Extinguish Carelessness.

Today is Fire Prevention Day. Fire Prevention Day is part of Fire Prevention Week and is observed on this date, in remembrance of the Great Chicago Fire of 1871. The observance of this day was initiated by President Calvin Coolidge in 1925.



Both the day and the week has been set asidefor young people and adults to learn how to make their homes safer against accidental fires.


A wiser man than I once said - A corpse is meat gone bad. Well, and what then, is cheese? Corpse of milk, which leads us to the fact that today is also Moldy Cheese day.



Am I really going to encourage you to eat rotting cheese, (while bleu, Camembert, Gorgonzola, maytag blue, Roquefort, brie, and Stilton are perfectly fine,) I also never thought I'd live through the age of multi-convicted White House candidate.


The celebrations of Cephalopod Awareness Days keep rolling along - Today we celebrate Nautilus Night, highlighting all the lesser-known extant cephalopods -



Hopefully the shocking nature of the documentary wasn't too off-putting for your holiday celebrations


October 9, 1969 -
BBC's Top Of The Pops refused to play the No. #1 hit in the country, Je T'Aime Moi Non Plus, on this date.



Serge Gainsbourg's song Je T'Aime Moi Non Plus, was considered one of the first 'orgasm records' and the BBC was not able to cope with such explicit lyrics and Jane Birkin's moans and groans.


October 9, 1969 -
The Supremes released the single Someday We'll Be Together, on this date. It will be Diana Ross' last recording with the group. Ross announced she was leaving The Supremes in November, and by the end of December that year, it hit #1 on the Hot 100, giving the group one last chart-topper, bringing their total to 12.



This was originally recorded by the duo Johnny & Jackey (Johnny Bristol and Jackey Beavers) in 1961. Their version went nowhere, and the duo were defunct a short time later. Jackey Beavers and Johnny Bristol wrote this song while they were touring in the Midwest. Most of it was written while they were driving from gig to gig. Harvey Fuqua, who was their label boss at Tri-Phi Records, also is credited as a writer. Fuqua was married to Berry Gordy's sister, Gwen, and later joined Berry's company, Motown Records, where he worked when this song was issued by The Supremes.


October 9, 1971 -
Van Morrison released one of his most popular songs, Wild Night, on this date.



One of his few songs with mass appeal, and proof that he could write a terrific Pop song whenever he desired. Morrison, however, generally shied away from couplets like "Come on out and dance, come on out, make romance" in favor of more esoteric offerings, which earned him a devoted following and critical praise.


October 9, 1984 -
The popular children's show Thomas The Tank Engine And Friends begins its run on BBC-TV, featuring a narrator by the name of Ringo Starr on this date.



Thomas, Edward, Henry, Gordon, James, Percy, Toby, Annie, Clarabel, Henrietta, Bertie, and The Fat Controller (known in the American dubs as "Sir Topham Hatt") are the only characters who have appeared in every season of the series.


October 9, 1986 -
The FOX network debuted Joan Rivers' new The Late Show on this date.



At first, Tribune Entertainment was supposed to hire Nell Carter as a talk show hostess for her own show, when it didn't work, consequently, the job was given to Joan Rivers, and the show was retooled.

Another job posting from The ACME Employment Agency.


Today in History:
October 9, 28 BC -
Caesar Augustus dedicated the Temple of Apollo to his patron god Apollo, on the Palatine Hill in Rome, on this date.

Not to upset those of you with delicate natures, but just think of having the lubricant concession with the amount of unnatural act committed that night.


October 9, 1000 -
Leif Ericson discovered Vinland and became the first known European to walk in North America, on this date (or not). In 1964, the United States Congress authorized and requested the President to proclaim October 9 of each year as Leif Erikson Day.

The day after Leif Ericson Day in 1965, Yale University astonished the world with its Vinland Map, a 1440 transcription of a map believed to have been originally drawn by Ericson himself (or possibly Eriksson, but certainly not Eiriksson) around 1000 A.D., and which appeared to depict parts of Canada. Just a few years ago, more evidence supporting the authenticity of the map was revealed, lending further support to the conclusion that there were Vikings in North America five centuries before Columbus soiled his first diaper.

This is an exciting development, because it will almost certainly necessitate the development of Viking reservations and the establishment of Viking-run casinos.



Still more exciting are recent scientific findings that suggest Caucasians may have existed in North America prior to being displaced by the so-called native-Americans who were later visited by Vikings prior to being utterly displaced by still more Caucasians.



But this is also deeply troubling, because there was probably someone here before those original Caucasians.



In the interests of fairness, I enthusiastically endorses the endowment of every American with their own casino.


October 9, 1582 -
It's true - tomorrow never knows.



Once again, because of the implementation of the Gregorian calendar this day does not exist in this year in Italy, Poland, Portugal and Spain. This leads to more mass confusion and most of the populace just go back to bed and give up belief in calendars.


On this date in 1776 a group of Spanish Missionaries, led by Father Francisco Palou founded Mission San Francisco de Asis in what is today San Francisco.

Their arrival displaced a small Native American population and therefore came to be known as the "missionary imposition."


October 9, 1855 -
Isaac Singer was issued a patent (US No. 13,661) for the sewing machine motor, which went on to revolutionize the textile industry.



That same year, SINGER becomes the largest selling brand of sewing machines internationally. The SINGER brand is awarded the first prize at the World’s Fair in Paris, France.


