Happy Thanksgiving, Buddy!

A Few Sexy Men - Glee

A few of the men from Glee made People's Magazine Sexiest Men Alive 2009 article.

The stars of Glee – Cory Monteith, 27; Matthew Morrison, 31; and Mark Salling, 27, hit the Vegas strip for their sexy shoot.

The good news is with the actors' ages, what could have been my cougar-crush on Puck is actually legal!

Dear Glee Director, please have more songs starring Puck with his guitar. kthxbye.

Spelunking

That's right. I went spelunking (you know, one of Carmen Sandiego's interests). Boy, I never thought I would be able to use that vocabulary word again!

On my recent visit to the tri-state area of D.C., Maryland, and Virginia. I explored Luray Caverns located in the Shenandoah Valley of Virginia.

Luray Caverns are the largest and most popular caverns in Eastern America. Luray Caverns began to form more than 4,000,000 centuries ago. Stalactites in Luray Caverns continue to form at a rate of one cubic inch every 120 years.

Okay, so it wasn't exactly spelunking: Luray Caverns have paved, well-lighted walkways winding through 1.25 miles of Luray Caverns. And as the website says, "Comfortable paved walkways lead visitors through inspiring chambers magnificently sculpted with countless stalactites and stalagmites."

Here are some of the photos I took of the exploration:

All coloration in Luray Caverns is natural, caused by the mineral content of the seeping ground water. The formation of Luray Caverns began after the limestone of the Shenandoah Valley was formed as a result of the inland sea. The enclosing rocks consist of granular crystalline dolomite belonging to the lower part of the Beekmantown dolomite of Early Ordovician age. The entire cavern is confined to a zone only about 100 feet thick and occurred in coarse-grained crystalline dolomite.

DREAM LAKE:
This is the largest body of water in the caverns. However, its deepest point is not more than 18 to 20 inches. This sparkling lake reflects a myriad of fantastic forms and creates a mirror image of the abundant stalactites hanging from the ceiling.

PLUTO'S CHASM:
Pluto's Chasm was the main horizontal channel in the caverns as water dissolved and eroded layer upon layer of limestone during the formation of these huge chambers over 400,000 years ago. Different solution levels left by the seeping water remain visible along the far wall. Acidic reactions from these accumulations of water will dissolve up to one-tenth of an inch of limestone per year in some caves. This chasm is over 500 feet long, and is 70 to 90 feet in depth.

SARACEN'S TENT: (with a fallen stalagtite)

Appearing as smooth and flowing as a curtain folded by hand, this formation is one of the most perfectly formed stone drapery structures in the world. The translucent sheets appear to have been parted, tent-like, for an entranceway.

STONE DRAPERY (close-up)

From the Smithsonian report of July 1880 – “there is nothing more beautiful in the cave than these scarfs, shawls, lambrequins of translucent calcite, some white as snow, others impregnated with the impurities of the soil above, falling in graceful folds, fringed with a thousand patterns, and so thin that a candle held behind one of them reveals all the structure within.”

TITANIA'S VEIL:
This shimmering white formation is pure calcite, the result of spreading crystalline deposits. These deposits, commonly called flowstone, spread laterally coating walls or ceilings. The Smithsonian Institution commented, “Here in this studio of nature are reproductions of all those objects which are wont to fill the mind with pleasure, wonder – objects whose multiplicity, variety and splendor would exhaust the whole literature of mythic and fairy lore in providing names for their infinite diversity of beauty.” Titania's Veil was named for Shakespeare's Fairy Queen from his play A Midsummer Night's Dream.

TOTEM POLES:

This cluster together is said to resemble totem poles. The poles illustrate how variable water and growth patterns can create gravity defying shapes. Many visitors see other objects within the shapes including an old-fashioned barber's shaving brush.

STALACTITE STRAWS:
Every stalactite begins with a single mineral-laden drop of water. When the drop falls, it leaves behind the thinnest ring of calcite. Each subsequent drop that forms and falls deposits another calcite ring. Eventually, these rings form a very narrow, hollow tube commonly known as a "soda straw" stalactite. Soda straws can grow quite long, but are very fragile.

