What do you look for when a young girl thinks she wants to join your order?

Mother Teresa: I look for in her if she has health of mind and body, if she has plenty of common sense, the ability to learn how to love, how to pray, how to learn languages, and also if she has cheerful disposition. These are the four things I look for. The rest can be acquired.

When Clement Moore wrote his poem "A Visit from St. Nicholas," his most profound inspiration came from a keen appreciation of his audience. He wasn't writing for publication, but to delight his own six children. To that end, he transformed the legendary figure of St. Nicholas, the patron saint of children, into Santa Claus, a fairy tale character for children.

Moore himself was a dour, straitlaced academician and a professor of classics. The year he wrote the poem, he refused to have it published, despite its enthusiastic reception by everyone who read it. The following Christmas "A Visit from St. Nicholas" found its way into the mass media when a family member submitted it to an out-of-town newspaper. The poem (also known by the title " 'Twas the Night Before Christmas") was an "overnight sensation," as we would say today, but Moore was not to acknowledge authorship of it until fifteen years later, when he reluctantly included it in a volume of collected works. He called the poem "a mere trifle."

The irony of this, according to Duncan Emrich (author of Folklore on the American Land), is that for all his protestations, Professor Clement Clarke Moore is now remembered for little else at all.

Orlando Magic general manager Pat Williams was not pleased with his team's performance early in the 1992 season. "We can't win at home, we can't win on the road," he declared one day after their record had fallen to 7-27. "As general manager, I just can't figure out where else to play!"

George Raft acquired and disposed of about ten million dollars in the course of his career. "Part of the loot went for gambling," he later explained, "part for horses, and part for women. The rest I spent foolishly."

Soon after the death of a well-known composer, someone who did not keep up with the news asked William Gilbert what the maestro in question was doing. "He is doing nothing," replied Gilbert.

"Surely he is composing," said the questioner.

"On the contrary," said Gilbert, "He is decomposing."