6-13-14


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Flagstaff Almanac: Day: 164 / Week: 24 
June Averages: 78° \ 42°
Today: Average Sky Cover: 2% RED FLAG
    H 81° L 41° Ave. humidity: 31%
    Wind: ave:   5mph; Gusts:  14mph  
    Average High: 77° Record High:  92° (1974)
    Average Low: 41° Record Low:  30° (1976)
        
Quote of the Day
                              or maybe 1926 when Native Americans could vote

Today’s Historical Highlights

1373 - Anglo-Portuguese Treaty of Alliance (world's oldest) signed in London
1774 - Rhode Island becomes 1st colony to prohibit importation of slaves
1828 - Simon BolĂ­var proclaimed dictator
1865 - Pres Johnson proclaims reconstruction confederate states
1866 - US House of representatives passes 14th Amendment (Civil rights)
1886 - Fire destroys nearly 1,000 buildings in Vancouver, BC
1888 - US Congress creates Department of Labor
1898 - Yukon Territory of Canada organized, Dawson chosen as capital
1920 - Post Office says children could not be sent by parcel post
1927 - Ticker-tape parade welcomes Charles A Lindbergh to NYC
1933 - German Secret State Police (Gestapo - Geheime Staats Polizei) established
1942 - The United States opens its Office of War Information.
1956 - After 72 years, Britain gives up Suez Canal to Egyptian control
1979 - Sioux nation receives $100 million in compensation for Black Hills SD
1990 - Nelson & Winnie Mandela welcomed in NYC
2005 - A jury acquits Michael Jackson of molesting 13-year-old

  Today’s Birthdays:   

How many can you identify? Answers in Today’s Birthdays below
My Free Rambling Thoughts   

So a couple of days ago I woke up with a sore right wrist. No big deal, as I figured I had slept on it wrong. It didn’t get better, or worse, until early this morning. I woke up about 5am and it really hurt. I have a high tolerance for pain, so when something is in pain to me, it really is in pain.  I took one of my unused pain pills from my foot pain of a few months ago. At 8a, it still really hurt, so I headed off to the Urgent Care place. I must have been asked at least 4 times if I sleepwalked. I don’t, or at least I don’t think I do. Anyway, after X-rays, they gave me a pain shot, a script of more pain pills and a Velcro wrist brace. The PA said I had some ‘old’ bone chips in my wrist, and that the radiologist would read the X-rays tomorrow and she would call me. I told her I was 65 and all my bones are old-er. She said it might be gout or it might not be. HMMM. The pain is much less so I’m not worried.

I am getting tired of Congressmen who play Monday morning quarterback. Now many are upset over the mess in Iraq. Many Americans didn’t understand Bush’s need to invade, except to get rid of tyrant and find some WMDs that didn’t exist. We had supported Hussain for decades. Then we pulled out and now the conservatives are saying we left with no plan to keep Iraq democratic. There was sectarian violence before we invade, it continued while we were there, and is still there now that we are gone. We now hear about ISIS, a new radical group that Al-Qaida had kicked out of their group because ISIS was too violent.  

We had our weekly lunch and I got lots of sympathy for my wrist. Mary has workers tearing out her patio and putting in pavers. Cheryl is awaiting her new French door window—at a cost of $450 for one of the two doors. Seems they have to take out the window that didn’t break and the blind that didn’t break and install a new ‘unit’ which is 2 pieces of glass and the blind. She did get a free car wash at Sam’s because no one there could get the machine that swipes the cards to work. She needed a wash since the water shortage in Williams will not allow anyone to wash a vehicle or water anything outside.

 

Game  Center (answers at the end of post)

Brain Teasers

When you behead a word, you remove the first letter and still have a valid word. You will be given clues for the two words, longer word first.

Example: Begin -> Sour, acidic
Answer: The words are Start and Tart.

