May 2


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Happy Birthday To:  

Todays  Historical  Highlights
1780William Herschel discovers 1st binary star, Xi Ursae Majoris
1808Uprising against French occupation begins in Madrid
1863: Stonewall Jackson attacks Chancellorsville, wounded by his own men South defeats North
1878US stops minting 20 cent coin
1885"Good Housekeeping" magazine is 1st published
1908"Take me out to the Ball Game registered for copyright
1932: Pulitzer prize awarded to Pearl S Buck (Good Earth)
1938: Pulitzer prize awarded to Thornton Wilder (Our Town)
1949Arthur Miller wins Pulitzer Prize (Death of a Salesman)
1955: Pulitzer prize awarded Tennessee Williams for (Cat on Hot Tin Roof)
1960: Pulitzer prize awarded to Al Drury (Advice & Consent)
1970: KOAI (then KNAZ) TV channel 2 in Flagstaff, AZ (NBC) 1st broadcast
2011Osama bin Laden, the suspected mastermind behind the September 11 attacks and the FBI's most wanted man is killed by the United States Special Forces in Abbottabad, Pakistan
 
Free Rambling Thoughts   
It sure tried to rain most of the day, but alas, none made it down even close to the ground. Maybe tomorrow.

I was able to clean out one closet today…at least that’s a start. Still gotta get rid of more stuff. I’m sure Goodwill as happy to see me this afternoon. Tomorrow our retirement group is doing lunch and seeing a movie. Actually we are seeing the movie first, so it will be a light lunch I’m sure.

So Obama made a secret trip to Afghanistan today. His speech was informative but I’m not happy that we are staying there. Our troops need to be home. I’m sure the war people on the right will be upset that he said that we were talking directly to the enemy. Can’t end a war without some talk.

Game   Center   (answers at the end of post)
Brain Game—A close up picture of what?

NPR Sunday Puzzle
You are given clues that end in a six-letter word. Rearrange the letters in the last word to get the answer to the clue. For example, given "Jewels a pirate buries," the answer would be "rubies."
1.      Turkey part that may be moistened with a baster:
2.     When a bridge is out, where the traffic is routed:
3.     Important member of a religious circle:
4.     You might need one to get through a military sector:
5.     Game for bridge haters:
6.     Big holiday for St. Teresa:
7.     What you can’t do to something that is silent:
8.     Rock whose chances of hitting the earth are remote: 
9.     Island 1000 miles ENE of Bogata:
10.  What someone might be who posts a sign “Silence Please”:

Riddle of the day
Violet, indigo, blue and green, yellow, orange and red; these are the colors you have seen after the storm has fled. What am I?
Anagram: unscramblenumbers represent the number of letters in each answer word

Lifestyle  Substance     
Harper’s Index         
Number of letters from Americans President Obama reads each evening: 10
Number of staffers in the Correspondence Office responsible for selecting those letters from the 11,000 received each day: 7
Found on You Tube 
Clown College       
Planet Earth—

Joke-of-the-day
A Spanish teacher was explaining to her class that in Spanish, unlike English, nouns are designated as either masculine or feminine.
 "House" for instance, is feminine: "la casa."
 "Pencil," however, is masculine: "el lapiz."
 A student asked, "What gender is 'computer'?"
Instead of giving the answer, the teacher split the class into two groups, male and female, and asked them to decide for themselves whether "computer" should be a masculine or a feminine noun.
 Each group was asked to give four reasons for its recommendation.
 The men's group decided that "computer" should definitely be of the feminine gender ("la computadora") because:
 1. No one but their creator understands their internal logic.
 2. The native language they use to communicate with other computers is incomprehensible to everyone else.
 3. Even the smallest mistakes are stored in long term memory for possible later retrieval; and
 4. As soon as you make a commitment to one, you find yourself spending half your paycheck on accessories for it.

 The women's group, however, concluded that computers should be masculine ("el computador") because:
 1. In order to do anything with them, you have to turn them on.
 2. They have a lot of data but still can't think for themselves.
 3. They are supposed to help you solve problems, but half the time, they ARE the problem; and
 4. As soon as you commit to one, you realize that if you had waited a little longer, you could have gotten a better model.
 The women won.
Rules of Thumb   
Easy shortcuts to make an ‘educated’ guess
The quality of food at a restaurant is inversely proportional to the size of the restaurants freezer.
Yeah, It Really Happened
  Returns tomorrow
              
Somewhat Useless Information   
John Ringling and his wife started spending their winters in Sarasota, Florida, in 1909. They fell in love with the area and in 1927 made it the winter headquarters of their circus. Ringling used his elephants to help with construction as he developed a commercial and residential center in the area.
John Philip Sousa's "Stars and Stripes Forever" is known as the Disaster Song in the circus world. It is only played in case of emergency as a way to signal to circus personnel that something is wrong without alarming the audience.
Professional clowns unofficially "trademark" their faces by sending close-up photos of themselves in full makeup to the Department of Clown Registry in Milwaukee. The clown submits a close-up photo of his face, and an artist painstakingly recreates it using acrylic paints on a goose egg, where it is kept "on file."
Famed clown Emmett Kelly portrayed himself in the Academy Award-winning film The Greatest Show on Earth. However, he wasn't completely happy with the finished film because in one shot he is seen without trademark makeup.
The Flying Wallendas were famous for performing their act without a safety net. This led to tragic consequences in Detroit in 1962, when their 7-person pyramid collapsed on the high wire, causing three performers to plummet 30 feet onto a concrete floor.
In 1999, 22-year-old Johnathan Lee Iverson became the youngest ringmaster in the history of the Ringling Brothers and Barnum and Bailey Circus. He was also the first African American to hold the position.

