Feb 29

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Today’s  Historical  Highlights

1712 - February 29 is followed by February 30 in Sweden, in a move to abolish the Swedish calendar for a return to the Old style

1836: General Edmund Gaines, and 1,100 soldiers have been engaged in a battle with a force of 1,500 Seminoles, under Chief Osceola, since February 27. The Americans built a stockade on the 27th. The Seminoles mount a major attack on the stockade. Many men are wounded on both sides during the attack. The fighting continues until March 6, 1836.

1936: An election is held to approve a Constitution and By-laws for the Santee Sioux Tribe of the Sioux Nation of the State of Nebraska. The vote is 284 to 60 in favor.

1940 - "Gone with the Wind," wins 8 Oscars

1956 - Islamic Republic forms in Pakistan

1960 - 1st Playboy Club, featuring bunnies, opens in Chicago

1972 - Hank Aaron becomes 1st baseball player to sign for $200,000 a year

♪Happy Birthday To: ♪                     

 

Free Rambling Thoughts   

Had a nice quiet birthday…very nice. It was snowing most of the day…reminded me so much of my younger life in Colorado. We postponed our lunch, because none of us knew if the foot of snow predicted would materialize. It didn’t, but that’s OK too. Got several calls and lots of birthday wishes on Facebook. My brother and his wife are busy moving from Manhattan to a loft in Brooklyn, but found time as the movers were arriving for a nice long birthday call. Life is gooder. I added a page to my FB account. It is the highlights of this blog, with important historical stuff that happened each day. We’ll see if anyone likes it. Fine I they do, fine if they don’t. I really enjoy looking up what has happened throughout history on the day it happens. If you are on FB it’s called  It All Happened Today. It doesn’t have the links of the blog, but does have a lot of stuff. Need to work on it a little, since there is no way to use Bold Print.
 I changed the blog page today…my birthday is usually the last day of February…so I automatically changed it this morning…forgetting that the 29^th is tomorrow. Oops.

Game   Center   (answers at the end of post)

Brain Game

NPR Sunday Puzzle

Categories: You are given the names the categories, and then name something in the categories beginning with each of the letters in "radio." For example, if the category were women's names, the answers might be Rachel, Alice, Doris, Imogene and Opal. Obviously there are many more correct answers.

1.      Things in a kitchen (No food items):

2.      Foreign makes of cars:

3.      Colleges or Universities that don’t have a state name in their name:

Wuzzles  What concept or phrase do these suggest?

Lifestyle  Substance     

Planet Earth—Mayan

Found on You Tube         

Antarctic glacier collapseThe Collapse of a Glacier

Harper’s Index         

Last day that Ancient Greek was taught at Michigan State University: 4/29/2011

Joke-of-the-day

Two guys were fishing down by the Ohio River on different sides of the riverbank at night. Guy number one was catching a whole bunch of fish for his family, but guy number two hadn't caught any and was frustrated and called out to guy number one "How come you've been catching all them there fish and I ain't caught a single one?"
Guy number one replied, " I don’t know.... why don’t ya come on over here?"
"I don’t know.... I don’t see a bridge, and their ain’t no boat, and I don’t swim to well"Guy number one picks up his flashlight, turns it on, and replies, " Why don’t you walk across this here beam of light?"Guy number two was outraged and replied "do you think am stupid? When I get half way you'll turn it off!!!"

Rules of Thumb   

Easy shortcuts to make an ‘educated’ guess

To protect your eyes from strain, make sure the screen is just beyond arm's length when you work on a computer.

Somewhat Useless Information    

The second longest geographical name that is accepted in the world is "Taumatahakatangihangak oauauotamateaturipukaka pikimaugahoronukupokaiwehe nua kitanatahu" (85 letters) which is a hill in New Zealand - it is a Maori phrase which translates to "place where Tamatea, the man with the big knees, who slid, climbed and swallowed mountains, known as land-eater, played his flute to his loved one."

Glaciers store between 70% and 80% of all the freshwater on the planet. 99% of those glaciers are in the Arctic and Antarctic.

