A to Z Challenge: L is for Link and Little Girlie

Hello, everyone!  I'm Link!  Also sometimes called Linker-Stinker, or Tuna Breath by Little Girl, whom I own.

I'm so good looking, and I know it!

They say a wonderful lady found me one day, after a huge rainstorm, when she was out for a walk.  I was in the leaves by the ditch, yelling for my mama.  Since mama was nowhere to be found, and I was wet and cold, the lady brought me where I could be bottle fed.

The mama lady here says I was the smallest kitten she'd ever bottle raised.  She didn't expect me to make it.  Because I was alone with no siblings to play with, she took special care to hold me a lot and socialize me well.

I grew up to be quite the handsome, fun loving guy!  Little Girl and I love to play together, and get into mischief.  I will run around like a kitten even though I'm now about a 2-year-old.  It's such fun to run and jump on people, and tear through the house like a mad thing.

All this damage is the handiwork of yours truly!

Little Girl sometimes takes me outside, and that's so cool!  She lets me run in the grass in the back yard, and sometimes I try to dig in the mud.  I don't ever try to run away, because I'm smart enough to know I own a great kid!

The one thing I sometimes don't like is that the #1 Son moved back in, and brought Mikey with him.  I mean, I know, I grew up with Mikey and Dansig, they were the ones who played with me and taught me how to be a good cat and all, but I got used to Mikey being gone.  So when he came back, I stalked him a lot.  He didn't like it, and we fought a few times.  It's all okay now, but it really was odd having him back at first.

Well, because the mama lady is doing this by alphabet, whatever that is, I have to share my day with Little Girly, who is an old lady and cranky.  Just don't tell her I said that.

I heard that!  Old and cranky.  Well, I am 9 years old, almost 10, but I'd hardly describe myself as old and cranky.

I may be literary, and fuss at the young ones, but that doesn't make me cranky!

Since I'm supposed to tell you where I came from (my cat mother, of course!), I'll get that over with.  I was one of a litter of four who was orphaned by a car running over our mom, and bottle raised here.  Because I bore a striking resemblance to the original cat they had whose name was Girlie, I was kept.  There, that's enough of that.

Bigger Girl belongs to me, and everyone better know it.  I edit her papers for her.  She's in college, and she really does need an editor when she's writing papers.  So I sit in her lap while she types, and I watch the screen.  She asks, and sometimes, I gotta tell you, it's a mess.  Other times, it's good stuff, which she learned from me.  Trust me when I tell you, I'm always honest with her about whether it's good or bad.

If there are books, I'm around them.

She claims I'm a communist, and that I've turned her bed into the coolective, but I just say I deserve everything.  I'm a cat, after all.

Today is

Ambedkar Jayanti -- India (birth anniversary of Dr. B.R. Ambedkar, father of the Indian Constitution)

Americas Day -- Honduras

Black Day -- South Korea (for those who got neither Valentine's gifts nor White Day gifts; singles wear black and get together to eat black noodle soup)

Celebrations in the Houses of Ra, Osiris, and Horus -- Ancient Egyptian Calendar (date approximate)

Children with Alopecia Day -- children lose their hair for many reasons, some information about it is here

Day of Mologa -- Yaroslavl Oblast, Russia (commemorates the destruction of the town of Mologa during the construction of the Rybinsk Reservoir)

Day of the Georgian Language -- Georgia (marking the 1978 protests of Soviet attempts to suppress the Georgian language)

Elfin Choir Congress -- Fairy Calendar

Ex Spouse Day -- why?

Global Day of Action on Military Spending -- sponsored by by the International Peace Bureau (IPB) and the Institute for Policy Studies (IPS)http://demilitarize.org/

Heavenly Sage Bao Sheng’s Birthday -- Taoism

International Moment of Laughter Day -- started by Izzy Gesell www.izzyg.com

Kinetoscope Day -- the first commercial exhibition of motion pictures through Edison's "peep show" device occurred on this day in 1894
 
Look Up At The Sky Day -- internet generated, no history on this one, but if it's a pretty day, take advantage of it (some sites say April 12, but since we don't know who started it, today is fine)

National Dolphin Day

National Love Our Children Day -- sponsored by STOMP Out Bullying and Love Our Children USA

National Pecan Day -- http://www.nationalpecanday.com/

N'Ko Alphabet Day -- Mande Language Speakers

Pan American Day -- Order of the American States

Pathologists' Assistant Day -- US (American Association of Pathologists' Assistants)

Pesach -- Judaism (Passover; begins at sundown)

Rato Machhindranath Jatra -- Nepal (chariot races for the god of rain; cannot confirm this year's date, but always begins mid-April)

Reach as High as You Can Day -- internet generated, and listed on various dates; a good idea, anyway, whenever you decide to celebrate it

Runic Half Month of Man (humanity) begins

Sacrifices to Leto, Pythian Apollon, Zeus, Hermes, and the Dioscuri in the Deme of Erichia -- Ancient Greek Calendar (date approximate)

