It is wisdom to believe the heart. – George Santayana
FOR TODAY – AUGUST 22nd – MONDAY
234th day of 2011 with 131 to follow.
Holidays for Today:
*National Spumoni Day
*Eat a Peach Day
*Be an Angel Day
*National Tooth Fairy Day – and/or February 28
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TODAY IN BIRTHDAYS:
- 1647 Denis Papin, Chitenay, physicist and inventor , best known for his pioneering invention of the steam digester, the forerunner of the steam engine and of the pressure cooker
- 1811 William Kelly, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, inventor (converting iron to steel, Kelly & Company)
- 1834 Samuel Pierpont Langley, Roxbury, Maine, astronomer, physicist, inventor (bolometer), aviation pioneer
- 1836 Archibald M Willard, Bedford, Ohio, artist (Spirit of ’76)
- 1860 Paul Gottlieb Nipkow, Poland, German inventor, the “spiritual father” of the core element of first generation television technology(Nipkow disk)
- 1867 Maximilian Bircher-Benner, Swiss physician and nutritionist (invented muesli cereal)
- 1920 Dr Denton Cooley, Houston, Texas, heart surgeon (1st artificial heart transplant)
- 1920 Ray Bradbury, Waukegan, Illinois, sci-fi author (Fahrenheit 451, Illustrated Man)
- 1934 Norman Schwarzkopf, Trenton, New Jersey, US General (Liberated Kuwait from Iraq)
1935 E. Annie Proulx, Norwich, Connecticut, author (Brokeback Mountain) - 1940 Valerie Harper, Suffern NY, actress (Mary Tyler Moore Show, Rhoda, Valerie)
- 1947 Cindy Williams, Van Nuys, California, actress (American Graffiti, Shirley in Laverne & Shirley )
- 1947 Donna Godchaux, Florence, Alabama, singer (Grateful Dead)
- 1965 Courtney Gains, Los Angeles, California, actor (Children of the Corn, Hardbodies, Lust in the Dust, Back to the Future, Can’t Buy Me Love, Colors, The ‘Burbs, Memphis Belle )
- 1967 Ty Burrell, Grants Pass, Oregon, actor (Modern Family )
- 1972 Paul Doucette, North Huntington, Pennsylvania, drummer (Matchbox 20)
- 1973 Howie Dorough, Orlando, Florida, singer (Backstreet Boys)
- 1978 Jeff Stinco, Montréal, Québec, Canada, musician (Simple Plan)
- 1979 Brandon Quintin Adams, Topeka, Kansas, actor (Mighty Ducks, The Sandlot )
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No matter how bad things get, you got to go on living, even if it kills you. – Sholom Aleichem
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HAPPENED THIS DAY IN HISTORY:
- 565 St. Columba reported seeing monster in Loch Ness (first known written account of monster).
- 1654 Jacob Barsimson arrives in New Amsterdam. He is the first known Jewish immigrant to America.
- 1831 Nat Turner’s slave rebellion commences just after midnight in Southampton, Virginia, leading to the deaths of more than 50 whites and several hundred African Americans who are killed in retaliation for the uprising.
- 1848 The United States annexes New Mexico.
- 1851 The first America’s Cup is won by the yacht America.
- 1864 12 nations sign the First Geneva Convention. The Red Cross is formed.
- 1865 First patent for liquid soap issued to William Sheppard of New York City.
- 1902 Theodore Roosevelt becomes the first President of the United States to ride in an automobile.
- 1911 Mona Lisa is stolen.
- 1926 Gold is discovered in Johannesburg, South Africa.
- 1932 The BBC first experiments with television broadcasting.
- 1950 Althea Gibson becomes the first black competitor in international tennis.
- 1963 American Joe Walker in an X-15 test plane reaches an altitude of 106 km (66 mi).
- 1985 Manchester Air Disaster sees 55 people killed when a fire breaks out on a commercial aircraft at Manchester Airport.
- 1989 The first ring of Neptune is discovered.
- 1996 Bill Clinton signs welfare reform into law, representing major shift in US welfare policy.
- 2003 Alabama Chief Justice Roy Moore was suspended after refusing to comply with a federal court order to remove a rock inscribed with the Ten Commandments from the lobby of the Alabama Supreme Court building.
