Once again - take the forecast seriously

Just because it hasn't started snowing yet, doesn't mean things can't rapidly deterorate -

If you have to, run out now. Then stay in and catch up on some of our past blog posts


Today is the sixth day of the Lunar New Year, and the garbage from the first five days of celebrating is piling up. The rubbish from the first to the fourth day of the Lunar New Year is considered “wealth,” but after the fifth day, that garbage becomes a sign of “poverty.” So, on the sixth day of the Lunar New Year, families participate in a traditional ritual called “Sending Away Poverty” (Song Qiong). This day marks a symbolic transition from the festive restrictions of the New Year to the resumption of normal life and work. The God of Poverty is believed to visit each household.

According to Chinese folklore, the God of Poverty was the son of the ancient Emperor Zhuanxu, one of the legendary rulers among the Three Sovereigns and Five Emperors of ancient China.

He was said to be short and weak, fond of wearing ragged clothes and living on a diet of coarse porridge. Even when people presented him with new clothes, he would not wear them until he had ripped them apart or burned them. Because of this, he was called “the man of poverty,” and over time, he gradually came to be regarded as the ghost of poverty.



In the legend of Nüwa, the sixth day of the Lunar New Year is also the Birthday of the Horse.



The horse is one of the “six domestic animals” (Liu Chu) that were critical to ancient Chinese agriculture and survival. On this day, rituals and beliefs focus on honoring the animal’s contribution to society.

According to tradition, today is also known as “Pouring Out Manure Day” (Yi Fei). Families clean their toilets because the God of Toilets is said to come and inspect the cleanliness of the household.

In an agricultural society, before modern plumbing, Chinese farmers would have someone clean the manure pit every three to five days. The sixth day was designated for this task. (And yes, it always stinks when you have to clean the manure pit.)


It's National Margarita Day. Margarita, in Spanish means Daisy





Remember, because of today's blizzard, you probably don't have work tomorrow - celebrate responsibly.


February 22, 1934 -
Frank Capra's romantic comedy It Happened One Night, starring Clark Gable and Claudette Colbert, premiered at Radio City Music Hall on this date.



Clark Gable gave the Oscar he won for his performance in this movie to a child who admired it, telling him it was the winning of the statue that had mattered, not owning it. The child returned the Oscar to the Gable family after Clark's death.


February 22, 1935 -
The Fox Film Corporation film, The Little Colonel, starring Shirley Temple, Lionel Barrymore and Bill Robinson, premiered in the US on this date. The film featured the famous stair dance sequence, making Shirley Temple and Bill Robinson Hollywood's first interracial dance couple. This scene was cut when the film played in the southern United States.



Shirley Temple memorized every line of dialogue in this movie, and while filming a scene with Lionel Barrymore, the veteran actor forgot a line. When Temple prompted him, Barrymore flew into a such a rage that one crew member took Temple away for fear that Barrymore might harm her. He later apologized to her, and they remained friends for many years.


February 22, 1956 -
Elvis Presley's song Heartbreak Hotel debuted on the Billboard pop chart at No. 68, on this date.





Mae Axton, a Nashville songwriter who wrote the music for Heartbreak Hotel, was living in Jacksonville when this song was written. She got a local country singer named Glenn Reeves to do the demo for Elvis, who did the demo the way he thought Elvis would do it. Elvis liked it, and did it exactly that way.


February 22, 1956 -
The film widely considered the worst film produced by a major studio in the 50s, The Conqueror, directed by Dick Powell and starring John Wayne as Genghis Khan, Susan Hayward, Agnes Moorehead, and Pedro Armendáriz, premiered in the US on this date.



The film was shot downwind from a nuclear test site and is considered the cause of cancer and death of many of the cast and crew.


February 22, 1977 -
The single New Kid in Town, the first release from the album Hotel California, was the Eagles' first to be certified gold for selling more than 1 million copies on this date.



Glen Frey mentioned in an interview at the time that the song was about Steely Dan whom the band saw as a new and upcoming group that was possibly taking over the spotlight from the Eagles (there has been some dispute as to whether or not Glen Frey was joking.) Given that the two bands shared a manager (Irving Azoff) and that the Eagles proclaimed their admiration for Steely Dan, this was more friendly rivalry than feud.


February 22, 2001 -
Mira Nair's wonderful Monsoon Wedding, opened in both Los Angeles and New York on this date. (if you don't already know it, Ms. Nair is the mother of the mayor of New York City, Zohran Mamdani.)



A large portion of the original footage (including the wedding itself) was ruined by an airport x-ray machine. The scenes had to be re-shot, when additional funds had been raised to do so, some months later.


