DECK THE HOLIDAY'S

President Obama      The National Thanksgiving Turkey Presentation is an annual ceremony that takes place in the White House Rose Garden.  The tradition officially began in 1947, when members of the National Turkey Federation presented President Truman with the National Thanksgiving Turkey.  The ceremony allows the president to unofficially usher in the holiday season, and to reflect upon the meaning and value of the Thanksgiving holiday.  What makes this annual ritual so whimsical and memorable is that, for many years, the presidents has spared the life of the National Turkey by granting it a presidential "pardon".  Here are some fascinating facts about the National Thanksgiving Turkey Presentation.    President Clinton  It is believed that the tradition goes all the way back to the administration of President Abraham Lincoln.  As the story goes, President Lincoln spared the life of a turkey out of love and loyalty to his son, Ta...

   Almost every culture in the world has its own vampire legend, and some date back thousands of years.  Today, we are most familiar with Count Dracula and other folklore from Eastern Europe.  Do you want to learn more?  Here is a list of 13 juicy trivia facts to get your blood pumping with Halloween just about a day away.  Was the first vampire a woman?  The oldest known vampire legends come from Babylonian and Sumerian mythology.  Female demons called the Lilu were said to hunt women and children at night, and drink their blood. Vlad III Tepes , also known as Vlad Dracul , was known for his incredible cruelty, he was alleged to have killed up to 30,000 people at one time!  His blood thirsty reputation inspired Bram Stoker's Dracula . The National Retail Federation listed "Vampire" as the second most popular adult Halloween costume in 2005.  Vampires were the sixteenth most popular children's costume for the same year. While mo...

   The term ghost is widely used to refer to any paranormal activity that occurs in the home, but it is really a misnomer.  Ghosts or the spirits of those who have passed on may cause a paranormal disturbance in your home, but they are not the only cause of a haunting.  To determine the type of haunting, an understanding of different types of entities is necessary. Residual Ghosts -Residual ghosts are probably the most common type of haunting.  It is believed that when a traumatic or emotionally charged event occurs in the lives of the living that it can be imprinted on the environment.  Certain geological features like the presence of water, limestone and other stone features seem to hold images of past events.  The residual ghost is seen performing the same tasks, walking the same path or singing the same song at regular intervals.  The characteristic person searching for a lost love or walking passively through the area they inhabited whe...

Poveglia Island    Poveglia Island is a very small island that is located in Italy's Venetian Lagoon.  The island itself is rather "run of the mill".  It is covered with a smattering of foliage, as well as some run down buildings, a water tower and a bell tower that appears to be receding back into the foliage that surrounds it.  Poveglia Island is split in two by a small canal that runs straight through it.  The canal has walkways over it.  On one side, there are the deteriorating parts of the different buildings, on the other, nothing but greenery and grass.  However, there is a more interesting aspect of the island that one wouldn't suspect by looking at it, though some say, you can tell when you are there, and that is the island's supposedly sinister history.    Poveglia Island was once inhabited by a small community.  However the island was abandoned around 1380, during the War of Chioggia.  Later, as the Bubonic P...

   Scary games to play at home are perfect for Halloween.  Some games are scarier than others, but for an adult Halloween party, the scarier the better. Try one of these games to play at home at your adult Halloween Party.  Ouija Board     Of the scary games to play at home, the Ouija Board is by far one of the scariest, if no the scariest.  A Ouija Board is used to talk to spirits. Ouija Boards make alot of people squeemish.  There are experts who believe that the Ouija Board is dangerous.  Some psychiatric experts believe Ouija Boards are portals that free demons from other dimensions to prey on humans.  For brave souls that want some truly scary fun, the Ouija Board is it.  Fury of Dracula     Fury of Dracula is one of the scary games to play at home, designed by Stephen Hand.  In this board game, one player is Dracula and the rest are vampire hunters.  The goal is to destroy Dracula before he can...

   Like many other places in the world, Canada has its fair share of ghost tales and haunted buildings.   Gibraltar Point Lighthouse       Gibraltar Point Lighthouse on Toronto Islands was first constructed in 1803 and was totally finished and operational by 1809.  Local legend states it is haunted by the first lighthouse keeper, JP Radan Muller.  Muller had been murdered one misty night by drunken soldiers from Fort York, looking for bootleg beer.  The soldiers had cut Muller up and buried his body somewhere on the beach.  The soldiers were charged, but later acquitted.  In 1893, a cofin was found buried on the beach with a jaw bone still inside it, but it has never been known if it ever belonged to Muller.  The lighthouse, since time is no longer on the shore line and  the sand has built up,  it now lies 100 meters inland.  It's not being used and is boarded up, but people say on misty nights you ...

In his recent autobiography, Ernest Borgnine reveals that his friend George Lindsay, Goober on "The Andy Griffith Show", turned down the part of "Mr. Spock" on TV's "Star Trek".  Lindsay, by the way, started out as a science teacher. James Whale said his Frankenstein (1931 star, Boris Karloff.  "His face fascinated me.  I made drawings of his head, adding sharp bony ridges where I imagined the skull might have joined". The U.S. Air Force refused to help in the filming of Howard Hawks' The Thing (1951), because the theme of the movie was counter to the Air Force's claim that flying saucers don't exist.  In fact, one crew member (Dewey Martin) reads a quote from Air Force regulations denying flying saucers to the others as they are flying near the UFO crash site. In George Pal's War of the Worlds (1953), the unique Flying Wing aircraft that drops the atom bomb on the advancing Martians was a prototype and remains, to th...