May your day be free from darkness and abundant with light.

Today is Diwali, the Festival of Lights, one of the biggest and brightest of all the Hindu celebrations. An ancient festival celebrating the triumph of light over dark and good over evil; the day is also significant in other religions including Buddhism, Sikhism and Jainism.



Diwali is derived from the Sanskrit word, “deepawali”, meaning “row of lights”. The day is also the beginning of the Hindu New Year.


It's National Easy Bake Oven Day. Established in 2017, the day commemorates the anniversary of the release of the iconic toy in 1963.



The original 1963 version was not a cheap toy mid you. In fact, it cost a hefty $15.95. That might not sound like a lot, but adjusting for inflation, it amounts to $127. Despite the price, the Easy-Bake Oven sold half a million units in its first year on the market, thanks largely to it's was featured at the 1964 World's Fair. Kids' think of all the fun you can have with two 100 watt bulbs. (Just don't touch the damn thing while it's plugged in.)


November 4, 1948 -
The controversial (for the time) film about life inside a mental institution, The Snake Pit, starring Olivia de Havilland premiered on this date.



Mary Jane Ward's book, the basis for this film, was an autobiographical account of the author's experiences in psychiatric hospitals. The book caused considerable controversy upon its publication in 1946, as it was a scathing indictment of the treatment of psychiatric patients, a subject considered taboo in the 1940s. Naturally, the book was a runaway bestseller.


November 4, 1960 -
The Daniel Mann’s adaptation of John O’Hara’s 1935 novel, Butterfield 8, starring Elizabeth Taylor, Laurence Harvey, and Eddie Fisher premiered on this date.



Elizabeth Taylor and her husband, Mike Todd, had planned for Cat on a Hot Tin Roof to be her final movie, as she intended to retire from the screen. Todd had made a verbal agreement about this with MGM, but after his death, MGM forced Taylor to make this movie in order to fulfill the terms of her studio contract. As a result, Taylor refused to speak to director Daniel Mann for the entire production and hated this movie.


November 4, 1967 -
Motown released the Smokey Robinson and The Miracles hit, I Second That Emotion, on this date.



Smoky Robinson and Al Cleveland wrote a third verse for this song, which pushed the length to 3:15. Acutely aware that songs longer than 3 minutes were often denied airplay, Motown head Berry Gordy had them eliminate the verse and bring the song down to 2:38, which was much more palatable for radio programmers. Robinson was OK with altering the song, as he had tremendous respect for Gordy's judgment and wanted the song to be a hit. He felt that he could tell a story in a song in whatever time he was allotted - even under 3 minutes.


November 4, 1972 -
Johnny Nash single I Can See Clearly Now hit #1 on the Billboard Hot 100 charts,on this date, becoming the first reggae tune to top the chart.



Nash, born in Texas, had legitimate reggae credentials: Bob Marley (before he became crazy famous) was an assistant producer and session player on the album, and also wrote three of the songs, including Stir It Up, which became Nash's next - and final - hit.


November 4, 1978 -
Let the warm feeling wash over you, even though the skinny white boy is singing, - place one hand on your monitor and the other hand upon the afflicted area. He is channeling the healing powers of Rev. Al Green. Feel his power emanate and pulsate through your loins.



The Talking Heads released their version of the Al Green classic Take Me To The River, on this date. (Someone fetch me a cold compress - I need a moment to compose myself.)


November 4, 1981 –
The Fall Guy starring Lee Majors, Douglas Barr, and Heather Thomas, premiered on ABC, on this date.



Since Lee Majors started his acting career by hanging out with stuntmen, and occasionally working as one, he made sure real stuntmen got plenty of work on the show.


November 4, 2005 -
Walt Disney Pictures released Chicken Little, voiced by Zach Braff, Garry Marshall, Don Knotts, Patrick Stewart, Amy Sedaris, Joan Cusack, Wallace Shawn, Harry Shearer, Fred Willard, Catherine O'Hara, and Adam West, on this date. It was the second in-house Disney film completely created with computer animation, the first being Dinosaurs in 2000.



Holly Hunter was the original voice of Chicken Little. she recorded all of her lines, but was replaced by Zach Braff when the studio decided to make the character a male.


November 4, 2016 -
Netflix premiered the incredibly successful series about a young woman forced to take over a multinational business after the unexpected death of her beloved father, The Crown, starring, Claire Foy, Matt Smith, Vanessa Kirby, Victoria Hamilton, Jared Harris, John Lithgow and Eileen Atkins, on this date.