October 9, 1872 -
A traveling dry goods salesman named Aaron Montgomery Ward launches the world’s first mail-order general merchandise business on this date. His first catalog, which was a page long, listing 163 items, would be the first to be called a Wish Book. Ward initially writes all of the catalog’s copy himself.



The catalog will rapidly grow in popularity, so much so that it will soon be imitated by other enterprising merchants, most notably Richard Warren Sears, who published his first general catalog in 1896. Montgomery Ward will grow into one of the largest retailers in the U.S., but its sales will decline through the late twentieth century, forcing the chain to close in early 2001.


October 9, 1888 -
The Washington Monument, designed by Robert Mills, was completed and the public was first admitted on this date.



Steam powered elevators carried visitors to the top in 12 minutes. It underwent a $1.5 million renovation in 1998.


October 9, 1915 -
Took my girl to a baseball game, sat her in the front ...

President Woodrow Wilson and his then fiancé, Edith Galt (and soon be the first female U.S. President, but that another story ...) watched game two of the World Series, at Baker Bowl, between Boston and Philadelphia on this date.

Wilson, an avid baseball fan, becomes the first U.S. President to attend a World Series.


October 9, 1934 -
While the Boomtown Rats don't like Mondays, King Alexander I of Yugoslavia didn't like Tuesdays. (Alexander is one of the rare european royalty not related to QueenVictoria in any measureable way.)

On account of the deaths of three members of his family on a Tuesday, Alexander refused to undertake any public functions on that day. On Tuesday October 9, 1934, however, he had no choice, as he was arriving in Marseille to start a state visit to the Third French Republic, to strengthen the two countries' alliance in the Little Entente. While being driven in a car through the streets along with French Foreign Minister Louis Barthou, a gunman, Vlado Chernozemski, stepped from the street and shot the King and the chauffeur. The Minister was accidentally shot by a French policeman and died later (I hate when that happens.)

It was one of the first assassinations captured on film; the shooting occurred straight in front of the cameraman, who was only feet away at the time. The cameraman captured not merely the assassination but the immediate aftermath; the body of the chauffeur (who had been killed instantly) became jammed against the brakes of the car, allowing the cameraman to continue filming from within inches of the King for a number of minutes afterwards.

The assassin, Vlado Chernozemski - driver of the leader of the Internal Macedonian Revolutionary Organization, Ivan Mihailov and an experienced marksman - was cut down by the sword of a mounted French policeman, then beaten by the crowd. By the time he was removed from the scene, he was already a bloody pulp.



The film record of Alexander I's assassination remains one of the most historic pieces of newsreel in existence (film footage), alongside the film of Tsar Nicholas II of Russia's coronation, the funerals of Queen Victoria of the United Kingdom, and Emperor Franz Josef of Austria, and the assassination of John F. Kennedy.


October 9, 1958 -
Pope Pius XII suffered a most 'unfortunate' accident after his demise. The Pope died during an exceptionally hot summer.



When Pius died, Professor Riccardo Galeazzi-Lisi who was treating the ill pontiff (Galeazzi-Lisi was not a doctor but an optometrist) turned embalmer, trying to hide his crimes.

Rather than slow the process of decay, the doctor-mortician's self-made technique sped it up, leading the Holy Father's corpse to disintegrate rapidly, turning purple, with the corpse's nose falling off. The stench caused by the decay was such that guards had to be rotated every 15 minutes, otherwise they would collapse. The condition of the body became so bad that the remains were secretly removed at one point for further treatments before being returned in the morning.



Very messy indeed.


October 9, 1967 -
On October 8th, Che Guevara was captured while leading a detachment with Simeon Cuba Sarabia in Bolivia. According to some soldiers present at the capture, during the skirmish as they approached Guevara, he allegedly shouted, "Do not shoot! I am Che Guevara and worth more to you alive than dead." Upon hearing of Guevara's capture, news was relayed to CIA headquarters at Langley, Virginia, via CIA stations in various South American nations.

The President of Bolivia, René Barrientos promptly ordered his execution upon being informed of his capture. Guevara was taken to a dilapidated schoolhouse in the nearby village of La Higuera where he was held overnight. Early the next afternoon he was executed. The executioner was Mario Terin, a Sergeant in the Bolivian army who had drawn a short straw after arguments over who got the honor of killing Guevara broke out among the soldiers. To make the bullet wounds appear consistent with the official story sold to the public, Felix Rodriguez, the CIA asset, ordered the soldier who pulled the trigger to aim carefully to make it appear that Che had been killed in action during a clash with the Bolivian army, and thus to help cover up the official secret assassination. Guevara received multiple shots to the legs, so as to avoid maiming his face for identification purposes and simulate combat wounds in an attempt to conceal his ex judicial execution.



Che Guevara had some last words before his death; he allegedly said to his executioner, "I know you are here to kill me. Shoot, coward, you are only going to kill a man." His body was lashed to the landing skids of a helicopter and flown to neighboring Vallegrande where it was laid out on a laundry tub in the local hospital and displayed to the press.



After the execution, Rodriguez took several personal items of Guevara's including a Rolex watch, often proudly showing them to reporters during the ensuing years. Today, some of these belongings, including his flashlight, are on display at the CIA headquarters. After a military doctor surgically amputated his hands, Bolivian army officers transferred Guevara's cadaver to an undisclosed location and refused to reveal whether his remains had been buried or cremated.

And that boys and girls, was your US dollars at work in 1967.


October 9, 1973 -
My emotion is real, and my everyday life is filled with the same feeling.



Sister Rosetta Tharpe, pioneering gospel singer and recording artist, died on this date.


October 9, 1974 -
Obscure German businessman Oskar Schindler, passed away at the age of 66 in Frankfurt, Germany on this date. A member of the Nazi Party, he ran an enamel-works factory in Krakaw during the German occupation of Poland, employing workers from the nearby Jewish ghetto. When the ghetto was liquidated, he persuaded Nazi officials to allow the transfer of his workers to the Plaszow labor camp, thus saving them from deportation to the death camps.



In 1944, all Jews at Plaszow were sent to Auschwitz, but Schindler, at great risk to himself, bribed officials into allowing him to keep his workers and set up a factory in a safer location in occupied Czechoslovakia. By the war's end, he was penniless, but he had saved 1,200 Jews. In 1962, he was declared a Righteous Gentile by Yad Vashem, Israel's official agency for remembering the Holocaust. According to his wishes, he was buried in Israel at the Catholic cemetery on Mount Zion.


October 9, 1978 -
Jacques Brel was certainly not alive and well and living in Paris on this date.



Mr. Brel, the Belgian-born French cabaret singer, had died earlier in the day.


October 9, 1985 -
Happy Birthday John (and Sean.)

Central Park's Strawberry Fields was dedicated on John Lennon's birthday, by Yoko Ono, who had underwritten the project, on this date.


Before you go -



Diwali and,



Halloween are in 22 days,



I'm not going to remind you that the General election is in 27 days, you're scared enough. But Thanksgiving is in 50 days.



and Christmas and Hanukkah are in 77 days.

Plan accordingly!



And so it goes

We'd all like to be in an an octupus's garden

Given your newsfeed is jam packed with other, more heady news, it is understandable that some may not remember that since 2007, ACME has been proud to recognize that every year from the 8th to the 12th of October, International Cephalopod Awareness Days come around to teach the world about Cephalopods!

Today is Octopus Day, celebrating all the eight-armed fellows.

This event is all about celebrating and sharing how fascinating and incredible they are!


Today is also Fluffernutter day. Celebrate by bringing fresh white bread, peanut butter, and marshmallow cream together.



While this may be a childhood favorite for some - it's causing me to gag to even think about.


October 8, 1925 -
One of the most expensive movie made, at the time (at $3.9 million,) Ben-Hur: A Tale of the Christ premiered on this date.



This film had an "extra" cast like no other. Many Hollywood stars showed up on set to watch the shooting and were pressed into service as extras, especially in the chariot race. In addition, many who would later become Hollywood's top stars, but who were at the time just struggling actors, were also in the crowd scenes as extras. Among well-known and soon-to-be-well-known names "working" in the film were John Barrymore, Lionel Barrymore, Joan Crawford, Gary Cooper, Marion Davies, Myrna Loy, John Gilbert, Douglas Fairbanks, Clark Gable, Harold Lloyd, Carole Lombard, Janet Gaynor, Fay Wray, Mary Pickford, Colleen Moore, Lillian Gish, Dorothy Gish, Samuel Goldwyn and Rupert Julian.


October 8, 1927 -
The Hal Roach studio released The Second Hundred Years short, starring Stan Laurel and Oliver Hardy - the first Laurel and Hardy film with them appearing as a team on this date.



Laurel and Hardy's heads were shaved for their appearance in this film, and their hair had not yet grown back in their roles in Call of the Cuckoos, released a week after this film.


October 8, 1977 -
The final masterpiece of Luis Buñuel, That Obscure Object of Desire premiered on this date.



According to screenwriter Jean-Claude Carrière, the reason Maria Schneider was dismissed from the film was her heavy drug use, which caused her to give a "lackluster" performance and caused tremendous friction between her and Buñuel.


October 8, 1966 -
The first Doctor Who episode to feature the Cybermen (the first episode of the Doctor Who serial The Tenth Planet) aired on this date.



The episode is the last episode to star William Hartnell as the First Doctor (and Patrick Troughton as the Second Doctor).


October 8, 1972 -
Richard Boone starred in the TV series Hec Ramsey, about a gunfighter intrigued with new methods of criminology at the turn of the previous century, which premiered on this date.



In the fall of 1972, NBC moved its successful Wednesday night Mystery Movie series consisting of Columbo, McCloud, and McMillan and Wife to Sunday nights and added a fourth show, Hec Ramsey, while turning the original slot over to three new mysteries (Banacek, Madigan, and Cool Million). Hec Ramsey was a product of Jack Webb's then prolific production company. The series, which ran for two seasons (a total of ten 90 minute to 2 hour episodes) was superficially a Western, but it was set in the waning days of the Wild West when science was beginning to play a more significant role in crime solving than gunplay.


October 8, 1980 -
... The hand speaks, the hand of a government man ...



Today is the 44th anniversary of Talking Heads' fourth studio Remain in Light was released on this date


October 8, 1983 -
Francis Ford Coppola's under-rated arthouse teen drama Rumble Fish, starring Matt Dillon, Mickey Rourke, Vincent Spano, Diane Lane, Diana Scarwid, Nicolas Cage, Dennis Hopper, and Tom Waits, opened in limited release in NYC on this date.



To mix the black-and-white footage of Rusty James and the Motorcycle Boy in the pet store looking at the Siamese fighting fish in color, Stephen H. Burum shot the actors in black and white and then projected that footage on a rear projection screen. They put the fish tank in front of it with the tropical fish and shot it all with color film.


October 8, 1984 -
The critically acclaimed TV movie The Burning Bed starring Farrah Fawcett, Paul Le Mat, and Richard Masur, premiered on NBC-TV on this date.



Lisa "Left Eye" Lopes, member of R&B group TLC watched this movie as a child with her sister. She was motivated to set her abusive father on fire in retaliation for abusing her mother on a daily basis as child. In the height of her fame, Lisa made national news for burning her boyfriend NFL star Andre Rison's house after setting stuffed teddy bears on fire in a bathtub.


Today's moment of Zen


Today in History:
October 8, 876 -
The First Battle of Andernach occurred on this date between the West Frankish king Charles the Bald and the East Frankish king Louis the Younger, near Kettig southeast of Andernach.

The results of the epic battle was Charles' complete defeat. Thusly proving medieval royalty did not put much thought into the feeling of their progeny when naming them - Charles was not in fact bald but quite hairy and Louis was already 42 when this battle took place. To make matters worse, Louis had a younger brother known as Charles the Fat, who was probably not fat. Really, parents can be so cruel.

Don't worry, this won't be on the test.


October 8, 1582 -
Because of the implementation of the Gregorian calendar this day (and the four previous days) does not exist in this year in Italy, Poland, Portugal and Spain.



This leads to mass confusion and most of the populace just go back to bed and wait for tomorrow.


October 8, 1869 -
Franklin Pierce, an American politician and the fourteenth President of the United States, serving from 1853 to 1857 is to date the only president from New Hampshire and was the first president born in the nineteenth century.



His good looks and inoffensive personality caused him to make many friends, but he suffered tragedy in his personal life (all three of his children died in childhood - don't ask how his third child died) and as president subsequently made decisions which were widely criticized and divisive in their effects, thus giving him the reputation as one of the worst presidents in U.S. history.



After losing the Democratic nomination for a second term, Pierce reportedly quipped "there's nothing left to do but get drunk" (quoted also as "after the White House what is there to do but drink?") which he apparently did frequently. He once ran over an elderly woman while driving a carriage drunk. Franklin Pierce died in Concord, New Hampshire on this date at 64 years old, from cirrhosis of the liver, thus ending his miserable life.


October 8, 1871 -
Mrs O'Leary's cow started The Great Chicago Fire that destroyed more than 17,000 buildings, killed more than 300 people and left 90,000 homeless, on this date.



Bad cow.

Catherine O'Leary seemed the perfect scapegoat: she was a woman, immigrant, and Catholic - a combination which did not fare well in the political climate of the time in Chicago. This story was circulating in Chicago even before the flames had died out and was noted in the Chicago Tribune's first post-fire issue. Michael Ahern, the reporter that came with the story would retract it in 1893, admitting that it was fabricated.



In 1997, the Chicago City Council passed a resolution exonerating Mrs. O'Leary - and her cow - from all blame.



Occurring the same day as the Great Chicago fire, a forest fire broke out at Peshtigo, Wisconsin, eventually killing about 2,500 people while burning some 850 square miles including, Holland, Michigan, and Manistee, Michigan (making it the largest lost of life by fire in the United States.)


October 8, 1918 -
Sgt. Alvin York (Gary Cooper) of Tennessee became a World War I hero by single-handedly capturing a hill in the Argonne Forest of France, killing more than 20 enemy soldiers and capturing 132 others on this date.



What makes this feat all the more amazing is that York original applied and was denied Conscientious Objector status because of his religious beliefs.


October 8, 1919 -
The first U.S. transcontinental air race began with 63 planes competing in the round-trip aerial derby between California and New York. Each way took about three days.



Seven men lost their lives during the race - flying was extremely hazardous at the time. Even the winner, Lieutenant Belvin W. Maynard, would meet his death three years later, while stunt flying at a county fair in Rutland, Vermont, on September 7, 1922.


October 8, 1928 -
Police raid 20 speakeasies in New York City in an effort to crack down on illegal liquor sales on this date.



New York City Police remain blind drunk, wandering the streets for three days afterward.


October 8, 1945 -
A patent for microwave oven was filed (US patent No. 2,495,429) by Percy LeBaron Spencer, who accidentally discovered that microwaves melted a chocolate bar in his pocket (the first item to be intentionally cooked in a microwave was popcorn.)



Spencer, an eighth-grade dropout and electronic wizard, worked for the Raytheon Manufacturing Corporation of Massachusetts developing a radar machine using microwave radiation. The first commercial microwave was produced nine years later and sold for $2,000.


October 8, 1948 -
For all my success with the Ramones, I carried around fury and intensity during my career. I had an image, and that image was anger. I was the one who was always scowling, downcast. I tried to make sure I looked like that when I was getting my picture taken..



Johnny Ramone (nee John William Cummings) the lead guitarist for The Ramones was born on this date.


October 8, 1956 -
New York Yankees pitcher Donald James Larsen pitches the first perfect game in a World Series - no walks, no hits, no runs.



His perfect game was the only no-hitter of any type ever pitched in postseason play until Doc Halladay pitched one on October 6th, 2010.


October 8, 1993 -
Ted Danson appeared in black face at a Friars Club roast for Whoopi Goldberg on this date.

His offensive comments amused Whoopi Goldberg but the incident becomes a great embarrassment.


October 8, 2011 –
On September 26th, 2011 Mikey Welsh, the former bassist for Weezer, posted on Twitter, “Dreamt I died in Chicago next weekend (heart attack in my sleep). Need to write my will today” followed by, “Correction – the weekend after next”.



He died on this date from a heart attack, possibly brought on by a drug overdose, in his sleep in a Chicago hotel room. If only they had read their Nostradamus.



And so it goes

Here we go again

October 7 -
Since it is the first Monday in October, it's the start of the 2024-2025 Term -



Once again I'm sure nothing much will be going on.


October 7, 1950 -
The character of Granny appeared for the first time in a Looney Tunes Cartoon when Canary Row, directed by Friz Freleng and starring Sylvester and Tweety, premiered on this date.



Mel Blanc's voice for Tweety, except when singing, was edited to an extra higher pitch than usual for this cartoon, but would go back to its regular edited pitch in Tweety's next short, Putty Tat Trouble.


October 7, 1952 -
A little TV show called American Bandstand premiered on this date, 70 years ago.



It premiered locally as a live show, Bandstand, on Philadelphia television station WFIL-TV (Channel 6, now WPVI-TV) on this date in Studio 'B', which was located in their just-completed addition to the original 1947 building (4548 Market Street) and was hosted by Bob Horn, with Lee Stewart as co-host. Dick Clark did not become associated with the show until 1956.


October 7, 1957 –
The first movie to be adapted to become a TV series, How to Marry a Millionaire, starring Lori Nelson, Merry Anders, and Barbara Eden premiered on this date. It was syndicated and not on a regular network.



A moderate success during its initial run, the show was renewed to return for an abbreviated second season but did so without Lori Nelson, who quit in a huff. Greta was said to have married a gas station owner and moved to California, and Lisa Gaye joined the cast as Gwen Kirby.


October 7, 1959 -
The 50s most glamorous and wholesome stars - Rock Hudson and Doris Day, starred in their first pairing, Pillow Talk, which went into general release on this date.



Despite being contractually bound by Universal to do the film, Rock Hudson consistently declined it, fearing it was too dirty and would harm his masculine image. Doris Day finally talked him into starring in it, and it subsequently became one of his biggest hits.


October 7, 1960 -
Route 66 starring Martin Milner and George Maharis premiered on CBS TV, on this date.



The Corvette was replaced every three thousand miles. Chevrolet was the show's sponsor. It was never explained how Tod was able to get a new Corvette so often. The Corvette was never red, as often believed. It was light blue in the first season, beige in the second season, and tan in the third season. The colors were chosen because they photographed well in black and white.


October 7, 1964 -
The Beatles appear on episode of ABC-TV's Shindig, (filmed on October 3rd in London, in front of the adoring Beatles Fan Club,) on this date.



The Beatles were at the top of the bill on the show; the other acts were Sandie Shaw, PJ Proby, The Karl Denver Trio, Tommy Quickly, Sounds Incorporated, and Lyn Cornell. The Beatles performed three songs live: Kansas City/Hey-Hey-Hey-Hey!, I’m A Loser and Boys. In addition to their performance, The Beatles also appeared in the show’s finale with the Karl Denver Trio.


October 7, 1971 -
William Friedkin's taut policier, The French Connection, opened in NYC on this date.



Roy Scheider and Gene Hackman patrolled with Eddie Egan and Sonny Grosso for a month to get the feel of the characters. Hackman became disgusted at the sights he saw during this patrol. In one incident he had to help restrain a suspect in the squad car and later worried that he would be sued for impersonating a policeman.


October 7, 1979 -
Factory Records released Transmission, the debut single (the 7" disc version) by seminal post-punk band Joy Division, on this date.



In May 2007, NME magazine placed Transmission at No.20 in its list of the 50 "Greatest Indie Anthems Ever", one place below their third single Love Will Tear Us Apart .


October 7, 1989 –
Janet Jackson's single, Miss You Much, one of seven Top 5 singles from the album Rhythm Nation 1814, topped the charts on this date.



This song was written by the production duo Jimmy Jam and Terry Lewis. They had a lot of success on Jackson's previous album, Control, in 1986 - the breakthrough album that helped Jackson break the pop mold and become a sex icon with a funky edge.


October 7, 1995 -
Alanis Morissette's third album, Jagged Little Pill reaches the top of the Billboard albums chart on this date. It became one of the best-selling albums of all time and made Morissette the first Canadian to achieve double diamond sales.



Morissette is the fourth female artist to have a debut album reach #1 in the 1990s, following Paula Abdul, Mariah Carey and Toni Braxton.


Word of the Day


Today in History:
October 7, 1492 -
Because of a flock of seagulls (I kid you not,) Columbus changed course to the southwest, on this date.



As a result he missed discovering Florida, leaving it for Fountain of Wayne (I mean Youth) groupie, Ponce de León, to discover.

Imagine the mess we'd be in if he didn't change course.


October 7, 1849 -
On this date, Edgar Allan Poe was found in a delirious state (Maryland) outside a Baltimore voting place (saloon).



Mr. Poe was often found delirious, especially outside voting places,



but this time his delirium was serious and he died.


October 7, 1952 -
It's Vladimir Putin's 72nd birthday.



All I'm going to say is he should live and enjoy his upcoming retirement.


October 7, 1955 -
It was on this day in San Francisco at the Six Gallery, the poet Allen Ginsberg read his poem Howl for the first time.



The poem begins, "I saw the best minds of my generation destroyed by madness." His friend Jack Kerouac sat on the edge of the stage and when Ginsberg was done, the audience exploded in applause.



When Lawrence Ferlinghetti published the poem Howl out of his City Lights bookstore in San Francisco, he was arrested and tried for obscenity, but he was found not guilty.


October 7, 1959 -

... There is no dark side of the moon really. Matter of fact it's all dark.



The dark far side of the Moon was photographed for the first time and pictures relayed back to Earth by Russia's Luna 3 spacecraft. After passing the Moon, the Luna 3 looked back from a distance of 63,500 km to take 29 photos of the sunlit far side of the Moon.



The photos, taken over a period of 40 minutes, were developed onboard and radioed back to Earth on October 18, 1959. They covered 70% of the far side. While the resolution of the photographs was very low resolution, many of the features of the Moon could be recognized.


October 7, 1964 -
Walter W. Jenkins, chief White House aide and longtime friend of President Lyndon B. Johnson, was arrested for disorderly conduct two blocks from the White House on this date. Jenkins was discovered in a YMCA pay toilet with another man.

Ultimately, Jenkins is forced to resign, so as not to jeopardize Johnson's re-election campaign. Jenkins stated that during his arrest, his mind had been "befuddled by fatigue, alcohol, physical illness, and lack of food."

Yeah, that's it, befuddled by fatigue... yeah, that and a wide stance will get you in trouble in a men's public restroom all the time.


October 7, 1968 -
The Motion Picture Association of America announced a new voluntary Hollywood rating system, on this date, giving advance warnings to parents so they can make decisions about which films might be appropriate for their children.

The four MPAA ratings included ‘G’ for general audiences of all ages, ‘M’ for mature audiences, ‘R’ for restricted under the age of 16, unless accompanied by an adult, and ‘X’, which the National Association of Theater Owners lobbied for in order to protect itself against lawsuits.


October 7, 1968 -
Jose Feliciano caused an uproar when he does a slow, jazzy version of the song before Game 5 of the World Series between the Tigers and Cardinals, on this date. Afterwards, a Tigers official told him the club's phones were lighting up with angry calls from around the country: "Some veterans were taking off their shoes and throwing them at their television screens," he was told.



Among those joining the outrage were Tigers starting pitcher Mickey Lolich, who complains that the overly long rendition screwed up his pregame routine. As a result of his cover of the national anthem, many radio stations refused to play his songs, and his career suffered.


October 7, 2001 -
The US launched Operation Enduring Freedom, hunting for the terrorist in Afghanistan, that brought down the World Trade Center Towers. On December 31, 2014, Operation Enduring Freedom - Afghanistan concluded, and was succeeded by Operation Freedom's Sentinel on January 1, 2015. The Dept. of Defense was expected to formally end Operation Enduring Freedom on August 31, 2021, but concluded with the final withdrawal of US forces from Afghanistan on August 30.



Please take a moment out of your day today to consider the sacrifices, warranted or not, that the men and woman of the US military (and their families) have made.


October 7, 2011 -
The world’s largest chocolate bar was made by Thorntons Limited in Alfreton, Derbyshire, England on this date. The giant bar was smashed up, using axes, and samples were given to Thornton employees at the event. The rest was sold in stores to raise money for charity. (Sorry you weren't there to sample it.)



It measured 4.0 m (13 ft 1.48 in) by 4.0 m (13 ft 1.48 in) by 0.35 m (1 ft 1.78 in) and weighed 5,792 kilograms (nearly six tons). The ingredients were sugar, dried whole milk powder, cocoa butter, cocoa mass, butter oil, emulsifier. (This will be on the test.)


October 27, 2023 -
Hamas and several other Palestinian nationalist militant groups launched coordinated armed incursions from the Gaza Strip into the Gaza Envelope of southern Israel, the first invasion of Israeli territory since the 1948 Arab–Israeli War. The attack coincided with the Jewish religious holiday Simchat Torah.



The attacks initiated the ongoing Israel–Hamas war. Please take another moment out of your day to remember all of the victims of this conflict and hope that a ceasefire plan can be found and the remaining hostages can be freed.


And so it goes

You can always take more than nothing

Today is Mad Hatter's Day. The Mad Hatter wore a top hat on the front of which a slip of paper with reads "10/6." The 10/6 refers to the cost of a hat — 10 shillings and 6 pence, and later became the date and month to celebrate Mad Hatter Day. (Except since the Mad Hatter lived in England, 10/6 might refer to June 10th - but I'm not going there.)



The idiom “mad as a hatter” was around long before Carroll started writing. Colloquially used to describe an eccentric person, “mad as a hatter” is based on a problem that arose in the 1800s when hat companies used lead in the hat-making process. The lead got into their systems and they went insane, hence the term “mad as a hatter”.


October 6, 1927 -
Good, bad or indifferent to it, The Jazz Singer (the first feature-length movie with audible synchronized dialogue), premiered in NYC on this date.



Al Jolson's famous line (as Jack Robin) "You ain't heard nothin' yet." was an ad-lib. The intention was that the film should only have synchronized music, not speech, but Jolson dropped in the line (which he used in his stage act) after the song Dirty Hands, Dirty Face. The director wisely left it in.


In the late 40s through the 50s, the CIA led a top secret campaign, called Militant Liberty that encouraged studios to insert the theme of freedom into Hollywood movies. Alfred P. Sloan (think about the name and it will come to you) the recently retired head of of General Motors from 1923 to 1946, was recruited to head the cause. Sloan hired George Stewart Benson, president of Harding College to produce a series of cartoons to promote anti-Communist, pro-free enterprise themes.



Make Mine Freedom, which premiered on this date, was one of the first. At least three Warner Bros. cartoons during the period, Heir Conditioned, By Word of Mouse, and Yankee Dood It were probably produced under this program. And the famous Duck and Cover as well as Disney's Our Friend the Atom have the fingerprints of the program all over them. (We don't even have time to discuss the CIA's involvement with the live action studios during the time.)


October 6, 1960 -
Stanley Kubrick's gladiator spectacular, Spartacus, starring Kirk Douglas, Laurence Olivier, Peter Ustinov, John Gavin, Jean Simmons, Charles Laughton, and Tony Curtis, premiered in New York City on this date.



Peter Ustinov joked about his daughter, born at the beginning of production, being in kindergarten by the time this movie was finished. When asked what her father did for a living, she would answer, "Spartacus".


October 6, 1963 -
The wonderful adaption of the classic 18th Century novel, Tom Jones premiered in NYC on this date. (Bizarre piece of trivia: this was the last film that John F. Kennedy saw before his assassination.)



It took three hours to shoot the famous eating scene, in which Tom Jones and Mrs. Waters express their lust for each other by tearing into a huge feast. Buckets were conveniently placed out of camera range to accommodate the actors, who kept throwing up from all the eating.


October 6, 1963 -
“She was holding my hand and I thought, ‘Gee, she seems nervous.’ At that time, I wasn’t nervous. I was still very young, I think, about to do ‘Funny Girl,’ and now, when I think back on it, I think, ‘Oh, my God, I know exactly what she’s feeling.’ Or, you know, the fears. It’s like, as you get older and people are kind of looking for you to fail more, I think—not people, not the audience—but, you know, critics or producers or whatever. And I just felt her. I felt her anxiety. . . .”



Barbra Streisand appeared on The Judy Garland Show on this date and performed one of the most iconic duets in TV history.


October 6, 1965 -
The Supremes single I Hear a Symphony went to No. 1 on this date.



This was written by the songwriting team of Holland-Dozier-Holland, who wrote five consecutive #1 hits for The Supremes, starting with Where Did Our Love Go. Their next single was Nothing But Heartaches, which brought the streak to an end when it peaked at #11, but they went right back to the top with the next one, I Hear A Symphony.



0ctober 6, 1966 -
The Star Trek episode The Enemy Within, first ared on this date.

In it, a transporter mishap divides Captain Kirk into two versions of himself, one good and one evil, but neither is able to function separately for long.



The episode marks the first use of the line, “He’s dead, Jim.”


October 6, 1967 -

Kirk, Scott, McCoy and Uhura enter a parallel universe in the Star Trek episode Mirror, Mirror, which aired on this date. (Look for Spocks' outrageous Van Dyke beard in this episode.)



It took about a month to complete this particular episode. After filming had begun, BarBara Luna was diagnosed with strep throat. Since the script called for Capt. Kirk to kiss her, they had to postpone the kissing scene for three weeks until she was medically cleared, since they couldn't risk William Shatner getting infected. (I'm sure Bill would have risked it.)


October 6, 1969 -
The Beatles release a double A-side single Something and Come Together on this date. It was the only song written by George Harrison released as a single by The Beatles.



George Harrison wrote this during a break while The Beatles were working on The White Album. It was not recorded in time for the album, so Harrison gave the song to Joe Cocker, but Cocker didn't release it until late in 1969 on his second album, Joe Cocker!, which came out about a month after The Beatles issued it on Abbey Road.



John Lennon was sued for stealing the guitar riff and the line "Here comes old flat-top" from Chuck Berry's You Can't Catch Me. The lawsuit did not come from Berry, but from Morris Levy, one of the music industry's most infamous characters. He owned the song along with thousands of other early rock songs that he obtained from many poor, black, and unrepresented artists. Levy sued the Beatles, or more accurately, John Lennon, over the song around the time the Beatles broke up.

For years, Lennon delayed the trial while he and the Beatles tried to sort out all the legal and business problems that plagued Apple Records. Finally, in an attempt to avoid the court room as much as he could (Lennon felt like he was appearing in court more often than not), he settled with Levy. Lennon agreed to record his Rock N Roll album, which was just a series of cover songs, including three songs Levy owned (including You Can't Catch Me) on the tracklist.


October 6, 1973 –
Cher's single, Half-Breed, went to No. 1 on the Billboard Charts on this date. (Sorry for the earworm.)



Snuff Garrett produced the song despite his intention to quit working with Sonny and Cher. He had been battling Sonny, the singer's then-husband, over what type of material she should be singing. Lyricist Mary Dean wasn't aware of the conflict when she brought Half-Breed to Garrett, a song she wrote with Al Capps specifically for Cher. By the time this hit #1, Sonny & Cher's recording career as a duo had hit the skids with their last single, Mama Was A Rock and Roll Singer, petering out at #77. Their marriage wasn't performing much better; they divorced in 1975.


October 6, 1976 -
The song, Disco Duck by Rick Dees and His Cast of Idiots received a gold record on this date. The song was featured in the movie Saturday Night Fever but was not included on its soundtrack album.



According to Dees, the voice of the duck was provided by a guy he met at the gym who could pull it off. This was Kenneth Pruitt, who sued Dees after the song became a hit, claiming he was paid just $188 for his services, which included dressing up in a duck suit to promote the song on various TV appearances and on a walk through Times Square in New York City. It's likely that the suit was settled and Pruitt ordered to keep quiet - he has not been heard from.


October 6, 1978 -
Alan Parker's harrowing drama, Midnight Express starring Brad Davis, Randy Quaid and John Hurt, premiered in the US on this date.



Although the movie is based on a true story, it has been indicated by Billy Hayes twenty years after its release, that what is presented in the movie is a very exaggerated version of what happened to him in the prison in Istanbul, Turkey.


October 6, 1992 -
32 years ago, R.E.M. released their eighth studio album, Automatic for the People, on this date.



The album title was inspired by Weaver D's soul food diner in Athens, Georgia. When you ordered food there, they answered by saying "automatic." They had a sign that said "Delicious Fine Foods - Automatic For The People."

Another book from the back shelves of The ACME Library


Today in History:
Today is Armed Forces Day in Egypt (we'll get back to Armed Forces Day in a moment but it's not in celebration of the Elvis Costello album) and Ivy Day in Ireland. (Ivy Day is not a horticultural celebration. The date marks the anniversary of the 1891 death of Irish nationalist Charles Stewart Parnell;



Irish favoring home rule traditionally pin a bit of ivy to their lapels in his honor.

Ivy Day should not be confused with I.V. Day, celebrated only by drips.)


Aeschylus was the first Greek playwright to produce tragedies as we would know them today, but that's not important to our story today.



According to legend, Aeschylus died when an eagle, mistaking his bald head for a stone, dropped a tortoise on it, killing him instantly on this date in 456 BC (that was tragedy for Aeschylus but it's comedy to us.)


October 6, 105 BC –
Speaking of The Roman Empire (which I have a reason to - I write about history) - The battle of Arausio, occurred on this date. Migratory tribes of Cimbri (possibly a Celtic people but origin uncertain) led by Boiorix and Teutoni win a decisive victory against two Roman armies outside Arausio (now Orange in southeastern France) near the Rhone River.



The two inexperienced Roman commanders – proconsul Quintus Servilius Caepio, a noble, refuses to serve under the higher-ranked consul Gnaeus Mallius Maximus because he is a ‘new man’ – are so much at odds that Caepio launches an inept assault on the Cimbrian camp while Maximus is negotiating with Boiorix – causing virtually all the Romans and large numbers of their allied troops, servants and camp followers to be lost, one of the worst defeats in Roman history.

So I actually had a reason to think about it.


October 6, 1014 -
Czar Samuil of Bulgaria died of a heart attach after an army of 15,000 of his men returned, blinded by his enemy Emperor Basil of the Byzantine Empire. One out of every hundred of his men was permitted to keep one eye, such that they were able to return home.

For this victory Basil earned the title Bulgaroctonus, slayer of Bulgars.

I guess we shouldn't complain.


October 6 is the anniversary of one of the greatest moments in the history of literary criticism. It was on that date in 1536 that William Tyndale was recognized for his important contribution to world literature, the first translation of the New Testament into English - by being tied to the stake, strangled, and his dead body then burnt.



Ah, when men were men, women were women, and critics were murderous, torch-wielding fanatics!


October 6, 1956 -
Albert Sabin announced that his oral polio vaccine was ready for testing, on this date. With the menace of polio growing, complicated by the fact that there were 3 different strains of the crippling disease, Jonas Salk developed a vaccine given by injection, but it was only effective in preventing complications of polio, and did not prevent the initial infection.



By carrying out autopsies of polio victims, Sabin was able to demonstrate that the poliovirus multiplied and attacked the intestines before it moved to the central nervous system. He developed an oral vaccine, to be put onto sugar cubes that stimulated antibody production.


October 6, 1961 -
President John F. Kennedy advised American families to build bomb shelters to protect them from atomic fallout in the event of a nuclear war, on this date.



In raising Cold War civil defense issues, Kennedy said the government would soon begin providing such protection for every American.



Many Americans did prepare for nuclear war by buying up canned goods and building backyard bomb shelters. Also at the time many home builders offered a bomb shelter as part of new home packages.


October 6, 1966 -
LSD was declared illegal in the US on this date.



Hopefully you timed your intake accordingly.


October 6, 1973 -
In a surprise attack on the Jewish highest holiday of Yom Kippur - Syrian and Egyptian armies invaded Israel on this date, starting, what became known as, the Yom Kippur War. The US came to Israel's aid, but as Israel began winning the war, Israel wouldn't back down from the siege brought on by the Egyptian troops to the south.



The Soviet Union threatened to intervene on Egypt's behalf, causing high tensions between the US and Soviet Union that caused lasting damage to the relationship between two. Eventually, all parties came to a peace agreement.


October 6, 1976 -
During a televised debate on this date, President and candidate Gerald Ford asserts that there was 'no Soviet domination of Eastern Europe'.



Ford lost the election. (I believe the previous White House was trying to use the corollary, 'there was no Russian collusion in the election', from his playbook.)


October 6, 1981 -
During Armed Forces Day (commemorating Egypt's participation in the Arab-Israeli War,) armed gunmen leapt from a truck and began shooting into the reviewing stand at Egyptian President Anwar Sadat.



The assassination had been approved by Omar Abdel-Rahman, a cleric later convicted in the US for his role in the 1993 World Trade Center bombing.


October 6, 2007 -
Jason Lewis completed the first human-powered circumnavigation of the globe. Using a pedal boat, roller blades, bicycles, kayak, and his feet, the adventurer and sustainability campaigner finished the harrowing journey in a little over 13 years.



in the process of completing his ‘Expedition 360’, Lewis also became the first person to cross North America on inline skates, and the first to cross the Pacific Ocean by pedal power. Together with Stevie Smith, Lewis completed the first crossing of the Atlantic Ocean from mainland Europe to North America by human power. He successfully ended his 4,833-day expedition, having travelled 46,505 miles (74,842 km)


Before you go - whether or not you want to acknowledge this - Christmas and the start of Hanukkah begin in 80 days!



Bunkies, try to do something to get off the naughty list! Or hope that Hanukkah Harry will come through with the gifts.



And so it goes