The Love Story

One Sunday afternoon about a year ago a friend called and asked me if I had time to talk and was I sitting down? Then she just kept on talking without even giving me a chance to answer her.
“You won’t believe what I’m about to tell you, Keith! I didn’t know who to call except you.”
Since she’d convinced me that what she was about to say was something really juicy, I let her keep on keeping on.
”Are you sitting down?” she asked again, barely able to contain herself with the magnitude of what she was about to lay on me.
“Yeah, I’m sitting down – what is it?”
“Last night I went to a rock concert with a friend of mine and, after the show, we decided to go back to his house and hang out for a while. I thought I was into it but just a few minutes after I got there, my headspace shifted from wanting to party to wanting to leave — right away!
“Sorry, bud, but I have to go,” I told my friend as I headed for the door.
”What? — Why? It’s raining cats and dogs out there!”
”I don’t know why. I just know I have to right now!“
That didn’t give him much choice but to stand there waving at me as I backed out of his driveway.
As I turned on to the main street, I somehow ended up in a lane that wouldn’t allow me to make the right I’d made so many times before at that first stop light. So I decided to just keep going forward, make a few extra turns and get home that way.
But at the very next intersection, I got in the wrong lane again, so I decided to move along to the next light and then make my turn.
When I got there, I was aware of what I was doing but as I started to steer right, something inside of me said, ‘Don’t turn now. Go to the next light to take your right!’ The feeling (voice) was so strong and sure that, even though I didn’t know why I was doing it and I thought this whole thing was really, really strange, I decided to follow what voice was telling me to do.
Well, the minute did it, I realized that I’d put myself in a place where no one with any common sense or knowledge of the area would want to be. But that didn’t seem to matter because I still felt compelled to drive just a little further and take the next right, at which point the voice inside said, ’Go slow and turn on your brights.’ That’s when I heard myself scream, ’What in the world am I looking for?’
I swear to God, Keith, what happened next totally blew my mind. Out of nowhere, a little child wearing only a diaper ran out in front of my car. I immediately slammed on my brakes, shouted “Oh, my God,” then threw the car into park, jumped out and grabbed that precious child close to me, both of us crying and frightened. “Don’t you worry,” I told the little boy, “I’m here now and I won’t let you go!”
The police showed up just a couple of minutes after I called and one of them immediately took the boy out of my arms. While they were checking him out to make sure he wasn’t injured in any way, one of them asked me what had happened. As soon as I finished telling him what I’m telling you, he told me I could leave. “I’m afraid not, my friend, that just ain’t gonna happen!”
“What do you mean, ma’am?“
“Didn’t you pay any attention to what I just told you?“
“Yes, ma’am, I did. Why’re you asking me that?“
“Well, I believe I’m supposed to be with this child and I ain’t leavin’ ‘til his parents come for him — so you might as well give him back to me!“
“Okay, but that could be a while depending on when the report comes in that he’s missing.“
“Doesn’t matter…I’ll wait as long as I can. So please….” And I opened my arms to take him in.
“As soon as the boy was settled against me, the officer walked us over to his squad car and guided us into the back seat. The child was soon fast asleep, but not me and, after two hours of waiting, I was starting to nod out every few minutes. Besides, I knew I had to be at work in just a few hours, so, even though I didn’t want to let him out of my arms nor my sight, I knew I had to go. So I kissed his precious face and told him I loved him and I even felt that he said it back to me through the appreciation he held in his big blue eyes. As I was handing him back to one of the officers, he told me to be sure to give them my number so he could call me when he knew something.
“I was really relieved when I got the call the next day. What the officer told me is that it turns out that the boy’s family had come to Memphis from New Hampshire to visit relatives and that, on the night I found him, he had awakened around 2:30 and managed to let himself out of the house. For the next hour or so, this little 3-year-old managed to trudge a mile and half through the woods in the pouring rain with no shoes or clothes on until our paths met. The cop couldn’t tell me emphatically enough how thrilled his parents are to have their boy back and how grateful they are to me for what I did.”
After telling this most amazing story, my friend asked me if I thought that she had been prompted by some unseen force to rescue this child. I thought about her question and then I gave her some things to consider.
“What do you think?” I asked first. “Maybe you were rescuing yourself! But for sure the force guiding that experience was not unseen! Everything in it revealed itself, wouldn’t you say? It could be that your love and caring is so great that you summoned him to you and he was feeling his own calling to find you again so that you could be together at that moment in time.
When I first heard this story, and even now as I write it, it puts me in such a state of GRACE that my being explodes with a JOY that makes me cry a river. And that river seems to take me all the way to the Source that I’ve been searching for my whole life! I will forever be grateful to my friend for choosing me to share it with.

