Photo-Finish Friday: Let me show you how!

You little knuckle heads!  You don't know how to clean yourselves well enough.  Here, let me show you how!

Dr. Penguin loves to clean the babies.

Photo-Finish Friday is the brainchild of Leah at The Goat's Lunch Pail.



Today is:

Aldo Leopold Weekend -- Wisconsin, US (celebrating Aldo Leopold's Land Ethic; through Sunday)

Baba Marta Day -- Bulgaria (Grandmother Spring Day, martenitsa are worn until you see a stork or a tree blooming.)

Beer Day -- Iceland (marks the end of the prohibition of beer in 1989)

Be Positive, Do Something Positive Day -- the way to start Optimism Month

Bravo Day/Nuclear Victims Remembrance Day -- Marshall Islands

Chalandra Marz -- Engandine, Switzerland (various cities of this province have the traditional spring event where costumed young people, ringing bells and cracking whips, drive out the demons of winter)

Day to Mourn Victims of Land Mines -- anniversary of the day they were outlawed worldwide in 1999

Dia de las Islas Baleares -- Iberia, Spain

Dress in Blue Day -- US, for colorectal cancer awareness

Elves, Woodworkers, and Mechanics' Day -- Fairy Calendar

Employee Appreciation Day

Festival au Desert -- Selingue, Mali (the final installment of most remote music festival in the world, with lots of African music and traditions; through the 3rd)

First Day of Autumn -- Australia (they go by months, not equinoxes, like the rest of the world used to)

Humorists Are Artists Month begins -- any coincidence this spells HAAM?

Independence Day -- Bosnia and Herzegovina

International Day of the Seal

International Festival of Owls -- Houston, MN, US (a great way to celebrate and learn about the wonderful creatures that are owls; through Sunday)

Martisor -- Romanians and Aromanians, especially in Romania and Moldova (similar tradition to Baba Marta; first days of March are Zilele Babei, Days of the Old Woman, when Old Woman Winter, Baba Dokia, who lives in the mountains, might come back with ferocity.)

Midnight at the Oasis -- Yuma, AZ, US (nostalgic festival featuring cars and music of the 50s and 60s; throughy Sunday)

National Day of Unplugging -- sponsored by Reboot, encouraging recharging your spiritual life by unplugging your technology from sunset today to sunset tomorrow www.rebooter.net or www.sabbathmanifesto.org

National Fruit Compote Day

National Horse Protection Day -- US; sponsored by the Animal Miracle Foundation

National Pig Day -- sponsored by Ellen Stanley and Mary Lynne Rave, who want you to know that pigs are amazing animals that place fourth on the animal intelligence list!

Navii's Day / Vjunitci -- Asatru/Slavic Pagan Calendar (a Day of the Dead, bringing sacrifices and inviting the ancestors to attend the feast)

NEA's Read Across America Day -- on or near Dr. Seuss' birth anniversary; this year's theme is "Grab Your Hat and Read with the Cat"

New Year's Day -- Ancient Roman Pre-Julian Calendar; related observances
     Birthday of Mars Pater (Feriae Marti)
     Chalanda Marz -- Kalends of March (now a festival in Egandine, Grisons Canton, Switzerland, in which the children ring bells to ring out the winter)
     Matronalia -- Ancient Roman Calendar (Women's Festival to Juno)
     Renewal of the Vestal Fire

Nineteen Day Fast -- Baha'i (begins at sundown)

Noche de Brujas -- Cerro Mono Blanco, Catemaco, Mexico (Night of the Witches)

Nuclear Free and Independent Pacific Day -- in remembrance of the destruction of Bikini Atoll

Omizutori Matsuri -- Todai-ji Temple, Nara, Japan (Water-Drawing Festival of 1,200 year old Buddhist ceremonies, through the 14th)

Peace Corps Birthday / National Day of Action -- US

Peanut Butter Lovers' Day -- according to some foodie sites

Plan a Solo Vacation Day -- Solo Travel Portal wants you to dream big and plan what you would do if you could get away, solo.

ReFIRED, Not Retired Day -- the day to get Fired Up about Life, Part II; you aren't retired, you are reFIRED!