1. Shut -> Misplace; fail
2. Open -> Glass container
3. Unusual; lightly cooked -> They exist
4. Prevent from spoiling -> Holding back
5. Broken glass -> Unyielding
6. Dampen; cushion -> Frequent
7. One who leases -> Go into

Lifestyle  Substance:     

Found on You Tube with some relevance to today




Vintage 1955 Fran Allison commercial

OK Then…
Harper’s Index 

Total number of new workers introduced in to South Asian economies each month: 1,000,000

Unusual Fact of the Day

While its popularity in America is fairly recent, margarine dates back to 1860s France, when Emperor Louis Napoleon III offered a prize to anyone who could design a cheap butter substitute.

Presidential Fun Facts…

John Tyler: Graduated College of William and Mary (1807). Vice President under Harrison. First vice president to assume office after the death of a president. He was a Whig, but the Whig party disowned him after he vetoed banking bills supported by the Whigs. In January 1843, the Whigs introduced impeachment resolutions in the House, but the measures were defeated. Tyler served as president without being a member of any political party. He was a grand-uncle of Harry S Truman.

Ben Franklin on Character…

Industry. Lose no time; be always employed in something useful; cut off all unnecessary actions.

Common misused words...

It's and its
It's is the contraction of it is. That means it's doesn't own anything. If your dog is neutered (that way we make the dog, however much against his will, gender neutral) you don't say, "It's collar is blue." You say, "Its collar is blue." Here's an easy test to apply. Whenever you use an apostrophe, un-contract the word to see how it sounds. In this case, turn it's into it is. "It's sunny," becomes, "It is sunny." Sounds good to me.

Pen Names of famous authors…

Evan Hunter--Pen names: Ed McBain, Hunt Collins, Curt Cannon, Richard Marsten, D.A. Addams, and Ted Taine
Novelist Evan Hunter wrote both crime and science fiction using his own name and multiple pen names. Born Salvatore Albert Lombino in 1926, the author legally changed his name to Evan Hunter in 1952, but saw the most success from the work he published under the pseudonym Ed McBain. Beginning in 1956, he used that name for the majority of the crime fiction he wrote as part of the long-running 87th Precinct series. In a 2005 obituary for Hunter, who died of cancer at age 78, The New York Times explained that Hunter initially moved away from his (very Italian) birth name due to prejudice against writers with foreign names.

The World as 100 people…

Continent:
Africa 15
Asia 60
Europe 11
North America 5
South America 9

Joke-of-the-day

A preacher was standing at the pulpit giving his Sunday sermon when a note was passed to him. The only word written on the sheet was IDIOT. Looking up at the congregation, the preacher smiled and said: I have heard of men who write letters and forget to sign their names but this is the first time I will see a man sign his name and forget to write the letters. 

Rules of Thumb:   

WEARING JEWELRY AND MAKE-UP
Teenage girls should lay out the jewelry they want to wear, then put away one-third of the items. For make-up, they should lay out everything they'd like to use, then put away all but two items.

Yeah, It Really Happened

PERTH, Australia (UPI) - Australian police arrested a man and charged him with drunk driving after he was found riding a motorized beer cooler while under the influence of alcohol. The 22-year-old was driving the cart down the middle of a quiet street in the suburbs on Friday night. The motorized cooler – known in Australia as an esky – did contain alcohol at the time. "This motor vehicle would only be able to travel at very low speeds, the lighting devices on said vehicle would be negligible and make it very difficult for other motorists to see," police said in a statement, according to the Telegraph. Other Australians have been arrested for operating eskys while intoxicated in the past. A 38-year-old was arrested for drunk driving his motorized cooler back in March and a 23-year-old lost his license for nine months following a 2011 esky incident. In the 2011 case, the young man took his "extreme cooler" for a "test drive" on a main road.

Somewhat Useless Information   

Both Chevy Chase and Michael Keaton turned down the role of Dr. Peter Venkman (Bill Murray's character).

Bill Murray's role was originally written for John Belushi, but he died while the script was being written.

