Comments & Curiosities:

Easter Sunday. Can you believe it? It’s true. Happens every year about this time.

Around the world, people are celebrating the story of Easter, as they have for thousands of years. I thought I’d pass along some Easter thoughts you might want to share with your family and friends on this very important day, although probably not.

Everyone knows that ham is the big favorite for Easter dinner, but do you know why? Doesn’t matter. I’ll tell you anyway.

Years ago, before there were refrigerators or freezers or 3G networks, pigs were slaughtered in the late fall, which farmers thought was a great idea but pigs thought was stupid. If you are going to chop a porker up into little pieces, doing it in July with no way to preserve it is not a good plan. But doing it in the fall then curing the pork in a saltcellar for six months or so is an excellent idea, and by the time Easter rolls around, the timing couldn’t be better.

And that is why we eat ham on Easter. Saltcellars may be long forgotten, but Easter ham lives on.

Looking for something different for the kids this Easter? Try the Underwater Easter Egg Hunt in Key Largo, Fla. It’s a charity event that is way different than your average Easter egg hunt.

For the tenth year running, Capt. Spencer Slate from the Atlantis Dive Center will wiggle into a full-on bunny costume/wetsuit thing and lead a gaggle of divers down to where no bunny has gone before — $85 for certified divers, $30 for adult snorkelers and $20 for kiddie snorkelers, and that includes your gear. Operators are standing by but don’t say yes yet. Every diver wins a prize and whoever finds a specially colored egg wins — wait for it — a dive trip for two with Capt. Spence. Does it get any better than that? I don’t see how.

But if you happen to see the video of last year’s Easter egg dive, which I did, you will notice something odd. Capt. Spence alone is worth the price of submersion in his bunny suit, face mask and scuba tank, but the colored eggs are just laying there on a nice, smooth sandy bottom.

I would think that takes a lot of the hunt out of “egg hunt,” no? And how hard can it be to scope out the “specially colored” egg? They couldn’t find a kelp bed to do this in? I don’t get it.

Speaking of things that are a little off-center, the SPAM-for-Easter recipes came fast and thick again this year, although you need to use a pretty loose definition of recipe.

SPAM Easter bunnies are big, along with giant SPAM eggs — two fine entree choices that your guests will remember for a long time.

They will also never come to your house again for dinner on a bet, but that is a separate issue.

I did see a milestone in Easter oddities this year that I thought was very clever. You know what Peeps are, of course — those little marshmallow chicks that have been around forever.

Didn’t like them when I was kid and still don’t. Too sweet, too sticky and I try really hard not to eat anything that is DayGlo yellow. They are funny though, which is important, and even funnier when you dress them up.

A number of newspapers around the country, including the Washington Post, the Seattle Times and the Chicago Tribune hold annual “Peep Diorama” contests in which people pick a theme and create a tabletop Peep diorama around it.

The level of detail is amazing and proves yet again that some people have way too much time on their hands. One Easter-themed entry that was either really funny or really irreverent or both would make the perfect centerpiece for someone’s Easter table — a complete Peep diorama of the Last Supper, with every Peep perfectly costumed and positioned. The title? “The Lord and His Peeps.”

There were historical Peeps — “Madame Peepadour’s Court” and the “Peepstock Music Festival” — and a number of reenactments of current events, including a remarkably detailed delivery room scene of Octomom Nadya Suleman’s big moment, with doctor Peeps and nurse Peeps in full scrubs and three newly arrived baby Peeps in incubators labeled “A,” “B” and “C.” The title of the piece: “Oh My Peep, There’s an ’H’ in There!”

And finally, a diorama of last year’s Miracle on the Hudson, with Peep passengers in life vests standing on the wings of a U.S. Airways jet being led by Capt. Sullenberger in uniform and white mustache.

I think that’s it — non-traditional perspectives on a very important day, plus Peeps, Octomom and SPAM. Don’t be so quick to judge. Just because something is hot pink, has 1,200 grams of fat and more salt than Morton’s doesn’t mean you can’t mold it into something meaningful. Try it. You might win something. I gotta go.

PETER BUFFA is a former Costa Mesa mayor. His column runs Sundays. He may be reached at [email protected].