(even Alex Trebek knows it. Listen to him quietly chuckle.)
But I'm not going to explain it. If you don't know, google it.
I can't believe I forgot this, yesterday was Blue Monday, the most depressing day of the year.
Hopefully you didn't hang yourself yesterday and are reading this today.
Today in History:
It's a strange mix of birthday wishes today
January 17, 1706 -
Benjamin Franklin was born on this date.
The inventor of spectacles and the hundred dollar bill, Franklin was one of Washington’s first celebrated womanizers to avoid conviction. One day Franklin tied a key to the string of a kite that he then flew in a thunderstorm, thus discovering Electrolysis.
Franklin also invented the Post Office and can be credited with the creation of the first fully functioning disgruntled postal worker.
On January 17, 1806, President Thomas Jefferson's grandson James Madison Randolph became the first child to be born in the White House - his mother was Martha Randolph, one of President Thomas Jefferson's two daughters, this was her 8th child.
Sadly, no official records have been kept on the more interesting statistics of children conceived in the White House.
Also born on January 17 was Al Capone, in 1899. Chronic self-esteem problems in his early adolescence resulted in his turning to a life of crime in Chicago (where crime had by now trickled down from elected officials to the lower classes).
Capone was such a successful gangster that eventually Robert DeNiro had to play him.
In the end, Capone was captured by Elliot Ness and his Untouchables, who got their name from the fact that their busy schedules prevented them from changing their underwear
January 17, 1860 O.S. - which means Julian calendar. We celebrate his birthday on the 29th of January N.S. - which means Gregorian calendar. So it not really his birthday today but he's dead so I don't think he really cares.) -
Anton Chekhov was born in Taganrog, Russia.
Tragically, a bureaucratic snafu at the Kremlin resulted in Chekhov’s not being told he was one of the Great Russian Writers, so he practiced medicine well into middle life. By then, of course, he was almost good enough to quit practicing, but he’d also made a name for himself as a writer. As a doctor and writer of comedies, Chekhov originated the saying "laughter is the best medicine" (some of his tubercular patients disagreed, but they subsequently died, proving his point).
Chekhov’s greatest work is The Seagull, in which a young man kills a seagull, making his girlfriend cry and a lot of people with unpronounceable Russian names argue and wave pistols about.
Chekhov should not be confused with Chekhov, who was the security officer of the USS Enterprise,
and neither of them should be confused with Charo.
It's Betty White's birthday
Don't you hope you're that cool at half her age.
January 17, 1962 -
James Eugene Carrey, Canadian-American actor and rubber-faced comedian, was born on this date.
Now you figure out how all of those people are related
January 17, 1929 -
Popeye the Sailor Man, created by Elzie Crisler Segar, first appears in the Thimble Theatre comic strip on this date.
I yam what I yam
January 17, 1961 -
In his farewell address, President Eisenhower warned against the rise of "the military-industrial complex."
And yet, Patrice Lumumba, the first prime minister of Congo, was murdered after 67 days in office on this date. President Eisenhower allegedly approved the assassination of the prime minister by the CIA.
January 17, 1977 -
Convicted murderer Gary Gilmore is executed by a firing squad in Utah, ending a ten-year moratorium on Capital punishment in the United States.
Let's do it
And so it goes.
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