It was great foresight on the part of our beloved city forefathers to lay out the city in such a way that this happens every year just around my birthday.
Once again, the sun will be perfectly lined up with the east-west streets of New York.
So get outside to catch the 'Full Sun on the Grid' at 8:20 pm ET and enjoy it. (You can see it one more time tomorrow night but it might be cloudy. )
ACME would like to issue this public service announcement concerning Brain Freeze (also known as sphenopalatine ganglioneuralgia) -
Why bring this up? The date today is 7/11 (at least in this country. Foreigners and other degenerates refer to the day as 11/7 but that's another story...)
July 11, 1936 -
The Looney Tunes short, Porky's Pet, directed by Jack King, and starring Porky Pig, was released on this date.
A sign in the station invites travellers to stop at the Millar Manor, a nod to the short's writer, Marvin Millar.
July 11, 1942 -
A classic 40s Merrie Melodies cartoon, Bugs Bunny Gets the Boid was released on this date.
The part where Bugs and Killer are temporarily fooled into thinking that the bones are theirs is a reference to a Harold Lloyd film, The Freshman.
July 11, 1942 -
The Looney Tunes short, Wacky Blackout, directed by Bob Clampett, was released on this date.
Thurl Ravenscourt, who would go on to bring cereal mascot Tony the Tiger to TV screens everywhere, is featured here, along with the future Betty Rubble, Bea Benaderet.
July 11, 1965 -
One of the 60s best Beach movies, Beach Blanket Bingo opened today.
In the scene where Don Rickles is doing his comedy routine, everyone in the club is laughing, except Buster Keaton (who can be seen in the background) indicating that he didn't think Rickles was particularly funny (and didn't realize he was in view of the camera).
July 11, 1969 -
The Rolling Stones released Honky Tonk Women on this date.
In this song, Mick Jagger sings about having a go with two different honky tonk women. The first is a "gin-soaked, bar-room queen in Memphis" - likely a prostitute. The second is a "divorcée in New York City." Jagger would sometimes introduce it as being "a song for all the whores in the audience."
July 11, 1969 -
Co-incidentally, David Bowie, released his single Space Oddity, supposedly in conjunction with the July 20th Apollo 11 moon landing, on this date.
In 1980, Bowie released a follow-up to this called Ashes To Ashes, where Major Tom once again makes contact with Earth. He says he is happy in space, but Ground Control comes to the conclusion that he is a junkie.
July 11, 1970 -
Three Dog Night started a two-week run at No.1 in the US with their version of the Randy Newman song Mama Told Me Not To Come, which was also a No.3 hit in the UK.
The song was first covered by Eric Burdon on his first solo album in 1966 and gave Tom Jones & Stereophonics a No.4 hit on the UK Singles Chart in 2000.
July 11, 1983 -
Reading Rainbow, hosted by Levar Burton premiered on PBS on this date
While developing the show, the creators of Reading Rainbow met with Fred Rogers and Joan Ganz Cooney of Sesame Street and The Electric Company fame to find out how to make more engaging television programming.
July 11, 1990 -
For some reason 20th Century Fox released The Adventures of Ford Fairlane directed by Renny Harlin and starring Andrew Dice Clay, on this date. The film was both a commercial and critical failure.
Billy Idol was cast as Smiley, but had to pull out of the role after a nearly-fatal motorcycle accident. Renny Harlin personally asked Robert Englund, who had previously worked with him on A Nightmare on Elm Street 4: The Dream Master, to take over the role after Idol's accident.
July 11, 1997 -
The under-rated Robert Zemeckis Sci-Fi film (based on a Carl Sagan novel,) Contact, starring Jodie Foster, Matthew McConaughey, James Woods, Tom Skerritt, John Hurt, Angela Bassett, Rob Lowe, and David Morse, opened on this date.
The remark made throughout the movie by different characters, that if humans were the only life in the universe, it would "be a terrible waste of space", is a famous quote by author Carl Sagan. It references a statement by the Scottish essayist Thomas Carlyle, considering the potential worlds of other stars; "A sad spectacle. If they be inhabited, what a scope for misery and folly. If they be not inhabited, what a waste of space."
Today in History:
July 11, 1533 –
The Church of England came into being on this date. The story of its origins is shrouded in sex and therefore historically important.