 

Henry Ziegland thought he had dodged fate. In 1883, he broke off a relationship with his girlfriend who, out of distress, committed suicide. The girl's brother was so enraged that he hunted down Ziegland and shot him. The brother, believing he had killed Ziegland, then turned his gun on himself and took his own life. But Ziegland had not been killed. The bullet, in fact, had only grazed his face and then lodged in a tree. Ziegland surely thought himself a lucky man. Some years later, however, Ziegland decided to cut down the large tree, which still had the bullet in it. The task seemed so formidable that he decided to blow it up with a few sticks of dynamite. The explosion propelled the bullet into Ziegland's head, killing him. (Source: Ripley's Believe It or Not!)

The human brain is responsible for many complex creations, but it can’t invent the image of people. So the “strangers” that you meet in your dreams actually have the faces of people who you’ve once seen in your real life but forgotten, like your childhood mailman or that guy bumped into on the side walk that one time.
Chances are that you’ve laid their eyes on more than a few individuals, and so the brain as a huge cast of characters to play with when you drift off to sleep. Except for in the case of extreme psychological disorder, every human being dreams. In fact, in a recent study, students who were awakened at the beginning of each dream but still allowed 8 hours of sleep, all experienced difficulty concentrating, irritability, hallucinations, and signs of psychosis in a span of three days.
When they were allowed their REM sleep, their brains compensated for the lost time by increasing the percentage of the sleep spent in the REM stage. Dreams are a window into the subconscious. Even though most of the time, they’re completely random, disorganized, and we forget 90% of them within 10 minutes of waking up; many people have drawn inspiration from their dreams. Mary Shelly’s Frankenstein was a based on a dream that she had.

The world is inundated with the most prolific beauties of nature ever witnessed. Nearly everywhere there are inhabitants, an amazing piece of Earth’s wonder is never too far away. From huge forests to enormous collections of marine life, our planet shares its natural glory with us in some of the most astounding areas imaginable. Here are 15:
15. Central Sikhote Alin Russian Federation

The Sikhote Alin mountain range contains one the richest and most unusual temperate forests of the world. It is a mixing zone between taiga (an area characterized by coniferous forests) and the subtropics where southern species such as the tiger and Himalayan bear cohabit with northern species such as brown bear and lynx. The site runs form the peaks of the Sikote Alin to the Sea of Japan and is important for the survival of many endangered species such as the Amur tiger.
14. Jungfrau-Aletsch-Bietschhorn – Switzerland

One of the most glaciated areas in the Alps, the site includes Europe’s largest glacier and a range of classic features resulting from glacial activity such as U-shaped valleys, cirques (an amphitheatre-like valley), horn peaks and moraines (any glacially formed accumulation of unconsolidated debris). It provides an outstanding geological record of the uplift and compression that formed the High Alps. The diversity of Alpine wildlife is represented in a range of alpine and sub-alpine habitats, and plant colonization in the wake of retreating glaciers provides an outstanding example of plant succession. The impressive vista of the North Wall of the High Alps, centred on the mountains of Eiger, Monch and Jungfrau, has played an important role in European literature and art.
13. Cerrado Protected Areas Brazil

The two sites included in the designation contain flora and fauna and key habitats that characterize the Cerrado – one of the world’s oldest and most diverse tropical ecosystems. For millennia, the sites have acted as refuges for species during periods of climate change and will be vital for maintaining Cerrado biodiversity during future climate fluctuations.
12. Alejandro de Humboldt National Park Cuba

