Tag: god

Can you answer these questions about Christmas? Take the quiz!

by Pam Harris, "blind" writer

This is the 20th Century Club in our community, the oldest women’s civic group in our town. It was formed in 1900, and no, we have no original members still with us. We have members as young as in their fifties (well, one, and she’s not in the picture because she was sick), and our oldest member is 96. But we have fun together, and what follows are some questions we had in a Christmas trivia game we played.

Confession: I created the game by researching. So if one of the answers given is not correct, please comment and let me know.

We did the game as a multiple choice activity, so I will give you those options as well. Correct answers will be at the end of the blog.

Christmas Trivia

  1. When was Dec. 25 first declared to be the date of Jesus’ birth? a. 75 A.D. (I think the proper term these days is C.E. for Common Era, but I still use the B.C. and A.D.) b. 510 A.D. c. 33l6 A.D. d. 190 A.D.
  2. Three wise men from the east followed the star to Bethlehem. a. True. b. False
  3. Which of these Christmas songs has sold the most? a. “Silent Night” b. “All I Want for Christmas Is You” by Mariah Carey c. “Blue Christmas” by Elvis. d. “White Christmas” by Bing Crosby
  4. When adjusted for inflation, which of these movies grossed the most at the box office? a. “Home Alone” b. “How the Grinch Stole Christmas” c. “Christmas Vacation” d. “A Christmas Story”
  5. We Baby Boomers remember the Bob Hope specials that aired around Christmas. How many USO tours did Bob Hope and his variety of guests do for the troops? (not necessarily the Christmas productions) a. 12 b. 81 c. 57 d. 23
  6. Who played “Mary,” Jimmy Stewart’s character’s wife, in “It’s a Wonderful Life?” a. Greer Garson b. Donna Reed c. June Lockhart d. Mary Pickford
  7. How tall is the 2025 Christmas tree at the Rockefeller Center in NYC? a. 75 feet b. 90 feet c. 120 feet d. 140 feet

I had ten questions, but these are all I can remember. I don’t have my original questions because I gave them to someone else to use at another Christmas party. Here are the answers:

  1. 336 A.D. The Roman emperor Constantine declared Dec. 25 to be the date of Jesus’ birth. In 350 A.D. or sometime after that, Pope Julius I made it official as a holiday to be celebrated by Christians. The date coincides with the winter solstice pagan holiday celebrated by Romans at the time. Scholars and theologians agree there is no evidence to support the date, but it is still a time for Christians world-wide to commemorate the birth of Christ.
  2. False. the Bible does not say how many wise men came to see Jesus, but the number “three” is represented because of the three gifts of gold, frankincense, and myrrh. In addition, the wise men did not go to the stable where he was born. the Bible says they came to the house where he was, and Biblical scholars say Jesus could have been as old as two years old since Herod had the boys two years old and under slaughtered in his attempt to prevent a new king from taking power.
  3. “White Christmas” by Bing Crosby. It has sold more than 50 million copies worldwide.
  4. “Home Alone.” I was surprised to learn that “How the Grinch Stole Christmas” and “Christmas Vacation” were also very close, ahead of “Elf” and “A Christmas Story.”
  5. 57. Bob Hope began the USO tours in 1941, and his last one was in 1991 in Saudi Arabia during the Desert Shield era. One source said 47, but other sources said 57, so I went with that. Regardless, it was a lot! He was born on May 29, 1903, so you can do the math!
  6. Donna Reed. Some of us remember “The Donna Reed Show” that aired from 1958 until 1966.
  7. 75 feet. I was surprised by this. I think it looks much taller on television!

How did you do? If I hadn’t been the creator of the game, I would have missed most of these questions. And, like I said, some of the numbers may be off a bit because if the sources used. I tried to use reliable sources since AI, believe it or not, is not perfect!

I won’t blog next week, so I will wish each one of you a wonderful Christmas and hope you will know peace and contentment during a time of year that can be stressful and sad for some as well as happy for others. Many thanks to all who take the time to read my blogs because looking at those stats warms my heart to know so many take the time to do so. I hope you find something in each one that entertains, inspires, comforts, or makes you chuckle.

Happy Holidays!

What does it really mean to be blind?

by Pam Harris, "blind" writer

When people think of “blind,” they normally think of someone like Stevie Wonder, who is completely blind due to being born prematurely and lacking oxygen, which destroyed his eyesight.

But completely blind people, meaning people with no light perception at all, only make up 10 to 15 percent of the more than one million people in the United States considered to be blind. The other 85 to 90 percent have some light perception and even some functional vision. Another estimated four to six million people in the U.S. live with vision loss that cannot be corrected with glasses, contact lenses, or medical treatment.

October is Blindness Awareness Month, and since joining that one million in February 2020, I have made it my mission to learn how to live as normally and independently as possible utilizing techniques and assistive devices and apps to enable me to do most everyday activities. I will write about those things next week.

People in the VIP (visually impaired persons) community want those of you who are sighted to understand a few things. First, blindness is a spectrum. It is different for each individual. For me, I have no central vision in either eye and some peripheral loss, and the amount of vision I do have is 20/400 or sometimes 20/300 in the right kind of lighting. My friend Trent, however, has no vision at all in one eye and extremely cloudy vision in the other due to cornea issues. Diane has lost all vision in one eye due to glaucoma, and the other eye is declining rapidly.

I have more functional vision than either. I can see to walk just fine, although I have tripped over objects or dips in the sidewalk/road. I can cook using specialized tools, although I usually have some spills or make a mess. I clean my house, do laundry, do all the normal things a sighted person does.

But I can’t drive, I can’t read. I can’t see people’s faces. I can’t see the house next door if I look directly at it, but I can see it if I look up to the sky or down to the ground (peripheral vision). Like Trent, I have a constant fog, although it’s not as bad as his. I can see a car if it’s as close as 10 yards from me, but my blurry distance vision can only make out shapes if anything at all. Yet I have functional vision. And with the devices I use, I can function very well.

Confused? Of course you are. I would be, too, if I wasn’t on this journey. Sam Seavye of “The Blind Life” on YouTube has a great shirt available that says it all: I can see, but I can’t. It’s complicated.” Yes, it is.

I think I speak on behalf of the VIP community when I say that, as difficult as it is to understand, we have some days of better vision than others. We can do more than you might think possible, but at the same time don’t assume just because my peripheral vision picked up that dirty sock on the floor that I can see what you can. Understand that distance matters. Understand that lighting matters. Understand that contrast matters.

The term for people like me is “legally blind.” You might say you’re legally blind without your glasses, but you’re not. Legal blindness means you can’t see the big E on the chart even with glasses. Legal blindness might mean you only have a 20 degree field of vision when the sighted world has 90. Legal blindness might mean you see nothing more than light and dark.

For most of us, our vision continues to decline. We go along for several days and maybe even weeks and begin to think, “Well, I think it’s stable,” but then there’s a sudden drop. Most of us have had days of depression (or months or years), and we still experience frustration. But we accept. We have no choice.

My purpose in writing this? My mission is to educate the general public, inform the VIP community about ways to live an independent life, and offer support to those new to vision loss so they can have an empathetic ear. It always helps to talk to someone who understands what it is you’re experiencing.

I hope you’ll read my blog next week when I write about the devices I use and some of the apps. And if you’d like more detail, my book Learning to Live with Vision Loss is available for $2.99 as an ebook and $5.99 as a large-print paperback. Sorry, no audiobook, but if you have Alexa, you can purchase the ebook, and Alexa will read it to you.

Thanks for taking the time to read this lengthy blog. Please help spread the word: there IS hope after vision loss.