CALCITE (close-up):

All formations in the caverns are calcite, a crystalline form of limestone, the result of limestone dissolved in water then re-deposited in the hollowed-out underground chambers as stalactites and stalagmites. Calcite in its purest form is naturally white.

SHAGGY DOG/WOOLLY MAMMOTH:
Like the totem poles, this large formation draws attention because many visitors see a resemblance of a shaggy dog or woolly mammoth. His head is to the left.

FRIED EGGS:
Thousands of natural curiosities and irregularly shaped objects can regularly be observed along the tour route like the "Fried Eggs." The audio tour said they weren't sure how these formed, but they think wear the "eggs" sit used to be two stalagmites that broke off and tourists would rub them for good luck (of course, now, you are not allowed to touch anything in the caverns).

STALACPIPE ORGAN:
Located in the Cathedral is the Great Stalacpipe Organ, the world's largest musical instrument. Stalactites covering 3 1/2 acres of the surrounding caverns produce tones of symphonic quality when electronically tapped by rubber-tipped mallets. This one-of-a-kind instrument was conceived by Mr. Leland W. Sprinkle.

Today, the organ, featured on Ripley's Believe It or Not, plays a variety of songs, many chosen for their range and deep, resonate tones. Visitors stand enthralled as haunting melody and chords reverberate throught the vaulted ceilings. Listen to it now:

Happy Friday the 13th!

An estimated 17 to 21 million people in the United States are affected by a fear of Friday the 13th. Some people are so paralyzed by fear that they avoid their normal routines in doing business, taking flights or even getting out of bed. It's been estimated that $800 or $900 million is lost in business on this day.

But why? What in history dictates this fear?

According to folklorists, there is no written evidence for a Friday the 13th superstition before the 19th century. The earliest known documented reference in English occurs in an 1869 biography of Gioachino Rossini:

• [Rossini] was surrounded to the last by admiring and affectionate friends; and if it be true that, like so many other Italians, he regarded Friday as an unlucky day, and thirteen as an unlucky number, it is remarkable that on Friday, the 13th of November, he died.

However, some folklore is passed on through oral traditions. Since determining the origins of superstitions is an inexact science (it's mostly just guesswork), several theories have been proposed about the origin of the Friday the 13th superstition.

One theory states that it is a modern amalgamation of two older superstitions: that thirteen is an unlucky number and that Friday is an unlucky day. Here's what I found on Wikipedia:

• In numerology, the number twelve is considered the number of completeness, as reflected in the twelve months of the year, twelve signs of the zodiac, twelve hours of the clock, twelve tribes of Israel, twelve Apostles of Jesus, twelve gods of Olympus, etc., whereas the number thirteen was considered irregular, transgressing this completeness. There is also a superstition, thought by some to derive from the Last Supper or a Norse myth, that having thirteen people seated at a table will result in the death of one of the diners.
• Friday has been considered an unlucky day at least since the 14th century's The Canterbury Tales, and many other professions have regarded Friday as an unlucky day to undertake journeys or begin new projects. Black Friday has been associated with stock market crashes and other disasters since the 1800s. It has also been suggested that Friday has been considered an unlucky day because, according to Christian scripture and tradition, Jesus was crucified on a Friday.

On the other hand, another theory by author Charles Panati, one of the leading authorities on the subject of origins, maintains that the superstition can be traced back to ancient myth:

• The actual origin of the superstition appears also to be a tale in Norse mythology. Friday is named for Frigga, the free-spirited goddess of love and fertility. When Norse and Germanic tribes converted to Christianity, Frigga was banished in shame to a mountaintop and labeled a witch. It was believed that every Friday, the spiteful goddess convened a meeting with eleven other witches, plus the devil - a gathering of thirteen - and plotted ill turns of fate for the coming week. For many centuries in Scandinavia, Friday was known as "Witches' Sabbath."

Another theory about the origin of the superstition traces the event to the arrest of the legendary Knights Templar. According to one expert:

• The Knights Templar were a monastic military order founded in Jerusalem in 1118 C.E., whose mission was to protect Christian pilgrims during the Crusades. Over the next two centuries, the Knights Templar became extraordinarily powerful and wealthy. Threatened by that power and eager to acquire their wealth, King Philip secretly ordered the mass arrest of all the Knights Templar in France on Friday, October 13, 1307 - Friday the 13th.