Quackers (Wordless Wednesday) and Words for Wednesday

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Linking up with Wordless Wednesday, Catsynth, Keith, 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 to encourage us to write stories, poems, or whatever strikes our fancy.   

This month, Sean Jeating is providing the prompts which will appear on River's blog.

This week's words/prompts are:

1.death  

2.forward  

3.important  

4.intend  

5.left

and/or:

1.pleasure  

2.step  

3.touch  

4.things  

5.understand

use either list or both, or mix and match, just have fun.

Charlotte's colour of the month is Smoky Rose

When there's been a DEATH in the family, some people are like Grandpa and when you talk about going through the deceased's belongings, they say, "There's all the time in the world to do that."

Then there's Uncle J.  To him, it's IMPORTANT to move FORWARD with getting through everything, mostly because we don't want to still be sorting her things this time next year.

I do not INTEND the job be LEFT solely up to him, so i will continue to go down on Saturday to do the regular housecleaning and then one other day a week, which might vary depending on my schedule, so he and i can make sure family and friends get mementos and anything useful go to someone who will use it, getting items ready for donation and throwing out plenty which cannot be of use to anyone.

Sometimes it's a slog, and sometimes we find things which make it a PLEASURE.  With each STEP, we are careful to offer really important things to Grandpa first, then if neither of us want it, it is offered to family.

We have to TOUCH all the THINGS, too, and Grandma had a lot of things.  She was an artist, and made scrapbooks and collage art, so she had scraps of things everywhere as anything could furnish material for her.

A great find was the letters Grandpa wrote home to her when he was in the military and she hadn't moved up to join him on base yet.  It's hard to think of them as young and in love like they were once, and this helps us UNDERSTAND them better.

It's going to be a hard and joyful work.

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 Today is:

Bring Your Jack-O-Lantern to Work Day -- just check the fire code before you light that candle

Boun Suang Heua -- on the Mekong River near Vientiane, Laos (second day of the Ok Phansa festival, the Boat Racing Festival)

Celtic Tree Month Negetal (Reed) begins

Children's Day -- Australia

Dia do Servidor Publico -- Brazil (Civil Servants' Day)

Flying Baby Day -- celebrating the first baby born on an airplane on this day in 1929

Fyribod (or Forebode) -- Ancient Norse Calendar (announces the beginning of winter; date approximate)

Hari Sumpah Pemuda -- Indonesia (Youth Pledge Day)

Hawaiki Nui Va'a Race -- French Polynesia (spectacular three-day open water outrigger canoe races from Huahine to Raiatea to Tahaa to Bora Bora)

Independence Day -- Czechoslovakia (from Austria-Hungary in 1918; still celebrated in the Czech Republic and Slovakia)

International Animation Day -- ASIFA (to honor the day Emile Reynaud presented the first animation to the public)

Isia -- Ancient Egyptian Calendar (dates approximate; first day of the 6-day Isis festival)

Lung Health Day -- US (on the Wednesday of Respiratory Care Week; some sites to explore about lung health are here and here)    

Milvian Bridge Day -- Christain (day to reflect on the interrelationship of religion and government)

National Chocolate Day

Okunchi Matsuri -- Karatsu, Japan (with floats that date back to the 1800s; through the 30th)

Oxi Day / Greek National Day -- Greece (Sometimes "Ochi" or "Ohi", literally "No Day", celebrating resistance to Mussolini.)

Part Your Hair Crooked Just To See If Anyone Will Say Anything About It Day -- internet generated, celebrate at your own risk

Plush Animal Lovers' Day -- internet generated; celebrate your love of stuffed animals today

Runic Half-month Hagal (hailstone) begin

St. Jude Thaddeus' Day (Patron of desperate or hopeless cases -- the reason Danny Thomas chose this saint to invoke as patron of the hospital he helped found.)

St. Paraskevi of Iconium's Day (Patron of fairs and traders; in Russia, patron of marriage; associated in Ukraine with Mokosh, the ancient women's divinity, and celebrated on the final Friday of the month)

St. Simon the Zealot's Day (Patron of curriers, sawmen, tanners)

Wild Foods Day -- as in, grown or caught in the wild (please be careful if you like mushrooms and want to gather your own!)

