New Meaning for Service Dog (Wordless Wednesday)

Prayer time!

Praying is hard work!

Linking up with Wordless Wednesday.

Today is:

Armed Forces Day -- Sao Tome and Principe

Defeat of Jesse James Days -- Northfield, MN, US (a bank raid reenactment, plus parade, races, rodeo, and more; through Sunday)

Defense Day -- Pakistan

Ear and Trumpter Contests for Mice -- Fairy Calendar

Farmers and Threshermens Jubilee -- New Centerville, PA, US (steam engines, threshing the old fashioned ways, and fun; through Sunday)

Festa Della Rificolona -- Florence, Italy (one of Florences oldest and most colorful celebrations; through tomorrow)

Fight Procrastination Day/National Do It Day

Flag Day -- Bonaire, Netherlands Antilles

Full Harvest Moon a/k/a Full Corn Moon/Indigo Moon/Wise-Crone Moon (with so much food ripe for gathering, harvesting can go on well into the night by the light of the hugely full Harvest Moon)

     Binara Full Moon Poya Day -- Sri Lanka (began yesterday evening)

     Chusok -- South Korea (Harvest Moon Festival; began yesterday, through the 20th; a harvest festival and day to give homage to the ancestors and celebrate family)

     Han'gawi -- North Korea (Harvest Moon Festival; through the 21st; a harvest festival and day to give homage to the ancestors and celebrate family)

     Navajo Sing Festival -- Navajo Native Americans festival in thanksgiving for the harvest, begins at the full moon and goes on for one week 

     Taw Thalin Full Moon -- Myanmar

     Zhongqiu Jie / Chong Chao -- China; Macau; Taiwan (Mid-Autumn Festival or Moon Festival, the birthday of the earth god T'u-ti Kung, celebrating the harvests, family, and eating moon cakes, matchmaking, sky lanterns, Fire Dragon Dances, and more)

National Coffee Ice Cream Day -- Sweetie swears the best ever was at Howard Johnson Restaurants back in the day

Nijamati Sewa Divas -- Nepal (Civil Servants' Day)

Peach Days Celebration -- Brigham City, UT, US (delicious peaches and family fun; through Saturday)

Read A Book Day -- can't find the history on it, but enjoy!

Sacrifice to Hera Thelchinia -- Ancient Greek Calendar (date approximate)

Somhlolo Day -- Swaziland (Independence Day)

St. Magnus of Fussen's Day (Patron of crops; against caterpillars, hail, lightning, reptiles, vermin)

Stillbirth Remembrance Day -- Canada (some Provinces); US

Unification Day -- Bulgaria

Birthdays Today:

Justin Whalin, 1974

Sarah Strange, 1974

Rosie Perez, 1964

Elizabeth Vargas, 1962

Jeff Foxworthy, 1958

Jane Curtin, 1947

Swoosie Kurtz, 1944

Jo Anne Worley, 1937

Billy Rose, 1899

Joseph P. Kennedy, 1888

Jane Addams, 1860

Catharine Esther Beecher, 1800

John Dalton, 1766

Marquis de Lafayette, 1757

Henry Melchior Muhlenberg, 1711

Debuting/Premiering Today:

"The Life and Legend of Wyatt Earp"(TV), 1955

Jack Dempsey/Billy Miske Boxing Match(First match broadcast on radio), 1920

"La clemenza di Tito/The Clemency of Titus"(Opera, Mozart K. 621), 1791

Today in History:

The Victoria, the only surviving ship of Ferdinand Magellan's expedition, returns to Sanlúcar de Barrameda in Spain, becoming the first ship to circumnavigate the world, 1522

The Spanish "Silver Fleet" disappears off the Florida Keys, 1622

Founding of Salem, Massachussetts, 1628

The first US lighthouse is built in Boston, 1716

Hurricane hits Martinique and Guadalupe, hundreds of ships sink and thousands die on land and at sea, 1776

Thomas Blanchard patents the lathe, 1819

Oberlin Collegiate Institute of Ohio becomes co-ed, with 4 women and 30 men in attendance, 1837

Louisa Ann Swain of Laramie, Wyoming becomes the first woman in the United States to cast a vote legally after 1807, 1870

Juliana becomes Queen of the Netherlands, 1948

Canada's first television station, CBFT-TV, opens in Montreal, 1952

Nine Israeli athletes are killed during a rescue attempt after being kidnapped at the Munich Olympic Games; two had died during the kidnapping the day before, 1972

The Soviet Union recognizes the independence of the Baltic states: 

Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania, and restores the name St. Petersburg to Russia's second largest city, 1991

Cal Ripken Jr of the Baltimore Orioles plays in his 2,131st consecutive game, breaking a record that stood for 56 years, 1995

Diana, Princess of Wales is laid to rest in front of a television audience of more than 2.5 billion, 1997

China launches an investigation into its commercial pilots upon learning that more than 200 of them had falsified their resumes, 2010

Central Australia reports the first sighting since 1960 of a Central rock rat, 2013

Six Sentence Story: Ridley

Yes, i told Youngest Boy reassuringly, i will take very, very excellent care of Ridley, in fact, i'll make Ridley a special project.

