Difficult day. Enough said.

Then again, when is that enough for the meandering brain?

Badlands Blackie decided to "mess" on my bed. His "mess" found the one tiny pinhole in the plastic cover that i put over the bed to keep from having to worry about such "messes."

The rest of the day was spend mattress cleaning and pad cleaning (it's not dry yet) and trying to convince Sweetie that we do not need a huge, ugly tarp on the bed instead of a clear plastic cover that i can ignore.

The latter was not successful. The room looks awful with huge, ugly tarp on the bed.

Maybe i should have stopped at the opening line.


Today is

Anniversary of the Election of Benedict XVI -- Holy See (Vatican City)

Beginning of the Independence Movement -- Venezuela

Dogwood Festival -- Camdenton, MO, US (through the 22nd)

Dutch-American Friendship Day

Fiesta San Antonio -- San Antonio, Texas, US (through the 29th; annual celebration that honors the memory of Texas heroes who fought in the Texas war for Independence. More that 150 events, with sporting events, fireworks, dances...all culminating with the traditional "Battle of Flowers" parade!)

Get to Know Your Customers Day (celebrated quarterly)

Independence Declaration Day -- Venezuela

John Parker Day -- many US States

King Mswati III's birthday -- Swaziland

Landing of the 33 -- Uruguay

Lozenge Competition -- Fairy Calendar (no, i don't know what they do with the lozenges that makes it a competition)

National Amaretto Day

National Garlic Day

National Hanging Out Day -- Project Laundry List and other organizations promote bringing back the clothesline to save energy and the planet!

National High Five Day -- raising money for cancer research, sponsored by the National High Five Project

Oklahoma City Bombing Commemoration Day

Primrose Day -- UK (anniversary of the death of Disraeli)

Sandburg Days -- Galesburg, IL, US (celebrating their two-time Pulitzer Prize-winning native son, Carl Sandburg; through the 21st)

St. AElfheah's Day (Patron of kidnap victims; Greenwich and Solihull, England)

St. Expeditus of Melintine's Day (Patron of merchants, navigators; for expeditious and prompt solutions; against procrastination)

St. Leo IX's Day

Sumardagurinn fyrsti -- Iceland (First Day of Summer; also the first day of the month Harpa on the Icelandic calendar)

Yom HaShoah -- Judaism (Holocaust Remembrance Day)



Anniversaries Today:

Marie Antoinette marries Louis XVI by Proxy Marriage, 1770
Cheyney University is founded as The Institute for Colored Youth, 1837
Grace Kelly marries Ranier III of Monaco, 1956


Birthdays Today:

Maria Sharapova, 1987
Hayden Christensen, 1981
Kate Hudson, 1979
Luis Miguel Basteri, 1970
Ashley Judd, 1968
Al Unser, Jr., 1962
Paloma Picasso, 1949
Tim Curry, 1946
Dudley Moore, 1935
Jayne Mansfield, 1933
Dick Sargent, 1930
Hugh O'Brian, 1925
Eliot Ness, 1903


Today in History:

Sir Francis Drake sails to Cadiz and sinks the Spanish Fleet, 1587
Because he has no male heirs, Holy Roman Emperor Charles VI issues the Pragmatic Sanction of 1713, assuring Habsburg lands and the Austrian throne would go to his daughter, Maria Theresa, 1713
Captain James Cook sights Australia, 1770
John Adams secures Dutch recognition of the United States, and his home in The Hague becomes the first American Embassy, 1782
Venezuela achieves home rule, 1810
The Treaty of London establishes Belgium as a kingdom and Luxembourg as a Grand Duchy, 1839
Charles Duryea claims to have taken the first automobile built in the US for a spin, 1892
The first Boston Marathon is won by John McDermott of NY in 2:55:10, 1897
Leslie Irvin of the United States makes the first successful voluntary free-fall parachute jump, 1919
The 125th and final fascicle of the Oxford English Dictionary is published, 1928
Burma (now Myanmar) joins the United Nations, 1948
The Bay of Pigs invasion of Cuba ends in success for the defenders, 1961
Sierra Leone becomes a republic, 1971
India's first satellite, Aryabhata, is launched, 1975
The Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, USA, is bombed, killing 168, 1995
The German Bundestag returns to Berlin, the first German parliamentary body to meet there since the Reichstag was dissolved in 1945, 1999
His Eminence Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger is elected the 265th Pope of the Catholic Church, taking the name Benedict XVI, 2005
Fidel Castro resigns from the Communist Party of Cuba's central committee after 45 years, 2011