Tuesday, March 26, 2019

No wonder the vacuum beater brush quit turning (Wordless Wednesday) and Words for Wednesday

(Because some people like Blogger and some like WordPress, i am putting the same content at both.  If you would prefer to read this on the other site, it is linked here.) 


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Linking up with Wordless Wednesday and Sandee at Comedy Plus.     






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Words for Wednesday was begun by Delores and has become a moveable feast of word or picture or music prompts that encourages us to write stories, poems, or whatever strikes our fancy.    

This month, Delores is providing the prompt.

This week’s prompt is:  Television


The decision was made several years ago, and several things led up to it.

The first step, although i didn’t know it then, was a commercial, a political commercial to be exact.  The lie it contained was so blatant that i felt sick to my stomach.  In that moment i prayed, Lord, i don’t have a clear conscience to put garbage in my mouth, why am i putting it in my brain?  Right then i turned it off, and now i only watch house building and veterinarian shows with Grandma.

Then Sweetie decided he only wanted a monitor and speakers hooked up to a DVD/VHS player so he could watch movies and mini-series he wanted.

When the children were young, they loved Animal Planet, Disney Channel, LPB Kids.  As they grew, they watched less and less, and when i noticed no one had sat down in front of it except to play the game station hooked up to it, i cancelled the cable.

That is the story of how we, over time, got rid of Television in our house.


No judgment on those who still have it, i do enjoy those house building shows and Dr. Pol.  There are a lot of great series, and i keep up with the most popular ones by reading plot summaries on occasion, or letting someone tell me what's up.  In my case, lack of time, lack of interest in sitting for passive entertainment, the fact that no one else in the family is interested (the children all have the Netflix password), and lack of money to pay for something that won't be used is what keeps us off the TV grid.



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Today is:

Armed Forces Day -- Myanmar

Cherry Blossom (Sakura) Viewing and Celebrations begin -- Japan (the festivities get started around now, and vary by region depending on when the trees bloom in that area over the next 6 weeks)

Commemoration of Sen no Rikyu -- Omotesenke School of the Japanese Tea Ceremony, Japan (remembering the influential master in The Way of Tea)

Corkscrew Day -- M.L. Byrn of New York patented "covered gimlet screw with a 'T' handle" on this date in 1860

Little Red Wagon Day

Mi-Careme -- Guadeloupe; Saint Barthelemy; Saint Martin (Mid-Lent)

National "Joe" Day -- no, it isn't official, but today you can make everyone call you "Joe" if you want, and call them the same; probably started by someone who had no memory for names

National Spanish Paella Day

Quirky Country Music Song Titles Day -- after all, they do need their own day; sponsored by Wellcat Holidays    

St. John Damascene's Day (Patron of pharmacists, icon paiting, theology students)

St. Rupert of Salzburg's Day (Patron of Salzburg; celebrated on the 24th in the rest of the Church)

World Theatre Day


Anniversaries Today:

Mary Pickford marries Douglas Fairbanks, 1920


Birthdays Today:

Brenda Song, 1988
Stacy "Fergie" Ferguson, 1975
Nathan Fillion, 1971
Mariah Carey, 1970
Quentin Tarantino, 1963
Xuxa, 1963
Maria Schneider, 1952
Austin Pendleton, 1940
Michael York, 1942
David Janssen, 1931
Anthony Lewis, 1927
Mstislav Rostropovich, 1927
Sarah Vaughan, 1924
Harold Nicholas, 1921
Gloria Swanson, 1899
Thorne Smith, 1892
Ludwig Mies Van Der Rohe, 1886
Edward Steichen, 1879
Patty Smith Hill, 1868
Wilhelm Conrad Röntgen, 1845
Nathaniel Currier, 1813


Debuting/Premiering Today:

"Starlight Express"(Rock musical), 1984
"Funky Winkerbean"(Comic strip), 1972
"Singin' in the Rain"(Film), 1952
"La Rondine/The Swallow"(Puccini Opera), 1917
"The Colleen Bawn"(Play), 1860


Today in History:

Ptolemy V ascends to the throne of Egypt, BC196
Pope Clement V excommunicates the entire population of Venice, 1309
Juan Ponce de Leon discovers Florida, 1513
The first English child born in Canada at Cuper's Cove, Newfoundland to Nicholas Guy, 1613
The dike at Hardinxveld breaks, causing the Alblasserwaard flood, 1709
Spain losses Menorca & Gibraltar, 1713
John Parker Paynard originates medicated adhesive plaster, precursor to the band-aid, 1848
First reported sighting of the Yosemite Valley by Europeans, 1851
M L Byrn patents "covered gimlet screw with a 'T' handle" (corkscrew), 1860
The first international rugby football match, England v. Scotland, is played in Edinburgh at Raeburn Place, 1871
Famous Apache warrior, Geronimo, surrenders to the U.S. Army, ending the main phase of the Apache Wars, 1886
The first Japanese cherry blossom trees planted in Washington, D.C., 1912
The first successful blood transfusion takes place in Brussels, 1914
Typhoid Mary, the first healthy carrier of disease ever identified in the United States, is put in quarantine, 1916
Charlie Chaplin receives France's distinguished Legion of Honor, 1931
Nikita Khrushchev becomes Premier of the Soviet Union, 1958
The Good Friday Earthquake, the most powerful earthquake in U.S. history at a magnitude of 9.2 strikes South Central Alaska, killing 125 people and inflicting massive damage to the city of Anchorage, 1964
The Concorde makes its first supersonic flight, 1970
Construction of the Trans-Alaska Pipeline System begins, 1975
The Norwegian oil platform Alexander L. Kielland collapses in the North Sea, killing 123 of its crew of 212, 1980
The Solidarity movement in Poland stages a warning strike, in which at least 12 million Poles walk off their jobs for four hours, 1981
The US FDA approves Viagra, 1998
HMS Scylla (F71), a decommissioned Leander class frigate, is sunk as an artificial reef off Cornwall, the first of its kind in Europe, 2004
The UN General Assembly condemns Russia's annexation of Crimea, 2014 
Russia's Soyuz TMA-16M launches to deliver three crew members to the international space station to research the long-term effects of micro gravity, 2015

25 comments:

  1. Dang, I almost missed Corkscrew Day!

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  2. I forgot it was Wednesday and only just got the prompt myself about 5 minutes ago.

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  3. So that's where she left her mask heheh!

    Have a catwomantastic week :-)

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  4. I just had to check out your quirky country music titles. Your link is broke - at least when I try it out. Maybe this one works: quirky I don't know if "Mairzy Doats" is a country song, but in my book it takes the prize for quirkiness.

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  5. A bat mask. Hmmm...wonder what it is doing there.

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  6. Before the corkscrew, did they just push the corks into the bottle? Is that Batman's pocket costume you've chosen for Wordless Wednesday? Have a blessed week.

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    1. If you hit a upside-down bottle just *so* the cork will pop out. I bet that's what they mostly did ;)

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  7. Fun photo! ^_^

    Happy Moments to you,
    A ShutterBug Explores,
    aka (A Creative Harbor)

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  8. That mask ... does it mean they blew your cover? I like your tale of how you left the TV-grid. Sounds a bit like us. We don't have TV any more either. That is, we have a TV, but no connexion to the grid, the Owlets are free to watch all the video tapes (we still have loads) and DVDs they like. We stopped paying as we realized we had watched a grand total of two items in a year: One newscast and one movie. So not worth our money ;)

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  9. Now the batman these song is in my head. Just saying.

    You and I are on the same page concerning television. We have Netflix and Amazon Prime. We don't watch mainstream anything.

    Thank you for joining the Wordless Wednesday Blog Hop.

    Have a fabulous Wordless Wednesday, my friend. ♥

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  10. Interesting thoughts on television, and its demise in your family.

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  11. I think we all might be healthier and perhaps even happier if we turned off the TV more often. Good piece.

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  12. I think that there is just as much fake news on television as their is on the Internet. Biased news reporting everywhere!

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  13. Does that mean Batman's cover has been blown?

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  14. That sure would plug up a vacuum. :) You are wise to go without tv. I like home improvement shows and some comedies, but cable is expensive.

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  15. Wow, you have a batman mask? It looks like it survived the vacuum okay. It is ridiculous what TV costs and having to pay and watch commercials too just is not right in our book. Hugs and nose kisses

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  16. Messymimi, sorry for avalancing you with comments today, but ... you forgot Carl Barks' birthday 1901 ;)

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  17. Great minds, I wrote about Patty Smith Hill today too!

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  18. My TV watching is pretty simple. This evening I will be watching the old soap opera "dark Shadows"
    Coffee is on

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  19. My husband and I stay so busy that we never have time for tv. We had some friends that said we needed to watch a show, so we agreed to watch but only if they watched it with us. It was a great way to have "friend time" and not just wasted time in front of the tv. We do watch some shows on our laptops, but usually we are doing work at the same time. Having a TV and cable just feels like a waste of time and money to us. There always seems like something better we could be doing with our time.

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  20. about 8 years ago I stopped watching most TV and just stuck to movies and PBS series. Netflix helpsout too! Have a lovely day!

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  21. I had a vacuum beater incident this week, but it didn't involve a Batman related item. As to TV, I'm a child of TV and an adult of TV. I have one set on in my house at all times. I don't always pay attention, but I crave the noise.

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  22. Interesting to read different views on television and whether or not people still have them and watch. I have one and watch, but not much actual programming, since I detest the advertisements, so I watch a lot of DVDs, movies and TV series that I enjoyed in the past and some new to me movies and shows that my daughter and son recommend. Some I like, some I don't. They know me pretty well.

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