While yesterday was a scramble, today was a convergence of riches. Not one, not two, but three Plan As. And so far, only one of them hasn’t worked.
First up was something I’d been wanting to try for a long time. It’s Uri Geller’s birthday. For those unfamiliar with UG, he’s a self-professed telekinesthetist. This might actually not be a real word, but I’m going with it. In any case, it’s said he practices telekinetic stuff. His website calls him a ‘mystifier’, but I grew up knowing him as The Spoon Bender. So, to celebrate his 74th birthday, I bent a spoon. Or rather I tried to.
Here’s a video of Uri doing his thing in 1974 with a roasting fork:
And here’s a video of Uri a couple of years ago giving instructions on how to bend a spoon (other breakfast cereal manufacturers are available):
And here’s my spoon. A perfectly ordinary teaspoon:
I found myself somewhere comfortable to sit and grounded myself for good measure. Then I believed in myself. I believed in myself hard. I held the spoon between my thumb and forefinger, and began to rub. I tried to envisage energy flowing through me into my fingertips and into the spoon to activate the atoms. I believed.
I rubbed. And I rubbed. And I rubbed.
And nothing happened. I wiggled the bowl of the spoon and it was just as solidly attached to the shaft as it had been to start with. Dreams of my becoming a spoon bending mystifier shattered, I laid my spoon back down on the table.
As you can see, there’s no difference in the before and after shots, other than I managed to get the spoon more in focus the second time. So it’s clear, even after a year of honing my psychic powers, I remain decidedly un-supernatural.
Which is why I’m pinning (pun intended) my hopes on this evening’s folklore, for it is also St Thomas’ Eve. And it’s said that on St Thomas’ Eve, if you stick pins in an onion and stash it under your pillow you’ll dream of your one true love. Again.
The pin thing is quite specific, you have to stab the onion through its exact centre, then form a ring of pins around the initial pin while intoning:
Good St Thomas, do me right
The Perpetual Almanack of Folklore
And let my true love come to-night
That I may see him in the face
And in my arms may him embrace.
Now, there was some discussion over whether the onion should be peeled or not. I went with unpeeled to limit the amount of onion juice leeching out via the pinpricks onto my fresh bedlinen. Which might not be quite in the spirit of things, but no-one needs the head of their bed to be smelling like an allium. The onion is now stashed and I shall report back tomorrow.
And lastly, it’s the last Sunday of Advent, so I got to light the final candle on my Advent crown. Third Sunday candle is still lopsided although hanging on in there, but Fourth Sunday candle is sitting pretty:
Three things. Three Plan As. Plus my wheat is going gangbusters. And here’s today’s AdVent:
Only 16 days left to go…
Resources
Cooper, Q. and Sullivan, P. (1994) Maypoles, Martyrs & Mayhem: 366 Days of British Myths, Customs & Eccentricities, London, Bloomsbury Publishing Plc
Kightly, C. (1994) The Perpetual Almanack of Folklore, London, Thames and Hudson Ltd.
Good old Uri, still rubbing into old age
😉