What's funny (not so much funny-ha ha) about that joke, and I find to be true of most "ethnic" jokes, is that it's not actually an Irish joke -- it's just a no-teeth joke. Any old lady can have a fire-and-brimstone preacher and no teeth! (Any Christian old lady, at least...)

The way I heard it, and the way I always tell it, is complete with Irish accents. It's fun to say "But, Father! I don't have any teeth!" as "But Faaahhhther! I don' haaahhhve any taaayth!"

I hadn't checked in on Margaret and Helen in quite a while.

That is a funny blog. My wife e-mails me choice posts every once and a while.

I followed her summary of Ann Coulter's latest ... book? rant? ... and she had fun with it. Not the actual reading, but with the pointing and laughing.

This is interesting and counterintuitive (for me, anyway): Pious 'fight death the hardest'

People with strong religious beliefs appear to want doctors to do everything they can to keep them alive as death approaches, a US study suggests.

Researchers followed 345 patients with terminal cancer up until their deaths.

Those who regularly prayed were more than three times more likely to receive intensive life-prolonging care than those who relied least on religion.

The team's report was published in the Journal of the American Medical Association.

It suggests that such care, including resuscitation, may make death more uncomfortable.

Just over 30% of those asked agreed with the statement that religion was "the most important thing that keeps you going".

The researchers from the Dana-Faber Cancer Institute found these people were the least likely to have filled in a "do not resuscitate" order.

...

The researchers in this latest study stressed that religion had been widely associated with an improved ability to cope with the stress of illness.

But "because aggressive end-of-life cancer care has been associated with a poor quality of death and caregiver bereavement adjustment, intensive end-of-life care might represent a negative outcome for religious copers", defined as those who regularly used prayer or meditation for support.

Maybe there's some positive correlation between the degree of religiousness and fear of death?

My guess would be a correlation between religiousness and belief that the treatments would work, or between religiousness and the "preserve life at any costs" mentality.

My guess would be religious=if I'm good god won't punish me so this can't be the end, and athiest=sometimes shit happens for no reason at all so better get this over with.

Why is it that every time I sit down a cat curls up on my lap to sleep, but when I'm trying to sleep they are either poking me or making noise to wake me?

Because they're cats?

One of my cats is exactly like that - but the other one is the opposite. She will curl up on the bed when I go to sleep but refuses to cuddle when I'm sitting down.