Republic Day -- NE, Switzerland

Samiljeol (March 1st Movement Remembrance Day) -- South Korea

Self-Injury Awareness Day

Shabbat Across America/Canada -- sponsored by the National Jewish Out-reach Program, encouraging Conservative, Orthodox, Reform, and Reconstructionist Jews to observe the Sabbath from sundown tonight until sundown tomorrow www.njop.org

St. David's Day (Patron of doves; Patron of Wales, where it is called Dydd Gwyl Dewi Sant)

Whuppity Scoorie Day -- Lanark, Scotland (Spring festival, children run around the church and pick up coins thrown for them.)

Words by the Water: a Cumbrian Literature Festival -- Lake District, The Theatre by the Lake at Keswick, Devon, England (a lively literary festival; through the 10th)

World Civil Defense Day

World Day of Prayer-- International and Ecumenical; a day for Informed Prayer and Prayerful Action www.wdpusa.org

Yap Day -- Micronesia (festival celebrating the heritage of the Yap peoples)


Anniversaries Today:

Ohio becomes the 17th US State, 1803
Nebraska becomes the 37th US State, 1867
Howard University in Washington, D.C., is chartered, 1867


Birthdays Today:

Russell Wong, 1963
Nik Kershaw, 1958
Ron Howard, 1954
Alan Thicke, 1947
Dirk Benedict, 1945
Roger Daltry, 1944
Robert Conrad, 1935
Harry Belafonte, 1927
Pete Rozelle, 1926
Ralph Ellison, 1914
Harry Caray, 1914
David Niven, 1910
Glenn Miller, 1904
Watsuji Tetsuro, 1889
Frederic Chopin, 1810


Today in History:

Romulus, first king of Rome, celebrates the first Roman triumph after his victory over the Caeninenses, following the Rape of the Sabine Women, BC752
Lucius Cornelius Sulla, at the head of a Roman Republic army, enters Athens, BC86
Hulagu Khan, grandson of Genghis, conquerors Damascus, 1260
The Unitas Fratrum is established in the village of Kunvald, on the Bohemian-Moravian borderland. It is to date the second oldest Protestant denomination, 1457
23 Huguenots are massacred by Catholics in Wassy, France, marking the start of the French Wars of Religion, 1562
The Uppsala Synod is summoned to confirm the exact forms of the Lutheran Church of Sweden, 1593
Samuel de Champlain reclaims his role as commander of New France on behalf of Cardinal Richelieu, 1633
Sarah Goode, Sarah Osborne, and Tituba are arrested for witchcraft in Salem, Massachusetts, 1692
"The Spectator" begins publishing, in London, 1711
The first US census is authorized, 1790
Napoleon returns to France from his banishment on Elba, 1815
Rebecca Lee Crumpler becomes the first African-American female to earn a medical degree, 1864
Yellowstone becomes the world's first national park, 1872
E. Remington and Sons in Ilion, New York begins production of the first practical typewriter, 1873
Nikola Tesla gives the first public demonstration of radio in St. Louis, Missouri, 1893
Henri Becquerel discovers radioactivity, 1896
Battle of Adwa, Abyssinia (Ethiopia) defeats invading Italians, the first defeat of a colonizing European nation by an African colony, 1896
Albert Berry makes the first parachute jump from an airplane, 1912
The Republic of China joins the Universal Postal Union, 1914
The March 1st Movement, demonstrations for independence from Japan, begins in Korea, 1919
Charles Lindbergh, Jr., is kidnapped, 1932
The Hoover Dam is completed, 1936
US Steel raises workers wages to US$5/day, 1937
Trans-Canada Air Lines (forerunner of Air Canada) begins transcontinental operations (between Vancouver and Montreal), 1939
The International Monetary Fund begins financial operations, 1947
Chiang Kai-shek resumed the presidency of National China on Formosa, 1950
The Castle Bravo, a 15-megaton hydrogen bomb, is detonated on Bikini Atoll in the Pacific Ocean, resulting in the worst radioactive contamination ever caused by the United States, 1954
The Peace Corps is established, 1961
Villarrica Volcano begins a strombolian eruption causing lahars that destroy half of the town of Coñaripe, Chile, 1964
Venera 3 Soviet space probe crashes on Venus becoming the first spacecraft to land on another planet's surface, 1966
Bosnia and Herzegovina declares its independence from Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia, 1992
Yahoo! was incorporated, 1995
The Envisat environmental satellite successfully reaches an orbit 800 kilometers (500 miles) above the Earth on its 11th launch, carrying the heaviest payload to date at 8500 kilograms (9.5 tons), 2002
The International Criminal Court holds its inaugural session in The Hague, 2003
English-language Wikipedia reaches its one millionth article, Jordanhill railway station, 2006