Reflections

by Eddie Bass

I don't think I would have made it through high school if it hadn't been for the help of the World Almanac.

It was my principle reference tool, along with an outdated volume of the old Lincoln Library.

I hadn't seen, or even thought of, the World Almanac in years until one day before Christmas when I heard an ad on the radio for it.

I couldn't resist. I bought a copy and gave it to wife Jody as a Christmas present.

There was a puzzled look on her face when she unwrapped it, so I explained that while I had given it to her, it actually was for me. She said she understood.

The World Almanac is an amazing book. For one thing, it costs a pittance.

The list price is $9.95, but the bookstore where I bought it had marked down my 1998 volume by 25 percent.

That made it a real bargain.

It's a fat book. It measures 5-by-8 inches, but it's an inch-and-a-half thick.

And its almost 1,000 pages are jammed with facts that you never know when you'll need.

For instance, did you know that author Janet Dailey was born May 21, 1944, in Storm Lake, Iowa? Or that Brad Pitt's birthday was Dec. 18, 1964, and that he was born in Shawnee, Okla.?

And did you know that the Statue of Liberty from its base to the top of its torch is 151 feet and 1 inch? Or that there are 43,560 square feet in an acre?

The flashy red-and-yellow cover of the book proclaims that 1998 is the 130th year of the book's publication and that in those 130 years, 71 million copies have been sold.

And the book toots its own horn by saying that it's "the original, most trusted, most widely used, most complete and most up-to-date almanac available."

"More information than any other almanac," the back cover says.

"Special section : Countdown to the new millennium.

"Feature articles by Daniel J. Boorstin, Stephen Jay Gould, John Updike, and others.

"Full-color photo highlights of year, plus full-color world maps and flags.

"A guide to the Internet and directories of Web sites and e-mail addresses.

"Taxes: Complete information on the recent tax law changes.

"Plus complete and timely information on arts and entertainment, awards and prizes, U.S. cities and states, nations of the world, sports, the environment, noted personalities, population and vital statistics, crime, employment, consumer information, lifestyles, education, space exploration and astronomy, health and nutrition, the economy and business, and much more."

It would seem that with the current World Almanac and the Internet, there isn't any worthwhile piece of information that isn't available to you.

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