The Earliest haunts of man....

Happy Halloween everybody! We haven't posted here in a while, we've been busy. We've needed 26 hour days, but had to make do with 24. So we've been forgoing sleep to get things done. Anyway, it's All Hallows Eve, the time when ghosts and goblins walk the earth. So we thought we'd do a little history lesson for you. Ghost stories it seems have been told since man began telling stories. One of the earliest is a story told by Pliny the Younger who was born in 61 A.D. He recounts the tale of a haunted house in Athens. It seems to have all the elements that are with us today when discussing ghosts, chains, beckoning spirits, and a surprisingly calm young philosopher.. You can read it HERE.  This is far from the first mention of ghosts in literature, but it's fascinating to we here at The Crazy. Over a thousand years before Pliny the Younger wrote this narrative, the ancient Egyptians long held that ghosts were pretty much everywhere. And when the Pharoah Akenhaten died he was cursed by the priests to wander the desert forever as a ghost. The reason for the curse? Erasing many of the Gods from ancient Egypt and assigning ONE god to rule above them. The God Aten (the sun god) and surprise... guess who the sun gods sole representatives on earth were to be, Ankenhaten and Nefertiti of course. Many Egyptians claim to have seen the Ghost of Ankenhaten wandering the deserts of that country. Europe has too many ghost stories to quantify. You can't throw a rock anywhere in many European countries without it passing through (not hitting obviously) a ghost. So what about here at home, what are some of the earliest ghost stories of the America's? How about a ghost of one of the founding fathers? The Ghost of Benjamin Franklin has been sighted many times near the library of the American Philosophical Society in Philadelphia (with some reports that his statue in front of the library comes to life and dances in the streets). How about pre american, The tale of Colonel Buck is one example. He condemned a supposed witch to death. On the gallows she was reported to have said. "Your lies have offended the almighty, He will help me take you life and leave my mark upon your grave." The story continues with the Colonel being frightened to death by her spirit that very afternoon. And her footprint is still seen on his grave. It looks sort of like a foot as seen in the photo at the top of this blog entry. (Ok, water stain maybe.)  And finally, there is one American ghost that has been seen and reported by First lady Grace Coolidge, Queen Wilhelmina of the Netherlands, Eleanor Roosevelt, and perhaps the strangest report comes from Sir Winston Churchill who upon returning naked from his bath found Abraham Lincoln sitting in front of the fireplace in his room. (We imagine President Lincoln was as surprised as Mr Churchill.)  And President Harry Truman wrote in a letter to his wife that the White house floors "popped and the drapes move back and forth."   Mary Todd Lincoln told friends that the ghost of Andrew Jackson stomps and swears up and down the halls of the White House. So Happy Halloween to all of you. And if you see Mr Lincoln, tell him thanks for us will you. Ciao for now.

The Goblins will getcha if you don't watch out!

     Here it is, mid October and we still haven't discussed Halloween. We here at The Crazy love Halloween. (Or All Hallows eve, or Samhain,) This night (October 31st) was thought by the Ancient Celts to be the night when the spirits of the dead were released to roam the earth. The Celts would build bonfires, and dress in costumes (usually animal skins and antlers) they would burn food and animals in an attempt to placate these spirits, and also to predict the future. The holiday was mostly about the ending of summer and the beginning of the long dark winter. The Celts would extinguish their hearth fires early in the day. After the festival of Samhain (pronounced sow-in) was over, they would relight their hearth fires from the sacred bonfire to insure their protection in the coming winter. When the Romans conquered the Celts they also added parts to what has become our Halloween celebration. The Roman goddess Pomona (that's right Pomona, get over it.) the Roman god of fruits and trees, was incorporated into the Celtic Samhain tradition. (Perhaps where bobbing for apples came from?)
     On May 13, 609 A.D. Pope Boniface the IV, dedicated the Pantheon in Rome to all christian martyrs, and all Martyrs day was established, by the 700's A.D. the date was moved to November 1st. (Some say November 2nd)  and became All Saints day. The day before this event was designated All Hallows Eve.
     In some cultures the Night of All Hallows Eve was considered frightening, if not a dangerous time to walk abroad, as the spirits of the Dead may come and drag you away with them. Many cultures began wearing masks to walk about on this night so as to fool the spirits into thinking you were one of them. Somehow on the American continent the night also became about vandalism. And it wasn't until the 1950's that the traditional Halloween became a time for Family, celebration and trick or treating. It was thought that if you gave treats to the costumed folk who came to you door you could avoid the vandalism. In early America parades were organized and people began giving out food on the parade routes. Which over the years evolved into the current door to door sugar coma inducing event we now see.  Originally in early European cities food was placed in bowls on the doorsteps to placate the wandering spirits. (It's our guess here at The Crazy that many of these "wandering spirits" were starving folk who saw an opportunity for a meal.) Sadly for many of us, it seems that Halloween is slowly being eradicated. The traditions that started the holiday are steeped in superstition. And sadly many American cities are slowly shortening Trick or Treating to a few hours before dusk. How many of us remember going door to door till the wee hours of the morning trick or treating? If someone left their porch light on and their pumpkin lit they were fair game no matter what time of the night it was. 
     One interesting point about Halloween. It seems that the Jack-O-Lantern was originally carved out of a turnip. When many Irish immigrated to America in the 1800's they would carve out turnips in remembrance of Stingy Jack a man who trapped the devil in an apple tree. You can read the story HERE .They discovered the Pumpkin was much easier to carve and the current Jack-0-Lantern was born. So Happy Halloween to those of you who still love the oldest holiday still widely celebrated in America. Be sure to wear your mask when you go out. You never know if that shadow standing in the trees is a wandering spirit looking for someone to drag back to the land of the dead. That's about it, Ciao for now.

