Who's Buried in Grant's Tomb?

Trick question? You bet. The answer is no one. The General Grant National Memorial, commonly called Grant's Tomb located in New York City's Riverside Park, is a mausoleum. One gets entombed, not buried, in a mausoleum. Semantics aside, saying Ulysses Grant would be only half correct as entombed next to him is his wife.

The "correct" answer has led to the untrue belief that no bodies are interred there. But then, aporcypha abounds among us.

From the Greek for hidden away, apocrypha originally referred to Biblical books considered by the canonical powers as not divinely inspired, i.e. the Gnostic gospels. The word's definition has expanded to mean anything spurious.

Another classic example is the idea that before Columbus' voyage in 1492, people believed that the earth was flat. Since ancient times, most knew the earth was round. A century before the birth of Christ, Eratosthenes calculated the world's circumference within 100 miles of the actual figure. Even the common man could look at the unobstructed horizon and notice the earth's curvature.

The "world is flat" theory became popular after Washington Irving's 1828 biography of Columbus. An inveterate story-teller, Irving wouldn't let facts interfere with a good plot device. I concur.

Other facetious facts include Ben Franklin's support of daylight saving time. He mentioned it in a letter as a jab at the French habit of sleeping late. He did not mean for the idea to be taken seriously. Unlike Paron Weems' stories about George Washington. Weems coined the cherry tree story. His goal was to immortalize Washington as an American-Augustan demi-god.


Why does ever-gullible man take such pleasure in these tales? I believe it's an atavistic predisposition. Some chromosomal link to ancestors sitting watching the fire's shadows play on cave walls as the tribal storyteller weaves his verbal tapestry. Intrinsically, we are as credulous as those cavemen. Our technology has advanced, but we still delight in a good story and passing them on to others. It would be more romantic relating them around glowing embers as opposed to opening and/or sending an email.

To debunk some popular emails which people enjoy sending me: the word shit in not an acronym for shipping manure, Captain Kangaroo did not rescue injured fellow Marine Lee Marvin on Iwo Jima and displaying the middle finger as an insult has nothing to do with the Battle of Agincourt. - As ever BB

"There are people so addicted to exaggeration they can't tell the truth without lying."  ~Josh Billings*

*Pen name of 19th century humorist, Henry Wheeler Shaw - no relation

Did You Hear the One About?

Last night...New Orleans...Midnight...the police announce that Mardi Gras had ended and begin clearing the streets. Ash Wednesday had begun and with it Lent.

Easter is the first Sunday after the first Full Moon after the Vernal Equinox. Lent, a period of fasting, penance, retrospection and alms-giving begins 40 days before that. Well, kind of...today is March 9 and Easter is April 24. If you do the math, that's 46 days. Sundays don't count as Lenten Days. (Note: this is Roman Catholic. There are slight differences in the observance by other denominations and the orthodox churches).

Lent ends on Easter Sunday. Again, sort of...as of the Second Vatican Council, Good Friday and Holy Saturday are no longer considered Lent, but part of the Easter Triduum. Confused yet?  Just take two stations of the cross and call me in the morning.

As an altar boy, I enjoyed serving Mass between Holy Thursday and Easter Sunday. In respect for Christ's suffering, the sanctus bell is replaced by the crotalus (clapper in the vernacular). Getting the full sound out of this required subtle wrist action.


The only thing cooler was being a thurifer. You had to know how to swing the thurible to keep the incense from falling out and burning properly. The thurifer (just love using that word) also had to know the sequence of swings. At Christ the King, those who screwed up felt the wrath of Monseigneur McIntyre especially if you were his grand-nephew - lucky me.

So begins the celebration of the passion of Christ. On Good Friday, he was crucified, died and was buried. On the third day, the stone of the sepulcher was rolled away, he arose and walked out. If he sees his shadow, it's six more weeks of Lent.

Quite a lead in, just to relate one of the most sacrilegious jokes I know- as ever BB

"God is a comedian playing to an audience too afraid to laugh."  - Voltaire

Answers?

"Any answers? Any questions? Any rags, any bones, any bottles today?" - Groucho Marx as Professor Wagstaff in Horse Feathers


From Plato's academy to Wagstaff's Huxley College, man has pondered the answers to life's great mysteries. But as Douglass Adam's wrote when ultimate answer (42) was solved, we then have to figure out the question.

In ancient Greece, wandering scholars, known as sophoi, provided education for money. Plato abhorred what he saw as specious scholastics. He preferred philosophers, literally "lovers of wisdom," who gave freely of their knowledge. A related debate wages today, but both sides doth reek more of power than prudence.

Metaphysics deals with the first principles of things. It looks ontologically at the existence of being and epistemologically at how we know being.  Can universals exist in reality, or merely as concepts? Empiricism versus skepticism versus existentialism - as Jefferson Airplane sang, "The human name doesn't mean shit to a tree."

Philosophical debates tangle in the rhizome of man's ego. The Buddha illustrated this in his Flower Sermon offering a blossom rather than expressing a rational creed.


Western thought focuses more on control than knowledge. Ken Kesey addressed this concept in the screenplay, Over the Border, encapsulated in his collection, Garage Sale. In it, he ponders the great question, "How does this thing run?" Which inevitably leads to the next question, "How do I drive it?" Finally comes the ultimate interrogatory, "How the hell do I get off it?"

Man still embraces the hubris of Icarus...as ever - BB

"The answer is never the answer. What's really interesting is the mystery. The need for mystery is greater than the need for an answer." - Ken Kesey