- 2004 A version of The Scream and Madonna, two paintings by Edvard Munch, are stolen at gunpoint from a museum in Oslo, Norway.
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And Adam said, ”Lord, when I was in the garden, you walked with me everyday. Now I do not see you anymore. I am lonesome here and it is difficult for me to remember how much you love me.”
And God said, ”No problem! I will create a companion for you that will bewith you forever and who will be a reflection of my love for you, so that you will know I love you, even when you cannot see me. Regardless of how selfish and childish and unlovable you may be, this new companion will accept you as you are and will love you as I do, in spite of yourself.”
And God created a new animal to be a companion for Adam. And it was a good animal. And God was pleased.
And the new animal was pleased to be with Adam and he wagged his tail. And Adam said, ”But Lord, I have already named all the animals in the Kingdom and all the good names are taken and I cannot think of a name for this new animal.”
And God said, ”No problem! Because I have created this new animal to be a reflection of my love for you, his name will be a reflection of my own name, and you will call him DOG.”
And Dog lived with Adam and was a companion to him and loved him. And Adam was comforted. And God was pleased. And Dog was content and wagged his tail.
After a while, it came to pass that Adam’s guardian angel came to the Lord and said, ”Lord, Adam has become filled with pride. He struts and preens like a peacock and he believes he is worthy of adoration. Dog has indeed taught him that he is loved, but no one has taught him humility.”
And the Lord said, ”No problem! I will create for him a companion who will be with him forever and who will see him as he is. The companion will remind him of his limitations, so he will know that he is not worthy of adoration.”
And God created CAT to be a companion to Adam. And Cat would not obey Adam.
And when Adam gazed into Cat’s eyes, he was reminded that he was not the supreme being. And Adam learned humility.
And God was pleased. And Adam was greatly improved. And Dog wagged his tail.
And Cat did not care one way or the other.
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A farmer’s wife was terribly jealous. Evening after evening, she subjected her husband to a searching inspection. When she would find even a single hair on his coat, there would be a terrible scene! One night, she found nothing.
”So” she screamed, ”Now it’s a bald-headed woman!”
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PUNNY ONE-LINERS :
- Two fish were in a tank. One of the fish asks the other, “Can you drive this thing?”
- Did you hear about the two baby inkdrops? They missed their mother. They were waiting for her to get out of the pen. They didn’t know how long the sentence would be.
- A Buhddist walked up to a hot dog vendor and said, “Make me one with everything.”
- Two mice were enjoying a Thanksgiving dinner when one of the mice said, “Mmmm, this is gouda!”
-Two peanuts were walking through a park when thy were assaulted.
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Meyer, a lonely widower, was walking home along Delancy Street one day wishing something wonderful would happen in his life, when he passed a pet store and heard a squawking voice shouting out in Yiddish, “Quawwwwk…vus machts du?”
Meyer rubbed his eyes and ears. Couldn’t believe it. Perfect Yiddish.
The proprietor urged him, “Come in here, fella, and check out this parrot…”
Meyer did. An African Grey cocked his little head and said: “Vus? Kenst sprechen Yiddish?”
In a matter of moments, Meyer had placed five hundred dollars on the counter and carried the parrot in his cage away with him. All night he talked with the parrot. In Yiddish. He told the parrot about his father’s adventures coming to America . About how beautiful his late wife, Sarah, was when she was a young bride. About his family. About his years of working in the garment district. About Florida.
The parrot listened and commented.
They shared some walnuts.
The parrot told him of living in the pet store, how lonely he would get on the weekends. They both went to sleep.
Next morning, Meyer began to put on his tefillin, all the while saying his prayers. The parrot demanded to know what he was doing and when Meyer explained, the parrot wanted to do the same. Meyer went out and had a miniature set of tefillin handmade for the parrot.
The parrot wanted to learn to daven and learned every prayer. He even wanted to learn to read Hebrew.
So Meyer spent weeks and months, sitting and teaching the parrot, teaching him Torah. In time, Meyer came to love and count on the parrot as a friend and fellow Jew.
One morning, on Rosh Hashanah, Meyer rose and got dressed and was about to leave when the parrot demanded to go with him. Meyer explained that Shul was not a place for a bird, but the parrot made a terrific argument, so Meyer relented and carried the bird to Shul on his shoulder.
