Friday, February 28, 2014
PEOPLE BEING PEOPLE
An Alabama man was arrested after he ordered two pizzas to his mobile home and then allegedly robbed the delivery driver on his own doorstep. The driver told police that armed men robbed him as soon as he arrived at the house. Police quickly followed leads to the original delivery address. Inside, they said, they found Michael Long, 20, the pizzas, and the bag they came in. “We don’t typically see a suspect call a delivery driver to their actual address to commit a robbery,” said an officer.
PEOPLE BEING PEOPLE
A Kentucky woman allegedly bought a car just so she could ram it into a supermarket that she hates. Police said that June Ann Blocker intentionally smashed her newly purchased 2006 Lincoln through the front of a local Kroger, slightly injuring two people. The former Kroger employee appears to have a long-standing grievance with the store, having previously driven a car into another of its Elizabethtown shops in 1999. Despite Blocker’s animosity toward the store, said family friend Jane Embry, “she is a wonderful person.”
ROTARY CLUB FLAG SURVIVES WAR IN EAST INDIES
By Frans Erik Kramer, Jr., Phd
The ingenuity and courage of one woman, my mother, is responsible for preserving a relic from the pre-World War II Rotary Club of Batavia (Jakarta), Indonesia. It is in memory of her selfless devotion that I share this story.
In March of 1942, three months after the attack at Pearl Harbor, the Japanese took possession of the Dutch East Indies, now named Indonesia. We were living in Batavia (re-named Jakarta in 1945) at the time. My father, chairman of the semi-private government Agricultural Trade Union Association, was president of the Rotary Club of Batavia. During the occupation, he became the head of a resistance group in West Java. (click below to read more)
TODAY IN HISTORY
February 28
| 1066 | Westminster Abbey, the most famous church in England, opens its doors. | |
| 1574 | On the orders of the Holy Office of the Inquisition, two Englishmen and an Irishman are burnt for heresy. | |
| 1610 | Thomas West is appointed governor of Virginia. | |
| 1704 | Indians attack Deerfield, Mass. killing 40 and kidnapping 100. | |
| 1847 | Colonel Alexander Doniphan and his ragtag Missouri Mounted Volunteers ride to victory at the Battle of Sacramento, during the Mexican War. | |
| 1861 | The territory of Colorado is established. | |
| 1900 | After a 119-day siege by the Boers, the surrounded British troops in Ladysmith, South Africa, are relieved. | |
| 1863 | Four Union gunboats destroy the CSS Nashville near Fort McAllister, Georgia. | |
| 1916 | Haiti becomes the first U.S. protectorate. | |
| 1924 | U.S. troops are sent to Honduras to protect American interests during an election conflict. | |
| 1936 | The Japanese Army restores order in Tokyo and arrests officers involved in a coup. | |
| 1945 | U.S. tanks break the natural defense line west of the Rhine and cross the Erft River. | |
| 1946 | The U.S. Army declares that it will use V-2 rocket to test radar as an atomic rocket defense system. | |
| 1953 | Greece, Turkey and Yugoslavia sign a 5-year defense pact in Ankara. | |
| 1967 | In Mississippi, 19 are indicted in the slayings of three civil rights workers. | |
| 1969 | A Los Angeles court refuses Robert Kennedy assassin Sirhan Sirhan's request to be executed. | |
| 1971 | The male electorate in Lichtenstein refuses to give voting rights to women. | |
| 1994 | U.S. warplanes shoot down four Serb aircraft over Bosnia in the first NATO use of force in the troubled area. |
TRIVIA Q & A
What group of islands includes Jersey, Guernsey, Alderney, Sark and Herm?
(click below for the answer)
(click below for the answer)
THE FIRST WORD
quondam
PRONUNCIATION:
(KWON-duhm) 
MEANING:
adjective: Former; onetime.
ETYMOLOGY:
From Latin quondam (formerly). Earliest documented use: 1535.
USAGE:
"One of the assumptions Madison and others labored under was that Britain would be too preoccupied with beating Napoleon to pay much attention to its quondam colonies."
