Could be. Our family traces its roots back to the British Isles, though exactly where (Scotland, Ireland, etc.) is open to debate. Anyway, I guess that’s where Dad’s family got the superstition from.
Thanks for the link. I always wondered where that superstition came from, and now I know. Ignorance fought! Thanks again.
Heh, I’ve got a story that I’ve told maybe three or four times since it happened about 25 years ago. I always spent the year-end holidays with my girlfriend and her family. Most of them and I didn’t get along well and, after seven or eight years, I got really tired of spending every Christmas and the New Year with them. But for reasons that don’t matter now, it had to be that way, so I did my best to take part in the celebrations. There were maybe 15 of us crowded into a small room watching the countdown on the television. I was off to one side, with my butt against a wall, and as the countdown progressed, I moved just a bit to make room for someone. “Five, four, three…” I felt something snap behind me and the room went dark and silent. Turns out that I’d broken off the extension plug, leaving the prongs stuck inside the outlet.
Just imagine:
“What the hell happened?”
“It was me. I unplugged the TV!”
“Well, plug it back in!!!”
“I can’t!!!”
“Ohhhhh!!!”
It really was an accident and I felt very bad. For about 30 seconds. Laughing ever since.
I showed up solo at a hotel where a friend’s band was playing, but got turned away at the door. It was couples only (the door fee included everything, including a room for the night). There was a woman trying to get in and they were explaining the same thing to her.
We ended up chatting, and went back to the door as a couple. I paid and we were in! We got to know each other over drinks, I introduced her to the band, we danced, and we ended up sharing the bed for the night (morning).
Don’t know if it’s my best memory, but New Year’s Eve 1999, my college buddies and I were wandering through the French Quarter in New Orleans, drinking and reveling, and we realized it was approaching midnight and we didn’t have any champagne. Somehow, minutes before midnight, in Jackson Square, we stumbled over a satchel – and this satchel miraculously held an unopened bottle of champagne. At the strike of midnight, we popped the cork and between the three of us downed the bottle in seconds.
December 31, 1969, listening to a local radio station play the top 100 songs of the year. At midnight, there was still 11 songs to go so I stayed up to listen to them all. About 12:45, they finally played the number 1 song, Honky Tonk Women by the Rolling Stones.
My brother and I don’t get to see our cousins very often. We have no extended family in this state, so trips out of town are what we do over New Year’s. This year we went barhopping with our cousins and their SOs, and it was so much fun! We had breakfast shots WITH BACON, and some gingerbread and coffee drink with whipped cream! We’re already planning to make this a new New Year’s tradition!
This thread also makes me think of when it turned 1975. I don’t know why I remember it after 45 years, but I’ve often wondered about those involved. I was out and about when minutes into the new year, I saw a cop pulling over a car, and I thought what a sucky way to start a year.