Jul 24

FYI: Any blue text is a link. Click to check it out!

Jul. 25, 2019 Week: 30 \ Day: 206

86004:   H 75° \ L 54° \ Average Sky Cover: 40% 

Nearest wildfire:  4mi. Nearest lightning:  36mi

Wind:   8mph\Gusts:  8mph

Visibility: 10 mi

Record High: 92°[1931]   Record Low: 41°[1913]

Jul Averages: 82°\542° (8 day with rain)

Today’s Quote

We live in a rainbow of chaos.

Paul Cezanne

Random Tidbits

A nineteenth-century Chinese merchant was sentenced to death for murdering his wife. Sleep deprivation was deliberately chosen as the method of execution on the grounds that it would cause the maximum amount of suffering and would serve as the greatest deterrent to other potential murderers. He eventually died on the nineteenth day, having suffered terribly.

Children don't react the same way to sleep deprivation as adults: while adults get sleepy, children become hyperactive. In fact, a lack of sleep can result in ADHD-like symptoms in kids. Children need an average of nine to 10 hours of sleep each night.

Observances This Week

6-28
Tour de France

18-25

Restless Leg Syndrome (RLS) Education & Awareness Week

20-28

National Moth Week Link

21-27

Captive Nations Week
International Lace Week  Link

National Independent Retailers Week Link  
National Zoo Keeper Week Link

RAGBRAI

25-27

Comi Great Texas Mosquitos Days

Observances for Today

Carousel Day or Merry-Go-Round Day Link
Culinarians Day

Hire A Veteran Day  Link  Link
National Chili Dog Day  
National Hot Fudge Sundae Day

National Intern Day  Link  
National Refreshment Day  Link  
Red Shoe Day (International)  Link  Link  (Lyme Disease)
Thread The Needle Day Link
Video Games Day Link

My Rambling Thoughts

Fire control is much better. Thanks to the hundreds of first responders who have helped in this tremendous effort to protect our town’s life and property. There is much less smoke today, planes still dropping retardant, some areas close to the fire moving from GO to SET status. A very good sign…

A friend from our discussion group has invited me to a ‘boy’s night’ with some of the top astronomers here in Flag to discuss my recent adventure with them. And I get a free BBQ dinner. Excited.

Mary is back in town and I talked to her this morning. She’s happy to be home…she is also in the SET area and says that now she worries about flooding in her area. Cheryl took a bad fall while working on her raised planter. She is OK now but had to wait for neighbor’s come outside to get help getting up. Scary.

So, I listened to much of the Mueller hearings today. Maybe I should say TOO much of the hearings. Everyone had an agenda, everyone got to ask questions. No bombshells. Both sides will claim victory. Who loses? American democracy is in the process of losing.

Today’s Puzzle

Answer at the bottom of this page

As defendants, we deny all involvement in the unscrupulous dealings which have come to light in the recent government investigation.  What country name is hidden in the previous sentence?

Today’s Highlighted Historical Events

1500’s

1567 Don Diego de Losada founds the city of Santiago de Leon de Caracas, modern-day Caracas, the capital city of Venezuela

1700’s

1722 The Three Years War begins along the Maine and Massachusetts border

1775 Maryland issues currency depicting George III trampling Magna Carta

1800’s

1814 English engineer George Stephenson introduces his first steam locomotive, a travelling engine designed for hauling coal on the Killingworth wagonway named Blücher

1850 Gold discovered in Oregon (Rogue River)

1854 Walter Hunt is awarded the first U.S. patent for a paper shirt collar

1868 US Congress forms Wyoming Territory (Dakota, Utah & Idaho)

1871 Carousel patented by Wilhelm Schneider, Davenport, Iowa

1897 Writer Jack London sails to join the Klondike Gold Rush where he will write his first successful stories

1900’s

1941 FDR bans selling benzine/gasoline to Japan

1952 Puerto Rico becomes a self-governing US commonwealth (Constitution Day)

1961 In a speech John F. Kennedy emphasizes that any attack on Berlin is an attack on NATO

1969 Edward Kennedy pleads guilty to leaving scene of an accident a week after the Chappaquiddick car accident that killed Mary Jo Kopechne

1972 US health officials concede African American were used as guinea pigs in 40 year syphilis experiment

1984 Cosmonaut Svetlana Savitskaya becomes 1st woman to walk in space

1985 Spokeswoman for Rock Hudson confirms he has AIDS

1985 Steve Cram runs world record mile (3:46.32)

2000’s

2014 Palestinian officials call for a "Day of Rage" in the West Bank and within Israel against Israel's operation against Gaza; Israeli Defense Force prepares for protests

2016 Verizon announces $4.83 billion purchase of Yahoo

2018 Liquid lake found on Mars under its South Pole by European Space Agency's Mars Express orbiter reported in "Science"

Highlighted Birthdays Today

1884 Davidson Black,

Canadian paleoanthropologist and doctor of anatomy who identified "Peking Man", born in Toronto, Ontario (d. 1934: @49)

1894 Walter Brennan,

American actor (Real McCoys, At Gun Point), born in Lynn, Massachusetts (d. 1974: @80)

1920 Rosalind Franklin,

English chemist and co-discoverer of the structure of DNA, born in London (d. 1958: @37: cancer

1923 Estelle Getty,

American actress (The Golden Girls, The Golden Palace), born in NYC, New York (d. 2008: @84)

1941 Emmett Till,

American lynching victim, born in Chicago, Illinois (d. 1955: @14: murdered)

1954 Walter Peyton,

football player (d. 1999: @45: liver disease/cancer)

50’s

52- Matt LeBlanc,

American actor (Joey Tribbiani-Friends), born in Newton, Massachusetts

40’s

41- Louise Brown,

English woman who was the first person to be born through in vitro fertilization, born in Oldham, England

Highlighted Historical Obits Today

80’s

@84-1997 Ben Hogan,

American golfer (9-time major title winner; US masters 1951, 53)

70’s

@78-2018 Judith Appelbaum,

American magazine & newspaper editor and educator, dies from ovarian cancer

@76-1865 James Barry

[Margaret Ann Bulkley],

female disguised as a man, surgeon general (British army), born in County Cork, Ireland

60’s

@62-1995 Charlie Rich,

American country singer (Lonely Weekends), dies from embolism

@61-1834 Samuel Taylor Coleridge,

British romantic poet (Rime of Ancient Mariner), dies of heart failure

@60-1934 François Coty,

French perfume manufacturer

50’s

@57-1984 Willie Mae "Big Mama" Thornton,

American rhythm-and-blues singer and songwriter (Hound Dog, Ball & Chain, Stronger than Dirt), dies of heart and liver disorders

40’s

@47-2008 Randy Pausch,

American professor of Computer Science at Carnegie Mellon University, known for his "Last Lecture", dies from cancer

Puzzle answer:

Sweden. "defendants, we deny".