Biscuit and Gravy (Feline Friday), Friendly Fill-Ins, and Nature Friday

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Feline Friday was originally started by Steve, The Burnt Food Dude (may he rest in peace), and i'm going to believe it's because he liked cats.

He handed hosting duties off to Sandee at Comedy Plus, and now she has entrusted it to me.

Feline Friday is simple to join.  All you have to do is: Post a picture, drawing, cartoon or video of a cat (they may be silly or cute).  Then add your link!

One thing for sure is this is a fun and easy meme to do.  So come and join us in Feline Friday.

What better way to start the weekend than with a feline!

Biscuit is a live wire, his brother Gravy, not so much.

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Friendly Fill-Ins are easy to do. There are four statements: the first two statements are provided by Ellen of 15AndMeowing, and the final two are offered by Lorianne The Menagerie Mom of Four-Legged Furballs. They try to make sure the statements will be fun to both answer and share. The linky will be posted at or about 12:00 AM on Friday. Please head over to one of their sites, link up, and share your thoughts!      

Here are this week's statements with my responses underlined:

1. I would be willing to pay more for ________________________.

2. I refuse to spend money on ______________________.

3. My _________ is a bit chaotic.

4. A fun fact about me is that _________.

1. I would be willing to pay more for   sustainable products and packaging.

2. I refuse to spend money on   TV, it's just not my thing.

3. My   car GusGus die Fledermaus   is a bit chaotic.  After all, it has hauled all my cleaning stuff for years.

4. A fun fact about me is that   i am a flatlander (we live in a swamp) and i love mountains, in person or in pictures, i find it a joy to have a reason to look up for a change!

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Nature Friday is hosted by LLB in Our Backyard.  Simply post a picture of the natural world, and link up!   

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Today is:

Abolition Day -- Martinique

Bear Waking Day -- Norway (traditionally said to be the day the bears awaken from their hibernation, at least according to many sites)

Bermuda Day -- Bermuda (obs.)

Buy a Musical Instrument Day -- even just a kazoo, and have some fun making music; maybe if this one spreads around the world and enough of us do it, it will foster some harmony in our lives

Don't Fry Day -- another day to raise awareness of the need for sun protection through the summer    

Heat Awareness Safety Day -- US (your guv'mint at work, and actually doing something right that you really should pay heed to)  

Harvey Milk Day -- The Harvey Milk Foundation    

Independence Day -- Montenegro

International Day for Biological Diversity -- UN

National Death Busters Day -- US, because the upcoming Memorial Day weekend in the US is the most dangerous for driving; be careful out there!

National Maritime Day -- US (commemorating the first transoceanic voyage under steam power)

National Poppy Day -- US (on this Friday before Memorial Day, wear a poppy to show your support to all who have served in the military)

National Sovereignty Day -- Haiti

National Vanilla Pudding Day

National Wig Out Day -- US (on the Friday before Memorial Day, don your wig and your alter ego and have fun!  there are events around the country)    

St. Julia's Day (Patron of torture victims; Corsica, Portugal; Livorno, Italy)

St. Rita of Cascia's Day/La Abodada de Impossibles (Patron of desperate causes, difficult marriages, forgotten causes, illness, lost causes, parenthood, sick people, sterile people, victims of physical spousal abuse, widows, wounded people; against abuse, infertility, loneliness, sickness, sterility, wounds, unhappy marriages; Cascia, Italy; Dalayap, Philippines; Igbaras, Philippines)

Toothpaste Tube Day -- the tube was invented on this day in 1892 by dentist Washington Wentworth Sheffield, who wanted to replace the unhygenic practice of dipping the brush into a jar of dental cream

Unity Day / National Day -- Republic of Yemen

World Goth Day -- Get your Goth on around the world! 

