Civic Association Sign (Wordless Wednesday) and Words for Wednesday

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Linking up with Wordless Wednesday and Sandee at Comedy Plus.     

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Words for Wednesday was begun by Delores and has become a moveable feast of word or picture or music prompts that encourages us to write stories, poems, or whatever strikes our fancy.    

This month, the prompts are being provided by Margaret Adamson and her friend Sue Fulton, and are posted by Elephant's Child.                  

The weeks words are:

1. Scuttle
2. Rapper
3. Drop
4. Machine
5. Flowery
6. Button 

And/ or 

1. Cashback 
2. Tipping
3. Pizza
4. Energy
5. Unsubstantiated
6. Clear

The words were just not speaking to her.  Nothing came CLEAR, there was no ENERGY.  

Generally she could hear a SCUTTLE in the back of her brain when the words were posted.  One or more of the characters she'd been thinking about would DROP in and say, "Hey, those are about me!"

This time she was as clueless as a RAPPER trying to sing opera.  The mantra going around in her brain was about the upcoming PIZZA party, how she didn't want to mess up the mail out she needed to send, and the UNSUBSTANTIATED feeling that she had forgotten something important.

The story MACHINE just wasn't going to get anything out of words like FLOWERY and BUTTON, as nice as those words are.  TIPPING back her water bottle for a sip, she tried to think of how in the world to use the word CASHBACK without sounding like an ad for a credit card.

Then she decided that not having a story to tell can be a story.  Sometimes it just works out that way.

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Today is:

Agriculture Day and Labor Day -- Haiti

Amtrak Day -- the train service began this day in 1971

Anxiety Disorders Screening Day -- if you have symptoms, get checked, there is help   

Badminton Horse Trials -- Badminton, Gloucestershire, England (international horse trials of show jumping, cross-country, and dressage; through Sunday)

Beltaine / Samhain -- Wiccan/Pagan

Bladder Cancer Awareness Month    http://www.bcan.org/

Calends of May -- Ancient Roman Calendar; related observances

    Day sacred to Maia

    Feast for Lares Praestites (household gods)

Childhood Stroke Awareness Month -- also called Pediatric Stroke Awareness Day, because kids can have strokes, too 

Chimney Sweeps Day -- the boys as young as 4 trained to help master sweeps got Mayday off each year

Constitution Day / National Day -- Marshall Islands

Executive Coaching Day -- a reminder, on what is most countries' Labor Day, that workers deserve great leaders

Faint-Hearted Fairies May (or May Not) Ball -- Fairy Calendar

Feast of Our Lady of Peace and Good Voyage -- Antipolo, Rizal, Philippines (pilgrimages to the shrine of Nuestra Sra de la Paz y Buen Viaje; through the month)

Festival of Saint Efisio -- Cagliari, Italy (one of the most colorful religious festivals anywhere in the world; through the 4th)

Garland Dressing -- Charlton on Otmoor, England (a wooden cross is bedecked with yew and box leaves)

Global Love Day -- sponsored by The Love Foundation      

Go Fetch! National Food Drive for Homeless Animals -- PALS Foundation 

Great American Grump Out Day -- encouraging everyone to avoid grumpiness and rudeness for 24 hours; who knows, you might enjoy it so much it will stick!

Gujarat Day / Maharashtra Day -- MH, India

Journée Internationale de la Guérilla Tournesol / International Sunflower Guerrilla Gardening Day -- begun in Belgium, now celebrated worldwide, guerrilla gardeners are encouraged to plant sunflowers (or an appropriate plant for their climate) in a neglected public place or shabby flower bed

Keep Kids Alive! Drive 25 Day -- 20-25mph in school zones, please   

Kevadpuha -- Estonia (Spring Day)

Law Day, USA -- US, by Presidential Proclamation

Lei Day -- Hawai'i (where you celebrate Mayday with a lei instead of mayflowers)

Loyalty Day -- US

May Day / Labor Day / Worker's Day -- International; celebrated as the beginning of summer in some places, as a Labor Day in others

Mother Goose Day -- as declared by the Mother Goose Society    

National Chocolate Parfait Day

National Day to Prevent Teen and Unplanned Pregnancy -- US   

National Golf Day -- We Are Golf sponsors this day, and is holding an event on Capitol Hill today, too    

National Love Day -- Czech Republic (couples flock to the memorial of the poet Karel Hynek Mácha in Prague and kiss)

National Purebred Dog Day -- US (as proposed on this page)     

New Homeowner's Day -- can't find confirmation on this one, listed at a few sites but no history or records of why this day

'Obby 'Oss (Hobby Horse) Parade -- Padstow, Cornwall, England (every May 1 since 1502, if the records are correct)

Play of St. Evermaar -- Belgium (annual performance of a mystery play, in its original form from over 1,000 years ago, by the village)

Riding of the Bounds -- Berwick-upon-Tweed, Casey, England (riders scour the countryside to be sure the Scots have not encroached upon English soil in this 5 century old tradition)

Rodonitsa -- Asatru/Slavic Pagan Calendar (day to offer feasts to the ancestors, named for Rod, god of family and the cosmos)

Santacruzan / Flore de Mayo -- Philippines (lasts through the month, celebrating Mary and St. Helena's finding of the True Cross)

Save the Rhino Day / Rhino Mayday -- International

School Principal's Day -- since teachers get a day, so should the principal

Silver Star Day -- US (to honor all military who have earned a Silver Star)   

SOS Radio Week -- UK (The Royal National Lifeboat Institution keeps the seas safer, and Radio Amateurs help them raise funds; it used to be a week, and though that's still the name, it now lasts the whole month of May)          

Stepmother's Day -- sponsored by secondwivesclub.com

St. Joseph the Worker's Day -- Holy See(Vatican City)

St. Peregrine Laziosi's Day (Patron of AIDS patients, cancer patients, and the sick; against cancer, open sores and skin diseases)

St. Walpurga's Canonization Day (The saint who banishes the evil from Walpurgis night.)

