Pick a Number

Let's pick a number off the top of our heads (ambiguity!) and talk about it, okay?

I'm reaching into Lincoln's top hat and drawing out a number...well, what do ya know? It's the number THREE!

Three is a very special number, and what a coincidence that out of about 4,000 numbers in the hat, I drew that very number!

Did you know:

1. That it takes 3 licks to get to the center of a Tootsie Pop? Don't take it from me, though. It's true because Mr. Owl says so.  Even though when I was about 14, I was riding home from somewhere in some parent's back seat, and I counted 579. Still, owls can't be wrong.

Don't do it, kid!

2. That when Forrest says he was shot down twice and got cancer once, and survived all THREE, he could either be talking about bad luck OR good luck coming in threes? Bad luck = shot down and cancer. Good luck = survived.

3. That a hat trick in hockey is succeeding  at something in three consecutive attempts? Sound familiar?

Another hat trick. How'd he do that?

4. Dorothy clicked her heels 3 times and said "There's no place like home."

There's no way I would've walked a mile in those shoes. I bet the first thing she did when she got back to Kansas was have Toto fetch her some Epsom Salts.

5. In Ovid's Fasti, there was a lot of things done 3 times. It's a great book. You should read it.

However, you can say "I believe in unicorns" 3 times or a million times, but it doesn't make it so. 

6. In the Chinese language, "three" sounds like "alive."

It's obvious that this character sounds like "alive," isn't it?

7.  My ancestor, Odin, suffered three hardships upon the World Tree as he searched for runes. One hardship was hanging himself.

8. In philosophy, it is said that three-ness can come from two-ness, and that in everything, there is an internal contradiction. Georg Hegel, Kant, and Foucoult all spoke of this triad of logic: thesis, antithesis, synthesis.

9. Apparently, you have to knock three times on the ceiling if you want someone. I'v e never tried that, because I'm scared of who might show up.

I would actually be THRILLED. 

10. AND, according to Pythagoras, 3 is the perfect number. It's the beginning, middle and end. Three gods ruled the Earth--Jupiter ruled Heaven, Neptune ruled the sea, and Pluto ruled the underworld. Jove (aka Jupiter, aka Zeus) was represented by three forked lightning. Neptune (aka Poseidon) had a trident. And Pluto (aka Hades) had a 3 headed dog that probably loved bacon. Kevin Bacon. 

There were 3 Fates, 3 Graces, 3 Furies, 3 Nymphs, 3 Harpies, 3 Billy Goats Gruff (lol), 3 x 3 Muses.

Watch out, Kevin Bacon.

The body was divided into 3 parts (mind, body, spirit). And the list goes on and on and on and on and on. Three times three times three times a million more.

And I won't even go into pi.