Monday, March 06, 2006
Strange but True!
We have just finished a cruise to the Panama Canal. Our first stop was Half Moon Cay in the Bahamas. As I sat in a small tender making our way to the shore, I asked the woman seated next to me where she lived. "Anchorage,” she replied. At our last stop at the Sloth Sanctuary in Costa Rica I overheard Judy, one of the owners, explain that she had met her husband Bill thirty years ago in Alaska. We then walked down to the riverbank and boarded some canoes for a brief jungle tour. Ten canoes had already departed before we got our chance. Five of us got in. The woman in front of us was from Anchorage. Of the six to eight people from Alaska on the tour out of a total of 1400, we wound up seated next to three of them in small boats, two on the first day and one on the final day. Pure happenstance!
It is a well-known fact that if you have a room with 23 strangers in it, the odds are that 2 of them will have the same birthday. With 60 people in the room the odds go up to 97%. I have tried this many times and it always seems to work. This phenomenon has its own name—the birthday paradox. My grandson Braden has two cousins who are ten and three who were born on Feb. 3. He also has a stepbrother who was born on that date. My father was born on October 30 and his son was born on the 31st. However, if it were not for Daylight Savings Time they would have shared a common birthday.
Then there was the strange case of Mark Twain. He wrote that he came into this world with Halley’s Comet and he wanted to go out with it. He got his wish. At least sorta! He actually was born about two weeks early and died about three weeks too late. In his case it was close enough.
Then there was John Adams and Thomas Jefferson, two of the signers of the Declaration of Independence.
As John Adams lay dying his last words were, “At least Jefferson still lives!” Ironically, Jefferson had died a few hours earlier. The date—July 4, 1826.
A few weeks after Diana and I were married, I suggested on a lark that we try to feel colors. We took times closing our eyes very tight and guessing several times without any success. Two days later I picked up a copy of Gods, Graves, and Scholars and started reading. Five pages into the chapter I was reading about Chichen Itza and the sacred Blue Cenote, when my blood suddenly ran cold. It seems that there was a belief that divers could somehow “feel” colors in the pitch-black waters of the cenote. A week later I was reading another book about Padre Keno and I had a similar experience about a conversation two days prior. Then it happened again two weeks later. Since that remarkable month I have had two other occasions on which I made a strange observation and then read about an almost identical parallel within a few days. It was almost like reading a novel and an important clue is presented a chapter or two earlier and then you are slapping you head and muttering “Of course!”
Six or seven years ago Diana and I were in Nashville, Tennessee, on the Nash Trash Tour. I have never been a fan of country music, but the night before we had gone to the Ernest Tubb museum so I had had a brief exposure. One of the frizzled-hair sisters on the Tour threw out the question “Who was the first person to record music live on a radio?” No one had a clue. “Come on,” she said. “Guess!” She looked straight at me. “Ernest Tubb,” I said in desperation, not being able to think of anyone else. Her mouth dropped open. “That is correct.” “That is the first time anyone has ever gotten that answer correct.” She threw me a Nash Trash magnet. She then hit us with a real stumper. “How did Conway Twitty get his name?” “From Conway, Arkansas!” I shouted. Again her mouth fell open. And she threw me a second Nash Trash magnet. “But,” she explained, “that is only half correct. Twitty came from Twitty, Texas.” It did not matter. I had two magnets. It would have been a great day to have been on the “Sixty-Four Thousand Dollar Question!”
We have just finished a cruise to the Panama Canal. Our first stop was Half Moon Cay in the Bahamas. As I sat in a small tender making our way to the shore, I asked the woman seated next to me where she lived. "Anchorage,” she replied. At our last stop at the Sloth Sanctuary in Costa Rica I overheard Judy, one of the owners, explain that she had met her husband Bill thirty years ago in Alaska. We then walked down to the riverbank and boarded some canoes for a brief jungle tour. Ten canoes had already departed before we got our chance. Five of us got in. The woman in front of us was from Anchorage. Of the six to eight people from Alaska on the tour out of a total of 1400, we wound up seated next to three of them in small boats, two on the first day and one on the final day. Pure happenstance!
It is a well-known fact that if you have a room with 23 strangers in it, the odds are that 2 of them will have the same birthday. With 60 people in the room the odds go up to 97%. I have tried this many times and it always seems to work. This phenomenon has its own name—the birthday paradox. My grandson Braden has two cousins who are ten and three who were born on Feb. 3. He also has a stepbrother who was born on that date. My father was born on October 30 and his son was born on the 31st. However, if it were not for Daylight Savings Time they would have shared a common birthday.
Then there was the strange case of Mark Twain. He wrote that he came into this world with Halley’s Comet and he wanted to go out with it. He got his wish. At least sorta! He actually was born about two weeks early and died about three weeks too late. In his case it was close enough.
Then there was John Adams and Thomas Jefferson, two of the signers of the Declaration of Independence.
As John Adams lay dying his last words were, “At least Jefferson still lives!” Ironically, Jefferson had died a few hours earlier. The date—July 4, 1826.
A few weeks after Diana and I were married, I suggested on a lark that we try to feel colors. We took times closing our eyes very tight and guessing several times without any success. Two days later I picked up a copy of Gods, Graves, and Scholars and started reading. Five pages into the chapter I was reading about Chichen Itza and the sacred Blue Cenote, when my blood suddenly ran cold. It seems that there was a belief that divers could somehow “feel” colors in the pitch-black waters of the cenote. A week later I was reading another book about Padre Keno and I had a similar experience about a conversation two days prior. Then it happened again two weeks later. Since that remarkable month I have had two other occasions on which I made a strange observation and then read about an almost identical parallel within a few days. It was almost like reading a novel and an important clue is presented a chapter or two earlier and then you are slapping you head and muttering “Of course!”
Six or seven years ago Diana and I were in Nashville, Tennessee, on the Nash Trash Tour. I have never been a fan of country music, but the night before we had gone to the Ernest Tubb museum so I had had a brief exposure. One of the frizzled-hair sisters on the Tour threw out the question “Who was the first person to record music live on a radio?” No one had a clue. “Come on,” she said. “Guess!” She looked straight at me. “Ernest Tubb,” I said in desperation, not being able to think of anyone else. Her mouth dropped open. “That is correct.” “That is the first time anyone has ever gotten that answer correct.” She threw me a Nash Trash magnet. She then hit us with a real stumper. “How did Conway Twitty get his name?” “From Conway, Arkansas!” I shouted. Again her mouth fell open. And she threw me a second Nash Trash magnet. “But,” she explained, “that is only half correct. Twitty came from Twitty, Texas.” It did not matter. I had two magnets. It would have been a great day to have been on the “Sixty-Four Thousand Dollar Question!”
