Dec 29, 2012


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Flagstaff Almanac:  Week: 52/ Day: 364   
Today: H   32°L -3° Averages: H  42° L 16° Records: H 61°(1980)L -12°(1966)
Wind: ave:   8mph; Gusts:  9mph  ave. humidity:  89%
Quote of the Day:

Today’s Historical Highlights:
11 killed, 75 hurt by terrorist bomb at LaGuardia Airport—1975
1st nautical almanac in US published by Samuel Stearns, Boston—1782
2nd Irish constitution goes into effect; Irish Free State renamed Erie—1937
Assassination inside Canterbury Cathedral of Thomas Becket—1170
Bob Marley postage stamp issued in Jamaica—1982
Bowling ball invented—1862
British burn Buffalo, NY during War of 1812—1813
Coach Paul "Bear" Bryant ends his career with Alabama (323 wins) —1982
Edison patents "transmission of signals electrically" (radio) —1891
Emma Snodgrass arrested in Boston for wearing pants—1852
Gas lights 1st installed at White House (Polk's administration) —1848
Hong Kong begins slaughtering all its chickens to prevent bird flu—1997
Life magazine ceases publication—1972
Mongolia gains independence from the Qing dynasty—1911
SF Symphony formed—1911
Star Trek's "Trouble With Tribbles" 1st airs—1967
Sun Yat-sen becomes the first President of the Republic of China—1911
Treaty of New Echota is signed, ceding all the lands of the Cherokee east 
     of the Mississippi River to US—1835
Wayne Gretzky & Martina Navratilova, named athletes of decade by AP—1989
Wounded Knee Battle or Massacre (depending on which version you read) —1890 

     Happy Birthday To: ♪. ♪   
How many can you identify?…answers in Today’s Birthdays

Free Rambling Thoughts:   
I had a great Christmas in Chicago. The family in-laws are so kind and nice to me. Lots of great people, even better food than last year, Christmas Chaos with little ones…and big ones too. We had three separate gift sharing events…two on Christmas Eve and one on Christmas Day. Must say they have an interesting White Elephant gift exchange where you pick a gift from the pile and you can open it or steal one that is already open. Then when all the gifts are open, you have another round of stealing. For the real gift exchange, you can only steal once. A lot of fun, lots of laughs, and everyone had a great time.

My trip was fairly uneventful with an hour delay in Minneapolis on the way. One the way back we got to Phoenix about 45 minutes early. The drive to Flag was also uneventful but the driver warned us we might have problems with snow. Luckily, we came in on time, between two storms. On the drive home from the shuttle drop off, it was snowing real hard, but stopped about an hour later. Then there is my brother’s trip…they were flying from Chicago to Houston, to Merida on United. The plane was about 30 minutes late leaving Chicago and landed in Houston. Some idiot left his seat on the approach to move to the front of the plane to ‘make his connection’. He was told to return to his seat. So he did, then he got up again while the plane was on the tarmac. He was told he would be greeted by the local cops when they got to their gate. They had to wait about 15 minutes for the cops to arrive. That guy was carted off and Richard and Laura got off the plane and walked to the next gate…which was right beside the gate they were in. The plane to Merida had left 4 minutes earlier. It’s a one flight a day deal. Why the idiots on the ground didn’t hold the plane will never be known…strange since it is also a United Flight and surely everyone knew why the plane was late. They did get a flight for the morning to Cancun and then rented a car for a 4 hour drive…getting to Merida about 3 hours earlier than they would have on the plane. To top off the great travel adventure, upon landing in Cancun, they couldn’t find Laura’s one checked bag. So they left and it will be delivered sometime. They are at their hacienda until the 8th so things should work out. On a sad note, their 19 year old cat, who had been sick for a couple of months, had to be put down on Wednesday. Hard on both of them, especially since they couldn’t be there with Mr. Snaps at the end.

Game  Center: (answers at the end of post)
Hidden Countries
Find two countries in the sentence
 Vladimir and Olga are Soviet names. 
Lifestyle  Substance:     
Ok, then?

Read This Headline Carefully!!
A sign posted in Germany's Black Forest:
IT IS STRICTLY FORBIDDEN ON OUR BLACK FOREST CAMPING SITE, THAT PEOPLE OF DIFFERENT SEX, OR INSTANCE, MEN AND WOMEN, LIVE TOGETHER IN ONE TENT, UNLESS THEY ARE MARRIED WITH EACH OTHER FOR THIS PURPOSE.
Countdown to 2013 begins:

Bet You Didn’t Know…from History Channel
The Greek Dark Ages, which lasted from 1200 to 800 B.C., saw the collapse of cities and towns, a return to small-scale farming and animal herding, and the disappearance of writing for more than 400 years.
Harper’s Index:         
Percentage of Americans who viewed college as a good financial investment in 2008: 81
Percentage in 2012: 57
Unusual Fact of the Day:
President Grover Cleveland's first name is Stephen. Grover is his middle name.
Found on You Tube: 

