1-2-15

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Almanac: Week: 52 \ Day: 002 
December Averages: 44°\17°-wind chill-drop 10°
86004 Today: H 30°\L 11°
Ave. humidity: 85%     Average Sky Cover: 75%
Wind ave:   5mph\Gusts:  14mph
Ave. High: 42° Record High:  60° (1902)
Ave. Low: 16° Record Low:  -21° (1919)

Observances Today:
Run Up the Flagpole and See if Anybody Salutes It Day
National Personal Trainer Awareness Day

Observances This Week:
1-7
New Year's Resolutions Week
Celebration of Life Week 
Diet Resolution Week 
Silent Record Week

2-8
Someday We'll Laugh About This Week


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Quote of the Day

 Historical Highlights for Today
1602 - Spanish force in Ireland surrender to the English army at Kinsdale
1818 - Lord Byron completes "Childe Harold's Pilgrimage" (4th canto)
1832 - 1st Curling club in US (Orchard Lake Curling Club) opens
1839 - 1st photo of the Moon (French photographer Louis Daguerre)
1882 - Because of anti-monopoly laws, Standard Oil is organized as a trust
1890 - Alice Sanger becomes 1st female White House staffer
1893 - 1st US commemoratives & 1st US stamp to picture a woman issued (Queen Isabella, patron of Columbus)
1903 - Pres T Roosevelt shuts down post office in Indianola Miss, for refusing to accept its appointed postmistress because she was black
1910 - 1st junior high schools in US opens (Berkeley California)
1919 - Anti-British uprising in Ireland
1923 - Ku Klux Klan surprise attack on black residential area Rosewood Fla, 8 killed (compensation awarded in 1995)
1935 - Bruno R Hauptmann trial begins for kidnap-murder of Lindbergh baby
1941 - World War II: German bombing severely damages the Llandaff Cathedral in Cardiff, Wales
1942 - WWII: 28 nations at war with Axis powers, pledge no separate peace deals
1944 - 1st use of helicopters during warfare (British Atlantic patrol)
1969 - Australian Rupert Murdoch gains control of the 'News of the World'
1974 - 55 MPH speed limit imposed by Richard Nixon
1983 - Gary Trudeau takes a 20-month break from writing "Doonesbury"
1985 - Egyptian Pres Mubarak reappoints Coptic pope Shenuda III
2014 - Raul Castro gives a speech commemorating the 55th anniversary of the Cuban revolution and warns of "neo-liberal and neo-colonial thinking" entering the country
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  Birthdays Today:
How many can you identify? Answers below in Birthday’s Today


My Rambling Thoughts
Ah, 2015 started with a blue sky, but quickly clouded over with more snow expected. No complaints, it’s why I live at 7000’…I get all four seasons.
Quiet New Year’s Eve for me. Made it till 12m but not much longer. Only a few horns in our quiet neighborhood. We have a new snow crew and they are great. When it snows this much the older guys left a pile of snow where the sidewalk meets the parking pavement. Not the new crew…I can get out, if I wanted to without having to climb a mountain of snow and ice. NICE!
I am getting a little cabin fever as I haven’t ventured out since I got home the 30th. But tomorrow, I’m out and about. Today was putting all the Christmas stuff and lights away. While doing that, I also did 5 loads of laundry. Vacuumed up all the little tinsel pieces that fell off. Everything is now packed or folded, or hung up. Very productive way to start the new year.
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Brain Teasers
(answers at the end of post)
Can you break this code?

Shift three. Caps lock one. Shift six.
Tab six. Tab nine. Tab seven.
Tab four. Tab three. Caps lock one. Caps lock three.
Tab five. Caps lock six. Tab eight. Caps lock two. Shift 10.     


Found on You Tube with some relevance to today




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Paraphernalia 4 the Brain:     
50’s Inventions…
1951
Super glue invented.
Power steering invented by Francis W. Davis.
Charles Ginsburg invented the first video tape recorder (VTR).

Education Facts…
<>  In Iceland, more books are published and sold per person every year than anywhere else in the world. Ten percent of Icelanders become a published author in their lifetime.
<> Harvard earns enough money from interest on its endowment that it could offer free tuition to every student and still profit.

Flagstaff, AZ History…
75 YEARS AGO
Christmas tree lighting has begun on most homes, churches and schools. This project is sponsored by the Women's Club Garden Department. The deadline for entries in the 20th of December. Mrs. Richard Heath Chairman.
           
