When the Sleeping tiger is awakened

Rep. Anthony Weiner gets fired up over the vote for aid to those sickened by toxins resulting from the 9/11 attacks.



Perhaps Washington DC isn't such a sleepy little burg during the summer


This summer's quickly slipping by - hope you're out doing something fun this weekend - The summer is almost half over.

For no particular reason: Sign In Stranger



And I'm always left asking - How much exactly can you make collecting Turkish union dues?


Today in History
July 31, 1945 -
Wearing a stolen army uniform, prisoner John Giles attempts to escape from Alcatraz island by boarding an outbound cargo boat. But instead of San Francisco, the vessel heads for Angel Island, where Giles is promptly captured.

Always check your schedules before boarding your escape craft.


It was on this day in 1954 that human feet first stood upon the summit of Pakistan's K2 mountain, the second-tallest mountain in the world.

K2 was known to the Chinese as "Great Mountain" and to Indian and Pakistani locals as "That Big Thing Over There." It was not until 1856, when T.G. Montgomerie of Britain's Survey of India was logging the mountains of the Karakorum range, that it was dubbed K2. This helped distinguish it from K1, to its left, and K3, to its right.

(K1 was later named Mount Masherbrum. K3 moved to New Mexico, where it is believed to be running a New Age bookstore under an assumed name.)

It was an Italian expedition led by Ardito Desio that first succeeded in ascending to the peak of K2. Team members Lino Lacedelli and Achille Compagnoni achieved that distinction on July 31, 1954.

The summit wasn't reached again until 1977, when a Japanese team with more than 1500 porters found their way to the top.



The first American expedition reached the top in 1978 without the aid of any stinking porters.


July 31, 1948 –
At Idlewild Field in New York, New York International Airport is dedicated by President Harry Truman.

A 30 year old Congressman John F. Kennedy suddenly has a blinding headache that day and doesn't know why.


July 31, 1966 -
Beatles records are burned in Birmingham, Alabama -- only because John Lennon innocently declared that the band happens to be "more popular than Jesus."



The record burning of course has the opposite effect, as sales of Beatles records dramatically increase (in part to burn them.)


July 31, 1966 -
Charles Whitman, as a student at the University of Texas at Austin, wounds 30 and kills 16, before being killed by police.



Two years later, Peter Bogdanovich directs his first film, Targets, based of the the Whitman slayings.



The film, starring Boris Karloff, is hailed as one of the most promising debuts of a director since Orson Welles.


July 31, 1971 -
One of the most expensive car rides occurred on this date, when James B. Irwin and David R. Scott took the Lunar Roving Vehicle or "Moon Buggy" on it's premiere jaunt on the surface of the moon.



I bet there was a lovely Earth out that evening.


July 31, 1979 or 80 -
Harry Potter, an orphan who discovers that he is a wizard was born on either of these dates. Although disputed by his author, J K Rowlings, the Harry Potter brand has made her a billionaire.



Who knew an orphaned kid with a facial birthmark could make someone so much money?



And so it goes.

Here's a laugh to start your weekend

Cast members of Dinner With Smucks have a fake interview for the film



I wish/hope the film is this good.

July 30, 1729 -
Happy Birthday Charm City



The city of Baltimore was founded on this date.

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



Julie Newmar (Catwoman in the TV series) does not appear in this film because she did not know about it and had signed to do another project. By the time she was informed, she could not get out of the other commitment in time to do this movie.


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



This was Michael Keaton's feature film debut. The fraternity having the party in the morgue is Delta Tau Chi (seen on the wall) which is the same fraternity as in Animal House.

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

On July 30, 1419, Jan Želivský, 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 go indoors.

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


It's Emily Brontë's birthday.

The Brontës 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 Brontës 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 Brontës 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 Brontës were heavily influenced by the Romantics (That's 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.




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 July 30, 1932. 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.



Flowers and Trees was a commercial and critical success, winning the first Academy Award for Best Short Subjects: Cartoons.


July 30, 1938 -
In his Dearborn, Michigan office Henry Ford proudly accepts a Nazi medal on his 75th birthday. The Grand Cross of the Order of the German Eagle is 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 -
The last shot at the German dream of the perfect Aryan nation - Arnold Schwarzenegger 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) was what Hitler had in mind but who knows.


July 30, 1975 -
Where have you gone Jimmy Hoffa, the nature turns it jaundice eyes to you?

Jimmy Hoffa is or isn't dead.



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.



And so it goes.

I'm sorry ...

... but I've never thought of tequila in this way:



Does Justin Timberlake's mother know he's playing with the video camera again.


July 29, 1958 -
President Eisenhower stopped playing golf long enough to signed the National Aeronautics and Space Act, which created NASA.



Richard Nixon immediately gave Ike a rum toddy and let him take his afternoon nap.

July 29, 1959 -
Another campy cult classic William Castle flick, The Tingler opens on this date.



... Ladies and gentlemen, please do not panic! But SCREAM! Scream for your lives!


Today in History:
July 29, 1588 -
Phillip II of Spain sent his armadillo to invade England. This Spanish armadillo was defeated by the belly-buttons of Lord Howard and Sir Francis Drake in one of the greatest navel engagements of all time.

The defeat altered the balance of power in Europe irreversibly and marked the last use of armadillos in navel warfare.


July 29, 1900 -
Italian King Umberto I thought he was have a good day. It was a warm summer evening and he had just finished distributing prizes to athletes after a sporting competition. Umberto got back into his carriage and Gaetano Bresci, an Italian-born anarchist who had resided in America, burst from the crowd brandishing a revolver and fired four times, killing the king instantly.



The murder was believed to be due to the king’s decision to fire cannon rounds into a crowd of starving peasants and workers that had assembled asking the king for assistance; 100s were killed; Bresci was arrested, found guilty, and sentenced to a life of hard labor at Santo Stefano Prison on Ventotene Island. Humbert was succeeded by his son, Victor Emmanuel III. After serving less than a year of his life sentence, Bresci was found dead in his cell, in extremely suspicious circumstances.


July 29, 1921 -
The Council on Foreign Relations is incorporated in New York City by a group of bankers and other influentials, including John D Rockefeller. The CFR remains a vital component of the New World Order, and is surpassed in importance only by the Trilateral Commission.

Now that you have this information, you know too much and you'll probably have to be killed.


July 29, 1921 -
Adolf Hitler is selected as leader of the National Socialist Party.



I'm guessing there have been some regrets concerning this election.


July 29, 1965 -
The Beatles movie Help! premiered in London on this date.



Director Richard Lester originally approached Peter Sellers to play Clang, Sellers declined because he didn't want to be upstaged by the Beatles.


July 29, 1968 -
Pope Paul VI issues encyclical Humanae Vitae, prohibiting all unnatural forms of birth control.



This did not please many practicing Catholics, although he thereby answers an age-old question - Altar boys can't get pregnant.


July 29, 1974 -
Mama Cass Elliot, a very large part of The Mamas and the Papas, dies in London.



Although initial reports ascribe the cause of death to choking on a ham sandwich, in actuality it was a heart attack.


July 29, 1981 -
Britain's Prince Charles married Lady Diana Spencer in an internationally televised ceremony at Saint Paul's Cathedral in London, England.



They were divorced in 1996 . She was dead by 1997 and he married his long time mistress in 2005.





And so it goes.

It's National Milk Chocolate Day

Hey Kids, eat as much milk chocolate today as you like. If you don't the terrorist have won.

(Yes, it is a conspiracy organized by a large Eastern Syndicate of dentists.)


July 28, 1948 -
Bud and Lou's biggest box-office success, Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein, opened on this date.



Although he would play similar vampires in other films since Dracula, this would be only the second, and last, time that Bela Lugosi would play Dracula in a feature film.

July 28, 1954 -
An early Brando classic, On the Waterfront, premiered in New York on this date



The producer forgot to pay for rear-projection equipment, hence the reason why the cab where Brando and Steiger play out the film's most famous scene has blinds.


July 28, 1954 -
One of Bogart's best late work, The Caine Mutiny, premiered in New York on this date. A bizarre irony is that this film directed by Edward Dmytryk and On the Waterfront directed by Elia Kazan premiered on the same date. Both men testified before the House Un-American Activities Committee with vastly different personal results.


Humphrey Bogart's tour de force performance in the climactic courtroom scene was so powerful that it completely captivated the onlooking film technicians and crewmen. After the scene's completion, the company gave Bogart a round of thunderous applause.


Today in History
July 28, 1540 -
King Henry VIII married his fifth wife, Catherine Howard on this date.



To celebrate his nuptials, Henry had his chief minister, Thomas Cromwell, executed.

It must have been some reception.


July 28, 1794 -
Maximilien "The Incorruptible" Robespierre had dominated the Committee of Public Safety during the "Reign of Terror." He asserted the collective dictatorship of the revolutionary National Convention and attacked factions led by men such as Jacques-René Hébert which he felt threatened the government‘s power.

Maximilien Robespierre was guillotined for having ravaged the French meteorological cycle with his nefarious Rain of Terror on this date.


July 28, 1835 -
King Louis Philippe of France survived an assassination attempt by Giuseppe Maria Fieschi, who rigged 25 guns together and fired them all with the pull of a single trigger, killing approximately 18 people but not his intended target

What a lousy shot.


July 28, 1841 -
James Boulard and Henry Mallin pull the decomposed body of a young woman from the Hudson River near Hoboken, New Jersey. Mary Cecilia Rogers, who worked at a popular cigar store, is initially thought to have been killed in the course of a brutal gang rape, but ultimately it seems more likely that she died from a botched abortion.



Years later, novelist Edgar Allen Poe adapts the sensational news story about "The Beautiful Cigar Girl" into the short story The Mystery of Marie Roget.


For those of you still seeking your Masters in European History -

July 28, 1914 -
It was a sweltering July in most of Europe and the world as most people knew it was about to end. That was the day on which, still reeling from the recent assassination of their Archduck Franz Ferdinand in Sarajevo, Austria-Hungary declared war on Serbia.

Because Russia was a Slavic nation, like Serbia, Czar Nicholas II sent a few troops toward Vienna the very next day, hoping either that Austria-Hungary would become nervous and back off or that the Russian troops would loot someone else for a change.

But it was hot, people were angry, and Austria wasn't in any mood to back off. If anything, they were feeling a little pissy: a day later, they sent some troops of their own toward Russia.

The Russian Czar was unaccustomed to this kind of confrontational behavior. His self-esteem in tatters, he mobilized the entire Imperial Army against Austria and began calling himself Tsar.

Emperor Wilhelm II of Germany observed the Russian mobilization with unease. The Slavs of Russia considered the Slavs of Serbia their blood cousins, but the Germans and Austrians were closer still. Like brothers. Like twin brothers. (Fraternal, not identical). The Emperor dashed off a note to his friend (and cousin) the Tsar (formerly the Czar), asking if maybe Russia wouldn't mind calling her troops back within, say, the next twenty-four hours or else. He sent another little note to France, asking if they wouldn't mind promising to keep their noses out of certain other peoples' business, if certain other people should happen to go to war within the next, say, eighteen hours.

Neither Russia nor France offered any reply to the Emperor's little notes (possibly because he wrote it in German - not his first language - now if he wrote it in French, that might have been different - they all spoke French at home), and his feelings were understandably hurt. He mobilized his own army, declared war against Russia on August 1, against France on August 3, and started calling himself Kaiser.

To reach France, the Germans had to cross through Belgium. Belgium expressed its sincere desire not to be crossed. This was unreasonable and forced the Germans to start killing Belgians on the night of August 3.

Britain, meanwhile, didn't care about Serbia. Britain didn't care about Russia. And Britain certainly didn't care who attacked France — it had been their own national sport for centuries. But they had foolishly pledged their support to unreasonable little Belgium, and had no choice but to declare war on Germany on August 4. This was extremely vexing to the British monarchy, as they themselves were mostly German and Kaiser Willie was King Georgie cousin (and remember, as well as the Czar, Tzar/ Tsar.)



On the same day, the United States declared its reluctance to become involved in the European conflict until it had a better idea who'd win.

Austria, meanwhile, had been touched by the fervor with which Germany had come to her defense—and by the rapidity with which Russian troops were advancing toward both of them. Emperor Franz Josef (somehow not related to any of the other people involved in this war) declared war against Russia on August 5.

Serbia, already being pounded by Austria, declared war against Germany on August 6. Montenegro considered this bold and dashing, and wanted a piece of the action: she declared war against Austria on August 7, and, ebullient at finding herself intact a whole five days later, went so far as to declare war against Germany on Aug 12.

Already at war with Germany, an irritated France declared war against Austria on August 10. Caught up in the excitement, Britain declared war against Austria on August 12. By now it seemed like everyone was getting involved. There was a mad rush to war. Japan declared war against Germany on August 23.

Japan's hostilities toward Germany offended Austria, who declared war against Japan on August 25. Fastidiously egalitarian in their foreign policy, they declared war against Belgium three days later. Things were now spinning wildly out of control. On August 29, France declared war against Mongolia, Ireland declared war against Lichtenstein, and dogs declared war against cats.

World War One was underway. In just four years, it would claim 8.5 million lives and leave 21.2 million wounded, and lay the groundwork for an eventual rematch.

Sometimes family feuds just get out of hand.


July 28, 1945 -
A US Army B-25 bomber crashes into the Empire State Building between the 78th and 79th floors. An engine plunges down an elevator shaft, sparking a fire in the basement. Eleven people in the building are killed, in addition to the three man bomber crew. Elevator operator Betty Lou Oliver survived a plunge of 75 stories inside an elevator, which still stands as the Guinness World Record for the longest survived elevator fall recorded.



And if I step outside my apartment and look up Fifth Avenue, it's still standing.

(And folks - Please, this clip doesn't prove or disprove any 9/11 Conspiracies.)


July 28, 1957 -
A C-124 transport plane carrying three nuclear weapons jettisons its precious cargo into the Atlantic, somewhere east of Delaware and New Jersey. The bombs are never recovered.



Remember every time you go to a beach off the Jersey Shore, a 200 foot radioactive mutant Blue Crab is lurking.



And so it goes.

Happy 70th Bugs.

July 27, 1940 -
Bugs Bunny made his debut in a cartoon called A Wild Hare, on this day. Warner Brothers' writers and animators set out to make a rabbit who would be the epitome of cool. They modeled bugs on Groucho Marx with a carrot instead of a cigar. Mel Blanc gave him a Brooklyn accent.



He was a nonchalant rabbit who chewed on his carrot in the face of all of his enemies and he was famous for the line, "What's up, doc?" which he used in that first cartoon when he met Elmer Fudd who was hunting rabbits.

I'd like to send out a great big birthday kiss to that wascally wabbit but interspecies relations are generally frowned upon.


July 27, 1949 -
Mighty Joe Young, an RKO Radio Picture made by the same creative team responsible for King Kong, premiered in New York City on this date.



This was the first feature film for which Ray Harryhausen used his newly created stop-motion technique.

(At age 55, Terry Moore, star of the film, who describes herself as a "devout Mormon" posed nude in the August 1984 issue of Playboy magazine.)


July 27, 1978 -
National Lampoon's Animal House, the grandfather of all gross-out comedies, premiered in New York City on this date. (Toga party, anyone?)



This was Kevin Bacon and Karen Allen's first movie. Donald Sutherland was so convinced of the movie's lack of potential, that, when offered a percent of the gross or a flat fee of $75,000 for his three days' work, he took the upfront payment. Had he taken the gross percentage he would have been worth an additional $3-4 million.


July 27, 1983 -
Hollywood's favorite little person's break out film, Risky Business, opened on this date. This film is not, as usually noted, an above average teenage sex comedy but the precursor to 'Greed is Good' mantra that sunk this country for years to come.



The dance scene where Joel dances to Old Time Rock N' Roll was completely improvised. In the script Tom Cruise was simply instructed to "dance to rock music".

I must embarrassingly admit that I still wear Ray-Ban Wayfayers sunglasses.


July 27, 1984 -
Prince burst out on an unsuspecting world in Purple Rain, premiering on this date. (Stop thinking of it as a movie - it's more like the longest MTV video ever shot.)


(I hope you're waving your arms in the arm!)

The film almost got an "X" rating because of the sex scene with Prince and Apollonia. However, after several seconds were cut out of it, the film came out with an "R" rating.

Today in History:
July 27, 1890 -
At the Chateau d'Auvers, Vincent van Gogh presses a revolver to his chest and pulls the trigger. Somehow the bullet misses the vital organs, and the painter manages to stumble over to a friend's house.



The following night, Van Gogh dies of an infection in the arms of his brother Theo.


July 27, 1953 -
The armistice that ended the Korean War was signed today. It was a war that began in June 1950 when North Korea invaded the south. Almost 35,000 Americans were killed in the conflict, more than 5,000 captured or went missing. A corporal in the 1st Marine Division named Anthony Ebron said, "Those last few days were pretty bloody. Each time we thought the war was over we'd go out and fight again. The day it ended we shot off so much artillery that the ground shook. Then, that night, the noise just stopped. We knew it was over."



Harry Truman said that if he had signed the same armistice, the Republicans would have drawn and quartered him, but Dwight D. Eisenhower had run for president on the platform that he would end the war, and when he was elected, that's what he did.

Unfortunately, someone forgot to inform the North Koreans that they, in fact, signed the armistice and are still technically at war with someone.


July 27, 1980 -
Mohammad Reza Shah Pahlavi, the exiled Shah of Iran, dies of lymphatic cancer in Cairo.

Hey, everyone looks just a little more guilty standing next to Nixon.


July 27, 1996 -
During a celebration for the Atlanta Olympics, security guard Richard Jewell notices a suspicious green knapsack in Centennial Park. He immediately alerts police and helps to clear people from the area shortly before the pipe bomb explodes. For his trouble, Jewell becomes the FBI's preliminary suspect and news organizations run wild with the story.



Because he didn't do it, numerous media outlets end up paying him large undisclosed settlements. Eric Rudolph was later charged with the bombing. He was arrested May 31, 2003. Rudolph later pleaded guilty to the bombing.



And so it goes.

His mother should have known

July 26, 1753 -
Professor Georg Wilhelm Richmann, German physicist, died of electrocution in St. Petersburg, Russia. He was attending a meeting of the Academy of Sciences, when he heard thunder. The Professor ran home with his engraver to capture the event for posterity. While the experiment was underway, a supposed ball lightning appeared and collided with Richmann's head leaving him dead in a red spot. His shoes were blown open, parts of his clothes singed, the engraver knocked out; the doorframe of the room was split, and the door itself torn off its hinges.

Since his mother was not completely versed in the evils of electricity, she could not warn him of it's danger. He was apparently the first person in history to die while conducting electrical experiments.


July 26, 1943 -
Can your grandpa shake his moneymaker like this?



Michael Philip Jagger, Golden Globe and Grammy Award winning singer, songwriter, occasional film producer and actor, was born on this date. Remind yourself - he has 4 grandkids.


Winsor McCay, an American cartoonist and animator, died on this date in 1934. A prolific artist, McCay's pioneering early animated films far outshone the work of his contemporaries, and set a standard followed by Walt Disney and others in later decades.



His two best-known creations are the newspaper comic strip Little Nemo in Slumberland, which ran from 1905 to 1914, and the animated cartoon Gertie the Dinosaur, which he created in 1914.


Today in History:
July 26, 1826 -
Schoolmaster Cayetano Ripoll is hanged in Valencia, after uttering his last words: "I die reconciled to God and to man." He is the last person executed by the Spanish Inquisition.



Gee, I guess at that point everybody should have expected the Spanish Inquisition. (I promise I won't mention the Inquisition for a while.)


July 26, 1947 -
President Truman signed the National Security Act, creating the Department of Defense, the National Security Council, the Central Intelligence Agency and the Joint Chiefs of Staff. The act forbade the CIA from operating within the US.

And no, Donald Rumsfeld is not in the background of this picture.


July 26, 1956 -
A little more than 11 hours after colliding with the Swedish liner Stockholm, the Italian liner Andrea Doria, carrying 1,134 passengers and 572 crew, sank off New England coast.



46 people on the Andrea Doria and 5 crew members of the Stockholm died. Miraculously, 14-year-old Linda Morgan, was throw from her bed on the Andrea Doria onto the wrecked bow of the Stockholm, withour sustaining and major injuries. Unfortunately, her step father and step sister, sharing the cabin with her, were killed.


July 26, 1984 -
Serial killer, cannibal and flesh suit wearer Ed Gein dies at the Mendota Mental Health Institute, a home for the criminally insane.

Gein inspired the films Psycho and Silence of the Lambs. I wonder if he got any of the royalties.


July 26, 1991 -
Paul Reubens (Pee Wee Herman) is arrested in Florida, for exposing himself at the South Trail XXX Cinema.



Following the incident, Reubens loses his children's television show and product endorsements. Flash ahead - Pee Wee Herman's show on Broadway opening in October is doing brisk andvance business.


Weep no more - Amanda Bynes has 'unretired'. (I had to be reminded who she was when she retired - I know, I'm old. Hey you kids, get off my lawn!)



And so it goes.

Rachel Maddow calls them as she sees them

Once again, Rachel Maddow calls out Bill on his b*llshit



Gotta love her (most of the people in my house watch SpongeBob and Hannah Montana and I hang my head in shame. )


The very silly movie, Caddyshack, premiered on this date (watch it - you'll laugh in spite of yourself.)



This steak still has marks from where the jockey was hitting it.


Unless, of course, you believe he was demoted by the Catholic Church,



It's St. Christopher's Day


Today in History:
July 25 1485 -
In Toledo, Spain, over 400 dead bodies are charged with heresy and burned in effigy, in a great public spectacle.



What a wonderful thing, this Spanish Inquisition.


July 25, 1689 -
King Louis XIV of France declared war on Britain for having joined the League of Augsburg and the Netherlands in order to oppose the French invasion of the Rhenish Palatinate.

This caused the Battle of Schenectady in New York. (Really.)


July 25, 1848 -
British statesman Arthur James Lord Balfour was born on this date. In 1917, as Foreign Secretary of the British Government, Lord Balfour declared that "His Majesty's Government view with favor the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people, and will use their best endeavors to facilitate the achievement of this object, it being clearly understood that nothing shall be done which may prejudice the civil and religious rights of existing non-Jewish communities in Palestine, or the rights and political status enjoyed by Jews in any other country."

This came to be known as the Balfour Declaration, acknowledged by scholars throughout the world as the beginning of the Middle East Peace Process.


July 25, 1917 -
Margaret Zelle, also known as Mata Hari, is found guilty of spying and is sentenced to death.



There is no actual evidence that she is a spy, although she may have slept with half of the German army (and the French had a thing about that.)


July 25, 1943 -
Benito Mussolini resigned as Head Evil Bastard of Italy. He did not receive a gold watch. His 401(K) was in tatters.

He was therefore machine-gunned to death, suspended upside down, and urinated on by the people of Italy as a civic reminder of the importance of retirement planning.


Duck Dodgers in the 24½th Century is a Merrie Melodies cartoon created in 1952 and released on July 25, 1953, starring Daffy Duck as space hero Duck Dodgers, Porky Pig as his assistant, and Marvin the Martian as his opponent. Marvin the Martian had been introduced as a villain then named Commander X2 in Haredevil Hare (1948) playing opposite Bugs Bunny, but this cartoon was the first of many appearances of Duck Dodgers.

(Youtube has taken the clip down again - sorry)

The plot of the cartoon involves Duck Dodgers' search for the rare element Illudium Phosdex, "the shaving cream atom." In the future, the only remaining supply of the element is on the mysterious Planet X, which fortunately is found when Dodgers follows a path leading from Planet A to Planets B, C, D, and so on. Assisting him in his space explorations is Porky Pig , playing the role of the Eager Young Space Cadet. Dodgers is about to claim Planet X in the name of the Earth when Marvin the Martian lands on the same planet (in a ship called the Martian Maggot) and claims it in the name of Mars. The stage is set for a battle of wits (or lack thereof) between the two cartoon stars.


July 25, 1990 -
At a baseball game, actress Rosanne Arnold warbles the Star Spangled Banner, grabs her crotch, and endears herself to an entire nation.



Ah, America, land of opportunity.


July 25, 1999 -
Woodstock '99 festival ends in looting and rioting, leaving 12 trailers burned, towers toppled, and several women attacked during the course of the show.



About 500 state troopers were needed to quell the mass uprising of peace and love, apparently triggered by overpriced vendors and commercialization.


July 25, 2000 -
A right tire explosion on the Concorde causes the plane to crash after takeoff from Charles de Gaulle Airport in Paris, leaving 113 dead.



It is the first crash in Concorde's history, and the only supersonic commercial flight to ever crash.



And so it goes.

It's going to be brutally hot out there today

Take it slow - keep re-hydrating.


July 24, 1948 -
... Crunchy Munchies are the best, Look delicious on your vest. Serve them to unwanted guests, Stuff the mattress with the rest....

Marvin the Martian made his first appearance in Haredevil Hare, when it was released on this date.

where do we go from here?

It's David Essex' birthday



Which is the way that's clear


Today in History:
July 23, 1885 -
One of the most famous residents of West 122th Street and Riverside Drive made a most fateful decision on this date.

He died.


In 1881, Ulysses S.Grant, American general, the eighteenth President of the United States and famous horseback riding drunk, purchased a house in New York City and placed almost all of his financial assets into an investment banking partnership with Ferdinand Ward, as suggested by Grant's son Buck (Ulysses, Jr.), who was having success on Wall Street. Very wrong move. Ward swindled Grant (and other investors who had been encouraged by Grant) in 1884, bankrupted the company, Grant & Ward, and fled.

Grant learned at the same time that he was suffering from throat cancer. Grant and his family were left destitute; at the time retired U.S. Presidents were not given pensions, and Grant had forfeited his military pension when he assumed the office of President. Grant first wrote several articles on his Civil War campaigns for The Century Magazine, which were warmly received. Mark Twain offered Grant a generous contract for the publication of his memoirs, including 75% of the book's sales as royalties.

Terminally ill, Grant finished the book just a few days before his death. The memoirs sold over 300,000 copies, earning the Grant family over $450,000. Twain promoted the book as "the most remarkable work of its kind since the Commentaries of Julius Caesar," and Grant's memoirs are also regarded by such writers as Matthew Arnold and Gertrude Stein as among the finest ever written .

Ulysses S. Grant died at 8:06 a.m. on Thursday, July 23, 1885, at the age of 63 in Mount McGregor, Saratoga County, New York. His last word was a request, "Water" (I'd like to believe it was actually, "Sir, cut my bourbon with water."

Grant's funeral was one of the greatest outpourings of public grief in history. A large funeral parade marched through New York City from City Hall to Riverside Park. It had 60,000 marchers, stretched seven miles, and took up to five hours to pass. Well over one million spectators witnessed the parade.

The funeral was attended by numerous dignitaries, including President Grover Cleveland, his cabinet, the justices of the Supreme Court, the two living ex-presidents (Hayes and Arthur), virtually the entire Congress, and almost every living figure who had played a prominent role during the Civil War.

Civil War veterans from both North and South took part, reflecting the high esteem in which he was held throughout a reunified country. General Winfield S. Hancock led the procession, and Grant's pallbearers included former comrades -- General William T. Sherman, General Philip H. Sheridan, and Admiral David D. Porter - as well as former Confederates - Generals Joseph E. Johnston and Simon B. Buckner.

Completed in 1897, Grant's Tomb is the second largest mausoleum in North America (the Garfield Memorial is the first).

July 23, 1904 -
At the turn of the last century, ice-cream men were a breed apart. It was hard work making ice-cream and the rewards were few. "You don't choose ice cream," they said, "ice cream chooses you."

Well, Charles E. Menches was an ice-cream man. They say it ran in his veins. (They say forget the autopsy: they say you don't need actual ice-cream in your blood to have it in your veins.)

Charles E. Menches had always known he'd be an ice-cream man. Everyone had known. While other boys in St. Louis played stickball or jacks, little Chuckie experimented with different creams and salts. While other boys dreamed of being doctors or lawyers, little Chuckie dreamed of exotic flavor combinations like cinnamon-onion swirl and artichoke-pistachio.

Charles E. Menches's passion for ice cream was infectious. He made his brother Frank an ice-cream man. They began traveling to fairs and special events across the Midwest to sell ice cream from a tent.

They did what all ice-cream men did: they scooped their ice cream into bowls and sold it to their customers. People loved ice cream back then, just as they love it today. And why not? It was ice cream.

One sweltering day at the St. Louis World's Fair--July 23, 1904, to be precise--Charles E. Menches and his brother Frank sold so much ice cream that they ran out of dishes.

An ordinary ice-cream man might have folded up his tent and taken the rest of the day off. But not Charles E. Menches. Charles E. Menches knew the code of the ice-cream man. More than that, he lived it.


The people of St. Louis would not be denied their ice cream. Not if Charles E. Menches had anything to say about it.

The tent beside Charles and Frank's ice cream tent belonged to Ernest A. Hamwi, a Syrian pastry-maker who sold sweet wafer pastries called Zalabia. (Ernest A. Hamwi was what Syrians would call a Zalabia man, but they wouldn't say he had Zalabia in his veins. Syrians would never talk such tripe.)

In a moment of brilliant epiphany, Charles E. Menches bought all of Ernest A. Hamwi's Zalabia and rolled them into cones. He then began selling his ice cream in sweet wafer cones instead of dishes.

The ice cream cone was born.

(Sure, Italo Marchiony had received U.S. patent #746971 for the ice-cream cone seven months earlier in New York., but Italo Marchiony had never been an ice-cream man.)


July 23, 1923 -
While driving his 1919 Dodge, retired revolutionary Pancho Villa is ambushed and assassinated. But even with 16 gunshot wounds he still manages to kill one of his attackers.

Curiously, Villa's head is stolen from his grave three years later and never recovered. Despite persistent rumors, Yale's secret society Skull and Bones denies they possess the artifact.

But we know better.


July 23, 1966 -

• Monty Got A Raw Deal by R.E.M.

The "longest suicide in Hollywood" finally ended on this date, with the death of Montgomery Cliff of a heart attack brought on by his severe drug and alcohol addictions. In 1956, while filming Raintree County, he smashed his car into a tree after leaving a party. Elizabeth Taylor kept him from choking to death by removing two teeth lodged in his throat. She had been co-starring in the movie and happened to be at the party. Besides the two missing teeth, the accident left Monty with a broken jaw and nose, crushed sinus cavity, and severe facial lacerations which required plastic surgery. He needed reconstructive surgery on his face and returned after several weeks to finish the film.



He is now the most famous 'resident' of Quaker Cemetery in Prospect Park Brooklyn.



And so it goes.