Joke-of-the-day:
Q: How come legacy programmers get Halloween and Christmas confused? A: Because Oct 31 = Dec 25 (Octal 31 = Decimal 25)  
Rules of Thumb:   
Easy shortcuts to make an ‘educated’ guess
 COUNTING YOUR VOLUNTEERS
Any volunteer organization is alive and well if at least 35 percent of its members volunteer consistently.   
Yeah, It Really Happened
FORT DODGE, Iowa - An Iowa woman fired for being "irresistible" to her boss says a court decision against her was unfair. Melissa Nelson told CNN, "The last couple of days have just been an emotional roller coaster. I'm trying to stay strong. It's tough. I don't think it's fair. I don't think its right." An Iowa Supreme Court judge said the allegations do not amount to sex discrimination. Dentist James Knight, whose business is in Fort Dodge, fired dental assistant Nelson, an employee of 10 years, because she presented too much of a distraction and jeopardized his relationship with his wife, CNN reported Sunday. The Supreme Court affirmed a lower court's ruling that the employment termination did not amount to sex discrimination under the state's civil rights act. Knight's wife discovered in 2009 that Knight and Nelson were sending text messages to each other and demanded her husband fire Nelson, which he did in 2010, CNN reported. Knight told Nelson near the end of her employment that her clothing was "distracting," but Nelson said she wore scrubs at work, CNN reported. The court's decision said Knight told Nelson "if she saw his pants bulging, she would know her clothing was too revealing," and that Knight said in reply to Nelson's alleged comment about her infrequent sex life, "That's like having a Lamborghini in the garage and never driving it." In siding with Knight, Iowa Supreme Court Justice Edward M. Mansfield wrote on behalf of the court, "The issue before us is not whether a jury could find that Dr. Knight treated Nelson badly. We are asked to decide only if a genuine fact issue exists as to whether Dr. Knight engaged in unlawful gender discrimination when he fired Nelson at the request of his wife."  
Somewhat Useless Information   
  • A rubber band in some regions is known as a binder, elastic or lacker band or gumband in Australia.
  • Synthetic Rubber - About 3/4's of the world rubber come from crude oil.
  • Chicle, widely used as a base for chewing gum, is another latex product.
  • Latex is the sap of various plants, mostly from the rubber tree. If you expose the sap to the air it hardens and become 'rubbery'. Over the year various cultures learned that if you add certain other juices and saps to the mass it becomes more elastic and lasts longer. 
  • Latex is used in many types of clothing. It is different from rubber in that it is less refined and often thinner. Worn on the body (or applied directly by painting) it tends to be skin-tight, producing a "second skin" effect. It has a shinier finish than rubber. 
  • A story says that the first European to return to Portugal from Brazil with samples of such water-repellent rubberized cloth so shocked people that he was brought to court on the charge of witchcraft.  

Calendar Information        
Happening This Week:
25-31> It's About Time Week
Today Is                                                                      
Tick Tock Day
Pepper Pot Day
Saint Thomas [Becket] of Canterbury Feast Day
US: Texas: Admission Day (1845—28th state)
Today’s Events through History  
1st American Young Men's Christian Association (YMCA) chapter opened in Boston—1851 
CBS purchases NFL TV rights for 1966-68 at $18.8 million per year—1965
English troops occupy Savannah, Georgia—1778
Fred P Newton completes longest swim ever (1826 miles), when he swam 
     in the Mississippi River -Ford Dam, Minn, to New Orleans—1930
Germany begins dropping incendiary bombs on London (WW II) —1940
Leaders of the Khmer Rouge apologize for the 1970s genocide in Cambodia 
     that claimed over 1 million—1998
Patent granted for a 4-wheel automobile brake—1908
Ship carrying Jewish immigrants driven away from Palestine—1947
Steam-powered threshing machine patented, Winthrop, Maine—1837
US State Dept announces work on placing objects into Earth orbit (Elmsford NY) —1948

Today’s Birthdays                                                           
In their 80’s
Inga Swenson, Omaha Nebraska, actress (Gretchen-Benson) is 80
In their 70’s
Mary Tyler Moore, actress (Mary Tyler Moore, Ordinary People) is 76
Ray Thomas, England, rock vocalist (Moody Blues-Nights in White Satin) is 71
Jon Voight, actor (Deliverance, Midnight Cowboy) is 74
In their 60’s
Ted Danson, actor (Cheers) will be 65
Marianne Faithfull, Hampstead England, vocalist (Money) is 66
In their 50’s
Paula Poundstone, comedienne (Emmy Awards)is 53
In their 40’s
Jude Law, actor, film producer and director is 40

Remembered for being born today
Archibald Alison, Scottish historian (History of Europe) (1792-1867)
Tom Bradley, (Mayor-D-LA)  (1917-1998)
Pablo Casals, Vendrell Catalonia Spain, violinist/conductor/composer (1876-1973)
Ed Flanders, Minneapolis Mn, actor (Dr Westphall-St Elsewhere) (1934-suicide-1995)
Charles Goodyear, inventor (vulcanization process for rubber), (1808-1860)
Andrew Johnson, Raleigh NC, (Unionist), 17th pres (1808-1875)
Madame de Pompadour, mistress of French King Louis XV (1721-TB-1764)

Today’s Historical Obits                                                           
Julius Axelrod, biochemist, recipient of the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine—2004—at 92
Roy Engle, actor (Police Chief-My Favorite Martian)—1980—at 67
Big Foot (Unpan Glešká), Lakota Indian chief—at Wounded Knee—1890—at 64
Tim Hardin, US singer (Bird on a Wire)—drug overdose—1980—at 39

Answer: Hidden Countries
 Vladimir and Olga are Soviet names. 
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.