Random Tuesday News

And now, some randomness from around here, linking up with Stacy's Random Thoughts at Stacy Uncorked.  

On the vehicle front, i got too close to a culvert and need a tire on the Jalopy, and Lunceford the Land Yacht had the motor on the windshield wipers just die.  The tire is being changed this morning, while Sweetie brings Friend Chris to work, and then he comes back to Kevin and Lenny's so we can leave Lunceford and go to work in Jalopy when she is done.

Musical cars at its finest.

A lady from the church Women's Circle asked me to please come clean her house yesterday as her regular cleaning lady had surgery and she was desperate.  When i got there, the place looked like it hadn't had good attention in a while, and it was more than what one mostly tidy woman living alone should have in her home.  Then her grandson came in after work.  That explained the rest of the crumbs and the horrible whatever it was that stank to high heaven on the floor in the back bedroom.

Ms. JAI is back in town after almost a month away, and she has also brought her grandson to live with her.  She will get my full attention on Thursday afternoon, and i just know that dusting her many, many objet's d'art is going to take a back seat to grime removal, much to her chagrin.

The cat food wars are back in full swing these days.  Every spare moment i don't have is spent trying to prevent the adult cats, which are all overweight and on diet food, from sneaking the kitten kibble.  It's a losing battle, or should i say a gaining battle?  The kittens will go up for adoption in a couple of weeks and it will all be over, but meanwhile, i look out for sneaky cats and they look out for sneaky me to see who can outsneak the other.

There is a temporary win in place for the kitten escape battle.  The little things only weigh just over a pound each, but they can move up to five pounds or more of weight out of the way in the quest to get out of their kitchen play pen.  What they can't do now is move the box, which is velcroed to the wall.  They looked quite surprised when they attacked it as usual and it did not move, and continued to not move.

Eventually i expect them to find a work around, but meanwhile, the kittens are secured.

Little Girl should be back from her assignment this coming Friday, and it will be wonderful to see her.

Bigger Girl is helping a friend with a new product launch (some kind of game), and it is getting very close.  The closer it gets, the more nervous she gets, and the more time she spends setting up live demos and doing other things that i don't understand.  All i know is, i hope it goes well, they've put a ton of work into this.

One of these random Tuesdays, i'm going to do a rant.  It will have to wait until i'm not so busy that i'm too tired, though.

Today is:

Anti-Bigot Day -- doesn't seem to be sponsored by any particular group, which is good on a day to practice tolerance of all

Constitution Day -- Uruguay

Lunch of the Forward Goblins -- Fairy Calendar (not surprisingly, attended by Fairies only)

Mandela Day -- UN

National Caviar Day -- no one knows how it started, but even The Russian Tea Room in New York has celebrated it for years and caviar importers know all about it; pair it with ice cold vodka or a Burgundian pinot or unoaked chardonnay, but never with champagne!

Snake River Stampede -- Nampa, ID (the 102nd year of one of the top 15 professional rodeo events in the nation; through Saturday)

St. Theneva's Day (Patron of Glasgow, Scotland)

Vitulatio -- Ancient Roman Calendar (Vitula, goddess of exultation, joy, and life, is given the first fruits of the earth)

Wienermobile Day -- celebrating the creation, in 1936, of the now iconic vehicle by Oscar Mayer's nephew Carl

World Listening Day -- World Listening Project (this year's theme is "Listening to the Ground") 

Anniversaries Today:

Timothy Verner Taylor marries The Lady Helen Windsor, 1992

Bobby Brown marries Whitney Houston, 1992

Birthdays Today

Chace Crawford, 1985

Priyanka Chopra, 1982

Kristin Bell, 1980

Vin Diesel, 1967

Elizabeth McGovern, 1961

Ricky Skaggs, 1954

Richard Branson, 1950

Steve Forbes, 1947

James Brolin, 1941

Martha Reeves, 1941

Joe Torre, 1940

Dion DiMucci, 1939

Paul Verhoeven, 1938

Hunter S. Thompson, 1937

Yevgeny Yevtushenko, 1932

Dick Button, 1929

Screamin' Jay Hawkins, 1929

John Glenn, 1921

Nelson Mandela, 1918

Harriet Nelson, 1914

Richard "Red" Skelton, 1913

Hume Cronyn, 1911

Clifford Odets, 1906

Samuel Ichiye Hayakawa, 1906

George "Machine Gun" Kelly, 1895

Charles E. "Chick" Evans, Jr., 1890

Vidkun Quisling, 1887

Margaret "Unsinkable Molly" Brown, 1867

William Makepeace Thackeray, 1811

Gilbert White, 1720

Robert Hooke, 1635

Today in History

A Roman army is defeated by raiding Gauls, leading to the subsequent sacking of Rome, BC390

The Great Fire of Rome begins in the merchant area of the city, 64

King Edward I of England issues the Edict of Expulsion, banishing all Jews (numbering about 16,000) from England; this was Tisha B'Av on the Hebrew calendar, a day that commemorates many Jewish calamities, 1290

Matthew Flinders leaves England to circumnavigate and map Australia; it was he who gave the continent its name, 1801

The First Vatican Council decrees the dogma of papal infallibility, 1870

Britain introduced voting by secret ballot, 1872

Marie and Pierre Curie announce the discovery of a new element and propose to call it polonium, 1898

Adoph Hitler publishes Mein Kampf, 1925

The Intel Corporation is founded in Santa Clara, California, 1968

Nadia Comaneci became the first person in Olympic Games history to score a perfect 10 in gymnastics  at the 1976 Summer Olympics, 1976

Beverly Lynn Burns becomes first female Boeing 747 airline captain, 1984

On the Caribbean island of Montserrat, the Soufriere Hills volcano erupts; over the course of several years, it devastates the island, destroying the capital and forcing most of the population to flee, 1995

Storms provoke severe flooding on the Saguenay River, beginning one of Quebec's costliest natural disasters ever, 1996

Phoenix, AZ, US, is hit by a dust storm of the kind known as a "haboob", 2011

King Jong-un, son of King Jong-il, is announced the official Supreme Leader of North Korea, 2012

The 'immediate and severe' fiscal emergency declared by the U.S. city San Bernardino, California, allows it to declare bankruptcy without negotiating with creditors, 2012

Investigators on the case of the October 2012 Kunsthal gallery theft of paintings by Picasso, Matisse and Monet, discover paint, canvas and nails in the oven of a woman whose son has been charged with the crime, 2013

Detroit, Michigan files the largest municipal bankruptcy in history, 2013