Santa Claus Is Stalking Me

[Warning: No Sports Content Whatsoever]

At 10:10 this morning, I got a call on my cell phone with a number I did not recognize and the name "Santa Claus" on the screen. This makes a little bit of sense at first, but then it stops making sense and makes me think I am going to be killed by a reindeer very soon.

Last week, I was babysitting for my sister's children. My nephew was being stubborn when he went to bed and said he didn't want to pray, not even for his mom on Mothers' Day. So I told him I was going to call Santa Claus and tell him. He said he didn't believe me and I told him I'd show him in the morning.

He is not the kind of kid who would forget this type of thing, so before he got up in the morning, I added an entry for Santa in my phone: cell, home and work numbers, email, address...the works. So I showed it to my nephew and he insisted he didn't believe it was real, but was really quiet for a while too.

So I do have an entry for Santa Claus in my cell phone, so if someone at that number called me, that name would show up on the screen. The numbers I entered for my fake Santa entries were a made-up number, my cell number, and my home number with the area code "1-225"...get it? 12/25. I just checked, that happens to be the area code for Baton Rouge, Louisiana.

So you would think that someone from Baton Rouge mistakenly called me this morning, right? Or they were calling random people with the same cell number as them in other area codes, right? And it is just an amazing coincidence that this happened 5 days after I happened to enter their number into my phone (but never actually called it), right?

Here's where it gets creepy. The name on the screen said "Santa Claus," but the number that was calling was not any of the three numbers I have saved into my phone in the Santa Claus listing. And I do not have this number saved into my phone at all, so it should have popped up as "Unknown Caller," but instead it said "Santa Claus." What the hell?

Am I in the middle of a Christmas-themed horror movie? Just in case, I want to say to my wife that I love her and to Kate Beckinsale that I am sorry it never worked out for us.

Actually, A Duck's Quack Does Echo

I have long felt that Mythbusters is one of the cooler shows on TV, but in the last two weeks, it has become my favorite show. Why? Because where else do people test out urban legends that you've always wondered about, then just blow everything to hell at the end regardless of if it applies to the legend or not, and wrap it all up with a bow made of drunkenness?

Last week, they were testing to see if a sighted passenger could safely navigate for a blind driver (yes), and then they tested if the same sighted passenger could get drunk and still safely navigate for the same blind driver (no). So in the middle of the tests, the guy had to just sit down on the curb and drink a quarter of a bottle of Jack Daniels.

Today I saw an episode where they tested whether various methods could fool a breathalyzer test. Of course to accurately tell if that was happening, they first had to fail a breathalyzer test. So they had thirteen drinks (though they were never clear if they shared thirteen drinks or if it was thirteen each) and both blew over the legal limit. They then blew again after eating breath mints (no), taking a bite of an onion (no), putting denture cream in their mouths (no), gargling mouthwash (no!), and holding either a battery (no) or a couple of pennies (no) in their mouths.

This was after they tested if medieval villagers could have A) built a functional cannon out of a hollowed log (yes), and B) all been killed when the cannon later blew up (yes).

Educational and entertaining!

Here's a quick list of those myths they tested that I can remember:
You can't polish poo (no)
Phonebooks with interlocking pages are nearly inseparable (yes)
You can blow up an oxygen tank with a bullet...think Jaws (no)
You can blow up a propane tank with a bullet...think James Bond (no)
You can cut through the floor with bullets (no)
You can blow a hole in a wall with sodium and water...think MacGyver (no)
You can cut down a tree with bullets (sorta)
A child could float away with a pack of helium balloons (no...unless the pack is mansion-sized)
Ping pong balls can be used to raise a sunken ship (yes)
Poppy seed bagels can make you test positive for heroine...think Elaine from Seinfeld (yes)
Metal golf spikes attract lighting (no)
Breast implants will explode at high altitude (no)
Hot pepper pain remedies: milk (yes), water (no), tequila (no), toothpaste (no), beer (no)
Using a cell phone while pumping gas will cause an explosion (no)
Running in the rain keeps you drier than walking (no and then retested...yes)
Tesla's hand-held earthquake machine could destroy the Brooklyn bridge in an hour (no)
A can of beans on a hot stove could explode and kill you (yes)
A dog's mouth is cleaner than a human's (yes)
Yawning is contagious (yes)
A cowboy could shoot a man's hat off of his head (no)
Jet wash from a 747 could flip a: taxi (yes), school bus (yes), small plane (yes)

But this is supposed to be a sports blog, so here you go:
Helium will cause punts to travel further (no)
You can hit the cover off of a baseball (no)
Corked bats hit balls harder (no)
Sliding into a base you can't overrun is faster than not sliding (yes)
Humidifiers cut down how far baseballs are hit (yes)
A fastball can actually rise (no)
Jimmy Hoffa is buried at Giants Stadium (no)

It is on Discovery; I have no idea when thanks to my DVR, but seriously it is the best show on TV, so go find it (reruns are ubiquitous on Discovery).

Accountability Means The Ability To Steal From Bank Accounts, Right?

I lost my wallet on Wednesday and before I was able to get home, look up the number and call the credit card company to cancel it, someone found my wallet and made a few charges on my card.

The credit card company took the charges off and all is well, but I found it really funny what it was that this a-hole paid for with my card. Let's play multiple choice:

A: Flowers for an elderly loved one
B: A donation to a children's hospital
C: Clothing and food for a homeless shelter
D: The phone bill for a federal inmate

If you guessed A, B or C, I appreciate your faith in humanity.

I went to the website of the company that does the billing for the inmates and guess what their little tagline is: "Integrity, Responsiveness, Accountability." Ah, the irony.