Nuke 'em Back To The Stone Age

     

Tucson Weather Today

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175 pounds

I always go back to Harry Truman: Should we drop an atomic bomb to save 100,000 lives? That's a hell of a decision to make. Did he make that decision by himself? No, he had advisers.
--Lee Iacocca

Decisions.

The older I get the more difficult I find it to make choices. Little things. Tiny, seemingly insignificant selections (Hunts, Heinz, or store brand catsup) from the grocery shelves become overwhelming options to be lengthily considered. One has a better flavor, another is 20 cents cheaper, the other is almost a dollar less.

Adding a dollop of catsup to a serving of fried fish makes it tastier, but it also causes me to want more than one. Maybe I would be better off not buying any. I like the taste of breaded crunchy-fried fish without enhancement well enough. And catsup adds unnecessary calories.

But I like it even better with a splash of catsup.

Decisions, decisions, decisions.


It is getting harder for me to walk my usual two miles each day. After the walk my legs are so tired they hurt, and the pain lasts for several hours. Especially if I do not lie down for a while after I get home, take a possible nap for an hour or so. And I need nothing from the grocery, which is at the halfway point of my walk. My cupboard, my refrigerator, and my freezer are full.

Maybe it is better to skip walking today... let my old muscles rebuild a bit.

Decisions, decisions, decisions.


Is it so mysterious that I feel John McCain, well into his seventies, is a poor choice to continue as a decision making U.S. Senator?

I think not.

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Did You Know . . .?

The first animal launched into orbit, Laika, was found as a stray wandering the streets of Moscow. Soviet scientists assumed that such animals had already learned to endure conditions of extreme cold and hunger.

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HISTORICAL EVENT

On this day in 1945 President Harry Truman learned the full details of the Manhattan Project, in which scientists were attempting to create the first atomic bomb. The information thrust upon Truman a momentous decision: whether or not to use the world's first weapon of mass destruction.

The war with Japan dragged on and it looked to many as if the Japanese would never surrender. On July 16, the team of scientists at Alamogordo, New Mexico, research station successfully test  exploded the first atomic bomb.

The first Japan-directed bomb was exploded over Hiroshima on August 6, 1945, and a second was dropped on Nagasaki on August 8. The Japanese quickly surrendered.

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WORD FOR TODAY

bombastic
adjective
1.  Ostentatiously lofty in style,
2.  High-sounding but with little meaning.
3.  (of speech or writing) high-flown; inflated; pretentious.

To be bombastic is to be full of hot air -- like a politician who makes grand promises and doesn't deliver.

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CELEBRITY BIRTHDAYS

Barbra Joan Streisand

(born April 24, 1942)

Barbara Streisand is an American singer-songwriter, author, actress, writer, film producer, and director. She is one of the few entertainers who have won an Oscar, Emmy, Grammy, and Tony Award. She is the best selling female artist of all time, with more than 71.5 million albums in the United States and 245 million records sold worldwide. 

After beginning a successful recording career in the 1960s, by the end of the decade, Streisand ventured into film starring in the critically acclaimed Funny Girl. Other notable films include The Owl and the Pussycat, The Way We Were and A Star Is Born. 

Shirley MacLaine

(born April 24, 1934),

Shirley MacLaine is an American film and theater actress, singer, dancer, activist and author. She has won the Golden Globe Award for Best Actress – Motion Picture Musical or Comedy twice, for her roles in The Apartment and Irma la Douce, and the Golden Globe Award for Best Actress – Motion Picture Drama twice for Terms of Endearment and Madame Sousatzka. 

Jill Dorothy Ireland

(Apr 24, 1936 - May 18, 1990)

Jill Ireland was an English actress, best known for her many films with her second husband, Charles Bronson.

Melinda Patrice Clarke

(born April 24, 1969)

Melinda Clarke is an American actress who has primarily worked in television. Clarke is known for playing Faith Taylor on the daytime drama Days of Our Lives, the manipulative and cunning Julie Cooper on The O.C., and the professional dominatrix Lady Heather on CSI: Crime Scene Investigation. From 2010 to 2013, she portrayed Amanda on the action-thriller television series Nikita. She was added as a recurring character on Vegas in 2013.

