Every Last Pea (Awww Monday), Inspiring Quote of the Week, and Poetry Monday, Scooter

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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!

Someone loves peas and works hard to get every last one out of the bowl.  Usually, she lets me get the last few for her.

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Sparks is the brainchild of Annie of McGuffy's Reader, who wanted us to post something positive and uplifting at the start of the week.  While she no longer blogs, i like to post an Inspiring Quote of the Week in her honor.     

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Our dear friend Diane is taking a break

accommodations we must make

we miss her poetry and wit

so carry on as Poetry Monday's a hit!

Poetry Monday was started by Diane at On The Alberta/Montana Border.  Charlotte/Mother Owl and i are keeping it going while she takes a blog break, we hope temporarily.  Anyone else is welcome to join in the fun, just let us know!

This week the theme is Scooter.               

His scooter broke down

away out of town,

he thought he was out of luck

A car happened by,

he flagged down the guy,

wishing it had been a truck

But the driver was game,

tied scooter to car frame,

to give the poor guy a tow

"If I'm going to fast,

beep your horn a good blast,

and I'll know I need to slow."

The rope held taut,

the contraption had got

about a mile up the road

Another car turned upon

the road they were on,

and the first guy forgot his load

The two started gunning

their engines and running

along in a perilous race

When a cop at a light

saw this odd sight

his eyes bugged out of his face

He took off with a spin

and then radioed in,

"I've seen street racers with brass,

But I never have seen

two guys driving mean

and a scooter honking to pass!"

Future themes are:

May 25 Scooter (Today!)

June 1 Blue

June 8 Two Minute Sketch

(All themes are from the 365 Days of Drawing Prompts and Other Arts Facebook group.)

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Today is Memorial Day in the US and US Territories.  It's a day to remember and honor those whose military service to preserve our freedom cost them their lives.

It is also Prayer for Peace, Memorial Day, an interfaith encouragement to pray and work for permanent peace in the world.

Thanks to Barb Kowalik and The Cat Blogosphere for the event badge.

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Today is:

Africa Day / African Liberation Day  -- African Union; related observance

     Heroes' Day -- Lesotho

     President Yajya Jammeh's Birthday -- Gambia

First Patriotic Government / National Day -- Argentina (Dia de la Revolucion de Mayo)

Flitting Day -- parts of England; Scotland (traditional day on which leases were up for the year and people moved)

Geek Pride Day / Nerd Pride Day -- celebrate the geek / nerd in you!  Geek culture is the obvious choice to laud when it's Glorious 25 May, Star Wars Day, and Towel Day at the same time; began in Spain as "Día del Orgullo Friki"

Glorious 25 May -- in Terry Pratchett's Discworld

Independence Day -- Jordan(1946)

Liberation Day -- Lebanon

National Brown-Bag-It Day

National Heroes' Day -- Turks and Caicos Islands (a/k/a James Alexander George Smith "Jags" McCartney Day)

National Missing Children's Day -- US (promoting awareness of the problem of missing children)    

National Tap Dance Day -- US, birth anniversary of Mr. Bojangles

National Wine Day

Offering to Demeter -- Ancient Greek Calendar (date approximate)

Poetry Day -- Florida, US (since 1947, the state legislature declared this for all public schools in the state; if you don't live in Florida, enjoy a poem today, anyway)

Procession of the Statue of Artemis -- Ancient Greek and Roman Calendars, at Ephesus (date approximate, but always near the Thargelia)

Self-Reliance Day -- an internet originated holiday, based on the idea that we should all become more self-reliant in this day when it is a dying art.

Spring Bank Holiday -- UK

     Gloucestershire Cheese Rolling and Wake -- Cooper’s Hill, England (ancient tradition -- pre-Roman -- of rolling a large wheel of Double Gloucester cheese down the hill; winner of the races to catch it wins the cheese, and the rolling is now always held on the Monday Spring Bank Holiday)

     Tetbury Woolsack Races -- Gumstool Hill, Tetbury, England (this formerly important wool producing town still holds races up and down the hill, from the Royal Oak Pub up to the Crown Pub and back; part of traditional Whitsuntide folklore customs, which is now always held on the Monday Spring Bank Holiday)

Star Wars Day -- Part IV, A New Hope was released this date in 1977

St. Bede the Venerable's Day (Patron of lectors; Father of English History)

St. Mary Magdalen of Pazzi's Day (Patron of the ill; against illness and sexual temptation)

Towel Day -- Douglas Adams fans, unite!  Always know where your towel is   

Week of Solidarity with the People Of Non-Self-Governing Territories begins -- United Nations