Anniversaries Today:

Statue of Liberty dedicated, 1886

Maimonides College is founded, 1867 (first Jewish college in the US)

R.H. Macy & Co. in NYC opens, 1858

Founding of Harvard University, 1636

Universidad Santo Tomas Aquino is established, 1538 (first university in the New World)

Birthdays Today:

Matt Smith, 1982

Joaquin Phoenix, 1974

Brad Paisley, 1972

Jeremy Davies, 1969

Julia Roberts, 1967

Andy Richter, 1966

Jami Gertz, 1965

Daphne Zuniga, 1962

Lauren Holly, 1963

Bill Gates, 1955

Annie Potts, 1952

Bruce Jenner, 1949

Telma Hopkins, 1948

Dennis Franz, 1944

Jane Alexander, 1939

Charlie Daniels, 1936

Cleo Laine, 1927

Jonas Salk, 1914

Francis Bacon, 1909

Edith Head, 1907

Howard Hanson, 1896

Georges Auguste Escoffier, 1846

Desiderius Erasmus, 1467

Debuting/Premiering Today:

"The Jack Benny Program"(TV), 1950

"Dead End"(Play), 1935

Symphony No. 6 in B minor, Pathetique(Tchaikovsky Op. 74), 1893

Today in History:

Constantine the Great defeats Maxentius, 312

Battle of Yaunis Khan in which Turkish forces under the Grand Vizier Sinan Pasha defeat the Mameluks near Gaza, 1516

Battle of Amba Sel, in which Imam Ahmad ibn Ibrihim al-Ghazi again defeats the army of Lebna Dengel, Emperor of Ethiopia; the southern part of Ethiopia falls under Imam Ahmad's control, 1531

Peruvian cities of Lima & Callao are demolished by an earthquake, 18,000 die, 1746

Eli Whitney applies for a patent on the cotton gin, 1793

The first railroad in Spain, between Barcelona and Mataro, is opened, 1848

The Statue of Liberty is dedicated by President Grover Cleveland, and celebrated by the first ticker tape/confetti parade in NYC, 1886

An earthquake strikes Mino-Owari, Japan, kills 7,300, 1891

Tchaikovsky's Symphony No. 6 in B Minor, Pathétique, receives its première performance in St. Petersburg, only nine days before the composer's death, 1893

The St. Louis police try a new investigation method -- fingerprints, 1904

Czechoslovakia gains its independence in the break up of Austria-Hungary, 1918

The Volstead Act, passed by Congress over Wilson's veto, starts Prohibition, 1919

The first coast to coast radio broadcast of a football game, 1922

U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt rededicates the Statue of Liberty on its 50th anniversary, 1936

The Alaska Highway (Alcan Highway) is completed through Canada to Fairbanks, Alaska, 1942

Swiss chemist Paul Müller is awarded the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for his discovery of the insecticidal properties of DDT, 1948

The modern Kingdom of the Netherlands is re-founded as a federal monarchy, 1954

Nikita Khrushchev announces that he had ordered the removal of Soviet missile bases in Cuba, 1962

Nostra Aetate, the "Declaration on the Relation of the Church with Non-Christian Religions" of the Second Vatican Council, is promulgated by Pope Paul VI; it absolves the Jews of responsibility for the death of Jesus, 1965*

Britain launches its first satellite, Prospero, into low Earth orbit atop a Black Arrow carrier rocket, 1971

The centenary of the dedication of the Statue of Liberty is celebrated in New York Harbor, 1986

Cristina Fernández de Kirchner becomes the first woman elected President of Argentina, 2007

The US celebrates the 125th anniversary of the dedication of the Statue of Liberty, 2011

The World Health Organization ranks tuberculosis alongside HIV as 2014's two deadliest infectious diseases, 2015

The EU agrees to another Brexit extension to January 31 2020, 2019

The fifteenth-century medieval manuscript "The Book of Lismore", returns to Ireland after being donated by Chatsworth Settlement to University College Cork, 2020

Palestinian authorities in Jericho, West Bank unveil the restored floor mosaic in Hisham's Palace, one of the world's largest floor mosaics and dating from 660-750AD, 2021

Swedish engineers produce the world's first female crash test dummy which is not just a scaled down version of the male model, 2022

The UK records its lowest-ever fertility rate, with only 591,072 births in England and Wales, the lowest in 172 years, 2024

Hurricane Melissa strikes Jamaica as a category 5 storm, 2026