It's been a minute. Hoping to be back at cruising altitude from here.

In October of 1843, the literary genius Charles Dickens sat down to embark on what was in its original intent a cold, calculated business venture, intended to offset impending financial losses. While his previous works, The Pickwick Papers and The Old Curiosity

Shop had risen to meteoric levels of sales and positive critical acclaim, other works like Barnaby Rudge and Martin Chuzzlewit had conversely registered numbers far less in magnitude than the author had originally expected. This left Dickens slightly bewildered and uncomfortable--and somewhat compromised—as his business partners of the day were tightening the pressure on him to produce a palatable work. And one that would make it to press by that December. He had absolutely no idea how deep an emotional chord his little story would strike with the ordinary citizen—a simple story of redemption.

Today, I would like to discuss what is arguably the most famous

of all the works of Charles Dickens—A Christmas Carol—and a few of it’s cinematic offshoots, adaptations and transmogrifications.

On Box Number Seven.

November 30th, 1921, Over 100 years ago—a rural town in northern California was engaged in the mid-season holiday machinations. People baking pies, making presents and generally enjoying the wintry intermission between Thanksgiving and the upcoming Christmas celebrations.

What was a normal foggy winter morning--would become a moment that was so horrible, that there is no way to recall the moments without invoking the carnage that ensued.—the moment that a school carriage containing 15 souls would intersect with an oncoming train, killing nearly everyone, many of them instantly—the horrific nature of the scene—a a scene that technically reverberates right through the ledger lines of school-bus protocol to this day.