Tuesday Coffee Chat: Happy Easter!

Rory Bore at Ink Interrupted hosts the Tuesday Coffee Chat, and this week her topic is, Happy Easter!   Tell me about the best chocolate ever.  Or, if you are the religious sort, share some special thoughts on this day.

You would have to have never read my blog or been hiding under a rock to not know i am the religious sort.

Although, actually, i don't like religion.  No, i don't.  Religion doesn't help much, it doesn't do much good but instead makes people feel badly about themselves if they can't live up to all of the rules and regs, which no one really can.

Religion causes more trouble than it solves, and if you don't believe that spend about five minutes thinking about the Middle East situation.

What i like is relationship, the relationship with a personal and loving Savior.  The Savior Who cared so much He did everything possible to pay the cost and erase the separation between Him and us.

There's a popular Christian song with the lyric "All religion ever made of me was a sinner with a stone tied to my feet, it never set me free."

Don't go for religion, go for that relationship.

And Elmer's Gold Brick Eggs.  Until i gave up sugar, those were my go-to Easter standard.  Not necessarily the world's best chocolate, but locally made and delicious and they tasted like comfort to me. 

Today is:

Barthelemy Boganda Day -- Central African Republic

Borrowed Days begin -- old English/Scottish/Irish legends about how March borrowed the next 3 days from April; these are still seen as weather prognostication days based on several different legends

Day of Redress -- Fairy Calendar

Easter Tuesday -- TAS, Australia; Cyprus; Nauru

Knights of Columbus Founders Day

Martyrs' Day -- Madagascar

National Lemon Chiffon Cake Day

National Mom and Pop Business Owners Day -- as recognized by AICPA

Smoke and Mirrors Day -- some sites call it "Festival of Smoke and Mirrors Day," but appropriately no one knows who started it

Southland Provincial Anniversary Day -- Southland, NZ

St. Armogastes of Africa's Day (Patron of the poor and torture victims; against poverty and torture)

St. Gladys' and St. Gwynllyw's Day (the Welsh "Bonny and Clyde", who led a life of crime before their conversion)

Youth Day -- Taiwan


Anniversaries Today:

Harry Hamlin weds Lisa Rinna, 1997
Yeshiva College (now University) is chartered in New York, 1928


Birthdays Today:

Hideaki Takizawa, 1982
Jennifer Capriati, 1976
Lucy Lawless, 1968
Elle Macpherson, 1964
Christopher Lambert, 1957
Kurt Thomas, 1956
Earl Christian Campbell, 1955
Karen Ann Quinlan, 1954
Bud Cort, 1950
George Blaha, 1945
Eric Idle, 1943
John Major, 1943
John Joseph McLaughlin, 1927
Pearl Bailey, 1918
Sam Walton, 1918
Eugene Mccarthy, 1916
Philip Ahn, 1905
Denton True "Cy" Young, 1867
Isaac Mayer Wise, Rabbi and Founder of Reform Judaism, 1819
John Tyler, 1790
Carlo Buonaparte, father of Napoleon Bonaparte, 1746


Debuting/Premiering Today:

"Woman of the Year"(Play), 1981
"The King and I"(Play), 1951
"Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Combined Shows"(circus), 1919
"Mutt and Jeff"(Comic strip), 1908
"Jevgeni Onegin/Eugene Onegin"(Opera; Tchaikovsky Op. 24), 1879


Today in History:

The city of Salvador da Bahia, the first capital of Brazil, is founded, 1549
Treaty of Saint-Germain is signed, returning Quebec to French control after the English had seized it in 1629, 1632
Swedish colonists establish the first settlement in Delaware, 1638
Ludwig von Beethoven, age 24, debuts as a pianist in Vienna, 1795
Construction is authorized of the Great National Pike, better known as the Cumberland Road, becoming the first United States federal highway, 1806
Niagara Falls stops flowing for 30 hours due to an ice jam, 1848
The United Kingdom annexes the Punjab, 1849
Ohio makes it illegal for children under 18 & women to work more than 10 hours a day, 1852
Queen Victoria gives Royal Assent to the British North America Act which establishes the Dominion of Canada on July 1, 1867
Queen Victoria presides over the opening of Albert Hall in London, 1871
The Knights of Columbus are established, 1882
Dr. John Pemberton brews the first batch of Coca-Cola in his back yard, 1886
The North American Radio Broadcasting Agreement goes into effect at 03:00 local time, 1941
Ethel and Julius Rosenberg are convicted of conspiracy to commit espionage, 1951
NASA's Mariner 10 becomes the first spaceprobe to fly by Mercury, 1974
The Canada Act 1982 (U.K.) receives the Royal Assent from Queen Elizabeth II, setting the stage for the Queen of Canada to proclaim the Constitution Act, 1982
Catherine Callbeck becomes premier of Prince Edward Island and the first woman to be elected in a general election as premier of a Canadian province, 1993
Bulgaria, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Romania, Slovakia and Slovenia join NATO as full members, 2004
The Republic of Ireland becomes the first country in the world to ban smoking in all work places, including bars and restaurants, 2004
Thirty-five countries and over 370 cities join Earth Hour for the first time, 2008
A transistor-like transcriptor is built out of DNA and RNA molecules by American bioengineers at Stanford University, 2013

Not Yet

Note:  If Suldog sent you, you are probably looking for Thanksgiving Comes First.  You are also more than welcome to read today's meanderings while you are here.


"Hi, mom!"  Bigger Girl came in with a smile.

Hi, yourself, i said.  What's up today?