Complex geology and varied topography have led to a diversity of ecosystems and species unmatched in the insular Caribbean and created one of the most biologically diverse tropical island sites on earth. Many of the underlying rocks are toxic to plants and so species must adapt in order to survive in these hostile environments. This unique process of evolution has resulted in the development of many new species and the park is one of the most important sites in the Western Hemisphere for the conservation of endemic (characteristic of) flora. Endemism of vertebrates and invertebrates is also very high.
11. Galápagos Islands Ecuador

Situated in the Pacific Ocean some 1,000km from the South American continent, the19 islands of the Galápagos have been called a unique ‘living museum and showcase of evolution’. Ongoing volcanic activity reflects the processes that formed the islands. Located at the confluence of three oceanic currents, the Galápagos is a “melting pot” of marine species. These processes, along with the isolation of the islands, led to the development of unusual animal life – such as the land iguana, the giant tortoise and the many types of finches – which inspired Charles Darwin’s theory of evolution, following his visit in 1835.
10. Lake Turkana National Parks Kenya

Southern Island National Park has been added to Kenya’s Lake Turkana National Parks World Heritage site. The most saline of Africa’s large lakes, Turkana is an outstanding laboratory for the study of plant and animal communities. The three National Parks are a stopover point for migrant waterbirds and are important breeding grounds for Nile crocodile, hippopotamus and a range of venomous snakes. The Koobi Fora deposits, rich in mammalian, molluscan and other fossil remains, have contributed more to understanding paleoenvironments than any other site on the continent.
9. Yellowstone Wyoming, Montana, Idaho (USA)

Yellowstone National Park spans an area of 3,472 square miles (8,987 km²), comprising lakes, canyons, rivers and mountain ranges. Yellowstone Lake is one of the largest high-altitude lakes in North America and is centered over the Yellowstone Caldera, the largest supervolcano on the continent. Half of the world’s geothermal features are in Yellowstone, fueled by this ongoing volcanism. The park is the centerpiece of the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem, the largest remaining, nearly-intact ecosystem in the Earth’s northern temperate zone. Hundreds of species of mammals, birds, fish and reptiles have been documented, including several that are either endangered or threatened. The vast forests and grasslands also include unique species of plants. Grizzlies, wolves, and free-ranging herds of bison and elk live in the park.
8. The Grand Canyon Arizona (USA)

The canyon, created by the Colorado River over a period of 6 million years, is 277 miles (446 km) long, ranges in width from 4 to 18 miles (6.4 to 29 km) and attains a depth of more than a mile (1.6 km). Nearly two billion years of the Earth’s history have been exposed as the Colorado River and its tributaries cut their channels through layer after layer of rock while the Colorado Plateau was uplifted.
7. Columbia Ice Fields Alberta, Canada

The Columbia Ice field is located in the Canadian Rockies, astride the Continental Divide of North America. The ice field lies partly in the northwestern tip of Banff and the southern end of Jasper National Park. It is about 325 km² in area, 100 to 365 metres (328′ to 1,197′) in depth and receives up to seven meters (23 feet) of snowfall per year. The ice field feeds eight major glaciers, including: Athabasca Glacier, Castleguard Glacier, Columbia Glacier, Dome Glacier, Stutfield Glacier, and the Saskatchewan Glacier. [Image Source - copyright Matthew Walters]
6. The Great Barrier Reef Australia

The Great Barrier Reef is the world’s Largest coral reef system. It is composed of roughly 3,000 individual reefs and 900 islands stretching for 2,600 kilometers (1,616 mi) over an area of approximately 344,400 square kilometers (132,974 sq mi). The reef is located in the Coral Sea, off the coast of Queensland in northeast Australia. The Great Barrier Reef can be seen from orbit and is the world’s biggest single structure made by living organisms. This reef structure is composed of and built by billions of tiny organisms, known as coral polyps. The Great Barrier Reef supports a wide diversity of life, and was selected as a World Heritage Site in 1981.
5. Angel Falls Venezuela

