May 25

 

 

 

May , 2021   Week: 22    Day: 148                           

Visibility: 10 miles Ave. Sky Cover: 30%

Local: H 74°\ L 37°

Wind: 6mph/ Gusts: 10mph EXTREME Risk of Fire:   Active fire:  374mi Nearest Lightning: 722mi.

May Averages: 68°/34° (3 days w/moisture)

 

Today’s Quote

 

Unless we remember we cannot understand.

E. M. Forster

 

Humor

 

Las Vegas: All the amenities of modern society in a habitat unfit to grow a tomato.—Jason Love

 

Real Cities

 

Boring, Oregon is an unincorporated community in Clackamas County, Oregon. It is located along Oregon Route 212 in the foothills of the Cascade Mountain range, approximately twelve miles southeast of downtown Portland, and fourteen miles northeast of Oregon City. A bedroom community. Boring is named after William Harrison Boring, a Union soldier and pioneer whose family built a farm in the area in 1856, before Oregon had received statehood.

 

True Things

 

Perspective

In March, Einstein Cafe, an upscale dessert chain with outlets across the Gulf Arab states, started a fad by selling its thick, milky drinks in plastic baby bottles, complete with nipples. The Associated Press reported the cafe was inspired by photos of trendy bottles on social media, and the idea was an instant hit. People lined up at Einstein stores, they "took photos, they had fun, they remembered their childhood," said Younes Molla, CEO of the chain, but others "were so angry they said horrible things." In Dubai, Kuwait and Bahrain, the government cracked down on the new cafe offerings, saying the bottles violate the countries' customs and traditions; in Oman, citizens were asked to report sightings of the baby bottle confections to a consumer protection hotline. [Associated Press, 3/16/2021]

 

Weekly Observations

 

National Playground Safety Week Link National Work Zone Safety Awareness Week Link	Thru 30
National African Violet Week National Backyard Games Week National Safe Boating Week World Schizophrenia Awareness Week Link	23-29
Healthy and Safe Swimming Week Link International Learn To Swim Week Link National Fragrance Week Link	24-30
Undergraduate Research Week Link	24-28
Mule Days  Link   (Moved from April) Week of Solidarity With The People of Non-Self-Governing Territories:	25-31
Fleet Week (NY)	26-31
Mudbug Madness Days	28-30
Black Single Parents Week	28-6/3

 

Today’s Observations

Amnesty International Founders Day
Ascension of Baha'U'llah
Don't Fry Friday Link
Heat Awareness Day Link   
Menstrual Hygiene Day Link
National Brisket Day Link
National Cooler Day Link
National Hamburger Day Link

National Polka Day: Thru 30  Link 
National Road Trip Day Link
National Title Track Day

National Wig Out Day
Sierra Club Day Link
Slugs Return From Capistrano Day

My Sometimes-Long-Winded Thoughts

 

Nice warm day, no wind, lots of sunshine. Great!

I did some weekly shopping at Sam’s Club. I was going to get gas…$2.95/gal…but the wait was very long. I saw a friend from Tuba at Sam’s. I would have missed her, due to her mask, but she recognized me. They had queen size pillows on sale, so I got some new ones. I am really rough on pillows.

I watched the BBC news on PBS last night. They reported that there have been 230 mass shootings in the US since Jan. 1^st. Yesterday was only day 147. Congress doesn’t seem to be able to do anything, our citizens don’t seem to be able to do anything. So disappointing.

Brian Sicknick’s mother wants to meet with GOP Senators before the vote on the commission. Only 6of the 50 agreed to meet with her. Several more had her meet with their staff. Thirteen refused her invitation outright. Her son died following the attack on the Capitol. It seems strange to me that listening to her is impossible because of their schedules.

Lenny and Eleanor, my brother’s half-brother and his wife, made it back to Fort Collins. After visiting Flagstaff, they stopped at Winslow to see the statue of Standing on the Corner, then went to visit friends in Santa Fe, then back home. Very cool.

 

Daily Puzzle

Answer: bottom of the page

 

If you drop me, I’m sure to crack, but give me a smile and I’ll always smile back. What am I?

 

Historical Events

 

585 BC – A solar eclipse occurred, as predicted by the Greek philosopher and scientist Thales. Knowing this exact date helped historians find other exact and near-exact historical dates.

1892 – In San Francisco, California, John Muir organized the Sierra Club.

1897 – Jell-o was introduced.

1902 – Owen Wister’s The Virginian was published by Macmillan Press. The book made the American Cowboy an icon.

