Editorial

Triskaidekaphobia not best use of time on Friday the 13th

Friday, November 13, 2015

While we're confident the Bison will prevail in Friday night's playoff game, but one thing is for sure: Nov. 13 will be an unlucky day for one of the teams meeting on Weiland Field.

We're well into the 21st century, but how many of us are stuck in the Middle Ages when it comes to the number 13?

Be honest now, wouldn't you rather deal with the numbers 12 or 14 any day?

We don't have any buildings that tall in McCook, but if we did, there's a good chance the elevators would skip the 13th floor.

In some buildings, the 13th floor is labeled "12A" or "M" (the 13th letter of the alphabet). Sometimes it's just not there, and other times the 13th floor is set apart for mechanicals such as heating and air conditioning.

Or, if you're more of a conspiracy theorist, it's used for secret spying operations to keep track of our cell phone calls and Internet activities.

Some buildings sidestep the issue, designating the 13th floor the pool floor, or in the case of the Trump Tower in Chicago, calling it the Mezzanine floor.

Others are split-level, with no elevator stops on the 13th floor, which is reached from the floor above or below.

The same goes for rooms; some buildings skip rooms or apartments numbered 13.

Being a committed scientist doesn't seem to help either. After the Apollo 13 near-disaster, NASA drew flak for designating the 13th space shuttle mission "STS 41-G." If it worked, it was only temporary; a year and a half later, that shuttle, the Challenger, exploded on launch.

Other cultures have their own version of triskaidekaphobia, the fear of the number 13.

In some parts of China, new buildings avoid the fourth, 14th, 24th floors because the word for "four" sounds like "death" in Mandarin. Some blend eastern and western superstitions, omitting the 13th floor as well, meaning the elevator skips from the 12th to 15th floor.

You can usually find a Highway 13 in North America, but you won't in Ontario, Canada, where there has never been a Highway 13.

Rather that worry about it being Friday the 13th, however, how about we acknowledge another designation?

Nov. 13 is World Kindness Day.

Check out BuzzFeed's "101 Random Acts of Kindness" at http://bzfd.it/1WWjAYI

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