Angel Falls is the world’s highest free-falling, freshwater waterfall at 979 m (3,212 ft), with a clear drop of 807 m (2,648 ft). It is located in the Canaima National Park, in the Gran Sabana region of Bolivar State, Venezuela. The height of the falls is so great that before getting anywhere near the ground the water is buffeted by the strong winds and turned into mist. The base of the falls feeds into the Churun River, a tributary of the Carrao River.
4. Vredefort Dome Johannesburg, South Africa

Two billion years ago a meteorite 10km in diameter hit the earth about 100km southwest of Johannesburg, creating an enormous impact crater. This area, near Vredefort in the Free State, is now known as the Vredefort Dome. It was voted South Africa’s seventh World Heritage site at Unesco’s 29th World Heritage Committee meeting in Durban in July 2005. The meteorite, larger than Table Mountain, caused a thousand-megaton blast of energy that is now considered the largest meteor impact sight on Earth.
3. Aurora Borealis Northern Hemisphere

Auroras are natural different colored light displays, which are usually observed in the night sky, particularly in the polar zone. In northern latitudes, it is known as the aurora borealis, named after the Roman goddess of the dawn, Aurora, and the Greek name for north wind, Boreas. It often appears as a greenish glow (or sometimes a faint red), as if the sun were rising from an unusual direction. The aurora borealis is also called the ‘northern lights’, as it is only visible in the North sky from the Northern Hemisphere. The aurora borealis most often occurs from September to October and from March to April.
2. The Amazon Rainforest South America

The Amazon Rainforest is a moist broadleaf forest in the Amazon Basin of South America. The area is also known as Amazonia or the Amazon Basin, and encompasses seven million square kilometers (1.2 billion acres), though the forest itself occupies some 5.5 million square kilometers, located within nine nations: Brazil (with 60 percent of the rainforest), Colombia, Peru, Venezuela, Ecuador, Bolivia, Guyana, Suriname, and French Guiana. The Amazon represents over half of the planet’s remaining tropical rainforest in the world.
1. Milford Sound New Zealand

Milford Sound is located in the south west of New Zealand’s South Island. Although called a sound, it is more accurately classified as a fjord. Milford Sound, the most famous tourist site of New Zealand, has also been called an eighth Wonder of the World by Rudyard Kipling. It is situated within the Fiordland National Park which is in turn part of the Te Wahipounamu World Heritage site. Milford Sound runs 15 kilometres inland from the Tasman Sea and is surrounded by sheer rock faces that rise 1200 metres or more on either side. Among the peaks are The Elephant at 1517 m (4977 ft), said to resemble an elephant’s head, and Lion Mountain, 1302 m (4271 ft), in the shape of a crouching lion. Lush rain forests cling precariously to these cliffs, while seals, penguins, and dolphins frequent the waters. The drive to Milford Sound itself passes through unspoiled mountain landscapes before entering the 1.2 km Homer Tunnel which emerges into rain-forest carpeted canyons that descend to the sound. Near Milford Sound are also locations used to film some of the scenes of the Argonath in The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring

"Dreamt" is the only English word that ends in the letters "mt".
"Duff" is the decaying organic matter found on a forest floor.
"Fickleheaded" and "fiddledeedee" are the longest words consisting only of letters in the first half of the alphabet.
"Asthma" and "isthmi" are the only six-letter words that begin and end with a vowel and have no other vowels between.
"Fortnight" is a contraction of "fourteen nights." In the US "two weeks" is more commonly used.
"Forty" is the only number which has its letters in alphabetical order. "One" is the only number with its letters in reverse alphabetical order.
"Four" is the only number whose number of letters in the name equals the number.
"Hang on Sloopy" is the official rock song of Ohio.
"Happy Birthday" was the first song to be performed in outer space, sung by the Apollo IX astronauts on March 8, 1969.
"Kemo Sabe", meaning an all knowing one, is actually a mispronunciation by Native American of the Spanish phrase, Quien lo Sabe, meaning one who knows."
The lunula is the half-moon shaped pale area at the bottom of finger nails.
"Ma is as selfless as I am" can be read the same way backwards. If you take away all the spaces you can see that all the letters can be spelled out both ways.
"Mad About You" star Paul Reiser plays the piano on the show's theme song.
"One thousand" contains the letter A, but none of the words from one to nine hundred ninety-nine has an A.
"Ough" can be pronounced in eight different ways. The following sentence contains them all: "A rough-coated, dough-faced ploughman strode through the streets of Scarborough, coughing and hiccoughing thoughtfully.
"Rhythms" is the longest English word without the normal vowels, a, e, i, o, or u.
"Second string," meaning "replacement or backup," comes from the middle ages. An archer always carried a second string in case the one on his bow broke.
"Speak of the Devil" is short for "Speak of the Devil and he shall come". It was believed that if you spoke about the Devil it would attract his attention. That's why when you're talking about someone and they show up people say "Speak of the Devil."
"Stewardesses" is the longest word that can be typed with only the left hand.
"Tautonyms" are scientific names for which the genus and species are the same.
"Taxi" is spelled exactly the same in English, French, German, Swedish, Portuguese, and Dutch.
"Teh" means "cool" in Thai. (Pronounced "tay").
"The sixth sick sheik's sixth sheep's sick" is said to be the toughest tongue twister in English.
"THEREIN" is a seven-letter word that contains thirteen words spelled using consecutive letters: the, he, her, er, here, I, there, ere, rein, re, in, therein, and herein.
"Underground" is the only word in the English language that begins and ends with the letters "und." $203,000,000 is spent on barbed wire each year in the U.S.
1 and 2 are the only numbers where they are values of the numbers of the factors they have.
1 in 5,000 north Atlantic lobsters are born bright blue.

Once there was a boy who loved a girl very much. The girl’s father however didn’t like the boy. The boy wanted to write a love letter to the girl but he was sure that the girl’s father would read it first. Nevertheless, he wrote this letter :

“This great love I said I have for you

Is gone and I find my dislikes for you

Increases everyday, when I see you

I don’t even like the way you look,

The one thing I want to do is to

Look another way. I never wanted to

Marry. Our last conversation

Was very dull and in no way

Has made me anxious to see you again.

You think only of yourself.

If we were married I know that I’d find

Life very difficult nor would I find

Pleasure in living with you. I’ve heart

To give, but it is not a heart

I want to give you, No one is more

Demanding or selfish than you and less

Able to care for me and helpful to me

I sincerely want you to understand that

I speak the truth. You will do me a favor

If you consider to put this to an end. Do not cry

To answer this. Your letters are full of

Things that do not interest me.

True concern for me. Goodbye! Believe me

I don’t care for you. Please don’t think

I am still yours”

The girl’s father read the letter, was very happy and gave it to his daughter. His daughter read the letter and was very happy too.

“CAN YOU ANSWER WHY WAS SHE HAPPY” 

Those were the days in the beginning of the eighties when the world Cricket was dominated by the power packed West Indies Cricket Team and the subtlety packed England Cricket Team…Pakistan also played a major part in the domination but not with their skills in the game but with their poor standards in umpiring.
During one of those days,Imran Khan,the captain of the Pakistan Cricket team met Australian captain Allan Border in an informal meeting in Sydney..During a chat Imran told Allan Border “AB,give me Sunil Gavaskar and B.S.Chandra Shekhar from India,we will beat Australia..”..In a shocking reply Allan Border said “..Imran,just give me two Umpires from Pakistan and we will beat the whole world..”…Imran Khan was left speechless..
Later,the furious Imran Khan complained to the Australian board..On pressure from his board,Allan Border tendered apologies to Imran Khan and Pakistan Cricket Board.
An Ugly Incident Between Collin Croft And A New Zealand Umpire
During 1980-81 the mighty West Indies came to New Zealand to play a three match test series.Technology was poor in those days and no proper surveillance from International Cricket Council(ICC) was in order.The standards of umpiring in this particular series was the worst ever and it is only after this controversial series the ICC has decided to introduce the neutral umpiring system.
Every appeal by the New Zealand bowlers and fielders,during this series,was upheld by the umpires and even genuine appeals by the West Indian cricketers were turned down.
It resulted in the loss of the first test for West Indies.The whole of the Cricketing world was shocked and could not digest this..New Zealand Umpire,Fred Goodall was the worst of the officiating umpires in that series..
In the second test played at Napier, Collin Croft,bowled a superb bouncer to Richard Hadlee..The ball kissed the gloves of Hadlee and landed in the hands of wicket keeper Deryck Murray.. Collin Croft and Murray made a loud appeal..Umpire Fred Goodall turned it down..Next ball by Collin Croft was deliberately declared a no ball by Goodall.There was nothing the mighty West Indians could do.