1928 – The Dodge Brothers, Inc. and the Chrysler Corporation merged.

1935 – John Steinbeck’s first successful novel, Tortilla Flat, was published.

1937 – Gesellschaft zur Vorbereitung des Deutschen Volkswagens mbH, later renamed Volkswagenwerk, or Volkswagon was founded.

1937 – The Golden Gate Bridge, San Francisco was officially opened to vehicles

1964 – The Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) was formed.

1987 – Matthias Rust, a 19-year-old amateur pilot from West Germany, took off from Helsinki, Finland, in his Cessna, and landed in Red Square, the heart of the Soviet Union.

1998 – Former Saturday Night Live actor and comedian Phil Hartman was shot and killed by his wife Brynn, in a murder/suicide.

1999 – In Milan, Italy, after 22 years of restoration work, Leonardo da Vinci’s masterpiece The Last Supper was put back on display. It is bigger than most people think – it is life-size, almost 29 feet wide.

2002 – The last steel girder was removed from the original World Trade Center site, officially ending the cleanup with closing ceremonies at Ground Zero in Manhattan, New York City.

2008 The first meeting of the Constituent Assembly of Nepal formally declares Nepal a republic, ending the 240-year reign of the Shah dynasty.

2016 Harambe, a gorilla at Cincinnati Zoo, is shot after dragging a 3 year old boy who had slipped into its enclosure (Cincinnati, Ohio)

2018 Coco-Cola launches its first alcoholic drink - Lemon-Do on island of Kyushu, Japan

2020 Minnesota Governor Tim Walz declares State of Emergency in Minneapolis and activates the Minnesota National Guard after protests over the death of George Floyd in police custody

 

Birthdays Today

 

77 – Gladys Knight, singer

77 – Rudy Giuliani, lawyer, politician

@65 – Jim Thorpe [(Sac and Fox (Sauk): Wa-Tho-Huk, translated as "Bright Path"], Olympic decathlete, football player, coach (d. 1953; heart failure)

@56 – Ian Fleming, English journalist,author (d. 1964; heart attack)

50 – Marco Rubio, politician

44 – Elisabeth Hasselbeck, American talk show host, author

43 – Jake Johnson, American actor

38 – Roman Atwood, American YouTuber

@20 – Cameron Boyce, American actor (d. 2019, seizure)

 

Puzzle Answer

 

A mirror

 

 

May 27

 

 

 

May 27, 2021   Week: 22    Day: 147                     

Visibility: 10 miles Ave. Sky Cover: 90%

Local: H 69°\ L 36°

Wind:  3mph/ Gusts:  6mph EXTREME Risk of Fire:  Active fire:  159mi Nearest Lightning: 583mi.

May Averages: 68°/34° (3 days w/moisture)

 

Today’s Quote

 

Courage is fear holding on a minute longer.

George S. Patton

 

Humor

 

Just keep driving. When something changes, you’ll know you’re out of Nebraska.

 

Real Cities

 

Okay, Oklahoma is a town along the east bank of the Verdigris River in Wagoner County, Oklahoma. The population was 620 at the 2010 census, a 3.9 percent increase over the figure of 597 recorded in 2000

The name Okay was adopted on 18 October 1919 after the "O. K. Trucks" brand of oil tankers made at a factory built there in 1915 by the Oklahoma Auto Manufacturing Company

 

True Things

 

Devil in the Details

An unnamed teenager in Thailand was excited by the surprisingly low price he found online for an Apple iPhone, and even though the shipping seemed a little high, he went ahead and ordered it, Oddity Central reported. The surprise came when he received a box nearly as tall as he was and found inside a coffee table shaped like an iPhone. The teen posted photos of his acquisition on social media and admitted he had been so anxious to snag the bargain that he didn't read the listing carefully. [Oddity Central, 3/23/2021]

 

Weekly Observations

 

National Playground Safety Week Link National Work Zone Safety Awareness Week Link	Thru 30
National African Violet Week National Backyard Games Week National Safe Boating Week World Schizophrenia Awareness Week Link	23-29
Healthy and Safe Swimming Week Link International Learn To Swim Week Link National Fragrance Week Link	24-30
Undergraduate Research Week Link	24-28
Mule Days  Link   (Moved from April) Week of Solidarity With The People of Non-Self-Governing Territories:	25-31
Fleet Week (NY)	26-31

 

Today’s Observations

 

 

Cellophane Tape Day
Eat More Fruits & Vegetables Day  Link
Joe Cool Day Link

National Grape Popsicle Day

National Italian Beef Day

Sun Screen Day

 

My Sometimes-Long-Winded Thoughts

 

I woke up to an overcast sky. Checked the weather report, yep…overcast and no precipitation in the forecast.

