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Almanac: Week: 03 \ Day: 013
January
Averages: 43°\16°
86004 Today: H 45°\L 32°
Ave. humidity: 89% Average Sky Cover: 95%
Wind ave: 1mph\Gusts: 12mph
Ave. High: 43° Record
High: 59° (2000)
Ave. Low: 16° Record Low: -6° (1963)
Observances
Today:
Blame
Someone Else Day
Make Your Dream Come True Day
Stephen
Foster Memorial Day
Observances This
Week:
8-14
Universal
Letter Writing Week
11-17
Cuckoo
Dancing Week
National Vocation Awareness Week
« »
Quote of
the Day
Historical
Highlights for Today
1099 - Crusaders
set fire to Mara, Syria
1559 - Elizabeth
I crowned Queen of England in Westminster Abbey
1695 - Jonathan
Swift ordained an Anglican priest in Ireland
1794 - Congress
changes US flag to 15 stars & 15 stripes
1830 - Great
fire in New Orleans thought to be set by rebel slaves
1874 - Battle
between jobless & police in NYC, 100s injured
1888 - National
Geographic Society founded (Washington, DC)
1938 - The
Church of England accepts the theory of evolution
1939 - Black Friday bush fires burn 20,000 square
KM of land in Australia
1943
- Hitler declares "Total War"
1957 - Wham-O Company produces the 1st Frisbee
1970 - Riots
begin in the Ballymurphy area of Belfast
1978 - NASA
select its first American women astronauts
1988 - Supreme Court rules (5-3) public school
officials have broad powers to censor school newspapers, plays & other
expressive activities
1995 - America3 becomes 1st all-female crew to win
an America's Cup race
2012 - Cruise ship Costa Concordia runs aground at
Isola de Giglio, Italy, with at least 15 deaths
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♫
Birthdays Today: ♫
How many can you identify? Answers below in Birthday’s Today
My
Rambling Thoughts
Sure didn’t start out as a great day, but got better. Went to the
eye doctor for a check and he was 30 minutes late. Then checked at the pharmacy
for some meds and found that there is a ‘nationwide shortage’ of one of them.
Then called the 800# to renew a magazine subscription and found that their
computer was down for the whole week so they couldn’t take credit card orders
until next week. Then around 11a the pharmacy called and could give me 60
tablets, instead of 90 for my med. I picked them up.
Then I got a phone call from my college roommate, who I haven’t
talked to in a couple of years. He retired last week, which I knew from
Facebook. He is having a difficult time with all his free time. We talked about
an hour and caught up. I reassured him that he just needs to settle in to the
new chapter. He agreed and seemed to appreciate my words of wisdom. He’ll be
fine. I realize how lucky I was to retire, move to a new town and start the new
chapter in a new place. I get his concerns as he really had nothing to new to
deal with, except that he didn’t have to commute for almost 3 hours a day for
his job. He does have 5 grandkids within a couple of hours of where he lives,
so after hearing about some of my drives to town, he saw that it wasn’t so bad.
He may be coming to AZ to visit a couple of us sometime. Nice.
« »
Brain
Teasers
(answers at the end of post)
Find
an anagram for each word in Group A. Each anagram will answer one of the clues
in Group B.
Group A
A. Shale
B. Pique
C. Nixed
D. Greet
E. Lodge
Group B
1. White heron
2. Provide gear
3. Eyed suggestively
4. Dog's lead
5. Alphabetical reference
Found on
You Tube with some relevance to today
« »
Paraphernalia
4 the Brain:
60’s
Inventions…
1961
Valium invented.
The nondairy creamer invented.
Education
Facts…
Japanese schools do not have proms.
The founder of McDonald's has a Bachelor degree in Hamburgerology.
Flagstaff,
AZ History…
75 YEARS
AGO
It’s time to put your Christmas tree on the curb. The J.C.’s big
truck will call for them and prepare for the big community bonfire. 8 p.m. on
Jan. 12 at City Park. The Flagstaff State Teachers College Choir will sing at
this free community event.
