Arcane Knowledge

Today's blog is concerned with arcane knowledge. Webster's New World Dictionary defines arcane as "understood by only a few; esoteric". The Richmond Heights Garden Club used to have members who were full of arcane knowledge.

Jim McK., former lieutenant-colonel in occupied Berlin and now deceased, used to opine that there was bountiful evidence that the Pleistocene glaciers stopped and melted at Highways 40/64. Of course mastodons and sabre toothed tigers were not thundering down the highways as the highways were not built until the 1950s. Excavation of soils during their construction phase revealed dramatically different soils and geologic features just north and south of the highways.

Anne H., former kindergarten teacher and now also deceased, used to tell the story of the discovery of lotus seeds from the Egyptian pyramids; these seeds were excavated from the tombs of the pharaohs and germinated 2,500 years later!

Most knowledge resides in some form or another on the Internet. Some of my favorite "arcania" there concern survival, like "How to Survive Falling from a Plane," "How to Survive an Elevator Free Fall," or "How to Survive a Fall from the Golden Gate Bridge". The Riverfront Times weekly used to carry a column titled, "News of the Weird" and I am sure it is archived somewhere. These were supposedly factual stories with bizarre or strange twists.

"Top Ten Conspiracy Theories" is another example of arcane knowledge. These lists have been published online since 2006 and conspiracy theories include death (Was Princess Di Murdered?, Was There More than One Kennedy Shooter?, Is Paul Dead?), government (The U.S. Government IS the Illuminati!, and The U.S. Government Caused 9/11), and Outer Space (Area 51 Was the Site of an Alien Party Gone Awry, The Apollo Moon Landing Was a Hoax). Satanic cults are another conspiracy theory.

And of course there are folkloric examples of arcane knowledge like the Bermuda Triangle, the Loch Ness monster, and spontaneous combustion of humans. Finally with Halloween right around the corner other arcane knowledge like the ghostly, the ghastly, the witchy, the paranormal, and those BAD Halloween jokes will scare our children. Of course you heard the one about the coffin that followed the woman home from the grocery store: bump, bump, bump and it did not stop following her until she got home to her bathroom and offered it cough syrup?!?

Use your arcane knowledge to dress up as your favorite character for Halloween and prowl the streets of Richmond Heights.