Michaela Chatterjee A pleasant family vacation ended abruptly with an unpleasant outcome for seventeen-year-old Michaela (Roser) Chatterjee. In the blink of an eye, a relaxing drive back home turned into a horrific car accident, followed by the chaotic scramble of a life flight via helicopter to emergency surgery. Another driver had panicked at the sight of oncoming traffic while trying to pass on a hill and smashed into the family vehicle, forcing them under the trailer of an eighteen wheeler. Three medical evacuation helicopters and five ambulances were called to the scene. Michaela’s injuries were by far the most serious. Her facial wounds looked particularly gruesome. A deep laceration extended across her forehead and ripped into her right eyelid, exposing two inches of skull and her eyeball. Her bicep was completely severed when her left arm smashed through the rear windshield. As a result, Michaela had gone into shock. The force of impact had been so great that she suffered a diffuse axonal injury to her brain, meaning her brain literally sheared and twisted inside her cranium, creating a blood clot. Fortunately for Michaela, the accident occurred only two miles from the personal residence of emergency room physician Scott Magley. He arrived at the scene and began administering first aid. Michaela flat lined on the flight to the hospital despite Dr. Magley’s best efforts to save her. Michaela was so badly injured that Dr. Magley was able to intubate her without anesthesia. Due to the severity of her brain injury, she remained … [Read more...]
The flying friar of Cupertino
Recently, some friends on social media compared the theory of evolution to the theory of gravity, suggesting the evidence that supported both was equally strong. The question was then posed by me: what evidence would be required before we might reasonably begin to question the theory of gravity? Can exceptions exist? The answer to my question seems rather obvious--if Newton's apple fell up toward the sky instead of down, for example, that would contradict the theory of gravity. We should begin to question the consistency of gravity if observations from multiple, credible witnesses claimed that objects or people either floated or flew in the air without using wires or other special effects to create a clever illusion. This "law" of gravity is easily testable: simply drop something from your hand, and it will fall to the ground. The evidence for gravity is so powerful that I can remember even as a young child (who still believed in Santa Claus) thinking the premise of the television show The Flying Nun was absolutely ridiculous...that because she only weighed 90 pounds and wore a cornette on her head, Sister Bertrille (Sally Field) would literally get blown off the ground by a strong wind. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CojNHPD_cOU Frankly, the idea hasn't really improved with age--it's about as believable as Mr. Ed, the talking horse, but not half as funny. From where do such silly ideas come? As for The Flying Nun, the inspiration was a book called The Fifteenth Pelican. But from where might author Tere Rios have gotten the idea of writing a novel about a … [Read more...]
What constitutes a miracle?
Paul Wood says that the headaches were so bad that he couldn't walk down a hallway without using the walls for support. X-rays showed a malignant brain tumor was the problem, although his neurosurgeon thought an aneurysm might have caused bleeding on the brain. His surgery was abruptly canceled after new x-rays revealed the tumor had vanished. Medical professionals refer to this phenomena as "spontaneous remission." One day the patient is dying of some incurable malady, and the next day has completely recovered. Statistically speaking, survival is not the expected outcome. When a person has what is normally considered a fatal illness or injury, we should naturally expect that person to die within a relatively short period of time, or at least have surgery or other treatment to save that person's life. There is no natural explanation for a tumor (and all symptoms) to simply disappear. But rarely, it does happen. According to the pastor of Gravity Church, Paul had inspired his fellow congregation members by saying, "No matter what happens to me, I'm going to be okay. I trust God." Nothing that anyone could possibly say would ever convince Paul Wood that he had not received a miraculous cure from God, facilitated by the power of prayer. Skeptics might argue that Paul's condition was inaccurately diagnosed and his doctors were incompetent, or might look for some other way to explain the inexplicable, but while Paul's recovery might be the exception and not the rule, it's hardly the only exception. Miracles appear to happen relatively frequently, once we start looking … [Read more...]
The ghost brother of Twisted Sister
(Image: © Paul Natkin\/WireImage) I must admit that the strongest memory I had of the “heavy metal” rock band Twisted Sister was not actually of the band, but a National Lampoon magazine I once owned. The cover bore the picture of an adorable but pitiful-looking dog with a .38 revolver pressed to its head. The cover threatened, “If you don’t buy this magazine, we’ll kill this dog!” It's a well known fact that I'm a sucker for dogs, so I bought a copy. Even years prior to my involvement with animal rescue, I couldn’t resist the idea of saving that poor dog’s life. In retrospect, it may have been the best investment under five bucks I've ever made. That issue wasn't just funny; virtually every word was hilarious. There were spoofs of arcade games like Space Invaders but called “Sperm from Space”, longer articles such as “The Death of Ed McMahon”...even the fake "Letters to the Editor" were priceless. When I read that issue of National Lampoon, I laughed so hard I cried, some of the jokes were so funny. Then my friends passed it around the room and read it in turn, shedding tears of laughter as well. Only our friend Jarvis read the whole magazine from cover to cover and never even cracked a smile, but he was the exception. There was a point to be made here, and it's about Twisted Sister. One of the fake letters to the editor went something along these lines (from memory, so this is not a verbatim quote): Dear Sir: I would like to completely disavow myself from any association with the bands AC/DC, Judas Priest, Twisted Sister, Def Leppard, Motley Crue…after a long … [Read more...]