Ms. P had stressed to me just how special Ridley was, saying, "Ridley is the most important one!"

Youngest Boy had looked quite worried when handing Ridley to me, and i'd taken Ridley as a special charge, determined to do what was right.

Thus is was that, yesterday, i set the washing machine to the special "hand wash" setting, took out some very gentle soap, and got a load of hand washables started, Ridley included.

Ridley looked perfect when i was done; gone were the jelly smears and bits of grime that young boys bring with them everywhere that had brought the crisis of needing Ridley washed in the first place.

Today Ridley, Youngest Boy's most important lovey he sleeps with, is clean and is being returned to him, fresh smelling from the recent ablutions.

Ridley, all clean and air drying.

Linking up with Uncharted Blog and Six Sentence Stories, where the prompt this week is Project.

Today is

Acton Fair -- Acton, ME, US (an old fashioned country fair plus midway, stage shows, and a great good time; through Sunday)

Banana Lover's Day

Be Kind to Humankind Week:  Thoughtful Thursday

Birthday of Isis -- Ancient Egyptian Calendar (date approximate)

Corn Palace Festival -- Mitchell, SD, US (harvest celebration and redecoration of the world's only Corn Palace; through Sunday)

Day Sacred to Consus -- Ancient Roman Calendar (god of graineries, horses, and mules)

Feast Day of Pan -- Ancient Greek Calendar (date approximate)

Feast of Incandescent Rebellion -- on lots of websites, and supposedly something celebrated in China, but no detail as to what it is really celebrating

Just Because Day -- internet generated, enjoy something ordinary you like to do, just because!

National Pots de Creme Day

Petroleum Day -- on the anniversary of the opening of the first commercial oil well in Titusvilla, PA, US, in 1859, a day set aside to work on figuring out how to do without petroleum

Prairie Village Jamboree -- Prairie Village, Madison, SD, US (keeping the old prairie life heritage alive for new generations; through Sunday)

St. Caesarius' Day (Patron against fire)

St. Monica's Day (Mother of St. Augustine; Patron of abuse victims, alcoholics, difficult marriages, disappointing children, homemakers, married women, mothers, victims of adultery and unfaithfulness, victims of verbal abuse, widows, wives; Bevilacqua, Italy; Mabini, Bohol, Philippines)

"The Duchess" Who Wasn't Day -- birthday of Margaret Wolfe Hungerford, who wrote under the pseudonym "The Duchess" and first said, "Beaty is in the eye of the beholder" in her novel, Molly Bawn

Threethousandth Thnork of the Year -- Fairy Calendar

Volturnalia -- Ancient Roman Calendar (god of water)

Watermelon Festival -- Winterville, NC, US (sticky fun; through Saturday)

Ziua Republicii -- Moldova (Independence Day, 1991)

Zucchini Festival -- Obetz, OH, US (family fun and zucchini; through Sunday)


Birthdays Today

Mario, 1986
Sarah Chalke, 1976
Chandra Wilson, 1969
Paul "Pee-wee Herman" Reubens, 1952
Barbara Bach, 1947
Tuesday Weld, 1943
Tommy Sands, 1937
Martha Raye, 1916
Mother Teresa, 1910
Lyndon B. Johnson, 1908
C.S. Forester, 1899
Samuel Goldwyn, 1882
Theodore Dreiser, 1871
Charles Gates Dawes, 1865
Hannibal Hamlin, 1809


Debuting/Premiering Today:

"Good Sex! with Dr. Ruth Westheimer"(TV), 1984
Mary Poppins(Disney film), 1964
"Prométhée/Prometheus"(Fauré tragédie lyrique), 1900



Today in History

The Persian invasion of Greece is halted with Greek victories in two separate battles, BC479
Koreans battle and prevent Japanese invasion, 663
The first unmanned hydrogen balloom flight reaching 900 m altitude, 1783
Petroleum is discovered in Titusville, Pennsylvania leading to the world's first commercially successful oil well, 1859
The shortest war in world history occurs from 09:00 to 09:45 between the United Kingdom and Zanzibar, 1896
Edgar Rice Burroughs' publishes "Tarzan of the Apes", 1912
First flight of the turbojet-powered Heinkel He 178, the world's first jet aircraft, 1939
The Mariner 2 unmanned space mission is launched to Venus by NASA, 1962
Turkish military diplomat Colonel Atilla Altikat is shot and killed in Ottawa, Ontario, Canada, 1982
The Rainbow Bridge, connecting Tokyo's Shibaura and the island of Odaiba, is completed, 1993
Mars makes its closest approach to Earth in nearly 60,000 years, 2003
Curiosity, the Mars rover, broadcasts its first audio recording of a human voice from the surface of another planet, 2012