Birthdays Today:

Apolo Anton Ohno, 1982

Ginnifer Goodwin, 1978

A.J. Langer,1974

Naomi Campbell, 1970

Morrissey, 1959

George Best, 1946

Paul Winfield, 1941

Michael Sarrazin, 1940

Frank Converse, 1938

Richard Benjamin, 1938

Susan Strasberg, 1938

Garry Wills, 1934

Peter Nero, 1934

Charles Aznavour, 1924

Judith Crist, 1922

Sun Ra, 1914

Sir Laurence Olivier, 1907

Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, 1859

Mary Cassatt, 1844

Richard Wagner, 1813

Debuting/Premiering Today:

"Mr. Rogers' Neighborhood"(TV), 1967

"Paulus / St. Paul"(Oratorio, Mendelsshon Op. 36), 1836

Today in History:

The Macedonian army of Alexander the Great defeats Darius III of Persia in the Battle of the Granicus, BC334

The Hashshashin (Assassins) attempt to murder Saladin near Aleppo, 1176

Pope Gregory XI issues five papal bulls to denounce the doctrines of English theologian John Wycliffe, 1377

Richard, Duke of York, defeats and captures King Henry VI of England, 1455

A grand jury indicts former Vice President of the United States Aaron Burr on a charge of treason, 1807

On the second and last day of the Battle of Aspern-Essling (near Vienna), Napoleon is repelled by an enemy army for the first time, 1809

The SS Savannah leaves port at Savannah, Georgia, United States, on a voyage to become the first steamship to cross the Atlantic Ocean; the ship arrived at Liverpool, England on June 20, 1819

HMS Beagle  departs on its first voyage, 1826

The transporting of British convicts to the New South Wales colony is abolished, 1840

Farmers Lester Howe and Henry Wetsel discover Howe Caverns, 1842

The Blackwall Tunnel under the River Thames is officially opened, 1897

The Wright brothers are granted U.S. patent number 821,393 for their "Flying-Machine", 1906

Lassen Peak erupts with a powerful force, and is the only mountain other than Mount St. Helens to erupt in the continental US during the 20th century, 1915

The most powerful earthquake ever documented, the Great Chilean Quake, measures 9.5 and strikes southern Chile, 1960

The nuclear-powered submarine the USS Scorpion sinks with 99 men aboard 400 miles southwest of the Azores, 1968

Ceylon adopts a new constitution, thus becoming a Republic, changes its name to Sri Lanka, and joins the Commonwealth of Nations, 1972

Namco releases the highly influential arcade game Pac-Man, 1980

Microsoft  releases the Windows 3.0 operating system, 1990

Johnny Carson retires from The Tonight Show after 30 years, 1992

Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia and Slovenia join the United Nations, 1992

A jury in Birmingham, Alabama, convicts former Ku Klux Klan member Bobby Frank Cherry of the 1963 murders of four girls in the bombing of the 16th Street Baptist Church, 2002

Sarah West, a British naval officer Commander is appointed commander of HMS Portland, the Royal Navy frigate; she is the first female officer to take command of a major British warship, 2012

Japanese researchers from University of Yamanashi report birth of mice from freeze-dried sperm stored on the International Space Station, 2017

The New York Stock Exchange announces Stacey Cunningham will be its first woman head in its 226-year history, 2018

Washington State becomes the 1st US state to legalize composting human bodies, 2019

Mount Nyiragongo erupts in the Democratic Republic of Congo, forcing evacuations by sending rivers of lava toward the nearby city of Goma, 2021

California, Arizona, and Nevada agree to a deal cutting water use of the Colorado River, 2023

Ireland, Norway, and Spain announce they will formally recognize a Palestinian state on 28 May, joining nine other European countries, 2024

Only So Much She Can Do (Six Sentence Story), Good Fences, Sammy's Poetry Day, and Brian's Thankful Thursday

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Ms. G has great aspirations for the many things she wants to do but has two problems, she works at her own very deliberate (read, slow) pace, and if it takes a lot of physical effort, she runs out of steam.

Part of it is she used to be super woman and did everything, golf, fishing, her own carpentry, light electrical and light plumbing, hanging and floating sheetrock, painting, and etc. for the houses she flipped.

Part of it is she is now in her “senior citizen” years with diabetes and bad ankles, knees, hips and spine, and what we will politely call a “weight issue.”

