Tuesday, February 4, 2020

Just a few more days to go

The eleventh day of the Lunar New Year is known as the day to welcome Zi Gu (the Purple Lady).

According to legend, Zi Gu was a concubine of a rich man in ancient China. The wife of the rich man killed her in the toilet due to her jealousy. The Heavenly God had compassion for her, so he made her the god of the toilet. Zi Gu represents all the females who groan under the oppression in the feudal society. (I'm ambivalent about the reward Zi Gu got in this deal.)



Traditionally, the 11th day of the Lunar New Year is when the wife’s father would invite his son-in-law to a meal at home. It not only provides quality bonding time between the two families, but also a chance to clear out the leftovers from the celebratory food for the Jade Emperor’s birthday on the 9th, so once again the left overs can be used to entertain the sons-in law.


February 4, 1961 –
United Artists'
film The Misfits, directed by John Huston, (written by Arthur Miller,) and starring Marilyn Monroe, Clark Gable and Montgomery Clift, went into general release on this date.



A doctor was on call 24 hours a day for both Marilyn Monroe and Montgomery Clift during the filming because both were experiencing health problems with alcohol and medical stimulants. Ironically, Clark Gable died of a heart attack right after production ended. Marilyn Monroe blamed herself for Clark Gable's death. However it should be noted that Gable was already in poor health when filming began. He had been a chain smoker since his mid-teens, and until recently he had been a heavy drinker. Twice over the past decade he had suffered severe chest pains which could have been heart attacks.


February 4, 1970 -
Twentieth Century Fox's
film Patton, directed by Franklin J. Schaffner, (written by Francis Ford Coppola,) and starring George C. Scott premieres in New York on this date.



The movie begins without showing the 20th Century-Fox logo, or any other indication that the film is starting. At military bases across the US theater owners reported that soldiers in the audience would often stand up and snap to attention when they heard the movie's opening line ("Ten-hut!"), assuming it to be a real call to attention.


February 4, 1977 -
Fleetwood Mac's Rumours
album was released 43 years ago on this date - it's hard to believe.



The Rumours album was pieced together by overdubbing individual instruments, since the band was in no position to record at the same time. The only instance of two instruments being recorded together on the album occurs on the song, The Chain, when the drums and guitar solo are playing together.

This was another album my sister and I wore the needle on the record player out on.


February 4, 1984
British group Culture Club second song released off their second album, Colour by Numbers, Karma Chameleon reach No. #1 on the Billboard charts on this date.



This was Culture Club's biggest hit in the UK, where 1,405,000 copies were sold, making it the biggest-selling single of 1983. It also won the 1984 Brit Award for Best Single.


Today's moment of Zen


Today in History:
February 4, 1861
-
State delegates met in Montgomery, Alabama, to form a Confederate government on this date.

They elected Jefferson Davis as president of Confederacy.



Do you think Hallmark has a card commemorating this event?


February 4, 1889 -
Harry Longabaugh
was released from Sundance Prison in Wyoming, thereby acquiring the famous nickname, The Sundance Kid on this date.

Kids, this was the original version of Brokeback Mountain during the 60's


February 4, 1902 -
Isolationist, racist, neo-nazi and early environmentalist Charles Lindbergh, first man to fly solo across the Atlantic, was born on this date.



Kind of complicated guy, don't you think.


February 4, 1912 -
Franz Reichelt
(alias The Flying Tailor) designed an overcoat to fly or float its wearer gently to the ground like the modern parachute. To demonstrate his invention he made a jump of 60 meters from the first deck of the Eiffel Tower, at that time the tallest man-made structure in the world.



The parachute failed and Reichelt fell to his death. The jump was recorded by the cameras of the gathered press. Winner of the 1912 Darwin Award.


February 4, 1913 -
Each person must live their life as a model for others.



Rosa Lee Parks, civil rights activist whose refusal to give up her seat on a segregated bus in Alabama started the Civil Rights Movement, was born on this date.


February 4, 1918 -
Nobody fucks with Ida Lupino



Ida Lupino
, actress, director, and a pioneer among women filmmakers was born on this date.


February 4, 1948 -
Vincent Furnier
(Alice Cooper), rocker and avid golfer, was born on this date.



Yes, we're all not worthy.


On February 4, 1972, Senator Strom Thurmond sent a secret memo to William Timmons (in his capacity as an aide to Richard Nixon) and United States Attorney General John N. Mitchell, with an attached file from the Senate Internal Security Subcommittee, urging that British musician John Lennon (then living in New York City) be deported from the United States as an undesirable alien, due to Lennon's political views and activism.



The document claimed that Lennon's influence on young people could affect Nixon's chances of re-election, and suggested that terminating Lennon's visa might be "a strategy counter-measure".


February 4, 1974 -
Patty Hearst heard the burst of Roland's Thompson gun, and bought it
.



Newspaper heiress Patricia Hearst, 19 years old, was kidnapped in Berkeley, California, by the Symbionese Liberation Army on this date.


February 4, 1983 -
Karen Carpenter
died of anorexia nervosa on this date. She frequently took laxatives and induced vomiting to prevent weight gain.



At the time of her death she was pencil thin. Lead graphite thin.


February 4, 1987 -
Pianist/jewelry wearer Wladziu Valentino died in Palm Springs, California due to complications from AIDS on this date.



Nobody ever suspected the man was gay.


February 4, 1998 -
Microsoft billionaire Bill Gates was assaulted with a direct hit by a fluffy cream pie during a three-pronged attack in Brussels. He was in Belgium attending meetings with industry and government leaders.



Rumor is that the attack was engineered by Noel Godin, infamous for his other pie throwings at government officials.


February 4, 1999 -In NYC, plainclothes police officers fired 41 shots at Amadou Diallo, a Bronx street peddler and immigrant from Guinea, who was unarmed in front of his Bronx home. Police were searching for a rapist and Daillo was killed with 19 gunshot wounds.

Officers Kenneth Boss, Sean Carroll, Edward McMellon and Richard Murphy were later indicted (but ultimately cleared) for 2nd degree murder.


February 4, 2004 -
Mark Zuckerberg
, a Harvard University student, launched "The facebook", as it was originally known, on this date; the name taken from the sheets of paper distributed to freshmen, profiling students and staff.



Within five years of its founding, Facebook had more than 500 million users. And if you think I'm going to say anything more, you're nuts.


On February 4, 2008, at 00:00 GMT, NASA transmitted the Beatles song Across The Universe in the direction of the star Polaris, 431 light years from Earth. The transmission was made using a 70m antenna in the DSN's Madrid Deep Space Communication Complex, located outside of Madrid, Spain. It was done with an "X band" transmitter, radiating into the antenna at 18 kW. (This may be on the test.)



In case our overlords on Nibiru are Carpenter fans, here's a tune for them



Should our alien overlords come from Planet X, hopefully David Bowie will plead our case, now that he is back home.



And so it goes.


351

No comments: