11/21/14

     

Tucson Weather Today

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"Write what you know. That should leave you with a lot of free time."
---Howard Nemerov

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Did You Know . . .?

People were "unfriending" each other long before Facebook. In 1659, an English clergyman wrote, "I hope, sir, that we are not mutually un-friended by this difference which hath happened betwixt us."

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HISTORICAL EVENT

ON THIS DAY IN 1887 the American inventor Thomas Edison announced his invention of the phonograph, a way to record and play back sound. Edison stumbled on one of his great inventions -- the phonograph -- while working on a way to record telephone communication at his laboratory in Menlo Park, New Jersey. His work led him to experiment with a stylus on a tinfoil cylinder, which, to his surprise, played back the short song he had recorded, "MARY HAD A LITTLE LAMB". Public demonstrations of the phonograph made the Yankee inventor world famous, and he was dubbed the "Wizard of Menlo Park." Although initially used as a dictating machine, the phonograph proved to be a popular tool for entertainment, and in 1906 Edison unveiled a series of musical and theatrical selections to the public through his National Phonograph Company. Edison, who acquired an astounding 1,093 patents in his 84 years, died in 1931.

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WORD FOR TODAY

Brogan [BRO-guhn or BRO-gann]
noun
1. a heavy, sturdy shoe, especially an ankle-high work shoe.
2. a rough shoe of untanned leather, formerly worn in parts of Ireland and the Scottish Highlands.

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CELEBRITY BIRTHDAYS

Goldie Jeanne Hawn

(born November 21, 1945)

Goldie Hawn is an American actress and film director. Hawn is known for her roles in television's Rowan & Martin's Laugh-In and films such as The Sugarland Express, Private Benjamin, Foul Play, Shampoo, Overboard, Bird on a Wire, Death Becomes Her, The First Wives Club, and Cactus Flower.

Margaret Julia "Marlo" Thomas

(born November 21, 1937)

Marlo Thomas is an American actress, producer, and social activist known for starring on the sitcom That Girl and her award-winning feminist children's franchise, Free to Be... You and Me. Thomas serves as National Outreach Director for St. Jude Children's Research Hospital, which was founded by her father, Danny Thomas, in 1962.

Nicollette Sheridan

(born 21 November 1963)

Nicollette Sheridan is an English television and film actress, known for playing Edie Britt on the ABC dramedy series Desperate Housewives and as Paige Matheson of the CBS primetime soap opera Knots Landing. In film, she is known for her roles in The Sure Thing, Noises Off, Spy Hard, and Beverly Hills Ninja.

Nadia Buari

(born 21 November 1982)

Nadia Buari is a Ghanaian actress. She received two nominations for Best Actress in a Leading Role at the African Movie Academy Awards in 2007 and 2009.

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"It is desirable that a man live in all respects so simply and preparedly that if an enemy take the town... he can walk out the gate empty-handed and without anxiety."
--Henry David Thoreau

This Is Who I Am