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I do not believe that civilization will be wiped out in a war fought with the atomic bomb. Perhaps two-thirds of the people of the earth will be killed.
--Albert Einstein

NASA TV

This Is Who I Am

   

The Mystery Of Whales

     

Tucson Weather Today

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177 pounds

"We are not what we might be; what we are
Outlaws all extrapolation
Beyond the interval of now and here:
White whales are gone with the white ocean." 
--Sylvia Plath


On The Rundown, a daily source of interesting news events presented by PBS, I read the following:

UN court orders Japan to stop whaling program.

I wonder what long-term effect this will have on the powers that be in Japan. I would not suggest holding your breath until changes occur. You see, I was alive back on December 7, 1941 and the day still lives in infamy, and in my long, long-term memory.

Below is an excerpt I read and felt like sharing with anyone who cares for this sort of thing:

"Apropos of Eskimo, I once heard a missionary describe the extraordinary difficulty he had found in translating the Bible into Eskimo. It was useless to talk of corn or wine to a people who did not know even what they meant, so he had to use equivalents within their powers of comprehension. Thus in the Eskimo version of the Scriptures the miracle of Cana of Galilee is described as turning the water into blubber; the 8th verse of the 5th chapter of the First Epistle of St. Peter ran: ‘Your adversary the devil, as a roaring Polar bear walketh about, seeking whom he may devour.’ In the same way ‘A land flowing with milk and honey’ became ‘A land flowing with whale’s blubber,’ and throughout the New Testament the words ‘Lamb of God’ had to be translated ‘little Seal of God,’ as the nearest possible equivalent. The missionary added that his converts had the lowest opinion of Jonah for not having utilized his exceptional opportunities by killing and eating the whale."
--Frederick Hamilton,
The Days Before Yesterday


When I lived in Florida in the 1980s I visited Sea World in Orlando and was privileged to be drenched (soaked?) when the Killer Whale named Shamu used his great tail to flip gallons of water out of the tank and into the audience.

Shamu

An experience to be remembered. Not to be repeated, but to be fondly remembered.

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Did You Know . . .?

When the Comanche shaman White Eagle's magic failed to protect his warriors in battle, they renamed him Coyote Vagina.

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HISTORICAL EVENT

Just after 6 p.m. on April 4, 1968, Martin Luther King Jr. was fatally shot while standing on the balcony outside his second-story room at the Lorraine Motel in Memphis, Tennessee. The civil rights leader was in Memphis to support a sanitation workers' strike and was on his way to dinner when a bullet struck him in the jaw and severed his spinal cord. King was pronounced dead after his arrival at a Memphis hospital. He was 39 years old.

His killer, James Earl Ray, died in 1998.

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WORD FOR TODAY

ambergris  [AM-buhr-grihs or AM-ber-grees]
noun
A waxy grayish substance formed in the intestines of sperm whales and found floating at sea or washed ashore. It is added to perfumes to slow down the rate of evaporation.

Ambergris is a solid, waxy, flammable substance of a dull grey or blackish color produced in the digestive system of sperm whales. Freshly produced ambergris has a marine, fecal odor. However, as it ages, it acquires a sweet, earthy scent commonly likened to the fragrance of rubbing alcohol without the vaporous chemical astringency. Although ambergris had been highly valued by perfumers as a fixative (allowing the scent to last much longer), it has largely been replaced by synthetics.
--Wikipedia

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CELEBRITY BIRTHDAYS

Craig Theodore Nelson

(born April 4, 1944)

Craig T. Nelson is an American actor. He is best known for his Emmy-winning role as Hayden Fox on the TV series Coach, Deputy Ward Wilson in the 1980 film Stir Crazy, Steven Freeling in the 1982 film Poltergeist, the Warden in My Name is Earl, and Mr. Incredible in the 2004 film The Incredibles. He currently stars in the TV series Parenthood.

Beatrice “Bea” Benaderet

(Apr 4, 1906 - Oct 13, 1968)

Bea Benaderet was an American actress. She appeared in a wide variety of television work, which included a starring role in the 1960s television series Petticoat Junction and Green Acres as Shady Rest Hotel owner Kate Bradley, supporting roles as Blanche Morton in The George Burns and Gracie Allen Show and as the original voice of Betty Rubble during the first four seasons of The Flintstones, and in The Beverly Hillbillies as Pearl Bodine.

Robert John Downey, Jr.

(born April 4, 1965)

Robert Downey, Jr. is an American actor who made his screen debut at the age of five, appearing in his father Robert Downey, Sr.'s film Pound. He has appeared in roles such as Less Than Zero and Weird Science. Other films include Air America, Soapdish, and Natural Born Killers. He starred as Charlie Chaplin, the title character in the 1992 film Chaplin.

