Easter facts

1. Not only are we on the cusp of Easter today, it is also the Iraninan New Year, Nowruz. My coworker Arta had to wake up at 5 AM this morning to wish her family, who are visiting London, a happy new year.
2. When I was 4 my birthday was on Easter Sunday. It snowed, my grandma made me a special tunnel cake filled with chocolate pudding (she burned her first two tries and was very grouchy by the time the third was completed. Each ruined cake got thrown into the driveway which made the very cold birds in our neighborhood very happy.) I got a purple bike with a white plastic basket and training wheels.
3. When I was 10 my birthday was on Easter Sunday again. My Mom made me a cake in the shape of the cross. I think that was the same year my brother got a cherry pie with soccer players for his birthday. Mom liked theme cakes.
4. One year on Easter my dad hid an egg in the tube of one of our living room lamps. it was not discovered for at least 2 weeks, during which time Snuffy the cat received much abuse and many smell related accusations. Poor maligned Snuffy.
5. We always used to go to sunrise service for Easter.
6. My favorite Bible verse growing up came from Good Friday. You know, the bit when Jesus looks at the thief on the cross next to him and says "You too, shall be with me in Paradise." I think that's it anyhow. It's essentially what he said anyhow. At my most religious I always aspired to be like Jesus in that moment. Reaching out to sinners even in my most trying moments. Except my most trying moments generally involved my brother torturing my Cabbage Patch Kids (Elspeth Samantha who wanted to be a doctor took the brunt of his abuse, Sheila Adele, perhaps because she was a preemie, was often spared.) and seriously I did not want to see his face in Paradise. It was a trial. I still think the sentiment is good but I can't say for sure that I'd be able to carry through whilst nailed to a cross. If I were nailed to a cross I would probably just make a lot of swears and then pass out. (I looked it up on Wikipedia, "Truly, I say to you, today you will be with me in paradise (Luke 23:43)" that's pretty much what I said.)
7. My friend Justin died in a motorcycle crash just before Palm Sunday1997. He was only 21. I remember going to my friend Danielle's a few days after hearing the news and her boyfriend Dan asked me sarcastically, "Hey Carolyn, have you been touched by the Holy Spirit today?" I said "No, not yet," and probably made a joke about inappropriate touching. It was one of the saddest Easters I can remember, I was drunk for a lot of it.
8. I can't remember the last time I went to church for Easter Sunday. Probably when I was 18, maybe. It would have been at St Paul's Lutheran Church on West Water St in Port Huron, Mi. But that's just a guess.
9. We always had ham and scalloped potatoes for Easter dinner at my house. the other sides always changed but those two dishes were a constant. The week after Easter my mom would make kumle, a Norwegian potato dumpling, boiled in broth made from the ham bone and the remaining bits of ham. You should eat kumle with lots of butter and salt, my grampa calls them ribstickers because they are so, well, sticky that they will stick to your ribs. This always seemed like a funnier statement when I was a kid, now I realise that it's just a statement of the obvious.
10. My current employers give everyone a giant chocolate egg for Easter each year. This year I got one with Smarties, last year it came with 2 Mars bars.
11. I always ate the head off my chocolate Easter bunny first when I was a kid, well ears first really, then head. Any other method is wrong and sinful. Jesus will not see you in Paradise if you eat the feet first. He told me so. It's the worst sin of all.