"Well, I took my friend Muriel out to the abandoned pier," she said.  "I love it out there, and she likes it, too!  She thought it was great, an old pier, part of it ripped away so you have to make sure your feet are on the thickest parts that are still standing so you don't slip.  It's covered in really great graffiti, and my friend Will actually did some of it before i even met him!"

Isn't that thing out over the Mississippi River?  It's probably abandoned because it's unsafe.  Be careful when you go out there, you don't want to tumble into Old Man River, there's no coming back out! i noted.

"Yes, I know, and you are right, it is in bad shape.  Muriel and I joked that it's only held together by the bird poop!  That's why even the homeless people don't go there any more."

But your friend Will has been out there?

"Yes, and we took his friend Anthony, too.  But I'd rather go just with Will, or now with Muriel, because Will is just a friend, but Anthony has a crush on me, or so Will says, and I think he's right.  How come people can't just be friends without someone trying to get you into a relationship?"

"Yeah, what's up with that!" Little Girl joined the conversation.  "At my school, everyone is asking me, 'Do you have a boyfriend?' and 'Why aren't you in a relationship?' and they just don't understand.  Why can't they get that I'm not interested in that right now?"

It's sad, i noted.  They think life should revolve around that stuff, just like in the movies and on TV.  Try telling them that right now, you just want to concentrate on school, you've got time for that later.

"That's what I've said, and they think I'm weird," Little Girl said.  "But that's okay, I don't mind being weird."

Says the girl who claims to be part vampire, i noted drily.  She grinned at me.

"Yeah, I've said the same kind of stuff, but all the guys think about is that they want to 'get out of the friend zone,'" Bigger Girl said.  "They seem to see it as a challenge."

 "I mean, I get that it's nice to have someone who cares about you like that, that a relationship can be a great thing, and can feel wonderful, but I'm only 15, so I'm not looking for that in my life yet.  Let me grow up and get my education for goodness sake!"  Little Girl is very decided about that matter.

Now, i just hope they both continue to feel this way for a few more years.




Today is:

Eid-e-Ghadir -- Iran

Feast of Good & Plenty (the candies)

French Food Festival -- LaRose, LA, US (local specialties, dancing, music, and fun; through Sunday)

Great Pumpkin Carve -- Chadds Ford Historical Society, Chadds Ford, PA, US (carving pumpkins that weigh about 150lbs or more each; through Saturday)

Independence Day -- Zambia(1964)

Lilith's Day -- Ancient Mesopotamian Calendar (Lilith, legendary first wife of Adam, mother of the giants; date approximate)

Maladay -- Discordianism

National Bologna Day

Share a Pop Tart With Someone You Love Day -- internet generated, and how much do you want to bet the Kellogg company may have had a hand in it?

St. Anthony Claret's Day (Patron of weavers; Catholic press; Claretians; Missionary Sons of the Immaculate Heart of Mary)

St. Crispin's Eve Celebration -- Tenby, Wales

St. Raphael the Archangel's Day (traditional date; Patron of health inspectors, druggists, happy meetings, leaving home, travelers; against blindness)

Suez Victory Day -- Egypt

Take Back Your Time Day -- Canada; U.S. (anniversary of the day in the US that the Fair Labor Standards Act went into effect, specifying a 40-hour work week as the standard, in 1938)

United Nations Day
     Disarmament Week begins
     World Development Information Day

World Origami Days -- held each year from today, the birth anniversary of Lillian Oppenheimer, founder of the first origami societies in Britain and the US, until Nov. 11, which is Origami Day in Japan; a couple of good sites are http://origamiusa.org/wod and http://www.japanese-city.com/calendar/events/index.php?eID=31502

Birthdays Today:

Kevin Kline, 1947
F. Murray Abraham, 1939
David Nelson, 1936
J. P. "Big Bopper" Richardson, 1930
Y. A. Tittle, 1926
Moss Hart, 1904
Alexandra David-Neel, 1868 (first female foreigner to explore Tibet)
Sarah Joseph Hale, 1788 (author of "Mary had a little lamb")
Antony van Leeuwenhoek, 1632
Domitian, Roman Emperor, 51


Debuting/Premiering Today:

The first Transcontinental Telegram is sent, 1861


Today in History:

Cathedral of Chartres is dedicated, 1260
The Treaty of Westphalia ends the 30 Years War, recognized the independence of Switzerland, and marks the end of the Holy Roman Empire, 1648
Felix Mendelssohn, age 9, performs his first public concert in Berlin, 1818
The match is patented, by A. Phillips, 1836
The first US transcontinental telegram is sent, from San Francisco to Washington, DC, ending the need for the Pony Express after only 2 years, 1861
Levi P. Morton, US ambassador to France, drives the first rivet for the Statue of Liberty, 1881
Dr. Robert Koch discovers the germ that causes tuberculosis, 1882
Anna Taylor becomes the first woman to go over Niagara Falls in a barrel, 1901
The first NYC subway opens, 1904
Harry Houdini's last performance, 1926
The Hershey Company is incorporated, 1927
"Black Thursday", the start of the stock market crash, Dow Jones down 12.8%, 1929
Al Capone is sentenced for tax evasion, 1931
The George Washington Bridge, connecting NY to NJ, opens, 1931
US forbids child labor in factories, 1938
The United Nations Charter is signed by the first member nations, 1945
Eisenhower pledges US support to South Vietnam, 1954
Government of Poland legalizes Solidarity trade union, 1980
Launch of Deep Space 1 comet/asteroid mission, 1998
The Concorde makes its last commercial flight, 2003
Justice Rutherford of the Ontario Superior Court of Justice struck down the "motive clause", an important part of the Canadian Anti-Terrorism Act, 2006
"Bloody Friday" saw many of the world's stock exchanges experience the worst declines in their history, with drops of around 10% in most indices, 2008