I know that I’ve mentioned the state of Maine many times in this blog but it’s time to tell you a little more about it. I moved here in 1999 from the not-so-great state of Massachusetts. I’ve traveled a lot during my life and lived in a number of states but I have to say out of all them Maine is the best. It’s called America’s “Vacation Land” because it seems like everyone wants to come here in the warm months and enjoy the beaches, the wilderness, the lighthouses, the lobsters and the simpler way of living. With that in mind I thought I’d share with you the following list. As you read each of these entries add these words to the end of each sentence, “You must live in Maine.”

• If your local Dairy Queen is closed from September through May . . .

• If someone in a Home Depot store offers you assistance and they don’t even work there . . .

• If you had a lengthy telephone conversation with someone who dialed a wrong number . . .

• If you measure distance in hours . . .

• If you know several people who’ve hit a deer or moose more than once . . .

• If you switched from heat to AC in the same day and then back again . . .

• If you can drive 75 miles through 2 feet of snow during a blizzard for beer without flinching . . .

• If you install security lights on your house and garage, but leave both unlocked . . .

• If you carry jumper cables in your car and your wife actually knows how to use them . . .

• If you design your kid’s Halloween costume to fit over a snowsuit . . .

• If driving is better in the winter because the potholes are filled with snow . . .

• If you know all four seasons: almost Winter, Winter, still Winter, and road construction . . .

• If you have more miles on your snowblower than your car . . .

• If you find 10° just a little chilly . . .

Well there you have it. Everything you ever want to know about Maine but were afraid to ask. We’re already preparing for winter and since we had such a mild one last year we’re expecting the worst. If you like snow shoveling, ice fishing, skiing, snowmobiling, cross-country skiing, and falling on your ass on a daily basis . . . come spend your winter in Maine.

THE WAY LIFE OUGHT TO BE

INTERESTING TOILET FACTS

• The most impossible item to flush is a ping-pong ball.

• The first toilet air freshener was a pomegranate stuffed with cloves.

• Psycho was the first Hollywood film that showed a toilet flushing – thereby generating many complaints.

• The idea of separate cubicles for toilets is a relatively modern invention; Romans, for example, sat down together in large groups.

• The town Council of Cheltenham Spa once voted to replace the words Men and Women on their public toilets with Ladies and Gentlemen in order to” attract a better class of person.”

• Before the invention of toilet paper, people use shells or stones, bunches of herbs or, at best, a bit of sponge attached to a stick, which they rinsed with cold water.

• Hermann Goring refused to use regulation toilet paper and used to bulk-buy soft white handkerchiefs instead.

• In 1986, Nathan Hicks of St. Louis, Missouri, shot his brother Herbert dead because he used six toilet rolls in two days.

• The world’s oldest piece of toilet paper – thought to be 1200 years old – was found buried under an Israeli garage.

• And last but not least, Elvis Presley, Judy Garland, and Lenny Bruce all died on the toilet.

TOILET QUOTE

“You know that it is by the state of the lavatory that a family is judged.” (Pope John XXIII)

This completes my first Trivia Week. I hope everyone enjoyed this bizarre collection of facts as much as I did collecting them. I may have to do this again in the future because I have many more of these tidbits to share.

TRIVIA RULES