  

What to do... What to do...

It's been a a while since we posted here at The Crazy. We have been busy. Have you noticed how life sometimes comes up and bites you in the ass? Why is it that time (which supposedly keeps everything from happening at once.) sometimes seems to glitch, and suddenly everything is happening at once, it's as if some sort of problem imp suddenly sprang into existence and began creating problems for us. It's been a couple of weeks of putting out one (figurative) fire after another. The days have blurred into a miasma of gottado's, Gotta do this gotta do that. Usually when life overwhelms some of us here we find a way to slip away and spend a little quiet time reading, or driving. But lately it seems that life has decided that we are too busy to relax. Or are we? Didn't we spend four hours (probably more) watching television last night? Couldn't that time be spent doing something more constructive? Is watching television relaxing? Is it constructive? What did we get from it? Did we learn anything? Is simply being entertained a form of relaxation? It seems the things that we at The Crazy are entertained by are mostly fantasy worlds that have very little to do with reality. Do Olivia, Peter, Walter and Asterix (ha ha) have anything useful to teach us here in the real world.
We have watched every episode of Fringe since it's inception. 100 hours of television. 100 hours of our lives that we will never get back. The writers of the show are certainly imaginative. They have brought us to other universes and back. Made us wonder at the "Fringe" science the show often demonstrates. And certainly we have laughed at the acid induced thoughts of Walter as he brilliantly builds lasers out of CD players, or uses a pigs eye to defeat a retinal scanner.  If this was the only show we watched we'd probably not feel too bad, but unfortunately the glass teat does not let us suckle so leanly.  We have become enslaved to it's constant flow of inanity and charm. Sure with current DVR technology we can watch the shows when WE desire, but still our evenings are not our own. Grimm, Alphas, Warehouse 13 (which just went on hiatus until next year.) Are just a few of the creations that fill our nights with glossy eyed staring at the flickering screen that seems to have a life of it's own. And of course The Big Bang Theory (thankfully only a half hour long) fills us with laughter once a week. And then of course there are the movies, we are certainly movie freaks, we have watched hundreds of them (if not thousands) over the last couple of years. And no one would deny that watching Arsenic and Old Lace (a gem of a movie starring Cary Grant and Raymond Massey) is at least somewhat redeeming to the soul. (Do we have a soul? That question is for another blog.) But what if we stopped watching television entirely (deep inside of this writers psyche something just cried out in terror) what would we do. Play games perhaps, some of us here at The Crazy are board game fanatics. Does playing a board game have any redeeming qualities that television does not? Should we spend the time creatively? Perhaps building furniture, or painting?  Do we stop watching television entirely, or try to wean from the shows we currently find less than appealing. Could we finish watching Fringe (which is in it's last season) and be very careful not to fill that hour with another wildly entertaining, fun filled, thought provoking show. For those of you who watch reality television (the horror... the horror..) how does it feel to know that you are vicariously living THEIR lives and not your own?  These are all very meaningful questions, and we wish we had the time to answer them, but the Packer game is on soon, so it will have to wait for another time. Ciao for now.