Enjoyment (Awww Monday), Inspiring Quote of the Week, and Cats (Poetry Monday)

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Awww Monday is hosted by Sandee at Comedy Plus.

Join us every Monday for Awww...Mondays.  Post a picture that makes you say Awww... and that's it.

Make sure you get the code from Sandee's site, linked above, and leave a link to your post so we can visit you.  What better way to start the week than with a smile!

Tripod SissyCat so enjoys her time on the porch.

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Sparks, the brainchild of Annie of McGuffy's Reader, is on hiatus, so here's an Inspiring Quote of the Week in her honor.     

Source

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Poetry Monday was started by Diane at On The Alberta/Montana Border.  Jenny at Procrastinating Donkey is on a blog break and is sorely missed.   Charlotte/Mother Owl participates, and now Karen at Baking in a Tornado is jumping in at least once a month, too. 

This week the theme is Cats, in honor of International Cat Day being yesterday.  Just as it's hard to stop at having one cat, it's hard to stop at writing one poem about them so i wrote a haiku and a poem.                        

You mean each day's not

International Cat Day?

Well, it sure should be!

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Why do we love them

When they scratch

All new furniture

With dispatch?

What gives them

So much allure

When they cover with fur

All our couture?

What makes us keep

Them around at all,

When our feet are in danger

From every hairball?

Do they cast

Some kind of spell

So we love them even when

They yowl and yell?

This might just be

One reason why,

The joy of the purr

No money can buy.

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Today is:

Betty Boop Day -- she debuted in "Dizzy Dishes" on this day in 1930

Book Lover's Day -- internet generated, but if you love books, go sit under a shady tree with a cool drink and indulge!

Carnival Monday -- Grenada

Clean Out the Kitchen Cupboards Day -- because someone, somewhere, thought it would be a good day to remind us to get rid of the junk in there we haven't seen since last year

Dag der Inheemsen -- Suriname (Indigenous People's Day)

Festival for Sol -- Ancient Roman Calendar

Goblin Ugly Contest -- Fairy Calendar

Heroes Day -- Zimbabwe

Hijra -- Islam (Islamic New Year Begins at the viewing of the new moon crescent, so exact time/date varies by location)

Independence Day / National Day -- Singapore(1965)

International Day of the World's Indigenous Peoples -- UN

Jesse Owens Day -- the day he became the first American to win 4 gold medals

Nagasaki Day / Moment of Silence -- Japan

National Hand Holding Day -- sponsored by Adrienne Sioux Koopersmith of Chicago

National Rice Pudding Day

National Women's Day -- South Africa

Remembrance for Radbod, King of the Frisians -- Asatru/Norse Pagan

Sister Teresa Benedicta of the Cross' Day (born Edith Stein, killed at Auschwitz; Co-Patron of Europe; Patron of converts, martyrs, those who have lost their parents, World Youth Day)

Smokey the Bear Day -- Smokey first appeared on a U.S. Forest Service poster on this day in 1944

Veep Day -- US (commemoration of the day in 1974 Richard Nixon's resignation let Gerald Ford succeed to the presidency)

Yosakoi Matsuri -- Kochi City, Japan (over 100 groups come up with their own Bon dance and costume and have dance competions in the streets, through the 12th)

Anniversaries Today:

Coronation of Albert II of Belgium, 1993

Birthdays Today:

Audrey Tautou,1976

Eric Bana, 1968

Gillian Anderson, 1968

Delon Sanders, 1967

Hoda Kotb, 1964

Whitney Houston, 1963

Michael Kors, 1959

Amanda Bearse, 1958

Melanie Griffith, 1957

Sam Elliot, 1944

David Steinberg, 1942

Robert Joseph (Bob) Cousy, 1928

P.L. Travers, 1899

Joseph Locke, 1805

Amedeo Avogadro, 1776

John Dryden, 1631

Izaak Walton, 1593

Debuting/Premiering Today:

"Béatrice et Bénédict (Beatrice and Benedick)"(Berlioz Opera Comique), 1862

Walden(Thoreau, publication date), 1854

Today in History:

Battle of Pharsalus, in which Julius Caesar defeated Pompey, who fled to Egypt, BC 40

Bulgaria is founded as a Khanate on the south bank of the Danube after defeating the Byzantine armies of Emperor Constantine IV south of the Danube delta, 681

Start of construction of the Tower of Pisa, 1173*

Sistine Chapel opens, 1483

First horses arrive in Hawai'i, 1803

The Webster-Ashburton Treaty is signed, establishing the United States-Canada border east of the Rocky Mountains, 1842

Thoreau's Walden is published, 1854

Thomas Edison receives a patent for a two-way telegraph, 1892

Betty Boop makes her debut in the cartoon, Dizzy Dishes, 1930

Mahatma Gandhi is arrested in Bombay by British forces, launching the Quit India Movement, 1942

The United States Forest Service and the Wartime Advertising Council release posters featuring Smokey Bear for the first time, 1944

Singapore is expelled from Malaysia and becomes the first and only country to date to gain independence unwillingly, 1965

Richard Nixon becomes the first President of the United States to resign from office, 1974

Wayne Gretzky is traded from the Edmonton Oilers to the Los Angeles Kings in one of the most controversial player transactions in ice hockey history, 1988

The Liberal Democratic Party of Japan loses a 38-year hold on national leadership, 1993

Tensions escalate between North and South Korea, when South Korea claims North Korea fired over 100 rounds of artillery into the Sea of Japan, 2010

David Rudisha of Kenya becomes the first athlete at the 2012 Summer Olympics to set a new world track record and secures the 800m gold medal, while Usain Bolt becomes the first person to win the 100m and 200m sprint in back to back Olympics, 2012

Nepal's parliament bans menstruation huts (comes into effect August 2018), 2017

*completed two hundred years later