Odds of Dying

http://www.mjoesormen.no/deeldstebeskrivelseravormen.htm

Your lifetime odds of dying …

  • on a streetcar: 1 in 1,230,975
  • through burning or melting of nightwear: 1 in 738,585
  • in a discharge of fireworks: 1 in 615,488
  • in an earthquake: 1 in 131,890
  • through contact with hornets, wasps, or bees: 1 in 85,882
  • by lightning: 1 in 83,930
  • due to a cave-in or falling earth: 1 in 65,945
  • through contact with hot tap water: 1 in 64,788
  • in a legal execution: 1 in 58,618
  • by falling, jumping, or being pushed from a high place: 1 in 47,960
  • while riding an animal: 1 in 31,836
  • by drowning in the bathtub: 1 in 11,469
  • in a fall involving a bed, a chair, or other furniture: 1 in 5,031

Chance of dying in an assault by firearm: 1 in 325. Of shooting yourself: 1 in 219.

| Death

Backhanded Letters of Reference

What to write in a slacker’s letter of reference:

  • “You would be fortunate to get this person to work for you.”
  • “No one would be better for this position.”
  • “He doesn’t care how many hours he must put in.”
  • “There is nothing you can teach him.”
  • “I refer him with no qualifications whatsoever.”
  • “Waste no time in making him an offer.”

“All in all, I cannot say enough good things about this candidate or recommend him too highly.”

| Language

Spring Heeled Jack

http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Jack2.jpg

A villain worthy of DC Comics, Spring Heeled Jack leapt liberally around England between 1837 and 1904, attacking isolated victims who described him as a muscular devil in an oilskin.

If he was the devil, he wasn’t a very ambitious criminal, generally just crashing carriages and groping women. But he could jump 9-foot walls, perhaps using spring-loaded footgear, judging from some ill-preserved prints.

An anonymous letter implied that a human prankster was terrorizing London on a bet, and incidental reports began to mount. In 1838 four witnesses saw him breathe fire and jump to the roof of a house, and in 1845 he threw a 13-year-old prostitute from a bridge, his first killing. On the night of Feb. 8, 1855, long trails of hooflike prints were seen in the snow throughout Devon, crossing roofs, walls, and haystacks. By 1873 thousands were gathering each night to hunt the ghost.

Nothing seemed to stop him, including bullets, and he even attacked a group of soldiers at Aldershot Barracks in 1877. He was last spotted in 1904 in Liverpool, leaping over a crowd of witnesses and disappearing behind some neighboring houses.

There’s no good explanation. Some suspected the Marquess of Waterford, who was known to spring on travelers to amuse himself, but the attacks continued after his death. Others have suggested a stranded extraterrestrial, a visitor from another dimension, or a real demon. We’ll never know.

| History · Oddities

Shaggy Dog Story

A man is looking for a new pet, so he goes to the pet store and asks the owner if he has a dog. The owner shows him a few dogs, but the man isn’t interested. Suddenly the pet store owner has a thought.

“I know just the dog for you,” he says, and he goes to the last kennel in the row. “Isn’t that the shaggiest dog you ever saw?”

“Why, yes, that is the shaggiest dog I ever saw!” says the man. “I should take him to show my wife! I’ll buy him.”

The man buys the dog and takes him home to his wife.

“I bought a dog today,” he says. “Isn’t that the shaggiest dog you ever saw?”

“Why, yes, that is the shaggiest dog I ever saw!” says his wife. “You should take it to show the minister!”

“You’re right,” says the man, and he takes the dog to see the minister.

“I bought a dog today,” he says. “Isn’t that the shaggiest dog you ever saw?”

“Why, yes, that is the shaggiest dog I ever saw!” says the minister. “You should take it to show the mayor!”

“You’re right,” says the man, and he takes the dog to see the mayor.

“I bought a dog today,” he says. “Isn’t that the shaggiest dog you ever saw?”

“Why, yes, that is the shaggiest dog I ever saw!” says the mayor. “You should take it to show the governor-general!”

“You’re right,” says the man, and he takes the dog to see the governor-general.

“I bought a dog today,” he says. “Isn’t that the shaggiest dog you ever saw?”

“Why, yes, that is the shaggiest dog I ever saw!” says the governor-general. “You should take it to show the queen!”

“You’re right,” says the man, and he takes the dog to see the queen.

“I bought a dog today,” he says. “Isn’t that the shaggiest dog you ever saw?”

The queen says, “No.”

| Humor

The Yak

http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Yak_Drawing_historic.jpg

As a friend to the children commend me the Yak,
You will find it exactly the thing:
It will carry and fetch, you can ride on its back,
Or lead it about with a string.
The Tartar who dwells on the plains of Thibet
(A desolate region of snow)
Has for centuries made it a nursery pet,
And surely the Tartar should know!
Then tell your papa where the Yak can be got,
And if he is awfully rich
He will buy you the creature — or else he will not.
(I cannot be positive which.)

— Hilaire Belloc

| Humor · Poems

Dickens and Eliot

http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:George_Eliot_3.jpg

A revealing letter of Charles Dickens to George Eliot, 1858:

Dear Sir:

I have been so strongly affected by the two first tales in the book you have had the kindness to send me through Messrs. Blackwood, that I hope you will excuse my writing to you to express my admiration of their extraordinary merit. The exquisite truth and delicacy, both of the humor and the pathos of the stories, I have never seen the like of; and they have impressed me in a manner that I should find it very difficult to describe to you, if I had the impertinence to try.

In addressing these few words of thankfulness to the creator of the sad fortunes of Mr. Amos Barton, and the sad love-story of Mr. Gilfil, I am (I presume) bound to adopt the name that it pleases that excellent writer to assume. I can suggest no better one; but I should have been strongly disposed, if I had been left to my own devices, to address the said writer as a woman. I have observed what seems to me to be such womanly touches, in those moving fictions, that the assurance on the title-page is insufficient to satisfy me, even now. If they originated with no woman, I believe that no man ever before had the art of making himself, mentally, so like a woman, since the world began. …

| Literature