Flagstaff’s Iconic 50…
Dubeau and Hotel Downtowner Signs
When the federal government realigned Route 66 from Phoenix Avenue to Santa Fe Avenue in 1934, a sign war erupted between the hotels on the south side of the tracks.  Both the Motel DuBeau and Downtowner raised 60-foot lighted signs to attract customers from the new alignment.  
The Motel DuBeau was one of the first motels that opened on the Southside. Motels became popular in the 1920 as the U.S. highway system started to grow and people began taking longer car trips. 
In 1929, Albert Neil DuBeau opened a motel with 22 rooms and heated garages at the corner of Phoenix Avenue (then Route 66) and Beaver Street. According to Platt Cline’s book “Mountain Town,” the hotel cost around $45,000 to build. The rooms rented for $2.50 to $5 a night and featured private baths, double beds and carpet. 
The Downtowner was originally a series of brothels. K.J. Nackard bought the properties in 1918 when the state voted prostitution out and Prohibition in. It was originally called the Nackard Auto Inn. The motel eventually became the Grand Canyon International Youth Hostel.

Harper’s Index…
30
Factor by which a person in Nevada is more likely than one in Massachusetts to be the target of a federal wiretap.       

Rules of Thumb…
PLAYING THE MIDWAY
At an amusement park, ask the person at the game booth to demonstrate the game. If he refuses, it's because he can't win a prize. This means your chances of losing are too high.
           
Unusual Fact of the Day…
Ken Osmond, the actor who played Eddie Haskell in Leave It to Beaver, wasn't the troublemaker in real life. He grew up to become an L.A. policeman.
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Joke-of-the-day
One day, a cowboy rode into a Wild, Wild West town. The people in the town love to play jokes on visitors. After tying his horse to the pole outside a bar, the cowboy went in.
"A cup of milk please." he said to the bartender. After drinking, he went out, only to find his horse missing.
Knowing that the villagers did it, he went back into the bar and said to everybody," I am going to have another drink and when I finish it, I want to see my horse outside! Or else, I will have to do what I did in Texas - HERE!"
 The people were very frightened. When he finished his drink, he went outside and saw his horse. The villagers had put it back. Curious, the bartender asked the cowboy,” What did you do in Texas?"
The Cowboy replied," Well, I had to walk home.
 
http://li.ajokeaday.com/imp?s=96920&t=newsletter&sz=1x1&li=AJAD&e=cfrazier3_tcbs%40hotmail.com&p=20141229075946
http://li.ajokeaday.com/imp?s=96921&t=newsletter&sz=1x1&li=AJAD&e=cfrazier3_tcbs%40hotmail.com&p=20141229075946

Yep, It Really Happened
FRAMINGHAM, Mass. (UPI)
In an explosive fit of symbolism, a woman in Boston bombarded a local police precinct with uncooked breakfast meats -- bacon and pork sausage. Before serving her unwelcome meal -- disguised inside a Dunkin' Donuts box -- the woman approached an officer at a teller window offered loudly to "feed the pigs." The woman, Lindsey McNamara, subsequently smeared several of the bacon slices and sausage links on the window, tossing the others onto the counter. Her assault on the William H. Welch Way police station, in Framingham, Massachusetts, was short-lived; she was arrested shortly after 11:00 a.m. She faces charges of disorderly conduct and malicious destruction of property. Lieutenant Harry Wareham said it isn't clear what her motivation was, but feelings of ill-will towards the police have been growing after a series of incidents involving the deaths of unarmed African American males at the hands of police. "There's a lot of unrest regarding law enforcement, and I don't know if [this] is related or not," Wareham told Boston.com. "There's probably a lot more productive ways to voice her displeasure with police." McNamara later claimed to be religiously motivated. "God told me to go over there and feed the pigs," she said during her first court appearance.         

Somewhat Useless Information
Here’s a special list of things you didn’t know about how do people celebrate New Year’s Eve around the world.
<> There is a strong belief in America that eating black-eyed peas on New Year’s Day will ensure good luck in the new year. In Italy, people wear red underwear on New Year’s Day, as they believe that it will bring good luck for the upcoming year.
<> The world famous Time Square ball is made from Waterford Crystal and weighs over one thousand pounds. In 1942 and 1943, the ball was not dropped due to war restrictions.
<> New Year’s Eve Resolutions is a very old tradition. It dates back to the Ancient Babylonians and in Mesopotamia and date back to 2000 B.C. The most common resolutions are: weight loss, getting organized, spending less and saving more, staying fit and quitting smoking.
<> About 41% of American adults plan to kiss someone at the stroke of midnight on New Year’s Eve.
<> Julius Caesar is the man responsible for establishing New Year’s Day at January 1st, with the Julian calendar.
<> Ancient Persians gave eggs as New Year’s gifts, which symbolized productiveness.
A “new” New Year’s Eve ball was introduced at November 11, 2008. New Year’s Eve celebration in New York attracts more than 1 million people each year, with about 1 more billion people watching the broadcast on television.
<> 22% of Americans admit to falling asleep before midnight at New Year’s Eve.
<> According to the National Insurance Crime Bureau’s statistics, New Year’s Day is the day with the most vehicles been stolen, than on any other holiday throughout the year.
<> United States’ top three destinations  to ring in the New Year are: Las Vegas, Disney World and New York City.

