Free Republic

Let’s face it; there are a lot more BB guns and air rifles available than when we were kids. In fact, most options available these days are designed and marketed to fully-grown up kids. However, there is still one model that stands apart from the rest. The best BB gun for your kids to learn on is still the Red Ryder…

Like a famous scene out of “A Christmas Story,” a young child in southern Illinois learned the hard way not to place their tongue on a frozen pole. The Cairo Fire Department tells FOX 2 that crews responded to a call around noon for assistance involving a child who attempted to lick a frozen pole before their tongue ended up stuck on it. The situation was resolved without any significant injuries, and the Cairo Fire Department calls it “a lesson learned.” Investigators did not disclose any details about the age, gender or location of the child. The incident may remind...

Fragile? It must be Italian — or Oklahoman! A 50-foot-tall version of the sexy iconic leg lamp featured in the classic film “A Christmas Story” was erected in a small Oklahoma town to honor the artist who inspired it, according to friends and city officials. The statue boasts a black high heel and a fringed fiberglass lampshade atop a 10-foot crate marked “fragile” in Chickasha’s new downtown park, the oklahoman.com reported. The delightfully tacky novelty lamp — which was said to have emitted the “soft glow of electric sex” in the 1983 flick — was the brainchild of the late...

You'll shoot your eye out at this news. The A Christmas Story sequel has a release date of Nov. 17, according to HBO Max. The follow-up, called A Christmas Story Christmas will star Ralphie (Peter Billingsly) once again, who is "all grown up" and "must deal with Christmas and all that comes with it, this time as a dad," according to the streamer. The new film will take place in the 1970s, according to Variety, with adult Ralphie bringing his family to his childhood home for the holiday. "With the same attention-to-real-life tone of the first," the film's logline reads,...

A Christmas Story House, now restored to its movie splendor, is open year round to the public for tours and overnight stays. Directly across the street from the House is A Christmas Story Museum, which features original props, costumes and memorabilia from the film, as well as hundreds of rare behind-the-scenes photos. Among the props and costumes are the toys from the Higbee’s window, Randy’s snowsuit, the chalkboard from Miss Shields’ classroom and the family car. After reliving A Christmas Story at Ralphie’s house don’t forget to visit the museum gift shop for your own Major Award Leg Lamp and...

He wanted to emulate Flick who succumbs to a dare and sticks his tongue to a frozen pole in “A Christmas Story.”  When the character tries to pull away, he quickly discovers his tongue is stuck. Spencer Cline, of Sandwich, Illinois, and his friend Cole thought it was just movie magic, but they learned just how real that old pitfall is, the Aurora Beacon-News reports. “I was just tempted to,” he told the Beacon-News. “I’ve seen the movie ‘A Christmas Story,’ which kind of inspired me.” When Spencer stuck out his tongue last Tuesday, it instantly adhered to the pole.

A Christmastime reflection It was impossible. Mary may have lived in a time before science, before the polite and clinical agents of reason had scrubbed the angels and demons and desert spirits away from all but the dark outer edges of our minds, but she was a woman — she knew where babies came from and how they got made. She knew that she was a virgin and that she had not become a wife to the man to whom she was engaged. She also knew what being pregnant and unmarried was likely to mean to her — socially, religiously,...

This was read today in church

Every year a new audience is introduced to "A Christmas Story," the 1983 movie about a Depression-era family that became an unlikely Christmas classic when TBS started playing it nearly around the clock every holiday season. Peter Billingsley memorably played Ralphie, the bespectacled blond boy who wanted just one thing for Christmas: a Red Ryder BB gun. Now Billingsley is all grown up and making movies himself, and talking in depth about "A Christmas Story" for the first time.

Though the 1983 movie “Christmas Story” did not make much of an impression when it was initially released, it has since become a perennial holiday favorite with families across the country, as we are not only treated to Ralphie’s hilarious quest to obtain a Red Ryder BB gun, but as the film reminds all of us of our own childhood memories of Christmases past. While most of us are familiar with the cult classic, many may not know the tragic way in which the director of “Christmas Story,” Bob Clark, died…He was killed by an illegal alien drunk driver. On...