Calendar Information        
…Happening This Week:
1-7
Bread Pudding Recipe Exchange Week
Update Your References Week

Today Is                                                                      
Fire Day—a computer thing evaluating file extensions
Great American Grump Out
Roberts Rule of Order Day

Todays Other Events                                                             
1400’s
1497: John Cabot departs to North America
à
1600’s
1670: King Charles of England gives all trade rights to "all the Landes Countreyes and Territoryes upon the Coastes and Confynes of the Seas" lying within the Hudson Strait to the Hudson’s Bay Company. This monopoly remains in effect until 1859.
1700’s
1776: France & Spain agreed to give weapons to American rebels
1800’s
1865: Pres Johnson offers $100,000 reward for capture of Jefferson Davis
1871: Apache raid settlements near Fort Seldon, in southern New Mexico. According to army records Buffalo Soldiers cavalry troops chase them for 280 miles, but they do not catch them.
1890: Territory of Oklahoma created
1900’s
1918: General Motors acquires the Chevrolet Motor Company of Delaware
1930: Des Moines (Western League) defeats Wichita 13:6 to open 1st ballpark with permanently installed lights
1932: Jack Benny's 1st radio show premieres (NBC Blue Network)
1936: Emperor Haile Selassie & family flee Abyssinia
1946: The "Battle of Alcatraz" takes place, killing two guards and three inmates.
1953: Hussein I installed as king of Jordan
1960: Harry Belafonte 2nd Carnegie Hall performance
1968: Israeli television begins transmitting
1974: Former VP Spiro Agnew disbarred
1988: Jackson Pollock's "Search" sold for $4,800,000
1994: Dr Kervokian found innocent on assisting suicides
2000’s
2000: President Bill Clinton announces that accurate GPS access would no longer be restricted to the United States military
2011 : The 2011 E. coli O104:H4 outbreak strikes Europe, mostly in Germany, leaving more than 30 people dead and many others sick from the bacteria outbreak

Todays Birthdays                                                           
In their 60’s
Larry Gatlin, Seminole Tx, country singer (Gatlin Bros-Broken Lady ) is 64
Lesley Gore, Tenafly NJ, singer (It's My Party ) is 66
à
In their 40’s
Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson, American professional wrestler and actor is 40
In their 30’s
David Beckham, soccer player is 37

Remembered for being born on this day
James F. Byrnes, American statesman, and Justice of the U.S. Supreme Court in 1882
Catherine the Great [Catherine II], Stettin, Pomerania, Kingdom of Prussia, Empress of Russia in 1729
John Galt, Scotland, novelist (Ayrshire Legatees, Lawrie Todd) in 1779
Philippe Halsman, American photographer in 1906
Lorenz Hart, American lyricist ("The Lady Is a Tramp," ) in 1895
Hedda Hopper, American gossip columnist in 1885
Pinky Lee, children's show host (Pinky Lee Show ) in 1907
Benjamin Spock, CT, pediatrician (Common Sense Book of Baby Care) in 1903
Manfred Freiherr von Richthofen [The Red Baron], Breslau, German World War I fighter ace in 1892


Todays Obits                                                           
Jack Barry, game show emcee (Joker's Wild), dies of heart attack in 1984 at 66
Julio Gallo, wine maker (Gallo), dies in a car accident in 1993 at 82
Donald A Hall, airplane designer (Spirit of St Louis), dies of heart attack in 1968 at 69
J Edgar Hoover, first Director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (1924-72) dies of heart  attack in 1972 at 77
Jack Kemp, former United States Congressman and 1996 Vice Presidential Candidate dies in 2009 of cancer at 73
Osama bin Laden, leader of al-Qaeda and 'the most wanted man in the world' killed in 2011 at 54
Lynn Redgrave, British actress dies of breast cancer in 2010 at 67
Leonardo da Vinci, artist/scientist, dies in 1519 at 67

Answers                                                                                                                                            
Brain Game: Close Up Picture

Riddle of the day
I am a Rainbow.

NPR Sunday Puzzle
1.      Turkey part that may be moistened with a baster:
a.     breast
2.     When a bridge is out, where the traffic is routed:
a.     detour
3.     Important member of a religious circle:
a.     cleric
4.     You might need one to get through a military sector:
a.     escort
5.     Game for bridge haters:
a.     hearts
6.     Big holiday for St. Teresa:
a.     Easter
7.     What you can’t do to something that is silent:
a.     Listen
8.     Rock whose chances of hitting the earth are remote:  
a.     Meteor
9.     Island 1000 miles ENE of Bogata:
a.     Tobago
10.  What someone might be who posts a sign “Silence Please”:
a.     asleep
Anagrams

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.