It's a thousand pages, give or take a few

There's a time and place for the Kindle, and I own one now and have books on it that I don't otherwise have. But I don't find that my hand reaches out for it the way it does for a trade paperback, or (in the middle of the night) for the iPod Touch. - Nicholson Baker



Today is Paperback Book Day. The reason for the celebration today is that Sir Allen Lane started what would become Penguin Books, and they published their first paperback book on July 30, 1935. I just finished reading Cod: A Biography of the Fish that Changed the World by Mark Kurlansky.


Flowers and Trees is a 1932 Silly Symphonies cartoon produced by Walt Disney, directed by Burt Gillett and released to theatres by United Artists on this date. It was the first commercially released film to be produced in the full-color three-strip Technicolor process, after several years of two-color Technicolor films.



The original work was started in black and white. The black and white footage was scrapped when the decision was made to try Technicolor.


July 30, 1966 -
The Dynamic Duo made the jump from the TV scene to the movie scene - Batman, The Movie, premiered in Austin, Texas on this date.



The movie was scheduled to premiere in Austin, Texas, on August 1st, 1966. The premiere was postponed, however, because earlier that same day a disturbed University of Texas student and former marine named Charles Whitman went to the observation deck of the school's clock tower and opened fire on the campus, killing 16 people and wounding 32 others before being shot to death himself by police.


July 30, 1966 -
The Beatles' album Yesterday... and Today, went #1 and stayed #1 for five weeks, on this date.



The record was released just after John's infamous interview in which he stated that the Beatles were "bigger than Jesus", which angered Americans and provoked many bans on their music and public incineration of memorabilia. But Yesterday And Today would take public disapproval to a whole new level, as the original cover featured the band in butcher's smocks with baby doll parts and raw meat covering them. The record was pulled almost immediately - creating an instant collector's item - and in the confusion that followed, several replacement covers were issued.


July 30, 1977 -
Andy Gibb's song, I Just Want to Be Your Everything, reached no. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100, on this date.



This was the first of three #1 singles for Gibb, which made him the first male solo artist with three consecutive #1 singles in the US. The next single was (Love Is) Thicker Than Water, which was released when The Bee Gees were scoring huge hits from the Saturday Night Fever soundtrack. That song replaced Stayin' Alive at #1 and was bumped by Night Fever. Gibb's next single was Shadow Dancing, which he wrote with his brothers and also went to #1.


July 30, 1982 -
One of Ron Howard's early movie directorial efforts Night Shift, premiered on this date.



Henry Winkler was scheduled to begin principal photography for this movie in New York City during his holiday hiatus from Happy Days, and would resume the following year, following production of the ninth season of Happy Days. Winkler worked a total of nine days on-location in New York City before filming picked up again that day in California. Winkler worked on this movie Mondays through Wednesdays while concurrently shooting Happy Days on Thursdays and Fridays.


July 30, 1991 -
Metallica released one of their biggest hits Enter Sandman, on this date.



Pat Boone recorded a hilariously upbeat version of this for his In a Metal Mood album. He sang lyrics like "Dreams of war, dreams of fire" and "Exit lights" in an almost laughing manner. The music was jazzy and Vegas-esque, and the opening guitar riff was noticeably shorter.


July 30, 1999 -
Paramount Picture released the Gary Marshall Rom Com, Runaway Bride (a semi-remake of the Capra classic It Happened One Night) featuring the re-teaming of Julia Roberts and Richard Gere, and featuring the always funny Joan Cusack, on this date.



Julia Roberts, Richard Gere, Hector Elizondo, Kathleen Marshall, the uncredited Larry Miller (NYC barman),Patrick Richwood and the film's director Gary Marshall all appeared together in Pretty Woman.


July 30, 2004 -
The surprise hit stoner film, Harold and Kumar Go to White Castle, starring John Cho, Kal Penn, and the very funny Neil Patrick Harris, opened on this date.



As a "thank you" for all of the free advertising the film gave them, White Castle arranged to have collectible Harold and Kumar cups at all of their locations during the film's release. It marks the first time an R-rated comedy is advertised on fast food containers.

Don't forget to tune in to The ACME Eagle Hand Soap Radio Hour today


Today in History:
Prague has always been a tough town for elected officials.



On July 30, 1419, Jan Zelivsky, a Hussite priest at the church of the Virgin Mary of the Snows, led his congregation on a procession through the streets of Prague to the Town Hall. The town council members had refused to exchange their Hussite prisoners, and an anti-Hussite threw a rock at one of the protesters. Enraged, the crowd stormed the town hall and threw seven of the council members from the windows onto the spears of the armed congregation below. Thus, the First Defenestration of Prague occurred.



Less you think that was the only defenestration in that tough old town, at Prague Castle on May 23, 1618, an assembly of Protestants tried two Imperial governors, Wilhelm Grav Slavata (1572 - 1652) and Jaroslav Borzita Graf Von Martinicz (1582 - 1649), for violating the Letter of Majesty (Right of Freedom of Religion), found them guilty, and threw them, together with their scribe Philip Fabricius, out of the high windows of the Bohemian Chancellery. They landed on a large pile of manure and all survived unharmed. Philip Fabricius was later ennobled by the emperor and granted the title "von Hohenfall" (lit. translating to "of Highfall").