His more recent films include The Singing Detective, Kiss Kiss Bang Bang, A Scanner Darkly, Gothika, Zodiac and Tropic Thunder. In 2008, Downey played the role of Marvel superhero Tony Stark / Iron Man in the live action film Iron Man, a role he reprised in Iron Man 2, Marvel's The Avengers, and Iron Man 3. He will again reprise his role in the upcoming films, Avengers: Age of Ultron and another Avengers sequel. In 2009, he played the title character in Guy Ritchie's Sherlock Holmes and again in 2011's Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows.

Heath Andrew Ledger

(Apr 4, 1979 - Jan 22, 2008)

Heath Ledger was an Australian actor and director. His work comprised nineteen films, including 10 Things I Hate About You (1999), The Patriot (2000), A Knight's Tale (2001), Monster's Ball (2001), Ned Kelly (2003), The Brothers Grimm (2005), Lords of Dogtown (2005), Brokeback Mountain (2005), Casanova (2005), Candy (2006), I'm Not There (2007), The Dark Knight (2008), and The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus (2009).

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"Fiction was invented the day Jonah arrived home and told his wife that he was three days late because he had been swallowed by a whale."
--Gabriel Garcia Marquez

NASA TV

This Is Who I Am

   

All It Takes Is Willpower

     

Tucson Weather Today

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I recently enjoyed consuming an entire 12 oz.carton of Ben & Jerry's Cherry Garcia ice cream. The quality seems to have diminished since the previous time I sampled it, which was a long time ago. But as we all know, superior products always manage to go downhill in time, with all the new improvements (cheaper ingredients for higher profits) -- among other things.

It must be admitted, though, that I enjoyed every sweet, tasty morsel of cherry-flavored ice cream, whole embedded cherries, and brittle little slivers of milk chocolate.

Gooood.

But . . .

Damn!

For a brief moment of time, I forgot . . .

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TRIVIA

A Boeing 747's wingspan is longer than was the Wright brother's first flight.

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HISTORICAL EVENT

On this day, August 10 in 1945, just a day after the bombing of Nagasaki, Emperor Hirohito submitted Japan's acquiescence to the Potsdam Conference terms of unconditional surrender, and President Harry S. Truman ordered a halt to atomic bombing.

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WORD FOR TODAY

marketing
noun
The action or business of promoting and selling products or services.

Marketing is the process of communicating the value of a product or service to customers, for the purpose of selling the product or service. It is a critical business function for attracting customers.

Shrewd marketing practitioners know that, once a product has been adopted as superior to all its competitors by loyal consumers, the original product can be safely downgraded in quality by using cheaper ingredients, without being noticed by the consumer, The bottom line is always profit, profit, profit.

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CELEBRITY BIRTHDAYS

Martha Hyer

(born August 10, 1924)

Martha Hyer is a retired American film actress. She had roles in So Big (1953), Sabrina (1954), The Delicate Delinquent (1956) (Jerry Lewis' first film without Dean Martin), Houseboat (1958) and Once Upon a Horse, also in 1958 with Dan Rowan and Dick Martin.

In the 1960s, Hyer would play in films like The Best of Everything (1959), Ice Palace (1960), Desire in the Dust (1960), The Carpetbaggers (1964), First Men in the Moon (1964), Blood on the Arrow (1964) and The Sons of Katie Elder (1965), Night of the Grizzly (1966), among many others. She co-starred with Keenan Wynn in Bikini Beach (1964), one of the Beach Party movies with Frankie Avalon and Annette Funicello. Her most significant role came as the love interest of Frank Sinatra in Some Came Running.

José Antonio Domínguez Banderas

(born 10 August 1960)

Antonio Banderas is a Spanish film actor, director, producer, and singer. He appeared in some high-profile Hollywood movies, especially in the 1990s, including Assassins, Evita, Interview with the Vampire, Philadelphia, Desperado, The Mask of Zorro and Spy Kids. Banderas is also a voice artist, portraying the voice of Puss in Boots in the Shrek sequels and Puss in Boots as well as the bee in the US Nasonex commercials.