Sidereal Equinox New Year Celebrations -- throughout South and Southeast Asia, including
    * Assamese New Year, or Rongali Bihu (India's Assam Valley)
    * Bengali New Year, or Pohela Boishakh (Bangladesh and India's West Bengal state)
    * Burmese New Year, or Thingyan (Burma)
    * Hindu and Sikh New Year, or Vaisakhi (Punjab region)
    * Khmer New Year, or Chol Chnam Thmey, most commonly celebrated on April 13 (Cambodia)
    * Lao New Year, or Songkan / Pi Mai Lao, generally celebrated from 13 to 15 April (Laos)
    * Malayali New Year, or Vishu (India's Kerala state)
    * Nepali New Year, or Bikram Samwat / Vaishak Ek (Nepal)
    * Oriya New Year, or Maha Visuba Sankranthi (India's Orissa state)
    * Sinhalese New Year, or Aluth Avurudhu (Sri Lanka)
    * Tamil New Year, or Puthandu (India's Tamil Nadu state)
    * Thai New Year, or Songkran, celebrated from 13 to 15 April (Thailand)
    * Tuluva New Year, or Bisu (India's Karnataka state)


Sommarsblot -- Ancient Norse Calendar (celebration of the coming summer, with sacrifices to the gods over the next several days; through Walpurgis/May 1)

Spring Hula Hooping Day -- try out the old hula hoop one more time, then toss it

St. Benezet's Day (Patron of bachelors, bridge builders; Avignon, France)

St. Lydwina of Schiedam's Day (Patron of ice skating/roller skating/skaters, prolonged suffering, sick people; Schiedam, Netherland; against bodily ills and sickness)

St. Peter Gonzalez's Day (Patron of boatmen, mariners, sailors, watermen)

St. Tiburtius' Day (Considered the day the cuckoos return to England for the spring)

Takayama Spring Festival -- Takayama City, Japan (often considered one of the 3 most beautiful festivals in Japan; through tomorrow)

Vaisaki/Baisakhi -- Sikh (celebration of the spring grain harvest and of the rebirth of the Sikh religion in the 15th Century)

Youth Day -- Angola


Birthdays Today:

Abigail Breslin, 1996
Sarah Michelle Gellar, 1977
Adrien Brody, 1973
Anthony Michael Hall, 1968
Greg Maddux, 1966
Cynthia Cooper, 1963
Robert Carlyle, 1961
Brad Garrett, 1960
Emma Thompson, 1959
Ritchie Blackmore, 1945
Julie Christie, 1941
Pete Rose, 1941
Loretta Lynn, 1935
Rod Steiger, 1925
John Gielgud, 1904
Arnold Joseph Toynbee, 1889
Anne Sullivan, 1866
Emperor Momozono, 1741
Christiaan Huygens, 1629


Debuting/Premiering Today:

"The Boys in the Band"(Musical), 1968
"Bye Bye, Birdie"(Musical), 1960
The Grapes of Wrath(Publication date), 1939
"Jeux d'enfants"(Ballet), 1932
"Murders in the Rue Morgue"(Publication date), 1841
American Dictionary of the English Language(Publication date), 1828


Today in History:

Mark Antony, besieging Julius Caesar's assassin Decimus Junius Brutus Albinus in Mutina, defeats the forces of the consul Pansa, who is wounded, BC 43
Titus, son of emperor Vespasian, surrounds the Jewish capital with four Roman legions, beginning the Siege of Jerusalem, 70
Temur, grandson of Kublai Khan, is elected Khagan of the Mongols and Emperor of the Yuan Dynasty, 1294
The foundation stone of Cathedral St. Peter and St. Paul in Nantes, France is laid, 1434
Benjamin Franklin and Benjamin Rush establish the first abolitionist society in the US, 1775
Napoleon calls for establishing Jerusalem for the Jews, 1799
Noah Webster copyrights the first edition of his dictionary, 1828
The Donner Party departs Springfield, Illinois, 1846
Harriet Tubman begins her first Underground Railroad run, 1853
William Bullock patents the continuous-roll printing press, 1863
Abraham Lincoln is shot at Ford's Theater by John Wilkes Booth, 1865
Canada sets denominations of currency as dollars, cents, & mills, 1871
Canada passes the Dominion Lands Act, 1872
The RMS Titanic hits an iceberg  at 11:40pm and sinks 2 hours later, 1912
The first Volvo car premieres in Gothenburg, Sweden, 1927
The Grapes of Wrath, by American author John Steinbeck is first published by the Viking Press, 1939
The Soviet satellite Sputnik 2 falls from orbit, 1958
The heaviest hailstones ever recorded, at 1 kilogram, hailstones fall on the Gopalganj district of Bangladesh, killing 92, 1986
The most costly natural disaster in Australian history, a hailstorm, strikes Sydney, Australia, 1999
The Human Genome Project is completed with 99% of the human genome sequenced to an accuracy of 99.99%, 2003
The Oregon Supreme Court nullifies marriage licenses issued to gay couples a year earlier by Multnomah County, 2005
Ash from Iceland's Eyjafjallajokull volcano drifts towards Europe, causing air traffic to close over Northern Norway, 2010
The first-ever European MP's of Croatia are determined in an election held in anticipation of Croatia gaining formal entry into the European Union, 2013