In Our Community
Ever since I was a little boy, I was fascinated with magic. When my children were growing up, I had some magic tricks that I kept in a shoe box. When the occasion arose I could do some simple little tricks for the children and neighborhood kids.
There were several radio programs during the Golden Days of Radio that dealt with magic. One most notable was Mandrake the Magician. Mandrake was based on the King Features comic strip by Lee Falk, was syndicated in 1940, running in 15-minute serial format on WOR between November 11, 1940 and February 6, 1942. As in the strip, Mandrake lived with his servant Lothar, a giant who could "rip a crocodile's jaws apart or break the back of an anthropoid ape." They lived in a "house of mystery and many secrets." Mandrake, Lothar, and the beautiful Princess Narda battled evil elements, serving up generous portions of mysticism along the way. Raymond Edward Johnson, who would later gain fame as the host of Inner Sanctum Mysteries, played Mandrake. His voice was ideal as the man of a thousand secrets, whose chant "invovo legem magicarum" involved the laws of magic and set into play the bag of tricks. Listen to AM 1370 KDTH's Big Broadcast from 6 to Midnight on Sunday nights during April and you will hear the mystical sounds of Mandrake the Magician. Hospice of Dubuque
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Coin on Ice
Here’s a hack for knowing if your freezer lost power for an extended time while you were away from home. I’m old enough that when I see the word “hack” the cutting of weeds with a swing of a sharp blade first comes to mind. The newer meaning of the word “hack” is a “clever tip or technique for doing or improving something” (Merriam-Webster). So, here’s a clever tip or technique for knowing if your freezer lost power for a long period of time.
Put a plastic cup filled with water in the freezer. When it’s frozen, place a coin on the ice. When you return home after an extended time away and the coin is at the bottom of the ice, you know the contents of the freezer thawed and then re-froze. You would then know that there’s the possibility the food contents were thawed long enough to have gone bad. What an idea! I would like to shake the hand of the person who thought up this hack. Finding the coin at the bottom of the cup would be dismaying – it might mean throwing out the contents of the freezer. However, it’s better to know about the prolonged thaw than not know. As I write this, we’re away from our home. Yes, there’s a cup of ice with a coin on it in our freezer! I’ve added this hack to a long list of ways I’m warned in my life about possible dangers, threats, or failures of different devices. There’s the smoke alarm’s low battery beep, the check engine light on our car, the report from my doctor on my latest exam, and too many more to itemize. We have a love/hate relationship with warning messages. We don’t want to see the alarming messages, but we know ignoring them can prove harmful. We’ve come to see the value of warning devices and messages for many aspects of our lives, but how about life itself? Are we open to warnings and corrections to our thoughts, attitudes, speech, and actions? Hopefully we are if we don’t want to invite additional troubles, disaster, and sin. Where do these warnings and corrections come from? They come from our own conscience, the input of others, the good and bad examples of others, and from God. Looking at this list there’s only one source that’s perfect, always true and right, and that source is God. When we seek to be open to His input, direction, and even correction then He helps us deal properly with our conscience and the input and example of others. And how do we know what God thinks? My experience and that of countless others is that we can know God’s thoughts by reading, reflecting on, and applying His Word, the Bible. Socrates is reported to have said that “the unexamined life is not worth living.” Being open to the process of self-examination of one’s life is not always fun, but it’s wise to do so, and ultimately proves beneficial. The coin on the ice started me thinking about this. “Whoever conceals their sins does not prosper, but the one who confesses and renounces them finds mercy” (Proverbs 28:13). “Good morning, afternoon, or evening, whenever you are reading this fantastic, people friendly newspaper, you will discover some nostalgic data, as well as the newest happenings printed within The Golden View.
Before I share a short story with you, I will set the stage for why the idea to share a memory came about. Have you ever wondered why some television stations carry shows from the past? Take for instance the long running shows of Perry Mason and Gunsmoke. They appeared in the 50's. Then there was Leave It To Beaver and that ran from 10/57-9/63. These shows, as well as many other programs from long ago, are now being aired again. A lot of people are watching these shows or else the stations would not be airing them. People are hungry for shows that actually entertain them and are usually free from downers. Maybe they could be classified as nostalgic, but the shows I allowed my children to watch are now watched by my grandchildren and their children. They are in style nowadays. As aforementioned, this story came to mind while writing this article. I think the nostalgia of old TV shows stimulated my interest in the past. My basic career was in the office field and I became an expert digital typist. I often worked in offices with many other women. One such job blended me with seven other women working within a company that owned the building where I worked. The company occupied the entire 2nd, 4th, and 7th floors. The women I worked with were from the ages of 20 to 47. We all got along fine and often went to lunch together. I bonded with a peer that was my age and we became good friends. She had a boyfriend named Floyd and he was a 6 feet tall, robust Fireman. Millie, my friend, was 5'4", had blond hair and big brown eyes. They looked “cute” together. Floyd drove a black Cadillac. It was not a new car but he always bought a Cadillac. When Millie drove his car, she looked like a little kid behind the wheel. One evening Millie and her boy Floyd came by my apartment and I served them coffee and cake, as I usually did when friends visited me. I put Floyd’s coffee on an end table. He was a smoker but neither Millie nor I had the habit so I hadn’t put out any ashtrays. I soon noticed Floyd head toward the coffee table in front of my sofa and Millie saw the glare in my eyes. She knew I was a very fussy housekeeper. I had placed three decorative dishes on the coffee table. Floyd saw Millie looking at me, then he tilted his head, looked at me and said, “that isn’t an ashtray is it?” Before answering him, I scrambled to my feet and grabbed something to catch the ashes. I can’t seem to remember what I grabbed but I got it under the cigarette before the ashes dropped off. We all got a laugh out of that simple incident. Floyd and Millie got married and we became lifetime friends. I think this is a fine memory, not nostalgic, but a really heartfelt feeling of friendship created out of a silly mishap. |