom. Hmm, Texas has four. Wonder if that means anything?

You sourpusses better get with it. Monkeys have a better sense of humor than you do. Primates don't just laugh, they crack jokes. Koko, a gorilla, knows more than 2,000 words and and signs 1,000. She was recently asked, "What can you think of that's hard?" She signed "Rock" and "Work." She once tied her trainer's shoelaces together and signed "Chase."

Why do waiters like gorillas better than flies? Have you ever heard a customer complain "Waiter, there's a gorilla in my soup?"

One more Cub joke:

     Einstein invented a machine to reduce intelligence of the super smart so they could better fit 
     in with society.

     He strapped the apparatus on the head of his first genius volunteer test subject and turned 
     the machine on low, not sure of its power. After 30 seconds, he turned it off and anxiously asked 
     a test question: "What is the numerical equivalent of pi?"

     "3.14159 to infinity," the genius said.

     "Hmm," mused Einstein. Needs more power. So he set the machine to medium and tried again.

     "Now, he asked, Who was the 16th president of the United States?"

     "Lincoln, of course. Followed by Andrew Johnson and Ulysses S. Grant."

     Getting impatient, Einstein set the machine on high and let it rip. Strangely though, the machine 
     did not shut off automatically. As Einstein frantically tried everything, he finally had to smash the machine with a 
     hammer to make it stop. It had run on and on and on for more than five minutes.

     "Oh my God," he said concerned as he shook his subject., "Say something to me... say anything."

     The man shook his head and finally opened his eyes. Looking at an anxious Einstein, he hollered "HOW 'BOUT
     THEM  CUBS"

Confession: Don't tell anyone... I'm a Cub fan.


    

EEEK! A GHOST!

Ever see a ghost, feel a supernatural presence or consult a fortune teller? I'm not surprised... 29 % of us say we have had a touch with the dead, 18 % have seen or been with a ghost (I'm one of those... story to follow) and 15 % have consulted a medium. That's what Pew Research Center found in a recent study. Faith undoubtedly leads us to feel there is a spiritual world "out there." That and Scooby Do, of course.

I had a joyous experience that I will never forget. It is as clear in my mind today as it was many years ago, when I was seven. There was never a doubt. And because I was so young, I am even more convinced it was real because I was so naively 'pure' and without influence or prejudice on such subjects.

Growing up in the 'lower income' segment of America, my family lived in a small house owned by and adjacent to my maternal grandparents.  It was a great time because grandma spoiled my sister and me rotten with love, treats, surprises and permissiveness. What more could a seven-year-old want? And so did my grandma's mother, who lived with them. We called her Big Grandma (that's her) because she was, compared to Small Grandma, at least. She was perhaps stereotypically, an older Italian 'grandma-type' with her white hair in a bun, a round, ruddy face to fit her largish heavy frame... and always, a warm smile.  As a recent and older immigrant, she spoke only Italian but that was never a barrier to the fun we had together.

I remember the day she passed away, in the house just next door. The adults kept my sister and me in the kitchen behind the closed dining room door while they sadly said their tearful good-bys as Big Grandma lay dying on the living room couch.

About six weeks later, as Big Grandma was out my life and mind, our family was coming home from a movie and I, as the self-appointed front door-opener, ran ahead and up the steps to unlock the door.

When I burst into the living room, there, on our easy chair in the corner, sat Big Grandma in her familiar black and white poke-a-dot dress, tan stockings and black shoes. She had a warm smile for me... as always.


"Why Big Grandma," I hollered with absolute delight... and I can still hear myself saying it, "What are you doing here?" She didn't answer, but held out her arms to me. I turned to mom,  dad and sis, who were just coming up the porch steps, and shouted, "Big Grandma is here!"

But then, when I turned back, she was gone.

I remember being so excited as I told everyone what I had seen. I was so happy! Big Grandma came to say good-by to me.

And she did!