Hey, it's Paraskavedekatriaphobia Day everybody! Did you watch out for black cats (isn't that terribly racist?), avoid crossing under ladders (as if there's even an opportunity for that in today's paranoid construction job), and, honestly, who opens umbrellas in the house anyway? Don't you wait until you step out of the doorway so the umbrella doesn't get caught inside?
Seriously, though, have you ever wondered why the number 13 is such a big deal and why a Friday the 13th means a damn thing besides "bad Halloween ripoff?"
Wikipedia, of course, provides the annotated and also impossible-to-skim answers. We'll summarize it for you below:
1) The fear of a Friday that falls on the 13 is a phobia. That really long word up there is the name of that phobia. We'll just call it The Fear for our purposes here.
2) Honestly, no one really knows why The Fear is The Fear. The first known reference to The Fear was made in an 1869 biography of some guy named Gioachino Rossini.
3) "One theory states that it is a modern amalgamation of two older superstitions: that thirteen is an unlucky number and that Friday is an unlucky day." That settles it for us, but you can read on.
4) Another interesting note: "According to the Stress Management Center and Phobia Institute in Asheville, North Carolina, an estimated 17 to 21 million [crazy] people in the United States
are affected by a fear of this day. Some people are so paralyzed by
fear that they avoid their normal routines in doing business, taking
flights or even getting out of bed. "It's been estimated that$800 or $900 million is lost in business on this day." Despite this, representatives for both Delta and Continental Airlines
say that their airlines don't suffer from any noticeable drop in travel
on those Fridays."
Via Wikipedia.
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