Ms. G has been big into animal rescue for years and is always on the lookout for free food to give those who feed managed feral cat colonies, the brave people who trap feral cats, get them fixed and vaccinated, and then return them to their territory, going day after day to feed these stray waifs, often paying for most of the food themselves.

She had dropped some food she’d been given to distribute a couple of towns away with a contact but most of it had not been used or picked up by the person she’d left it for, so yesterday, just when the rain was chasing us, we went to get most of it back so she could send it to local feral feeders.

We were blessed to get to the location just ahead of the rain, get it loaded, and got back in the car just as the rains hit, then going back to her place, we got there after the rain had done, excellent timing; also by the time we got back to her house, she was pooped and our day was over, as i figured it would be.

Linking up with Denise at Girlie On The Edge Blog, where she hosts Six Sentence Stories, and the cue is Steam.     

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While Good Fences Around the World seems to have gone the way of the dodo bird, i still enjoy looking for and posting interesting fences, so i will!

This decorative fence in our neighborhood usually sports a banner or saying of some sort.

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It's Angel Sammy's Poetry Day!  This week's image and my poem:    

Yes, I know, I should go to bed,

but I pull the cover up over my head,

and I read half way into the night,

'cause to leave the story isn't right!

I have to know how the whole thing ends,

people in the books are some of my best friends,

I can't leave a story until a new day's dawning,

even if it means all day I'm yawning.

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Angel Brian's Family of Brian's Home - Forever hosts the Thankful Thursday Blog Hop.   It's time to share something for which i am thankful.  

Today i am thankful Ms. G may do everything else slowly but she drives fast and got our errands to two towns over done a lot faster than i thought we would.

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Today is:

American Red Cross Founder's Day -- established by Clara Barton on this date in 1881

Anastenarides Feast -- Greece (feast to St. Constantine and St. Helen)

Acension Day/Feast of the Ascension -- Orthodox Christian celebration of the ascension of Jesus into Heaven 40 days after the Resurrection

Battle of Las Piedras Day -- Uruguay

Brown Bag-It Thursday -- it's cheaper and healthier, and you might like it enough to start a new habit

Circassian Day of Mourning -- Circassians

Día de la Afrocolombianidad -- Columbia (Afro-Colombian Day; commemorates Columbia's abolition of slavery on this date in 1851)

Dia De Las Glorias Navales -- Chile (Navy Day)

Festival for Vevodus -- Ancient Roman Calendar (god of the dead, swamps, and volcanic movements, and sometimes regarded as the king of the Di Manes)

Honvédelem Napja -- Hungary (Day of Patriots and Military)

Independence Day -- Montenegro

"I Need A Patch For That" Day -- sponsored by Wellcat Holidays, which notes that since everything else has a patch, why shouldn't you?

International Tea Day -- UN

Lilies and Roses Day -- London, England (memorial of the death of Henry VI on this day in 1471; held at the Tower of London with representatives of Eton College and King's College, which he founded.)

National Memo Day -- an internet holiday with no known origin, just take a memo

National Strawberries and Cream Day

National Waitstaff Day

Passion Play Day -- the first Oberammergau, Germany, Passion Play was staged this date in 1634

Shavuot -- Judaism (Feast of Weeks; begins at sundown, through nightfall on the 23rd)

Sister Maria Hummel Day -- birth anniversary of the Franciscan nun and artist

St. Constantine's Day (Greek Orthodox Church; Patron of Greece)

St. Eugene de Mazenod's Day (Patron of dysfunctional families)

St. Helen's Day (Greek Orthodox Church; Patron of Greece)

     St. Helena Day -- St. Helena

World Day for Cultural Diversity for Dialogue and Development -- UN

Anniversary Today:

Humphrey Bogart marries Lauren Bacall, 1945

Birthdays Today:

Sarah Ramos, 1991

Ashlie Brillault, 1987

Lisa Edelstein, 1966

Judge Reinhold, 1957

Mr. T, 1952

Ian McEwan, 1948

Leo Sayer, 1948

Janet Dailey, 1944

Bobby Cox, 1941

Heinz Hollinger, 1939

Peggy Cass, 1924

Andrey Dmitriyevich Sakharov, 1921

Raymond Burr, 1917

Dennis Day, 1917

Harold Robbins, 1916

Sister Maria Innocentia Hummel, 1909

Fats Waller, 1904

Armand Hammer, 1898

Glenn Hammond Curtiss, 1878

Elizabeth Gurney Fry, 1780

Alexander Pope, 1688

Albrecht Dürer, 1471

Debuting/Premiering Today:

The Empire Strikes Back(Film), 1980

"Gypsy"(Musical), 1959

"Le Fils prodigue / The Prodigal Son(Prokofiev ballet, Op. 46), 1929

"Pagliacci"(Opera), 1892

Today in History:

Syracuse, Italy is captured by the Muslim sultan of Sicily, 878

The island of Saint Helena is discovered by the Portuguese navigator João da Nova, 1502

The nobility elect John Sobieski King of Poland and Grand Duke of Lithuania, 1674

The Order of St. Alexander Nevsky is instituted in Russia by the empress Catherine I; it would later be discontinued and then reinstated by the Soviet government in 1942 as the Order of Alexander Nevsky, 1725

Mary Campbell is abducted from her home in Pennsylvania by Lenape during the French and Indian War, 1758

Slavery is abolished in Colombia, South America, 1851

Russia declares an end to the Russian-Circassian War and many Circassians are forced into exile, 1864

French troops invade the Paris Commune and engage its residents in street fighting, 1871

The American Red Cross is established by Clara Barton, 1881

The Manchester Ship Canal in England is officially opened by Queen Victoria, 1894

The Fédération Internationale de Football Association (FIFA) is founded in Paris, 1904

Charles Lindbergh touches down at Le Bourget Field in Paris, completing the world's first solo nonstop flight across the Atlantic Ocean, 1927

Bad weather forces Amelia Earhart to land in a pasture in Derry, Northern Ireland, and she thereby becomes the first woman to fly solo across the Atlantic Ocean, 1932

Oskaloosa, Iowa, becomes the first municipality in the United States to fingerprint all of its citizens, 1934

A Soviet station becomes the first scientific research settlement to operate on the drift ice of the Arctic Ocean, 1937

The National War Memorial in Canada is unveiled by King George VI and Queen Elizabeth in Ottawa, 1939

Physicist Louis Slotin is fatally irradiated in a criticality incident during an experiment with the Demon core at Los Alamos National Laboratory, 1946

The opening of the Ninth Street Show, otherwise known as the 9th Street Art Exhibition – a gathering of a number of notable artists, and the stepping-out of the post war New York avant-garde, collectively know as the New York School, 1951

Michelangelo's Pietà in St. Peter's Basilica in Rome is damaged by a vandal, 1972

Democratic Republic of Yemen and North Yemen agree to a unity, merging into Republic of Yemen, 1990

The Ethiopian Civil War ends, 1991

Suharto, Indonesian president of 32 years, resigns, 1998

The clipper Cutty Sark is badly damaged by fire in London, England, 2007

JAXA, the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency, launches the solar-sail spacecraft IKAROS aboard an H-IIA rocket, 2010

The most active volcano in Iceland, Grimsvotn, erupts and triggers 50 small earthquakes, 2011

The Ringling Brothers and Barnum & Bailey Circus performs for the last time at the Nassau Coliseum in NYC after 146 years, 2017

Nepalese Sherpa Kami Rita sets a new record for the number of climbs of Mt Everest, reaching the summit for the 24th time, 2019

Omani author Jokha Alharthi becomes the first Arabic writer to win the Man Booker International Prize for her novel Celestial Bodies along with her translator Marilyn Booth, 2019  

Scientists announce the oldest and most distant gravitational waves ever detected, from a collision of two black holes, with first intermediate-mass black hole ever discovered at 7 billion light years away, 2019

Rayyanah Barnawi of Saudi Arabia, the first female Arab astronaut, goes into space on Axiom Space's second private mission, 2023

The French Post Office (La Poste) issues a scratch-and-sniff stamp that smells of bread to celebrate the baguette, 2024