Beware

Beware the Ides of March. Mostly because it means you only have one more month, in this country at least, to work on your income tax return.

Beware unlicensed fliers falling from the sky. If you get enough back on your taxes, or have more money than sense, you can now buy a jet pack that will let you fly to the store, just like Judy Jetson. Just fill the tank with gas at the local station, and you are ready to soar up to 8,000 feet above the ground. Got $100,000 lying around? Heaven forbid, with the way some people drive, that this ever become common.

Also beware Lady Gaga hair, coming to a bride near you, if you are "lucky." While at Whole Foods (a/k/a Whole Paycheck) this morning to pick up my 5 weekly grocery items I can find nowhere else, I stopped as usual to talk to the Coffee Bar Goddess Judy and Tracy, who stocks the coffee and tea aisle and works the coffee bar sometimes, too. Tracy is finally planning her wedding, and she and Judy were looking at bridal magazines between customers. Some of the pictures were beyond description. Do real people wear some of that stuff?

Beware orphaned kittens. They steal your heart, despite being what #2 Son calls "pooping car alarms," for their constant cries for food and lack of responsibility at the other end of the process.

All 3 of ours are doing well at the moment. Cute little nuisances.


Today is:

Brutus Day

Buzzards Day

Dumbstruck Day -- Fairy Calendar

Everything You Think is Wrong Day

Hilaria -- Ancient Roman Calendar (spring festival)

Ides of March

Incredible Kid Day

Marduk's Festival -- Ancient Mesopotamian Calendar

Napping Day

National Pears Helene Day

Rude Awakenings Day

St. Louis de Marillac's Day (patron of orphans, social workers, widows)

True Confessions Day

World Consumer Rights Day

Youth Day, Palau


Anniversaries Today:

Maine becomes the 23rd US state, 1820
The University of Toronto is chartered, 1827


Birthdays Today:

Sean Biggerstaff, 1983
Eva Longoria, 1975
Fabio, 1961
Sly Stone, 1944
Phil Lesh, 1940
Judd Hirsch, 1935
Harry James, 1916
Joe E. Ross, 1914
Macdonald Carey, 1913
Samuel "Lightnin" Hopkins, 1912
Andrew Jackson, 1767


Today in History:

Julius Caesar, Dictator of the Roman Republic, is stabbed to death by Marcus Junius Brutus, Gaius Cassius Longinus, Decimus Junius Brutus and several other Roman senators on the Ides of March, BC44
Liu Bei, a Chinese warlord and member of the Han royal house, declares himself emperor of Shu-Han and claims his legitimate succession to the Han Dynasty, 221
A Jew hating Monk in Seville, Spain stirs up people in that city to attack Jews, 1391
The first meeting of the Council of Trent, 1545
South Carolina becomes the first American colony to declare its independence from Great Britain and set up its own government, 1776
In an emotional speech in Newburgh, New York, George Washington asks his officers not to support the Newburgh Conspiracy; the plea is successful and the threatened coup d'état never takes place, 1783
A revolution breaks out in Hungary, and the Habsburg rulers are compelled to meet the demands of the Reform party, 1848
Jesse W. Reno patents an "inclined elevator" (escalator), 1892*
Rolls-Royce Limited is incorporated, 1906
Czar Nicholas II of Russia abdicates the Russian throne and his brother the Grand Duke becomes Tsar, 1917
Symbolics.com registers the very first Internet domain name, 1985

*The first actual working model, at Coney Island, was built four years later.