It took 5 days before the House Republicans spoke about MTG’s ridiculous statement regarding the holocaust. A tad late. A whole lot of babble that really said nothing.

I’m glad I don’t live in Texas. The governor is set to sign a bill that will require no background checks, no training, and no need for a carry permit or license to carry a handgun. The wild west seems to be having a revival.

Another mass shooting…this time in San Jose, CA. One of the only good things from Covid was there were no mass shootings during the quarantine.

The news media went bonkers yesterday about the newest Trump revelations. I’ll not be holding my breath for an indictment.

I have always wondered where the Covid virus came from. It is the only way science will be able to prevent another outbreak. I hope that they find out if it was from a lab or from a live market. It is so unfortunate that both sides have politicized this issue so much. I have always known that ‘science’ is, and always has been ‘evolutionary’. I also understand that many in the public have always questioned ‘science’. I don’t understand why this is the way humans react.

 

Daily Puzzle

Answer: bottom of the page

 

Enter the eight remaining numbers from 1 to 16 exactly once in the blank swquares so that the sum of the four number in each row, each column, and the two diagonals adds up to 34.

 

	2	3
5			8
9	7
		15	1

 

Historical Events

 

1199 – John (December 24, 1166 – October 19, 1216) became King of England. He’s the one who signed The Magna Carta, which was the first document to offer people individual rights.

1796 – The patent (#X0116) for a piano was issued to James Sylvanus McLean of New Jersey, for “an improvement in piano fortes.”

1890 – Two U.S. patents (#428,750,#428,751) for the first jukebox were issued to Louis Glass and his business associate, William S. Arnold for a “coin actuated attachment for phonographs.”

1919 – Pyrex glass was issued a patent (#1,304,623). The inventors, Eugene C. Sullivan and William C. Taylor for Corning Glass Works.

1930 – Masking Tape was patented (#1,760,820) by Richard G. Drew of St. Paul, Minnesota for his employers, 3M.

1931 – Auguste Piccard and Charles Knipfer took man’s first trip (in a pressurized cabin) into the stratosphere when they rode their balloon to an altitude of 51,800 feet.

1933 – The Walt Disney Company released the cartoon Three Little Pigs, with its hit song Who’s Afraid of the Big Bad Wolf?

1937 – The Golden Gate Bridge, connecting San Francisco with Marin County, California opened. Today was “Pedestrian Day” – cars were allowed the following day.

1967 – The U.S. Navy aircraft carrier USS John F. Kennedy was launched by Jacqueline Kennedy and her daughter Caroline.

1986 – Dragon Quest, the first major role-playing video game, was released in Japan.

1987 – U2 played in Rome so loud that they set off earthquake alarms in 2 different neighborhoods.

1994 – The National League and American League Baseball MVPs were Jeff Bagwell and Frank Thomas, respectively. Jeff and Frank were both born on the exact same day: May 27, 1968.

1998 – Oklahoma City bombing: Michael Fortier was sentenced to 12 years in prison and fined $200,000 for failing to warn authorities about the terrorist plot.

1999 The International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia indicts Slobodan Milošević and four others for war crimes and crimes against humanity committed in Kosovo

2012 A NATO airstrike kills a family of eight, including six children, in Afghanistan

2013 The largest flag ever made at 5 tons with 44 miles of thread is unveiled in Romania

2016 3 ships in 3 days sink carrying immigrants across the Mediterranean, drowning over 700 people

2020 US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo says Hong Kong no longer has autonomy from China, doesn't merit special trade relationship, in note to Congress

 

Birthdays Today

 

98 – Henry Kissinger, German-American political scientist, politician, Nobel Prize laureate

@93 – Christopher Lee, English actor (d. 2015)

86 – Lee Meriwether, American model and actress, Miss America 1955

@82 – Cornelius Vanderbilt, American businessman, philanthropist (d. 1877)

@82 – Vincent Price, American actor (d. 1993)

@56 – Rachel Carson, biologist, environmentalist, author (d. 1964; cancer)

@39 – [James Butler]’Wild Bill’ Hickok, folk hero (d. 1876; shot in card game)

 

Puzzle Answer

 

16	2	3	13
5	11	10	8
9	7	6	12
4	14	15	1