Tell me frankly what came to your mind when you read the story title Jennifer Lopez names her twins?
Tch, tch, tch. You guys are bad. But I am not like you. I guessed it right and I wish her well.
Once in a while it helps to laugh. They told me to laugh. Be happy.
For me it is a prescription medicine. If I don’t take it, my readers will notice that there is something missing in my writing. Like salt is less or altogether absent in the soup.
It was one of those weeks, when bills to be paid are fast approaching and there are no payments due to me on the horizon. Being cheerful was a tall order. But suddenly we get this unexpected order from a customer. The margin was very low but at least it would help with the cash flow. So I went to pick up the check. I was told it would be ready with the secretary to pick up. The secretary was a lady in her mid fifties. Seeing me tired and worn out, she said to me, “Big check you got their man. Cheer up. But don’t go to the strip joint tonight. I will get to know, ‘cos I work there part-time!”
That surely made me laugh. But the news story Gandhi ‘is myth’, Churchill ‘made up’ didn’t make me laugh, but it started me thinking. How is it that a nation like Great Britain with a long history, (on whose empire once the Sun never set), allowed its citizens to neglect history and believe Churchill never existed and that his story was ‘made up’. A nation that believes Sherlock Holmes really lived on Baker Street may as well believe the following:
Captain Jack Sparrow really ruled the Caribbean seas and Johnny Depp would ‘rightly’ be identified as Captain Jack Sparrow and Sean Connery would pass off as King Richard, the Lion Heart in their history quiz. Or they will name Tom Cruise as the Japanese Samurai known to them. In the same breath their greatest hero Horatio Nelson will either go unnoticed or denied existence.
Given the fact that TV entertainment has such a hold on their daily lives, the only way to make UK citizens to discern fact from fiction is through game shows like ‘who wants to be a millionaire’. Even if the participant may not know the answer, at least his(her) buddy will get a chance to Google and verify the existence of such great leaders.
Who wants to read the history books when there is a chance to become a millionaire!