Rosanna Lauren Arquette

(born August 10, 1959)

Rosanna Arquette is an American actress, film director, and producer. Arquette has appeared in both television and screen films. In 1982, she earned an Emmy Award nomination for the TV film The Executioner's Song. Arquette's first starring role was in John Sayles's Baby It's You. She starred in Desperately Seeking Susan (1985) alongside pop singer Madonna, for which she won a British Academy Film Awards (BAFTA).  Following the commercial and critical success of Lawrence Kasdan's Silverado in 1985, and the failure of both After Hours and 8 Million Ways to Die, she quit Hollywood to work in Europe

Jimmy Dean

(Aug. 10, 1928 - June 13, 2010)

Jimmy Dean was an American country music singer, television host, actor and businessman. Although he may be best known today as the creator of the Jimmy Dean sausage brand, he became a national television personality starting in 1957, rising to fame for his 1961 country crossover hit "Big Bad John" and his television series, The Jimmy Dean Show, which also gave puppeteer Jim Henson his first national media exposure. His acting career included a supporting role as Willard Whyte in the 1971 James Bond movie, Diamonds Are Forever.

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"You try moving things with nothing but willpower, and you'll see it's about as easy as trying to lasso a bull with a licorice whip!"
--Richelle E. Goodrich


NASA TV

This Is Who I Am

That Was Then, This Is Now

    

Tucson Weather Today

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I read somewhere that Samuel Goldwyn once said, "Pictures are for entertainment, messages should be delivered by Western Union." That statement seems, to me, to be contrary to the very concept  of art or intellectual insights existing within literature and cinema. Perhaps Mr. Goldwyn meant motion pictures intended for the entertainment of the masses. Or maybe he was referring to the maximization of profit... 'the bottom line.'

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The old Boy Scout cabin in my hometown is going to be destroyed, reports the Rensselaer Adventures blog.

Boy Scout Cabin

Rensselaer, Indiana
(Photo courtesy of Rensselaer Adventures)

Here is the comment I posted to that blog:

What a shame. I have many memories of weekly evening meetings in that cabin when I was a Boy Scout in the early to middle 1950s, when Ed Hudson was Scoutmaster and Bill Hudson his assistant. I remember when Max Henry went to the big Scout Jamboree and got to see President Truman. And Herbie Arihood often got sick to his stomach during activities, like the Compass competition. I was in the "Silver Fox Patrol" and we were ALWAYS the winners and got to keep the Compass trophy in our corner (Northeast Corner) of the cabin.

"Oh well... there is always conflict between Destroyers and Preservationists.

Rensselaer Adventures

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Here is an amazing video. Title:The Power of Concentration. Please watch it to the end.

Miyoko Shida Rigolo's Amazing Concentration

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TRIVIA

No piece of paper can be folded in half consecutively more than 7 times.

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HISTORICAL EVENT

On this day, June 1 in 1965 a coal mine explosion killed 236 workers at the Yamano mine near Fukuoka, Japan. The tragic disaster might have been avoided if the operators of the mine had taken even the most basic safety precautions. Yoshio Sakarauchi, the trade and industries minister of Japan, resigned in the aftermath of the disaster.

Note: Fukuoka has long been known internationally in WWII histories as the location of the most infamous, savage, and barbaric of atrocities.

WWII Prisoner Of War Atrocities

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WORD FOR TODAY

reconnoiter [ree-kuh-NOY-tuhr]
verb
-  to inspect, observe, or survey.
-  to examine or survey a region, area.
-  an exploration of an area in order to gather information.

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CELEBRITY BIRTHDAYS

 

 

Marilyn Monroe
(June 1, 1926 - August 5, 1962)

Marilyn Monroe (born Norma Jeane Mortenson) was an American actress, model, and singer, who became a major sex symbol, starring in a number of commercially successful motion pictures during the 1950s and early 1960s.After spending much of her childhood in foster homes, Monroe began a career as a model, which led to a film contract in 1946 with Twentieth Century-Fox.

Her early film appearances were minor, but her performances in The Asphalt Jungle and All About Eve (both 1950), drew attention. By 1952 she had her first leading role in Don't Bother to Knock and 1953 brought a lead in Niagara, a melodramatic film noir that dwelt on her seductiveness. Her "dumb blonde" persona was used to comic effect in subsequent films such as Gentlemen Prefer Blondes (1953), How to Marry a Millionaire (1953) and The Seven Year Itch (1955). Her dramatic performance in Bus Stop (1956) was hailed by critics and garnered a Golden Globe nomination. Her production company, Marilyn Monroe Productions, released The Prince and the Showgirl (1957), for which she received a BAFTA Award nomination and won a David di Donatello award. She received a Golden Globe Award for her performance in Some Like It Hot (1959). Monroe's last completed film was The Misfits (1961), co-starring Clark Gable with screenplay by her then-husband, Arthur Miller.