Yeah, It Really Happened                 

MERIDEN, Conn. -- A Connecticut family has a big mess to clean up after a car crashed into their bedroom while they were away.The Scalzos were caught off-guard on Sunday night when they drove up to their home on Round Hill Road in Meriden, Conn., after a weekend away in Pennsylvania.“I saw all the flashing lights and the fire engines… At first we thought it was a fire or something,” said Nick Scalzo.
When he and his family took a closer look, they couldn’t miss the car on its side that had flipped into their bedroom.“Sure enough, there was a car up against the house and chaos,” Scalzo added.Police told NBC Connecticut that the driver swerved to avoid hitting an animal, then lost control before he crashed into the home and caused thousands of dollars worth of damage.“Just a complete disaster,” said Scalzo — both on the outside and on the inside.
Scalzo’s bedroom was a shambles right after the fact, and roughly 24 hours later, it looked more like a construction zone. The walls were still boarded up and it was filled with rubble.“It will be a mess for a while,” Scalzo said.The crash happened 20 minutes before the family came home from their vacation. Despite the damage, the family said they were fortunate they weren’t in the bedroom, because someone could have been seriously hurt or even killed.“We could have been in there unpacking,” Nick Scalzo said.On Monday, Meriden police were still investigating the crash and didn’t know if alcohol could have been a factor. The driver was rushed to the hospital with minor injuries.“They wheeled him away. They asked if he was speeding; he said he wasn't,” Scalzo said.
Police told NBC Connecticut they questioned whether that was true and said the driver could have been going well over the 30 mph speed limit. Police have not released the name of the driver.

Calendar Information        

…Happening This Week:

27-03/3

Telecommuter Appreciation Week

Peace Corps Week

1-7

National Cheerleading Week

National Ghostwriters Week

National Write A Letter of Appreciation Week

Universal Human Beings Week

Today Is                                                                      

Bachelor’s Day

Floral Design Day

Inspirational Underlings Day

Leap Year Day

National Tooth Fairy Day

Today’s Other Events                                                             

1500’s

1504 - Columbus uses a lunar eclipse to frighten hostile Jamaican Indians

1600’s

1692 - Sarah Good & Tituba, an Indian servant, accused of witchcraft, Salem

1700’s

1704 - French & Indians attack Deerfield, Mass, kill 50, abduct 100

1780 - The Omicron Delta Omega fraternity was founded by Benjamin Franklin at James Madison University

1800’s

1892 - St. Petersburg, Florida is incorporated

1900’s

1904 - Theodore Roosevelt, appoints 7 man committee to study Panama Canal

1940 - Hattie McDaniel becomes 1st black woman to win an Oscar

1956 - Pres Eisenhower announces he would seek a 2nd term

1964 - Frank Rugani sets badminton shuttlecock distance record, 24.3 m [79 '  8.69 "]

1968 - National Advisory Commission on Civil Disorders (Kerner Comm) reports against racism & demands aid given to blacks

1980 - Gordie Howe becomes 1st NHL player to score 800 career goals

1988 - NYC Mayor Koch calls Reagan a "WIMP" in the war on drugs

2000’s

2004 - Jean-Bertrand Aristide resigns as President of Haiti following popular rebel uprising.

Today’s Birthdays                                                           

In their 80’s

Patricia [Anne] McKillip, US, sci-fi author (Fool's Run) is 84 or 21

Tempest Storm, American burlesque performer is 84 or 21

In their 60’s

Dennis Farina, actor (Blue Knight, Stanley, Stunt Man) will be 68 or 17

Tim[othy] Powers, US, sci-fi author (Epitaph in Rust, Night Moves) is 60 or 15

In their 50’s

Tony Robbins, American motivational speaker is 52 or 13

In their 40’s

Antonio Sabato Jr, actor is 40 or 10

In their 30’s

Ja Rule, American rapper and actor is 36 or 9

Remembered for being born on this day

John Philip Holland, Liscannor Ireland, pioneer in submarine building in 1840

John "Pepper" Martin, baseballer (NL stolen base leader 1933,34,36) in 1904

Karl Ernst von Baler, Russia, naturalist (discovered human ovum) in 1792

Louise Wood, director of Girl Scouts of USA (1961-72) in 1920

Today’s Obits                                                           

Pat Garrett, U.S. gunslinger, killed during land dispute at 57 in 1908

[Charles] Louis I [Augustus], King of Bavaria (L Montez), dies at 81 in 1868

Tore Ørjasæter, Norwegian poet dies at 82 in 1968

Sir James Wilson, Premier of Tasmania dies of 68^th birthday of heart disease in 1880

Answers                                                                                                                                            

Brain Game

 numbers 4 and 5 are identical

NPR Sunday Puzzle

1.      Things in a kitchen (No food items):

a.      range, apple corer, dishes, ice cream maker, oven

2.      Foreign makes of cars:

a.      Renault, Audi, Daihatsu, Isuzu, Opel

3.      Colleges or Universities that don’t have a state name in their name:

a.      Rutgers, Amherst, Dartmouth, Ithaca. Oberlin

Wuzzle

• One horse town
• Lotion
• A tall tale

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  ☺