Joyce Appleby; The Washington Post; A Stumbling, Fiery End to War of 1812; May 5, 2013.
Joyce Appleby; The Washington Post; A Stumbling, Fiery End to War of 1812; May 5, 2013.
Thursday, February 27, 2014
NOW YOU KNOW
Since 2008 Americans have left an estimated $44 billion unspent on gift cards from retailers, which can’t consider the value stored on the cards to be revenue until it is spent on merchandise.
New York Post
New York Post
MAPPING HUMAN EMOTIONS
BY THE NUMBERS
The number of identity fraud victims jumped from 12.6 million in 2012 to 13.1 million in 2013, according to a report from Javelin Strategy & Research. On average, that means another American becomes the victim of identity fraud every two seconds.
CNN.com
CNN.com
TODAY IN HISTORY
February 27
| 425 | Theodosius effectively founds a university in Constantinople. | |
| 1531 | German Protestants form the League of Schmalkalden to resist the power of the emperor. | |
| 1700 | The Pacific Island of New Britain is discovered. | |
| 1814 | Napoleon's Marshal Nicholas Oudinot is pushed back at Barsur-Aube by the Emperor's allied enemies shortly before his abdication. | |
| 1827 | The first Mardi-Gras celebration is held in New Orleans. | |
| 1864 | The first Union prisoners arrive at Andersonville Prison in Georgia. | |
| 1865 | Confederate raider William Quantrill and his bushwackers attack Hickman, Kentucky, shooting women and children. | |
| 1905 | The Japanese push Russians back in Manchuria and cross the Sha River. | |
| 1908 | The forty-sixth star is added to the U.S. flag, signifying Oklahoma's admission to statehood. | |
| 1920 | The United States rejects a Soviet peace offer as propaganda. | |
| 1925 | Glacier Bay National Monument is dedicated in Alaska. | |
| 1933 | The burning down of the Reichstag building in Berlin gives the Nazis the opportunity to suspend personal liberty with increased power. | |
| 1939 | The Supreme Court outlaws sit-down strikes. | |
| 1942 | British Commandos raid a German radar station at Bruneval on the French coast. | |
| 1953 | F-84 Thunderjets raid North Korean base on Yalu River. | |
| 1962 | South Vietnamese president Ngo Dinh Diem is unharmed as two planes bomb the presidential palace in Saigon. | |
| 1963 | The Soviet Union says that 10,000 troops will remain in Cuba. | |
| 1969 | Thousands of students protest President Richard Nixon's arrival in Rome. | |
| 1973 | U.S. Supreme Court rules that a Virginia pool club can't bar residents because of color. | |
| 1988 | Debi Thomas becomes the first African American to win a medal at the Winter Olympics. | |
| 1991 | Coalition forces liberate Kuwait after seven months of occupation by the Iraqi army. |
Wednesday, February 26, 2014
TIME TO SING
Group singing can create a rewarding feeling of oneness. Swedish researchers monitored the heart rates of 15 choral singers as they hummed, sang, and chanted. The singers’ pulses increased and decreased together as the music’s tempo changed, and their heartbeats aligned when the songs required them to breathe in unison. “You are synchronizing with other people, and harmonizing your hearts,” says study author Björn Vickhoff. That could explain why singing together strengthens solidarity in groups from football fans to work crews. The controlled breathing that singing demands also seems to have a calming influence, achieving “the same effect as breathing exercises in yoga.”
FROM PLASTIC TO PETRO
Scientists are reporting that a new fuel source is in the bag—the plastic bag.
