Almost Wordless Wednesday: Comfort

The other day, Little Girl knew i was having a difficult day, so she changed what she had written on my chalkboard cup:

A comforting message.

It's nice when someone knows just what to do to cheer you!


Today is

Be a Millionaire Day - now we all can go for that

Blue Jeans Day -- Levi Strauss and David Jacobs received the patent for their denim pants with riveted pockets on this day in 1873

Dainty-Four Remembrance Day  -- Fairy Calendar

Elf Fest -- Lothlorien Nature Sanctuary (near Needmore, Indiana; through next Monday)

Eliza Doolittle Day* -- in honor of Shaw and his famous fictional character, to encourage proper use of one's native language

Emancipation Day -- Florida, US

Emergency Medical Services for Children Day -- because children need different care, they aren't just tiny adults 

European Maritime Day -- European Council (this year's host for the conferences is Pireaus, Greece, and the conference will be 28-29 May)

Festival of Mjollnir -- Ancient Norse Calendar (feast of Thor's Hammer, date approximate)

Flying Solo Day -- Lindberg began his historic flight on this day in 1927

Frigga Blot -- Slavic Pagan/Asatru (honoring Frigga)

Grudie Rosnoe -- Slavic Pagan/Asatru (ten days of sacrifices to Rod for rain and good harvests)

Independence Day -- East Timor(2002)

Hari Kebangkitan Nasional Indonesia -- Indonesia (Indonesian National Awakening Day)

Mecklenburg Day -- North Carolina, US (commemoration of the signing of a declaration of independence from England by the citizens of Mecklenburg County on this day in 1775)

National Day -- Cameroon

National Employee Health & Fitness Day -- US (originally the 3rd Wednesday in May, but now spreading around the world as Global Employee Health & Fitness Month)

National Quiche Lorraine Day

Norman Rockwell Day -- his first Saturday Evening Post cover appeared this day in 1916

Pick Strawberries Day

St. Bernadine of Siena's Day (Patron of advertising and advertisers, communications personnel, compulsive gamblers/gambling addicts, public relations work and personnel; Italy; Aquila, Italy; Capri, Italy; Castelspina, Italy; Trevignano, Italy; the diocese of San Bernardino, California; against compulsive gambling, chest, lung, and respiratory problems and hoarseness of the throat)

St. Ives' Day (an honest lawyer; in the Anglican tradition, Patron of abandoned children and orphans, advocates, canon lawyers, judges, lawyers, and notaries; in the Roman Catholic tradition, Patron of Saint Ives, Cambridgeshire, England)

Turn Beauty Inside Out Day -- the day to remember what really counts is who you are, not just what you look like

T'veer Chong Kamhaeng -- Cambodia (Day of Remembrance, anniversary of Khmer Rouge regime takeover in 1975, a day to remember all who died at their hands and work for peace)

Weights and Measures Day / World Metrology Day -- anniversary of the treaty in 1875 which established the International Bureau of Weights and Measures in Sevres, France

World Autoimmune Arthritis Day -- The International Foundation for Autoimmune Arthritis sponsors an online virtual convention in all time zones around the world from today through Wednesday

*"One evening the King will say, "Oh, Liza, old thing,
I want all of England your praises to sing,
Next week on the twentieth of May,
I proclaim Liza Doolittle Day."


Birthdays Today:

Tahmoh Penikett, 1975
Tony Stewart, 1971
Tony Goldwyn, 1960
Bronson Pinchot, 1959
Ronald Prescott Reagan, 1958
David Paterson, 1954
Cher, 1946
Joe Cocker, 1944
Stan Mikita, 1940
Anthony Zerbe, 1936
George Gobel, 1919
Jimmy Stewart, 1908
Henri Julien Felix Rousseau, 1844
William Fargo, 1818
John Stuart Mill, 1806
Honore de Balzac, 1799
Dolly Madison, 1768

Debuting/Premiering Today:

"Elegie für junge Liebende / Elegy for Young Lovers(Opera), 1961
Norman Rockwell's First Saturday Evening Post Cover, 1916


Today in History:

The first Ecumenical Council in the Christian Church, the Council of Nicea, opens, 325
An earthquake kills about 300,000 people in Syria and Antiochia, 526
John Cabot sets sail from Bristol, England, on his ship  Matthew looking for a route to the west, 1497
Cartographer  Abraham Ortelius issues the first modern atlas, 1570
Shakespeare's Sonnets  are first published in London, 1609
Napoleon Bonaparte reinstates slavery in the French colonies, revoking its abolition in the French Revolution, 1802
Otto is named the first modern king of Greece, 1835
HMS Erebus and HMS Terror with 134 men under John Franklin sail from the River Thames in England, beginning a disastrous expedition to find the Northwest Passage in which all hands are lost, 1845
U.S. President Abraham Lincoln signs the Homestead Act into law, 1862
Levi Strauss and Jacob Davis receive a U.S. patent for blue jeans with copper rivets, 1873
The Triple Alliance between Germany, Austria-Hungary and Italy is formed, 1882
Krakatoa begins to erupt (the volcano's final and most notable explosion will occur on August 26), 1883
The first public display of Thomas Edison's prototype kinetoscope, 1891
Cuba gains independence from the United States, 1902
The Saturday Evening Post publishes its first cover with a Norman Rockwell painting ("Boy with Baby Carriage"), 1916
Montreal, Quebec radio station XWA broadcasts the first regularly scheduled radio programming in North America, 1920
By the Treaty of Jedda, the United Kingdom recognizes the sovereignty of King Ibn Saud in the Kingdoms of Hejaz and Nejd, which later merge to become the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, 1927
At 07:52 Charles Lindbergh takes off from Roosevelt Field in Long Island, New York, on the world's first solo non-stop flight across the Atlantic Ocean, 1927
Amelia Earhart takes off from Newfoundland to begin the world's first solo nonstop flight across the Atlantic Ocean by a female pilot, 1932
In a referendum in Quebec, the population rejects by a 60% vote the proposal from its government to move towards independence from Canada, 1980
First publications of the discovery of the HIV virus that causes AIDS in the journal Science by Luc Montagnier and Robert Gallo individually, 1983
The Chinese authorities declare martial law in the face of pro-democracy demonstrations, setting the scene for the Tiananmen Square massacre, 1989
In a second referendum in Quebec, the population rejects by a slight majority the proposal from its government to move towards independence from Canada, 1995
The independence of East Timor is recognized by Portugal, formally ending 23 years of Indonesian rule and 3 years of provisional UN administration (Portugal itself is the former colonizer of East Timor until 1976), 2002
Scientists at the Craig J. Venter Institute announce they have successfully created the world's first artificial lifeform by transplanting a synthesized genome into an existing cell, 2010