Another album from the discount bin at The ACME Record Shoppe


Today in History:
Associate with men of good quality if you esteem your own reputation; for it is better to be alone than in bad company - George Washington

Young George Washington was born on February 11, 1731 (or so he thought.)



Unfortunately for him, England had been tenaciously clinging onto the Julian calendar - they wanted none of that Papist Gregorian calendar crap. But England finally wanted to get with the times, so in 1752, Parliament adopted the Gregorian calendar. Many prominent colonists supported the new system; including Benjamin Franklin and George Washington. Washington updated his own birthday from the old February 11th to the Gregorian February 22.



But wait, there's more - the calendar switch of 1752 included another significant change. Under the Julian system, the year began on March 25. That means a colonist who went to bed on March 24, 1700, would wake up on March 25, 1701. The new Gregorian rules set the start of the year to January 1st. This created some confusion, since anyone who was born between January 1st and March 25th in the old system would have the wrong birth year in the new one - thus George's new birthday was February 22, 1732.



So you have to wish the Father of Our Country birthday greetings for the third time this month.



Much heavy drinking ensued.


On February 22, 1862, Jefferson Davis was officially inaugurated for a six-year term as the President of the Confederate States of America in Richmond, Virginia.

He was previously inaugurated as a provisional president on February 18, 1861.

I guess his mother was proud of him.


February 22, 1902 -
Sen. Elizabeth Warren pours herself a cold one somewhere, opining the events that occurred on this date

After years of souring relations between the two Democrats from South Carolina, Sen. John McLaurin took to the Senate floor on this date and claimed that his state’s senior senator, “Pitchfork Ben” Tillman, had spread a “willful, malicious and deliberate lie” about him. Tillman, who was standing nearby, then “spun around and punched McLaurin squarely in the jaw,” according to an official write-up of the incident on the Senate webpage.

“The chamber exploded in pandemonium as members struggled to separate both members of the South Carolina delegation,” it continues. The Senate later adopted Rule 19, after voting to censure both South Carolinians over the incident. The obscure rule has so infrequently been invoked that several media sources could only find two previous votes on this question in the history of the Senate -- on January 29, 1915, and April 21, 1952, until the good senator was herself censured on February 8, 2017, for impugned Jeff Session's character.


February 22, 1925 -
I just kind of conjured them up out of my subconscious and put them in order of ascending peculiarity.



The gothic illustrator and professed 'child hater' Edward St. John Gorey was spawned on this date.


February 22, 1974 -
A failed assassination attempt on President Nixon took place on this date. Samuel Joseph Byck, an unemployed tire salesman, attempted to hijack a plane and crash it into the White House to kill President Nixon.



When police stormed the plane, he committed suicide. No one else was injured, and Nixon was unaffected, although he did resign several months later.


February 22, 1980 -
During the XIII Olympic Winter Games in Lake Placid, New York, the United States hockey team defeats the Soviet Union hockey team 4-3 on this date.



It is considered to be one of the greatest upsets in sports history (the Miracle on Ice.)


February 22, 1987 -
Andy Warhol died of complications after gallbladder surgery, though the details are hazy. The official cause was listed as cardiac arrhythmia, but speculation includes his fear of hospitals as well as possible Cefoxitin allergy. Mr. Warhol is best known for painting pictures of Campbell's Soup cans and Marilyn Monroe, although never together.



Warhol's death brings him a bonus 15 minutes of fame.



His work can be seen in museums and galleries around the world to this very day.



Campbell's Soup cans can still be found in the canned goods section of your favorite supermarket to this very day.


February 22, 1994 -
CIA agent Aldrich Ames and his wife were charged by the United States Department of Justice with spying for the Soviet Union on this date.



Somehow by 1989 Ames had acquired the unexplained wealth from his spying and did very little to conceal the spying, he somehow managed to evade being caught for five more years.


February 22, 1997 -
The first cloning of an advanced mammal, a sheep known as Dolly, was announced in the news media, on this date. Dolly, actually born on July 5, 1996, was cloned from a mammary cell -



Dolly was purportedly named after Dolly Parton.

I guess that's a compliment.


February 22, 2002 -
Charles Martin Chuck Jones, director of many of the classic short animated cartoons starring Bugs Bunny, Daffy Duck, the Road Runner and Wile E. Coyote, died on this date.



At 85, Chuck signed a long-term contract with Warner Bros. to supervise the animation department. His thoughts on the contract were: "At 85 you can only think ahead for the next 50 years or so."




And so it goes.