Swieta Panstwowe -- Poland (National Day)

Tammany's Day / St. Tamenend -- US soldiers in the Revolution wanted a patron saint to rival St. George of the British Army, and chose Delaware Indian chief and wise man Chief Tamenend, also called Tammany

Unity Day -- Kazakhstan

Virgen de Chapi Festival -- Peru

Yom HaShoah -- Judaism (Holocaust Remembrance Day; begins at sunset)

Yotaka Matsuri -- Fukuno, Toyama, Japan (enjoy floats, paper lanters, and mock battles in this two day festival)

Zuni Green Corn Dance -- Zuni Native Americans (welcoming back the Corn Maidens who fled during the winter; dating approximate as many Native ceremonies are closed to outsiders)

Anniversaries Today:

Cheerios go on sale, 1941

Empire State Building Ribbon Cutting, 1931

Birthdays Today:

Wes Anderson, 1969

Tim McGraw, 1967

Charlie Schlatter, 1966

Steve Cauthen, 1960

Ray Parker, Jr., 1954

Paul Teutul, Sr., 1949

Rita Coolidge, 1945

Bobbie Ann Mason, 1940

Judy Collins, 1939

Sonny James, 1929

Charles "Chuck" Bednarik, 1925

Terry Southern, 1924

Jack Paar, 1918

Glenn Ford, 1916

Archie Williams, 1915

Kate Smith, 1909

Mark Clark, 1896

Leo Sowerby, 1895

Calamity Jane (Martha Jane Burke), 1852

Mary Harris "Mother" Jones, 1837

King Kamehameha I of Hawai'i, 1738

Joseph Addison, 1672

Debuting/Premiering Today:

"My One and Only"(Musical), 1983

Citizen Kane(Film), 1941

"Batman"(Detective Comics #27), 1939

"Buffalo Bill's Wild West"(touring Western show), 1883

"Le nozze di Figaro/The Marriage of Figaro"(Mozart Opera, K492), 1786

Today in History:

The Wars of Scottish Independence end with a treaty recognizing the Kingdom of Scotland as a separate entity, 1328

The Act of Union joins the Kingdom of England and Kingdom of Scotland to form the Kingdom of Great Britain, 1707

Species Plantarum is published by Linnaeus, marking the formal start date of plant taxonomy adopted by the International Code of Botanical Nomenclature, 1753

Josiah Wedgwood founds the Wedgwood  pottery company in Great Britain, 1759

Jesuit-taught Adam Weishaupt establishes the Illuminati in Ingolstadt (Upper Bavaria), 1776

Kamehameha, the king of Hawai'i defeats Kalanikupule and establishes the Kingdom of Hawai'i, 1785

The British colonies abolish slavery, 1834

The Penny Black, the first official adhesive postage stamp, is issued in the United Kingdom, 1840

The first wagon train leaves from Independence, MO, bound for California, 1841

Hong Kong Police Force, the world's second, Asia's first modern police force is established, 1844

Queen Victoria opens the Great Exhibition in London, 1851

The Empire of Brazil, Argentina  and Uruguay  sign the Treaty of the Triple Alliance, 1865

The Folies Bergère opens in Paris, 1869

Moses Fleetwood Walker becomes the first black person to play in a professional baseball game in the United States, 1884

The RMS Lusitania departs from New York City on her two hundred and second, and final, crossing of the North Atlantic, 1915

The first cooked meals on a scheduled flight are introduced on an Imperial Airways flight from London to Paris, 1927

The dwarf planet Pluto is officially named, 1930

The Empire State Building is dedicated in New York City, 1931

The Summer Olympics are cancelled due to war, 1940

The Salk vaccine is made available to the public, 1956

Fidel Castro proclaims Cuba a socialist nation and abolishes elections, 1961

Amtrak is formed to take over the U.S. passenger rail service, 1971

Pope John Paul II beatifies Edith Stein, a Jewish-born Carmelite nun who was gassed in the Nazi concentration camp at Auschwitz, 1987

On the same day, Rickey Henderson of the Oakland A's sets the record for stolen bases (his 939th), and Nolan Ryan of the Texas Rangers pitches his 7th career no-hitter, breaking his own record, 1991

Cyprus, Czech Republic, Estonia, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Malta, Poland, Slovakia, and Slovenia join the European Union, , 2004

Same-sex marriage is legalized in Sweden, 2009

Pope John Paul II is beatified by his successor, Pope Benedict XVI, 2011

The U.N. Human Rights Office determine it is a violation of international law to force-feed hunger strikers at the U.S. Guantanamo Bay prison, 2013