But the deadly fast bowler Collin Croft could not take it lightly.While bowling the next delivery Collin Croft came furiously close to Fred Goodall and pushed him violently with his bowling arm(elbow) and delivered the ball much to the surprise of Richard Hadlee.Later, a highly agitated Fred Goodall walked to the W I captain Clive Lloyd and reported..After kicking a lot of dust in the Cricketing World this storm gradually subsided.

For more Stories Plz Visit :.www.cricketstor.blogspot.in

         A team of international scientists have found a fish fossil at the bottom of a reservoir that is the oldest known creature with a face
It’s always nice to catch up with an old face – and here’s one from 419 million years ago…
A team of international scientists have found a fish fossil at the bottom of a reservoir that is the oldest known creature with a face.
And they believe it is the “missing link” in the ­development of vertebrates, offering more clues to ­the evolution of humans.
Experts have described the discovery in China as ­“stunning”.
Palaeontologist Professor John Long of Flinders ­University, Adelaide, said: “It finally solves an age-old problem about the origin of modern fishes.
“We now know prehistoric fish gave rise to the modern fish fauna as we know it.”

Fellow palaeontologist Matt Friedman added: “It will take time to fully digest the ­implications of such a ­remarkable fossil, but it is clear that a major reframing of our understanding of early jawed vertebrate evolution is now in full swing.”
The fish they found would have been eight-inches long and armour plated.
It is the most primitive vertebrate discovered with a modern jaw, and includes a bone found in humans.
British fossil expert Matt Friedman said of the creature: “It is the deepest branch of our family tree that bears the kinds of jaw bones found in humans.
“This is an unexpected discovery that inverts ­schoolbook teaching on the evolution of bony skulls.
“Up until now it had been thought the anatomical ­peculiarities of bony fishes, the group that would ­eventually give rise to human beings, are specialisations that arose later in vertebrate evolutionary history in our own bony fish lineage.
“But now that narrative has been turned on its head.”
The fossil was shown off by Professor Min Zhu, one of the team of scientists who found it, inhis Beijing laboratory.



 