Henry VIII ascended to the English throne in 1509, an energetic young man of seventeen. He immediately decided he needed a male heir. This became the enduring theme of his reign, and he consequently came to be known as the Son King—or, to his detractors, the Heir Head.
Henry was such a devout Catholic that he earned the title Defender of the Faith without even stepping into the ring. His first wife, whom he'd married before becoming king, was Catherine of Aragon, who earned the nickname "Catherine of Aragon." Catherine made an excellent queen until she failed to produce a son, at which point her job performance was reevaluated.
By the 1530s, Henry had decided he was married to the wrong queen. Now around forty, he did what many middle-aged men do - he got himself a convertible couch and a new wife.
The couch caused no controversy. The new wife, however, required official permission from the Pope, who - being Catholic - declined to authorize a divorce.
Henry divorced Catherine anyway, and on July 11, 1533, the Catholic Church effectively seceded from the Church of England in retaliation.
With the Pope having stormed off, Henry appointed himself head of the Church of England. Still the Defender of the Faith, he penned the Act of Supremacy, a bold legal document proving that the Church of England was better than the Catholic Church, that Henry was better than the Pope, and that a single white king was back on the market.
Sir Thomas More, then Lord Chancellor and one of Henry's closest confidants, refused to swear to the Act of Supremacy. On July 6, 1535, he was promoted to the rank of Sir Thomas Somewhat Less.
From this point forward, Henry began marrying and divorcing women on a near-sporting basis. The divorce process was now much more efficient, having removed the pesky bottleneck of papal approval. In fact, Henry turned the whole affair into a kind of royal game: each wife would be blindfolded and asked to produce a male heir.
This practice came to be known as Bluff King Hal, and centuries later it served as the inspiration for the popular French game Hungry Hungry Guillotine.
July 11 1804 -
Former Treasury Secretary Alexander Hamilton and sitting Vice President Aaron Burr duel in Weehawken, New Jersey after Hamilton allegedly slandered Burr during a political dinner in New York. Hamilton was shot in the liver and died the next day.
Meanwhile, Burr lives on to finish his term in office and is eventually tried for treason after attempting to raise an army and seize land for himself, either in Mexico or the Louisiana Territory., but that's another story.
July 11, 1859 -
Charles Dickens' novel, A Tale of Two Cities was published on this date.
The book, would become the best-selling, original English language novel of all time, with more than 200 million copies sold.
July 11, 1893 -
Japanese businessman Kokichi Mikimoto perfected his technique for creating hemispherical cultured pearls, producing the world's first cultured pearl on this day.
In the next 12 years, he would hone his technique, making spherical pearls that were indistinguishable from the perfect specimens rarely found in nature.
July 11, 1936 -
The Triborough Bridge in New York City was opened to traffic, on this date.
Built at the height of the Great Depression, the creation of the Triborough Bridge put thousands of struggling people to work. It also was New York City's first bridge specifically designed for automobiles.
July 11, 1937 -
I want to say at once that I frankly believe that Irving Berlin is the greatest songwriter that has ever lived.... His songs are exquisite cameos of perfection, and each one of them is as beautiful as its neighbor. Irving Berlin remains, I think, America's Schubert.
Jacob Gershowitz, one of the greatest writers of the American songbook, died of a brain tumor at age 38 in Beverly Hills, California on this date.
July 11, 1960 -
The novel To Kill a Mockingbird, written by Harper Lee (the book is her only published work, until recently) was published, on this date.
The novel quickly became a classic and won the Pulitzer Prize for Literature in 1961.
July 11, 1979 -
The derelict space station Skylab finally returned to Earth, ignominiously breaking into 500 separate fragments which are swallowed by the Indian Ocean. That was, except for the ones which crashed into Woorlba Sheep Station, near Balladonia in Western Australia.
Shortly thereafter, President Jimmy Carter telephoned the prime minister of that country to apologized for scattering NASA litter on his nation.
Oops. (Leading up to the event, Electric Light Orchestra took out ads in trade magazines dedicating their new single, Don't Bring Me Down, to Skylab.)
July 11, 1997 -
Bodybuilder and wannabe actor Jonathan Norman was arrested for trespassing on Steven Spielberg's estate in Malibu, California on this date. Believing that the film director "wanted to be raped," Norman had brought along a kit containing handcuffs, duct tape, nipple clamps, chloroform, and a stun gun.
And so it goes.
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