Whit Monday/Pentecost Monday

     Dicing for Bibles -- All Saints Church, St. Ives, Huntingdonshire, England (a ceremony dating back to a bequest in 1675 that provides Bibles for poor children of the parish; they play a dice game, in which they try to win one of the 6 Bibles provided)

Anniversary Today:

Lord Guildford Dudley marries Lady Jane Grey, 1553

Birthdays Today:

Brian Urlacher, 1978

Ethan Suplee, 1976

Lauryn Hill, 1975

Justin Henry, 1971

Jamie Kennedy, 1970

Anne Heche, 1969

Stacy London, 1969

Mike Myers, 1963

Connie Sellecca, 1955

Jessi Colter, 1947

Karen Valentine, 1947

Frank Oz, 1944

Leslie Uggams, 1943

Ian McKellen, 1939

Raymond Carver, 1938

Tom T. Hall, 1936

K.C. Jones, 1932

Beverly Sills, 1929

Robert Ludlum, 1927

Miles Davis, 1926

Jeanne Crain, 1925

Claude Akins, 1918

James Joseph "Gene" Tunney, 1898

Igor Sikorsky, 1889

Philip Murray, 1886

Bill "Bojangles" Robinson, 1878

John Alexander Dowie, 1847

Ralph Waldo Emerson, 1803

Debuting/Premiering Today:

Wonder Woman(Film), 2017

Star Wars Episode VI: Return of the Jedi(Film), 1983

Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope(Film), 1977

"The Subject Was Roses"(Play), 1964

"H.M.S. Pinafore"(Comic Opera), 1878

Today in History:

First recorded perihelion passage of Halley's Comet, BC240

Alfonso VI of Castile takes Toledo, Spain back from the Moors, 1085

Henry the Navigator is appointed governor of the Order of Christ, 1420

The Diet of Worms ends when Charles V, Holy Roman Emperor, issues the Edict of Worms, declaring Martin Luther an outlaw, 1521

Richard Cromwell resigns as Lord Protector of England following the restoration of the Long Parliament, beginning a second brief period of the republican government called the Commonwealth of England, 1659

Jews are expelled from Warsaw by Marshall Mniszek, 1784

In Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, delegates convene a Constitutional Convention to write a new Constitution for the United States, 1787

In the May Revolution, citizens of Buenos Aires expel the Viceroy Baltasar Hidalgo de Cisneros during the Semana de Mayo, 1810

The Patriots of Lower Canada (Quebec) rebel against the British for freedom, 1837

The first telegraphed news dispatch is published in Baltimore Patriot, 1844

Gilbert and Sullivan's H.M.S. Pinafore opens at the Opera Comique in London, 1878

The Republic of Formosa is formed, with Tang Ching-sung as the president, 1895

John T. Scopes is indicted for teaching Charles Darwin's theory of evolution in Tennessee, 1925

Henry Ford stops production of the Model T to begin the Model A, 1927

Jesse Owens of Ohio State University breaks five world records and ties a sixth at the Big Ten Conference Track and Field Championships in Ann Arbor, Michigan, 1935

The first ascent of Kangchenjunga (8,586 m.), the third highest mountain in the world, by a British expedition, 1955

In Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, the Organisation of African Unity is established, 1963

Star Wars (retitled Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope in 1981) is released in theaters, inspiring the Jediism religion and Geek Pride Day holiday, 1977

Bangladesh is hit by a tropical cyclone and storm surge, which kills approximately 10,000 people, 1985

Israel withdraws its army from most of the Lebanese territory after 22 years of its first invasion, 2000

32-year-old Erik Weihenmayer, of Boulder, Colorado, becomes the first blind person to reach the summit of Mount Everest, 2001

Oprah Winfrey airs her last show, 2011

The first commercial spacecraft, SpaceX Dragon, docks with the International Space Station, completing the maneuver at 12:02pm EDT, 2012

Facebook's Mark Zuckerberg receives an honorary degree from Harvard University, after dropping out in 2004, 2017

Mia Mottley, of the Barbados Labour Party, becomes the first female Prime Minister of Barbados, 2018

China’s Wolong National Nature Reserve releases the first footage of an albino panda ever taken in the wild, 2019

Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus is re-elected Director-General of the World Health Organization in Geneva, Switzerland, 2022

According to the US Census Bureau, between 2010 and 2020 the population of the USA aged at its fasted rate in 130 years, with median age jumping from 37.2 to 38.8, 2024