Gizmos
PRINCETON, N.J. (UPI)
Scientists say a new method, called ballistic capture, for transporting robotic rovers, satellites and astronaut-carrying spacecraft to Mars could save space agencies time and money. 
Currently, the favored method for getting a spacecraft into orbit around Mars is the "Hohmann transfer." After rocketing through the Earth's atmosphere, the craft make a beeline for the Red Planet, barreling through space at high speeds. As it approaches Mars, its thrusters fire in the opposite direction -- slamming on the brakes and swinging the craft into orbit. 
The Hohmann transfer is a highly effective move -- road-tested and reliable. But it is expensive and time specific. Launches are limited to a brief window when the orbit and rotation of Earth and Mars are just right. 
Ballistic capture, on the other hand, would allow a more flexible launch window. It would also do away with the fuel-guzzling that Hohmann's high-speed braking requires. Instead of rocketing straight at Mars, a ballistic capture technique would see the spacecraft launched out ahead of Mars' orbital path. It would gradually slow and hold in place, waiting for Mars to swing by -- the Martian gravity pulling the craft into orbit as it approached. 
"That's the magic of ballistic capture -- it's like flying in formation," Edward Belbruno, a visiting associated researcher at Princeton University, recently told Scientific American. 
Belbruno, along with Francesco Topputo of the Polytechnic University of Milan, is responsible for a new paper on the subject of ballistic capture and its potential for enabling cheaper more frequent visits to Mars. 
The study was published on arXiv, Cornell University's free science journal library, this week; it has also been submitted for formal publication to the journal Celestial Mechanics and Dynamical Astronomy. 
As both Belbruno and Topputo are willing to admit, ballistic capture isn't perfect. It takes much longer than the typical six-month straight shot that has spit a number of Mars current orbiters into their paths around the Red Planet. Ballistic capture would also put a craft into a much higher orbit than most probes prefer for their scientific missions. 
But the new study considers other options, too, including aerocapture, whereby a Hohmann transfer is tweaked to allow Mars' atmosphere to do some work in slowing down the craft's approach. That's why not as much fuel needs to be burned during the braking. 
Ballistic capture may need some kinks worked out, but NASA is excited about its potential. 
"It's an eye-opener," James Green, director of NASA's Planetary Science Division, told Scientific American. "This [ballistic capture technique] could not only apply here to the robotic end of it but also the human exploration end." 
NASA has used the ballistic capture technique on one of its lunar missions -- the GRAIL mission in 2011. The European Space Agency also used the technique for its SMART-1 lunar mission in 2004. 

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Today’s Events through History
1788 - Georgia is 4th state to ratify US constitution
1791 - Big Bottom massacre in the Ohio Country, marking the beginning of the Northwest Indian War

1800 - Free African American community of Philadelphia petitions US Congress to abolish the slave trade
1814 - Lord Byron completes "The Corsair"
1921 - 1st religious service radio broadcast in US, KDKA-Pittsburgh
1934 - 1st state liquor stores open, in Pennsylvania
1954 - Herman Wouks "Caine Mutiny," premieres in NYC
1968 - Christian Barnard performs 2nd heart transplant
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Birthday’s Today
Julius LaRosa, Brooklyn singer (fired by Arthur Godfrey on the air) is 85
Jim Bakker, televangelist (PTL Club)/rapist (Jessica Hahn) is 75
Ricky Van Shelton, country singer (Wild-Eyed Dream) is 63
Tia Carrere [Althea Janairo], actress (Wayne's World) is 48
Cuba Gooding Jr, actor (Boyz N the Hood) is 47
Taye Diggs, American actor is 44
Paz Vega, Spanish actress is 38
Kate Bosworth, American actress is 32
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Remembered for being born today
Nathaniel Bacon, leader of Bacon's Rebellion, Va 1647-1676 @29
William C Mills, museum curator (excavated Ohio Indian mounds) 1860-1928 @68
Barry Goldwater, American politician 1909-1998 @89
Isaac Asimov, Russia, scientist/writer (I Robot) 1920-1992 @72
Larry Harmon, American entertainer and TV producer (Bozo) 1925-2008 @83
Roger Miller, country singer (King of the Road) 1936-1992 @56
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Historical Obits Today
Margaret A. Brewer, soldier and 1st female general officer US Marine, 2013@82
William P. Carey, businessman\philanthropist, 2012, @81
Alan Hale Jr, Skipper on Gilligan's Island, cancer, 1990, @71
Tex Ritter, country singer (5 Star Jubilee), heart attack, 1974, @68
Roman poet Ovid (in Latin: Publius Ovidius Naso), 17AD, @59ish
Dick Powell, actor/director (Dick Powell Theater), cancer, 1963, @58
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Brain Teasers Answers
It spells out "Can you read this?"
Use your keyboard like a grid. Tab, caps lock and shift are the vertical side of the grid and one through nine are the horizontal side of the grid. For example shift five would be B.

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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 contains mistakes and sadly once 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.