Ray Parker Jr.'s theme song for the film was a No. 1 hit for three weeks. Huey Lewis later sued Ray Parker Jr. for plagiarism, due to similarities between the Ghostbusters theme song and Lewis' "I Want a New Drug."

The original trailer featured a 1-800 number, not a 555 number, which led to a prerecording of Bill Murray and Dan Aykroyd. They got 1,000 calls per hour, 24 hours a day, for six weeks.

The marshmallow goo that explodes onto William Atherton is actually 50 pounds of shaving cream.

The guns for the proton packs were originally wands. The wands were changed to laser guns to make it more believable that the Ghostbusters created their gear from practical equipment.

Calendar Information        

This Week’s Observances:

8-14
International Clothesline Week
National Body Piercing Week
National Flag Week
Jim Thorpe Native American Games

Men's Health Week
National Automotive Service Professionals Week


12-19

Nursing Assistants Week
12-15
Superman Days
US Open Golf Championship
Duct Tape Days


13-20
National Hermit Week

Today Is  

Banana Split Days: 13-14  
Blame Someone Else Day
Friday the 13th
Kitchen Klutzes Of America Day
National Juggling Day
Poultry Festival 13-14 
Work@Home Father's Day: 13  

Today’s Events through History  

1930 - 1st Nudist Colony opens
1933 - 1st sodium vapor lamps installed (Schenectady NY)
1953 - KOAA TV channel 5 in Pueblo-Colorado Spgs, CO (NBC) 1st broadcast
1970 - Beatles' "Let It Be" album goes #1 & stays #1 for 4 weeks

Today’s Birthdays                                                           

Richard Thomas, actor (John Boy-Waltons) is 63
Tim Allen, Denver, comedian (Tim-Home Improvement) is 61
Ashley & Mary Kate Olsen, twin actress (Michelle-Full House) is 28

Remembered for being born today

1786-1866 - Winfield Scott, army general (Union)/presidential candidate
1863-1935 - Lady Lucy Duff Gordon, English fashion designer
1865-1939 - William Butler Yeats, Ireland, poet (Wild Swans at Coole-Nobel 1923)
1892-1967 - Basil Rathbone, Johannesburg South Africa, actor (Sherlock Holmes)
1903-1991 - Harold "Red" Grange, "Galloping Ghost" of football
1910-1995 - Mary Wickes, American actress
1918-1996 - Ben Johnson, actor (Chisum)
1926-1982 - Paul Lynde, comedian (Uncle Arthur-Bewitched)

Today’s Historical Obits                                                           

Henry Middleton, American president of the Continental Congress, 1784, @67  
Edward Bowes, radio host (Major Bowes Amateur Hour), 1946, @ 71
Don Bolles, US journalist (Arizona), car bomb, 1976, @47
Benny Goodman, clarinetist/bandleader (King of Swing), heart attack, 1986, @77
Fran Allison, actress (Kukla, Fran & Ollie), 1989, @81
Tim Russert, Meet the Press moderator, heart attack, 2008, @58
William S. Knowles, American chemist and Nobel laureate, 2012, @95

Brain Teasers                                         

1. Close -> Lose
2. Ajar -> Jar
3. Rare -> Are
4. Preserve -> Reserve
5. Shard -> Hard
6. Soften -> Often
7. Renter - > Enter
8. Emigrate -> Migrate

Disclaimer: All opinions are mine…feel free to agree or disagree.

All ‘data’ info is from the internet sites and is usually checked with at least one other source, but I have learned that every site has mistakes and sadly once out the information is out there, many sites simply copy it and is therefore difficult to verify. Also for events occurring before the Gregorian calendar was adopted [1582] the dates may not be totally accurate.

§    And That Is All for Now  §

 

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Flagstaff, Arizona, United States
I retired in '06--at the ripe old age of 57. I enjoy blogging, photography, traveling, and living life to it's fullest.