Firm Grip (Six Sentence Story), Toy Fence (Good Fences), Ouch! (Sammy's Poetry Day) and Brian's Thankful Thursday

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The news here is slowly getting better.

Uncle P is actually trying to breathe more on his own; he is not following directions such as "squeeze my hand" or "blink your eyes" yet, but that may be because his hearing aid batteries have died, they need to replace the batteries and find out.

Brother-in-Law is on a lower amount of oxygen today than he was yesterday, and sounded like he was feeling better.

Sweetie still needs to be on oxygen to keep his levels up, but he is "feeling his oats" a bit; he actually wanted some broccoli with butter and parmesan for supper, and told me tomorrow i get to make him a small taco salad.

He was also able to remember how to find a contact in his phone today and call the person without help.

Bits of progress that remind us to be grateful that none of this is a surprise to G-d, and that we are always in His grip.

Linking up with Denise at Girlie On The Edge Blog, where she hosts Six Sentence Stories, and the cue is Grip.      

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Gosia at Looking for Identity has taken over Good Fences, and it's now Good Fences Around The World.  Post a picture of a fence or gate, link back to her blog, and go visit other blogs to see what interesting fences there are out in this big world.     

Behind this regular fence is the toy house with a fence of its own.

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 It's Angel Sammy's Poetry Day!  This week's image and my (free verse) poem:    

Shoes have a tongue

And speak

Without saying a word

These speak of

Elegance

Much time spent

Putting together an outfit

Getting the buttons just right

A gala evening,

And sore feet

Once you take them off.

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Brian of Brian's Home hosts the Thankful Thursday Blog Hop.   It's time to share something for which i am thankful.  

Today i am thankful that even though we had a great deal of thunder and some rather too-close-for-comfort lightening yesterday, we didn't get a bad storm and our neighborhood did not lose electricity.

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Today is:

Aloha Day -- unofficial celebration of the annexation of Hawai'i by the US

Anniversary of Snick-Snacker's Left Foot -- Fairy Calendar

Awa Odori Festival -- Tokushima, Japan (through the 15th; one of Japan's largest dance festivals, Awa-dance is said to be a "fool's dance", and the saying is "It's a fool who dances and a fool who watches, so if both are fools, you may as well dance!")

Festival for Hercules Invictus -- Ancient Roman Calendar (through tomorrow; based on an even older Greek celebration of Heracles at the same time of year)

Festival for Venus Vitrix -- Ancient Roman Calendar (Victorius Venus)

Ganesha Chaturthi -- Hindu (festival to honor the god of prosperity, prudence, and success, Ganesha; local customs and dates can vary, as can official government holiday status)

Grouse Day/Glorious Twelfth -- England; Scotland (opening of grouse hunting season; because the 12th is a Sunday in 2012, it will actually be celebrated tomorrow)

Her Majesty the Queen's Birthday and National Mother's Day -- Thailand

International Youth Day -- UN

Julienne Fries Day

Lychnapsia -- Ancient Roman Calendar (celebration of the Birthday of Isis, instituted after the conquest of Egypt)

Middle Children's Day -- on some sites, listed as Aug. 14; either way, Middle Children deserve a special day!

National Hobo Convention -- Britt, IA (held each year since 1900, gathering for migrant workers who are proud to call themselves "hobos" and make a living through working where they choose and travelling where they want; through Sunday)

National Toasted Almond Bar Day

Onam -- Hindu (start of a 14 day Hindu harvest festival observed by Malayali Hindus celebrating the legendary King Maveli/Mahabali)

Osirian Mysteries; Feast of the Lights of Isis -- Ancient Egyptian Calendar (date approximate, but this is the date the Romans gave it, so who am i to quibble?)

PC Day -- no, not politically correct, personal computer; IBM introduced theirs this day in 1981

Put Peanuts in Your Coca Cola Day -- and no, i can't figure this one out, but they say don't shake it once you do it; if anyone else wants to experiment with why, let me know the results

Solar Alignment with Teotihuacan, City of the Gods -- ancient when the Aztecs found its ruins, this city's ritual cave aligns with the setting sun today and April 29, also the rising and setting dates of the Pleiades

St. Gracilian's Day (Patron of Bassano Romano, Italy)

St. Murtagh's Day (Patron of Killaria, Ireland)

Vinyl Record Day -- celebrating the tremendous cultural influence of records, on the anniversary of the day in 1877 that Edison invented the phonograph

World Elephant Day -- learn more here    

Zaraday a/k/a Zarathud's Day -- Discordianism

Birthdays Today:

Casey Affleck, 1975

Pete Sampras, 1971

Peter Krause, 1964

Ann M. Martin, 1955

Pat Metheny, 1954

Sam J. Jones, 1954

Skip Caray, 1939

George Hamilton, 1939

William Goldman, 1931

George Soros, 1930

Alvis Edgar “Buck” Owens, 1929

John Derek, 1926

Michael Kidd, 1915

Jane Wyatt, 1912

Cantinflas, 1911

Joe Besser, 1907

Alfred Lunt, 1892

Cecil B. DeMille, 1881

Christopher "Christy" Mathewson, 1880

Edith Hamilton, 1867

Katharine Lee Bates, 1859

"Diamond Jim" Brady, 1856

Robert Mills, 1781

Thomas Bewick, 1753

Debuting/Premiering Today:

Wings(Film, only silent film to win the Oscar for Best Picture), 1927

Today in History:

The last ruler of the Egyptian Ptolemaic Dynasty, Cleopatra VII Philopater, allegedly commits suicide by asp bite, BC30

A conjunction of Venus and Jupiter occurs which may have been what the Bible calls the Star of Bethlehem, 3

Crusaders win the Battle of Ascalon, 1099

Juan Ponce de Leon arrives in Puerto Rico, 1508

Praying Indian John Alderman shoots and kills Metacomet, the Wampanoag war chief, ending King Philip's War, 1676

Isaac Singer is granted a patent for his sewing machine, the first one to be practical for home use, 1851

Asaph Hall discovers Deimos, 1877

The last quagga, a subspecies of zebra once plentiful in South Africa, dies at the Artis Magistra zoo in Amsterdam, 1883

Hawai'i is annexed by the US, 1898

William Somerset Maugham published "Of Human Bondage", 1915

Alleged date of the first Philadelphia Experiment test on United States Navy ship USS Eldridge, 1943

The Soviet Union detonates its first thermonuclear weapon, 1953

Echo I, the first communications satellite, is launched, 1960

South Africa is banned from the Olympic Games because of its racist policies, 1964

The first free flight of the Space Shuttle Enterprise, 1977

The IBM Personal Computer is released, 1981

Canada, Mexico, and the United States announce completion of negotiations for the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), 1992

The Oscar class submarine K-141 Kursk of the Russian Navy explodes and sinks in the Barents Sea during a military exercise, 2000

The Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter launches, 2005

Director of Wikileaks, Julian Assange, announces plans to release remaining Afghan War Diary documents from War in Afghanistan, 2010

President Obama's health insurance mandate from his Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act is struck down by the U.S. court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit, 2011

The International Olympic Committee announces it will punish athletes who support Russian LGBT rights at the 2014 Winter Olympic Games, 2013

NASA launches the Parker Space Probe, its first mission to the Sun and its outermost atmosphere, the corona, 2018

Scientists say they are close to an effective treatment for Ebola after a new drug trial has a 90% success rate in the Democratic Republic of Congo, 2019