Researchers at the University of Illinois and the U.S. Department of Agriculture have been experimenting with ways to turn plastic shopping bags into fuels, including diesel, gasoline and natural gas. They say that the heat-based process they have used produces more energy than it consumes, and they've worked out in new detail the characteristics of the fuel produced from the bags. (click below to read more)
Researchers at the University of Illinois and the U.S. Department of Agriculture have been experimenting with ways to turn plastic shopping bags into fuels, including diesel, gasoline and natural gas. They say that the heat-based process they have used produces more energy than it consumes, and they've worked out in new detail the characteristics of the fuel produced from the bags. (click below to read more)
PEOPLE BEING PEOPLE
Britain’s most heavily tattooed man has been refused a passport because of his unusual name: King of Ink Land King Body Art The Extreme Ink-Ite. The 34-year-old, who has covered 90 percent of his body in tattoos, sent off for a passport after legally changing his birth name, Mathew Whelan. But government officials denied the application, saying they could not accept “strings of words or phrases” as a name. “This is a breach of my human rights,” said Body Art, as he is known for short.
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TODAY IN HISTORY
February 26
| 364 | On the death of Jovian, a conference at Nicaea chooses Valentinan, an army officer who was born in the central European region of Pannania, to succeed him in Asia Minor. | |
| 1154 | William the Bad succeeds his father, Roger the II, in Sicily. | |
| 1790 | As a result of the Revolution, France is divided into 83 departments. | |
| 1815 | Napoleon and 1,200 of his men leave Elba to start the 100-day re-conquest of France. | |
| 1848 | Karl Marx and Frederick Engels publish The Communist Manifesto in London. | |
| 1871 | France and Prussia sign a preliminary peace treaty at Versailles. | |
| 1901 | Boxer Rebellion leaders Chi-Hsin and Hsu-Cheng-Yu are publicly executed in Peking. | |
| 1914 | Russian aviator Igor Sikorsky carries 17 passengers in a twin engine plane in St. Petersburg. | |
| 1916 | General Henri Philippe Petain takes command of the French forces at Verdun. | |
| 1917 | President Wilson publicly asks congress for the power to arm merchant ships. | |
| 1924 | U.S. steel industry finds claims an eight-hour day increases efficiency and employee relations. | |
| 1933 | Ground is broken for the Golden Gate Bridge in San Francisco. | |
| 1936 | Japanese military troops march into Tokyo to conduct a coup and assassinate political leaders. | |
| 1941 | British take the Somali capital in East Africa. | |
| 1943 | U.S. Flying Fortresses and Liberators pound German docks and U-boat lairs at Wilhelmshaven. | |
| 1945 | Syria declares war on Germany and Japan. | |
| 1951 | The 22nd Amendment is added to the Constitution limiting the Presidency to two terms. | |
| 1964 | Lyndon B. Johnson signs a tax bill with $11.5 billion in cuts. | |
| 1965 | Norman Butler is arrested for the murder of Malcom X. | |
| 1968 | Thirty-two African nations agree to boycott the Olympics because of the presence of South Africa. | |
| 1970 | Five Marines are arrested on charges of murdering 11 South Vietnamese women and children. | |
| 1972 | Soviets recover Luna 20 with a cargo of moon rocks. | |
| 1973 | A publisher and 10 reporters are subpoenaed to testify on Watergate. | |
| 1990 | Daniel Ortega, communist president of Nicaragua, suffers a shocking election defeat at the hands of Violeta Chamorro. | |
| 1993 | A bomb rocks the World Trade Center in New York City. Five people are killed and hundreds suffer from smoke inhalation. |
TRIVIA Q & A
What village in New Hampshire is known for being one of the first places to declare its election results?
(click below for the answer)
(click below for the answer)
THE FIRST WORD
coax \KOHKS\ |
 |
verb
1 :
|
to influence or gently urge by caressing or flattering : wheedle
|
2 :
|
to draw, gain, or persuade by means of gentle urging or flattery
|
3 :
|
to manipulate with great perseverance and usually with considerable effort toward a desired state or activity
|
|
Stem cells can be cultured to divide and then coaxed to turn into many different cell types.
"He is a little scared of the other cats, but he would love for you to come coax him out from under the kennels and admire his big, beautiful blue eyes." — From an article in Los Alamos Monitor(New Mexico), December 7, 2013
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Tuesday, February 25, 2014
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