Thursday Lists

I have decided that from this point forward I will attempt to post lists on Thursday and furthermore, all such lists will have thirteen entries. Why? Because this is my little play-place and I’m better than everyone else. So there.

This is not the inaugural edition of the Thursday list, that would be last Thursday. Still, I noted a nifty list idea on the Redheaded Ramblings site; which she got from Right Wing News so I’m going to take a stab at it:

13. Mohammed
Listen man, I really admire your idea of a religion based on strength rather than sappy neighborliness but what’s all this about 72 raisins and slaughtering infidels? An error in translation or are you really the bloodthirsty madman your followers have made you out to be?

12. Mary Magdalene
It occurred to me I couldn’t think of any women – outside of those I currently know – that I’d care to sit down to supper with. Since everyone else seems to think Jesus would be such a great dinner guest, I figured I’d be contrarian and assert that Mary Magdalene, as the embodiment of redemption would be a far better conversational partner.

11. Hunter S. Thompson
Haven’t any particular reason to list him, but tell me sitting down with him for an hour or two wouldn’t be a blast.

10. Harry Truman
I know we’d disagree about politics but maybe we could just play poker and drink some good bourbon and jaw about the old days. Maybe I could pick up a few fashion tips.

9. Babe Ruth
I suppose you could put Ty Cobb or Joe DiMaggio or Lou Gehrig in this spot but none of them seem to be as likely as the Babe to be a enjoyable supper companion. I’m sure with the Babe at the table the food and booze flowed as liberally as the rough humor.

8. Michael Collins
Not only the man who did so much to accomplish the dream of Irish Freedom but definitely a good storyteller and a hell of a drinker.

7. Octavian (Augustus Caesar)
How this weak boy with a bit of a lisp managed to consolidate power over Rome’s holdings and make her into an empire has got to be a hell of a story. He’d have to be a good politician to get where he was going and so ought to make an amiable companion.

6. Lewis Dreher
My great-great-great grandfather who volunteered in 1861 to fight for Union, got a hernia, got wounded, got sent home, re-upped, couldn’t do a lick of work, went home again and died young. I suspect he’s a pretty typical prairie boy but it’d be neat to hear some of his war stories.

5. Casper Rader
I can’t even calculate how many generations removed he is, probably 10 or so since he died soon after the turn of the 19th century. He was the first Rader in my line to come to America. He managed to make something of himself, owning land in Pennsylvania and finally migrating to south-western Virginia and making himself a elevated citizen in Wytheville.

4. Benjamin Franklin
Tips on the ladies, on politics and innumerable bottles of Madeira? I wonder how well he plays chess drunk. Probably very well, he and the other Founders managed to bang out a Constitution while probably sloppy drunk.

3. Niccolo Machiavelli
Did you really mean what you said in your writings or was it satirical? Synthesize his theories with the thoughts of the next two gentlemen and you’ve got an excellent prescription for order throughout the world.

2. Theodore Roosevelt
A gentleman and a man in the fullest sense. Another fellow chock-full of energy and brimming with ideas on how to sort out the world. I’d like to figure out how the “speak softly” part of the formula worked, as that seems to be what the world is lacking lately.

1. William T. Sherman
If you could get him to sit down long enough to eat supper I’m sure you’d have a hell of a good time just watching the energy of this fellow. And, I have a few questions for him on his theories of warfare as applied to the mideast.