On August 5, 1962, at 4:25 am, LAPD sergeant Jack Clemmons received a call from Dr. Ralph Greenson, Monroe's psychiatrist, saying that Monroe was found dead at her home in Brentwood, Los Angeles, California. She was 36 years old.

Morgan Freeman
(born June 1, 1937)

Morgan Freeman is an American actor, film director, and narrator. Freeman has received Academy Award nominations for his performances in Street Smart, Driving Miss Daisy, The Shawshank Redemption and Invictus and won in 2005 for Million Dollar Baby. He has also won a Golden Globe Award and a Screen Actors Guild Award. Freeman has appeared in many other box office hits, including Unforgiven, Glory, Seven, Deep Impact, The Sum of All Fears, Bruce Almighty, The Dark Knight Trilogy, and March of the Penguins.

Theresa Elizabeth "Teri" Polo
(born June 1, 1969)

Teri Polo is an American actress known for her role of Pam Focker in the film Meet the Parents (2000) and its two sequels, Meet the Fockers (2004) and Little Fockers (2010). She was one of the stars in the sitcom I'm with Her, as well as the political drama series The West Wing.

Andy Samuel Griffith

(June 1, 1926 - July 3, 2012)

Andy Griffith was an American actor, television producer, Grammy Award-winning Southern-gospel singer, and writer. He was a Tony Award nominee for two roles, and gained prominence in the starring role in director Elia Kazan's film A Face in the Crowd (1957) before he became better known for his television roles, playing the lead characters in the 1960–1968 situation comedy The Andy Griffith Show and in the 1986–1995 legal drama Matlock.

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Not necessity, not desire -- no, 'the love of power' is the demon of men. Let them have everything - health, food, a place to live, entertainment -- they are and remain unhappy and low-spirited: for the demon waits and waits and will be satisfied.
--Friedrich Nietzsche
    

One Year Ago in Japan

On March 11, 2011 a 9.0 magnitude tremor shook the Northeast section of Japan, triggering a tsunami and killing thousands of people.The Fukushima nuclear power plant was also damaged and began leaking radiation. Clearing up and rebuilding has been a huge task and one year later, there is still much more that needs to be done.

Many more pictures HERE

A Year After Fukushima

Debris one year later

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Daylight Saving Time (United States) began Sunday, March 11, 2012 at 2:00 am and ends Sunday, November 4, 2012, 2:00 am. Except Arizona and Hawaii. Move your clocks ahead 1 hour in spring and back 1 hour in fall.

Not having to put up with the twice each year nuisance of having to change time on all the clocks in the house is just another of the many advantages of living here in Tucson, Arizona. As of today, though, I will have to remember that until November we are now three hours behind the East Coast instead of only two.

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George Will was absent from the this week show's The Round Table. Without his calm, insightful conservative presence, it just ain't worth watching.

George Will's column in the Washington Post, regarding how Big Government can ignore The Law and get away with it will make you think... unless you are so brain-washed by socialist dogma that you can no longer think for yourself.

And that ultra-lengthy Cartier Jewelery commercial at the half-hour, with the dragon, leopard, sea monsters, sophisticated wealthy lady and the seemingly classical background music absolutely mystified me. All that imagery and computer aided graphics, the tools used by movie makers for their Action Adventure and childish mythological fairy tale films.

Does that actually sell jewelry?

No doubt.

I'm getting too old for the times.

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My Word For Today

contumely
(Noun)
Insolent or insulting language or treatment.
Synonyms
affront - insult - outrage

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Below is a link to a valuable resource for those who seek to increase their knowledge.

University of Toronto English Library

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HAPPY BIRTHDAY

Sam Donaldson

Born March 11, 1934

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Just when I was wondering what the Brits were up to lately, along comes the Post to update me:

The Washington Post reports:

Even as the Republican primaries highlight America’s divide over the separation of church and state, Britain finds itself locked in a debate over religion that is entangling not just the British government but even Queen Elizabeth II. The move to ban public prayers in tiny Bideford -- and potentially across all of England and Wales -- has erupted into a national proxy fight over the question of whether Christianity should still hold a privileged place in a modern, diverse and now highly secular society.

Perhaps organized religion is on its way out. It will take a long time, though. Oh well... successful human evolution takes a long time as well. Both are worth waiting for.

Probably . . .

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The questions don't do the damage. Only the answers do.
--Sam Donaldson