This incident took place about the 18th of January, 1945, in a wooded area about one mile outside of a small Belgian Village named "Petit Thier". I had taken command of "C" Company a few days earlier, on the road from Vielsalm to Petit Thier, when Captain Walsh was severely wounded by mortar fire. Petit Thier was, and is, a small village with a sizable road running parallel to a ridge which was occupied by Germans, and we were assigned to move to the village and meet a tank outfit, which we would support, or vice versa! We did arrive after dark, after having taken some casualties from the enemy fire, as we traversed the road directly in front of them, at a distance of probably one thousand yards. The company consisted of three officers and about sixty men at that point. As we left the village the next morning, at right angles to the road, and went off into the forest along a small road, or trail, without the benefit of the tanks, the forest, which we soon entered, was dense, and the snow was so deep, that instead of attacking in a front, we were forced to move in single file, and have the lead man break the path through the snow. This was so tiring that the lead man was rotated to the rear of the company after about 50 yards of forcing his way through the snow which was nearly three feet deep in the woods. The progress was slowed by occasional enemy fire, which resulted in everyone hitting the ground, and then moving forward after being prodded. This went on for the day in question until we reached a clearing in the woods. A firebreak was laid out somewhat like a street corner, since we had a clearing in front of us, and a clearing on our right, and we were in the northwest corner, with the Germans occupying the northwest corner, and who knew what in the other two corners. We had no support on our left flank, and did not know if any other of our sister companies were across the clearing to the southeast. Directly in front of our position was a small haystack, and perhaps three or four at the most, cows eating from the stack. We had a nice wooden bunker built by the Germans on our side of the clearing, and they had another one on the other side, in which they had mounted a machine gun which would fire at targets of opportunity. We were going to have to attack this situation, and since it was almost dusk, I decided to wait until dark and see if we could cross the clearing on our right, then move across the clearing toward the southwest corner, and come up on the flank of the Germans. It always seemed easier to me to avoid head-on attacks, if possible, and so after dark, I started out with a patrol to see if we could cross and find another outfit. Radio contact, we did not have, so we did not know that about ten yards into this clearing was a small shack, perhaps a pump house, set on a stone base, and we got this far along, when I rolled over on my side and called out to someone still in the woods, at which time the German machine gun ripped out a burst and slammed me on my back from a sideways position, looking at my arm I could see where the bullet had gone through my sleeve, and while no pain accompanied the hit, this was typical since shock made the initial trauma area numb. I concluded that what I had was a nice million dollar wound, and crawled back to our woods, calling off the patrol. Getting into the bunker, I tried to turn the company over to another officer, and told him it was a good hit for me, and here are the maps, "You take over". He wanted to see how much damage was done, and with some light in the bunker we started pulling off clothes. The bullet hole in the outer field jacket was almost exactly center on my arm, but the wool sweater had a shorter mark, and the wool shirt even less, finally, my wool underwear had perhaps a one inch mark, and on my skin there was a red mark, it had not even broken the skin! So I put all of the clothes back on, feeling gypped out of a good million dollar bullet hole. (Any wound which was not incapacitating, was considered a good deal, back to the rear for a little rest, and in the vernacular, a $1,000,000 wound!) The next day the machine gun was still there, and they had mortars which would occasionally throw a round into our area. As a consequence, I ordered an attack to be made directly across the perhaps 50 yard wide area, with Joe Colcord starting from a position down the line which would not be directly in front of the gun, and the bunker, and started another platoon directly at the bunker. They were almost immediately pinned down, and were trying to hide behind the haystack, and the cows, so that I decided to get out there and get the attack moving, and moved out to the stack, possibly 15 yards from our woods. At this time, while ordering some actions to take place, the Germans started to shell the haystack with mortar rounds, not a big explosive shell, but deadly enough. The next described sequence remains one of the most vivid of my entire life. While issuing orders, the thought popped into my mind with no preliminary warning, that "I was going to die, right now!" My response was not spoken, but it was none the less a response, and it was "Well, all right God, if it is time", and with my response came over me the most peaceful, serene, joyous feeling that everything was going to be wonderful and death was going to be a marvelous experience!! Almost at the same time, this inner conversation had taken place, a mortar shell landed on the back of the cow I was trying to hide under, and the cow fell over, away from me, and was dead! It is my belief that God, our Father, Gave to me the opportunity to know that my time was up, and based upon my response, decided to give me some additional time on earth, for his own reasons, of course. I heard no voices in my ear, saw no visions, but received a message that now was the time, and my consequent beliefs are that death will not be very frightening when we actually get there, God does indeed want us for his own, and will give to everyone the same loving thoughts to comfort them through. I have never been able to tell this story without becoming very emotional, and writing it is the same, through my tears, which must be tears of joy, the remembrance of that moment of light, and love, in the middle of one of my worst experiences is still present, and leads me to believe that we need not fear, as we have been told many times in Christ's own words. I have absolutely no remembrance of what transpired the rest of that day, except that we did not finish the attack, but pulled back to our side, and the following day when we were to launch an all-out attack, the Germans had vanished into the night.

The new flagship Walkman NW-ZX1 have just been announced by Sony Japan.