In the sixth month, God sent the angel Gabriel to Nazareth, a town in Galilee, to a virgin pledged to be married to a man named Joseph, a descendant of David. The virgin's name was Mary. The angel went to her and said, "Greetings, you who are highly favored! The Lord is with you." Mary was greatly troubled at his words and wondered what kind of greeting this might be. But the angel said to her, "Do not be afraid, Mary, you have found favor with God. You will be with child and give birth to a son, and you...

Author and Pastor, Terry L. Brown looks at the real reason for the season.

At the time of Jesus birth, people who attended sheep were considered the least significance to the human race by other people. They lived quiet and humble lives, often spending their days, and nights, with their flocks. The sheep that they tended were probably bred as sacrifice animals for the temple in near-by Jerusalem. These shepherds were probably just doing their usual job when the angel appeared to them—and with a multitude behind him. I think I would be shaking in my sandals too.

Fans of the holiday classic “A Christmas Story” are celebrating the film’s 25th anniversary with a convention and trips to the house where the movie was made. The 1983 film, an adaptation of Jean Shepard’s memoir of a boy in the 1940s, was set in Indiana but largely filmed in Ohio. The movie starred Peter Billingsley as Ralphie Parker, a young boy determined to get a Red Ryder BB gun for Christmas. The film was a modest theatrical success, but critics loved it. It eventually joined “It’s a Wonderful Life” and “Miracle on 34th Street” as a Christmas classic. “It’s...

'Ralphies' gathering on Thanksgiving weekend If you identify with Ralphie Parker, the 9-year-old Midwestern boy who longed for a BB gun, you may wish to spend Thanksgiving weekend in Cleveland with fans of the movie "A Christmas Story." That's when your fellow "Ralphies" will meet actors who played in the 1983 cult classic, tour the restored Cleveland home used in the movie and enjoy a Christmas dinner, just like the Parker family, at the C & Y Chinese restaurant.

A man convicted of causing a crash on Pacific Coast Highway that killed the director of "A Christmas Story'' and his son is scheduled to be sentenced today. Hector Manuel Velazquez-Nava faces a six-year state prison term. Velazquez-Nava pleaded no contest to two counts of manslaughter in August in the deaths of Robert Clark and his son, Ariel Hanrath-Clark. Authorities said Velazquez-Nava, an illegal immigrant, had a blood-alcohol content of .24 -- three times the legal limit.

Velazquez-Nava had a blood alcohol level of 0.24 percent, three times the 0.08 legal limit for driving. There was no evidence the Clarks had been drinking, police said. Velazquez-Nava does not have documentation of legal U.S. residency, nor does he appear to have ever had a U.S. driver's license, authorities said.

Secular Christmas poems and stories, like The Night Before Christmas or The Gift of the Magi, are remarkable in the way they enchant young people from generation to generation. But there is one Christmas story that never grows stale, that is fresh to all ages and places, to young and old, to men and women. It goes like this. In days now far, far gone, Israel was surrounded on all sides by enemies, torn by violence, and there in Israel a young girl, Mary by name, pledged to a man named Joseph, heard a voice, as she thought from...

Jimmy Carter's Seductive Crypto-Marxist Story of Palestine versus the Christmas Story "And you will be hated by all nations because of me...and many false prophets will appear and deceive many people." Matthew 24: 9-11 Former President Jimmy Carter recently came to Pasadena (California) to sign copies of his new book "Palestine: Peace Not Apartheid." Let's forget for a moment the detailed content of Carter's vitriolic and intentionally provocative book or Carter's tragic record as a President. I think all of us recognize he is a decent and intelligent man. But since it is Christmas time let's look at the underlying...

Howie Carr Broadcasting Live! Looking for the perfect tip-off to your weekend? Come hang out with Howie before the Celtics game this Friday night! Howie will be broadcasting live from 3-7pm this Friday the 15th at the Harp, located at 85 Causeway Street in Boston. There will be on-site giveaways, and of course plenty of fun with Boston’s most notorious talk show host!