Apparently, the streets of Prague were literally full of crap.

But what there were more, a defenestration (chronologically the Second Defenestration of Prague) happened on September 24, 1483, when a violent overthrow of the municipal governments of the Old and New Towns ended with throwing the Old-Town portreeve and the bodies of seven killed aldermen out of the windows of the respective townhalls.

Sometimes, the name the Third Defenestration of Prague is used, although it has no standard meaning. For example, it has been used to describe the death of Jan Masaryk, who was found under the bathroom window of the building of the Czechoslovakian Ministry of Foreign Affairs on March 10, 1948, allegedly murdered by Communists, though the official Communist line claimed this to be a suicide.

It's tough to be an elected official in Prague.



So, here are some quick rules for avoiding defenestration:

7. Don't throw stones at angry mobs.
6. Watch out for Catholics.
5. Watch out for Protestants.
4. Don't piss off really powerful people.
3. Surround tall buildings with piles of manure.
2. Never go to Prague.

And, of course,



1. Never leave home.

Again, it's a tough town for politicians but it's the gravy train for glazers.


July 30, 1729 -
Since we seem not to be able to travel there again this year, let us all wish the happiest of Birthdays to the Crab Cake Capital of the World.



The city of Baltimore was founded on this date and is named after Lord Baltimore (Cecilius Calvert).


July 30, 1818 -
It's Emily Bronte's birthday.



The Brontes were three hideous sisters who dwelt in a cave and had to share a single eyeball between them. They were eventually outwitted and slain by wily Odysseus. (Unless that was the Gorgons, in which case the Emily Brontes were three Englishwomen who wrote poetry and novels in the middle nineteenth century.)



Women were not allowed to write books at the time because novels were still being written in the formal style, and it was feared that women would corrupt that classic form with their penchant for multiple climaxes. The Brontes therefore wrote under the pseudonyms Currer, Ellis and Acton Bell. Charlotte got to be Currer and this made the other girls jealous: Currer was the handsome and swarthy sailor, while Ellis was the stuttering librarian and Acton was the simpleminded shepherd.

As authors, the Emily Brontes were heavily influenced by the Romantics (What I Like About You), but most scholars contend that Emily's Wuthering Heights owes more to the Meteorologists.



She is perhaps best known for her invention of Heathcliff, most recently popularized by American cartoonist George Gately.


July 30, 1865 -
The Brother Jonathan, a paddle wheel steamer, sank off the coast of Northern California after it hit a rock near Crescent City, on this date. 225 passengers and crew died during the ensuing panic. There were only 19 survivors. It has been considered the worst US steamship disaster that had occurred.

The 220-foot, side-wheeled steamer was on route to Puget Sound and reportedly carried as much as $2 million in gold. In the 1990s, Deep Sea Research found and salvaged 1,207 gold coins from the ship. California received 20% of the treasure and the rest was put up for auction in 1999.


July 30, 1871 -
The boiler on the Staten Island Ferry Westfield exploded, killing as many as 100 people and injured hundreds of others as well, on this date.

The ferry was owned by the president of the Staten Island Railway, Jacob Vanderbilt, who was arrested for murder, but was not convicted.


July 30, 1938 -
In his Dearborn, Michigan office Henry Ford proudly accepts a Nazi medal on his 75th birthday, on this date. The Grand Cross of the Order of the German Eagle was the highest award the Reich can bestow on foreigners. The medal arrives with a note of personal greetings from Adolf Hitler.

A rabid anti-semite, Ford paid for copies of the racist hoax Protocols of the Learned Elders of Zion to be deposited in major U.S. libraries.

Hopefully, there isn't a Ford in your future.


July 30, 1947 -
As the 'Siegfried' leitmotif from Act III of Wagner's opera played in the background - Arnold Schwarzenegger, the last gasp of the dream of the Aryan 'Uberman', was spawned on this date.



I'm not quite sure that an overly greased muscle man in a speedo (who would become the governor of a bankrupt US state and fathered children out of wed-lock ) was what Hitler had in mind, but who knows.


July 30, 1965 -
As part of President Johnson's Great Society program, the president signed the Social Security Act of 1965 into law established Medicare and Medicaid in the United States, on this date.



Both older Americans and people living in poverty benefited from passage of the Social Security amendments. Medicare initiated a basic program of insurance for those aged 65 and over, funded by a tax on employees wages and matched by employer contributions. Medicaid provided grants to states to establish health care programs for low-income individuals and families. The act also lowered the age at which widows could begin collecting benefits and added certain divorced women to the list of benefit recipients.


July 30, 1975 -
Jimmy Hoffa was or wasn't killed on this date.



Jimmy is or isn't buried somewhere in the Meadowlands or a horse farm or was made into ground meat and consumed at some very unfortunate barbecue (the FBI still continue to try to sort it all out.)



And so it goes.