Originally, creator Peter Morgan envisaged the series as being sixty episodes in total over six seasons, with the first season depicting events up to 1955, but as production was wrapping on season 4 on January 2020, he announced his intention to conclude the series with season 5. However, in July 2020, Morgan announced that it would be in the end the predicted six seasons, because he needed more episodes to convey the story he wanted to.


Another moment of edifying culture


Today in History:
November 4, 1847 –
Scottish physician, James Young Simpson, one of Queen Victoria's private physicians, discovers the anaesthetic properties of chloroform.



Chloroform is a colorless toxic chemical substance, which with an acrid, sickly sweet smell and taste, sends people off to sleep as they inhale. During an experiment with friends on this date, a Miss Petrie, Simpson's niece, tried chloroform. She fell asleep soon after inhaling it while singing the words, "I am an angel!"


November 4, 1869 -
The first issue of the scientific journal Nature was published on this date. The debut issue featured an article describing some recent work by Charles Darwin—and Darwin himself wrote in two subsequent issues.

The multidisciplinary British publication has also published important work on living primates, including that of Jane Goodall on chimpanzee tool use. The world’s most cited scientific journal, it is one of the few remaining academic sources that publishes original research across a wide range of scientific fields.


November 4, 1916 -
America's premier journalist and favorite 'uncle' Walter Cronkite was born on this date.



The term ‘anchor’, a central and authoritative news presenter, was coined to describe his coverage of the 1952 presidential election. His spontaneous emotional reaction to the news of President Kennedy's death cemented his relationship with the US public. And his coverage of the Vietnam War was one of the leading reasons for President Johnson's decision not to seek re-election.


November 4, 1922 -
It was on this day that a British man named Howard Carter made one of the greatest archeological discoveries of all time by discovering the tomb of King Tutankhamen (Boris Karloff).



Three months later, Carter opened the sealed doorway and found they led to the burial chamber of the ancient Egyptian Boy King Tutankhamun. Tut has been making his tour and putting a curse on those damn limeys who disturbed his eternal rest for nearly a century.


November 4, 1928 -
Arnold Rothstein, mobster and the man who fixed the 1919 World Series, was having a bit of bad luck. Rothstein had just finished playing a marathon three day game of poker with some 'business associates'.

Realizing that his losses totaled a staggering $320,000.00, Rothstein quit the game and refused to pay his debt. The Brain, as he was known by his associated suspected the game might not be on the up and up. His associates took umbrage at the accusation and 'arranged' to have Rothstein have an allergic reaction to some bullets at the Park Central Hotel in NYC on this date.

The gangster, a man of honor, refused to identify his killers on his deathbed. Had he only thought things might not be on the up and up playing cards with men named George "Hump" McManus and Titanic Thompson, things may have gone differently for him.


November 4, 1952 -
The US established the National Security Agency (NSA) on this date.

The NSA (is supposed to) serve as an intelligence agency of the US, gathering and analyzing foreign intelligence documentation and other forms of communication, usually involving encrypted information that requires decoding. (Just lift the receiver up off the phone and whisper, 'Happy Birthday', they'll hear you.)


November 4, 1960 -
After previously being a secretary, Jane Goodall was hired to study primates at Gombe Stream National Park in Tanzania. She observed on this date, two chimps pick up small twigs, strip off the leaves, and use them as tools to fish for termites in the ground for a snack.



This was the first time that an animal was observed to modify an object to create a tool to use for a specific purpose.


November 4, 1963 -
At a Beatles command performance (present: Queen Elizabeth; the Queen Mother; Princess Margaret), John Lennon utters the remark: "Will the people in the cheaper seats clap their hands? And the rest of you, if you'll just rattle your jewelry."



If you look very closely behind the Queen Mother, I believe Princess Margaret flipped John off.


November 4, 1979 -
The US Embassy in Tehran was stormed by "students", holding 52 hostages for 444 days.



The incident propels Ted Koppel and his magnificent hair onto the national scene with a long series of repetitive Nightline: America Held Hostage specials.


November 4, 1995 -
Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin, 73 years old, was killed by a right-wing, 27 year old Israeli law student, Yigal Amir, at a Tel Aviv peace rally.



Shimon Peres assumed the post of acting Prime Minister.


November 4, 2008 -



Senator Barack Obama of Illinois was elected the 44th president of the United States, the first African American to hold that position, on this date.

And so it goes