Flagstaff’s
Iconic 50…
Walnut
Canyon Cliff Dwellings
Stand at the Walnut Canyon observation point and gaze across these
canyon walls and imagine what life was like for the ancient Sinagua Indians
that that once lived in the cliff dwellings at Walnut Canyon. For reasons that
are a mystery, they left Walnut Canyon about 800 years ago. Take a hike along
Rim or Island Trails and enter some of cliff dwellings and see many others
nestled into the alcoves of the canyon walls.
Much like the Grand Canyon to the northwest, Walnut Canyon was
formed by 60 million years of water flowing first as a gentle creek across the
plateau, then etching and carving its way through steep passes. Deep gorges
formed in the sandstone, limestone, and other ancient desert rock some 20 miles
long and 400 feet deep.
Harper’s
Index…
1/3
Estimated portion of the past 100 executed US prisoners who
suffered from intellectual disabilities
Rules of
Thumb…
CHILDREN
AND FOOD
Young children's enjoyment of a home-cooked
meal is in inverse proportion to the amount of time spent preparing it.
Unusual
Fact of the Day…
Ronald Reagan's first Inauguration Day (Jan. 20th,
1981) was the warmest January inauguration on record, at 55°F. When reelected,
his second Inauguration Day (Jan. 21st, 1985) was the coldest on
record, at only 7°F.
« »
Joke-of-the-day
An old man walks into a bar, sits down, and
starts crying.
The bartender asks, “What’s wrong?” The old man looks at the bartender through teary
eyes and between sobs says, “I married a beautiful woman two days ago. She’s a
natural blonde, twenty-five, intelligent, a marvelous cook, a meticulous
housekeeper, extremely sensitive to my wants and needs, very giving, my best
friend, and intensely passionate in bed.”
The bartender stares at the old man for a brief moment and says, “But that
sounds great! You have what every man wants in a woman, so why are crying?”
The old man looks at the bartender and says, “I can’t remember where I live!”
Yep, It
Really Happened
Life isn't always easy in China. But even if you are working 70
hours a week for 90 cents an hour, things can always get worse. Like it did for
this poor construction worker.
A builder who broke both his arms and legs after falling off a construction
site survived for nearly a week by drinking his own urine.
Friends of Yang Hsieh thought he'd quit his job at the building site in Hunan
province, central China, but the 28-year-old had slipped and plunged 65ft,
shattering his limbs and breaking his mobile phone.
Unable to move or phone anyone he tried calling out for help but no one heard
him.
Builder Fai She, 32, said: "At first we thought he was off sick. We tried
calling him but the phone was constantly off and by day four we thought he must
have found work somewhere else. We had no idea he was lying on the ground below
us."
Yang was eventually found six days later when a passerby heard his cries for
help.
He was taken to hospital where doctors say he is now making a full recovery.
Somewhat
Useless Information
--Pacific
Island robber crabs love coconuts so much that they have developed the ability
to climb trees to satisfy their cravings.
--The praying mantis is the only insect that can turn its head 360 degrees.
--The electric eel can produce 350 to 550 volts of electricity up to 150 times
per hour without any apparent fatigue.
--Spider silk is five times stronger than steel, but it is also highly elastic
- a rare combination in materials.
--A large parrot's beak can exert 500 pounds of pressure per square inch,
enabling the bird to feast on such delicacies as Brazil nuts with a simple
crunch.
--Wasps can make paper by mixing wood pulp with saliva to form a paste, which
dries stiff.
Gizmos
HAMPTON, N.Y. (UPI)
Slinging
a fast-moving probe into orbit around a faraway planet is hard enough; landing
a hefty, astronaut-carrying spacecraft on an alien surface is beyond difficult.
But doing just that -- on Mars -- is exactly what NASA hopes to do in the
coming decade. To do so successfully, NASA engineers are considering employing
an inflatable spacecraft that resembles the rainbow-colored, donut-like
stacking rings that small children play with.
