JulyChasingMoons

  The Obituary   I frequently make a joke about not reading the obituaries. I tell my friends that I am afraid that one day I will look at them and see my own name there. I will be in a deep quandary wondering if I am here or there.   In quiet moments, having made this comment, I find myself wondering what I might read there?   Many years ago, this actually happened to a person. He saw his death wrongly in the local paper. He read further to ascertain what they had written of him. The obituary notice began, Dynamite King Dies.”  He had been the inventor of dynamite in the western world. He asked himself if this was how he wanted to be remembered? The answer that came to him loud and clear was that this was not how he wanted to be remembered.   From that very day onward, he began working wherever possible to make peace. His name was Alfred Nobel. He is remembered today by the great prize he set up, “The Nobel Peace Prize.’      ...

Chasing Balloons  A group of 50 people were attending a conference about the search for happiness. The speaker stopped and started giving each person a balloon. Each one was asked to write his/her name on it using a marker pen. Then all the balloons were collected and put into a small adjoining room. You can easily imagine this little room filled with inflated balloons. The attendees were told to enter that room and asked to find the balloon which had their name written, within 5 minutes. Everyone was frantically searching for their name, pushing, colliding with each other, all trying so very hard to find their balloon. It was utter chaos.   After about five minutes of this one or two had managed to find their balloon. The speaker then said that each person was to go and collect one balloon and give it to the person whose name was written on it and on the label each person was wearing. Within minutes everybody had their balloon.  The reassembled grou...

Iona Weather I remembered while living on Iona a film crew arrived for a time. Very soon after their arrival, the rumour went around about old Calum the seer.  While the film crew was filming the old Gaelic, seer came hobbling by.  "Tomorrow rain," he informed them and hobbled on. Sure enough, it rained the very next day.  Again, he hobbled past:  "Tomorrow sunshine," he let them know, and it was indeed a fine sunny day the next day. The director was mighty impressed and got the crew to hire him and every day the wise old sage predicted accurately what the weather would be.  But after a couple of weeks, the old man didn't show up and eventually, the director found him in his bothy. "Hey, we need your predictions, why aren't you showing up?"  "Radio has broken," the old man replied. Beware where you lay your trust.   

Scotland The Brave In Scotland, we have a rather raw sense of humour that you either get or you do not. Today I share one or two examples. A young boy came home from school and told his mother he had been given a part in the school play. "Wonderful,"  says the mother,  "What part is it?"   The boy says,  "I play the part of the Scottish husband!"   The mother scowls and says:  "Go back and tell your teacher you want a speaking part."   There was a notice put up in the local bank.   "We would like to thank all our customers for baring with us through the recent refurbishment." (If you didn't spot the joke, the spell checker won't help either) And lastly. The Sunday School teacher asked her class if they would like to go to heaven? All the hands went up except little jimmy. "Do you not want to go to heaven Jimmy?' asked the teacher. "No," says Jimmy, " My...

Simple Things Hughie is in a terrible state and goes to see a private therapist, too terrified to go to a doctor in case they declare him mad. "So how can I help?" asks the therapist. "It's like this," says Hughie. "I’ve started getting these fears at night, and they are getting worse! I keep thinking somebody is under the bed, so I go down under it to look and no one's there. Then my brain tells me there's somebody on top of the bed and it goes on like this all night: under, top, under, top. It's driving me mental. I cannot get a moment's sleep!" The therapist thinks for a bit and says, "I am positive I can cure you of this. Now, I want you to come and see me twice a week for the next six months for a two-hour session each time." "And how much will that be?" asks Hughie. "£60 per session," the therapist informs him. Hughie leaves, troubled at the thought of all that money and goes for ...