Researchers believe a lightweight inflatable structure -- the current prototype
is dubbed the Hypersonic Inflatable Aerodynamic Decelerator (HIAD) -- could be
deployed in order to slow the spacecraft's as it descends through the thin
Martian air.
"We have been eating, sleeping, dreaming this technology -- in my case for
six years," NASA scientist Anthony Calomino said last year at a project
meeting.
"In a real spacecraft, a connected stack of donut rings would be inflated
before entering a planet's atmosphere to slow the vehicle for landing,"
NASA explained in a blog update last summer. "The stacked-cone concept
would allow NASA to land heavier payloads to the surface of the planet than is
currently possible, and could eventually be used to deliver crews."
Slowing an alien descent with inflatables would save missions from carrying
extra fuel to put on the brakes by using reverse rocket propulsion.
But one the challenges is building the inflatable technology out of materials
that can withstand high temperatures caused by the friction of atmospheric
reentry.
"This idea has actually been around since the 1960s," said Neil
Cheatwood, the senior engineer at Langley Research Center in Hampton, Virginia.
"But now we have materials that can withstand higher temperatures. We've
made great strides with this technology."
Researchers plan to build and test a real life prototype consisting of a
titanium frame and an underlining of carbon fire skin. It would be inflated
with nitrogen.
« »
Today’s
Events through History
1610 - Galileo
Galilei discovers Callisto, 4th satellite of Jupiter
1849 - Vancouver
Island granted to Hudson's Bay Co
1915 - Earthquake
in Avezzano Italy kills 29,800
1930 - "Mickey
Mouse" comic strip 1st appears
1958 - 9,000
scientists of 43 nations petition UN for nuclear test ban
1986 - NCCA institutes eligibility requirements
based on college exams
1994 - Tonya Harding's bodyguard, Shawn Eric Eckardt
& Derrick Brian Smith arrested & charged with conspiracy in attack of
skater Nancy Kerrigan
« »
Birthday’s
Today
Rip
Taylor, actor and comedian (Gong Show) is 80
Billy
Gray, actor (Bud-Father Knows Best) is 77
Julia
Louis-Dreyfus, comedienne (SNL, Seinfeld,) is 54
Patrick
Dempsey, actor (Mike-Fast Times) is 49
Orlando
Bloom, English actor (The Lord of the Rings) is 37
William
Hung, American Idol contestant is 32
« »
Remembered
for being born today
John
Pringle Nichol, Scottish Astronomer and educator 1804-1859@54
Horatio
Alger, Jr., American minister and author (1832-1899@67
Sophie
Tucker, [Kalish], Russia, singer/last of red hot mammas 1887-1966@79
Ralph
Edwards, Merino CO, TV host (This is Your Life) 1913-2005@92
Robert
Stack, actor (Eliot Ness-Untouchables, Airplane) 1919-2003@84
s, actor
(Match Game, Ghost & Mrs Muir), 1937-2007@76
Brandon
Tartikoff, TV exec (NBC) 1949-1977@48
« »
Historical
Obits Today
Wyatt
Earp, US marshall (OK Corral), 1929, @80
Patrick
McGoohan, American actor (The Prisoner), 2009, @80
Chiang
Ching-huo, president of Taiwan, stroke, 1988, @77
Hubert
Humphrey, (Sen-D-Minn, VP), cancer, 1978@66
Teddy
Pendergrass, American R&B singer, repertory failure, 2010, @59
James
Joyce, novelist (Ulysses), perforated ulcer, 1941, @58
Ernie
Kovacs, comedian, car crash, 1962, @42
Stephen
Foster, composer (My Old Kentucky Home), fever, 1864, @37
« »
Brain Teasers Answers
A. Shale = (4) Leash
B. Pique = (2) Equip
C. Nixed = (5) Index
D. Greet = (1) Egret
E. Lodge = (3) Ogled
« »
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…§