Needless to say, they made quite a spectacle, and Meyer was questioned by everyone, including the Rabbi and the Cantor. They refused to allow a bird into the building on the High Holy Days, but Meyer persuaded them to let him in this one time, swearing that the parrot could daven. Wagers were made with Meyer.
Thousands of dollars were bet that the parrot could NOT daven, could not speak Yiddish or Hebrew, etc.
All eyes were on the African Grey during services. The parrot perched on Meyer’s shoulder as one prayer and song passed – Meyer heard not a peep from the bird. He began to become annoyed, slapping at his shoulder and mumbling under his breath, “Daven!”
Nothing.
“Daven…parrot, you can daven, so daven…come on, everyone is looking at you!”
Nothing.
After Rosh Hashanah services were concluded, Meyer found that he owed his Shul buddies and the Rabbi over four thousand dollars..
He marched home, so upset he said nothing to the parrot.
Finally several blocks from the Shul the Parrot began to sing an old Yiddish song, as happy as a lark.
Meyer stopped and looked at him.
“Why? After I had tefillin made for you and taught you the morning prayers, and taught you to read Hebrew and the Torah. And after you begged me to bring you to Shul on Rosh Hashana, why? WHY?!? Why did you do this to me?”
“Meyer, don’t be a schmuck,” the parrot replied. “Think of the odds we’ll get on Yom Kippur!”
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pic of the day: Parasailers at Pensacola Beach, Florida
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A businessman boarded a plane to find, sitting next to him, an elegant woman wearing the largest, most stunning diamond ring he had ever seen. He asked her about it. “This is the Klopman diamond,” she said. “It is beautiful, but there is a terrible curse that goes with it.”
“What’s the curse?” the man asked.
“Mr. Klopman.”
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Six guys were playing poker when Smith loses $500 on a single hand, clutches his chest and drops dead at the table. Showing respect for their fallen comrade, the other five complete their playing time standing up.
Roberts looks around and asks, “Now, who is going to tell the wife?”
They draw straws. Rippington, who is always a loser, picks the short one.
They tell him to be discreet, be gentle, don’t make a bad situation any worse than it is.
“Gentlemen! Discreet? I’m the most discreet man you will ever meet. Discretion is my middle name, leave it to me.”
Rippington walks over to the Smith house, knocks on the door, the wife answers, asks what he wants.
Rippington says, “Your husband just lost $500 playing cards.”
She hollers, “TELL HIM TO DROP DEAD!”
Rippington says, “I’ll tell him.”
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WARNING! ENTERING THE PUN ZONE!
There was a snail who went to a car dealership one day. The dealer came out and asked “How can I help you?”
“Well,” says the snail, “I want a car, but not just any car. I want it to be the fastest car you have.”
“Okay,” the dealer replied, “Anything else?”
“Yes,” the snail said. “Could you paint it green with bright yellow S’s on it?”
“Um, okay. It will be ready by next week. Come get it then.”
“Great,” said the snail and he left.
The following week, the snail returned and was overjoyed to see his bright green new car with yellow S’s on it. The dealer looked at him and said “Just one question. Why did you want our fastest car painted bright green car with S’s on it?”
The snail replied, “So that when people are walking down the street, they will turn and look and say ‘Look at that S car go!!!’”
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Boss, to four of his employees: ”I’m really sorry, but I’m going to have to let one of you go.”
Black Employee: ”I’m a protected minority.”
Female Employee: ”And I’m a woman.”
Oldest Employee: ”Fire me, buster, and I’ll hit you with an age discrimination suit so fast it’ll make your head spin.”
…To which they all turn to look at the helpless young, white, male employee, who thinks a moment, then responds: ”I think I might be gay…
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Nine-year-old Joey was asked by his mother what he had learned in Sunday School. “Well, Mom, our teacher told us how God sent Moses behind enemy lines on a rescue mission to lead the Israelites out of Egypt. When he got to the Red Sea, he had his engineers build a pontoon bridge, and all the people walked across safely. He used his walkie-talkie to radio headquarters and call in an air strike. They sent in bombers to blow up the bridge and all the Israelites were saved.”
“Now, Joey, is that REALLY what your teacher taught you?” his mother asked.
“Well, no, Mom, but if I told it the way the teacher did, you’d never believe it!”
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TODAY IN TRIVIA: A teaching on TEETH!
~Baby first teeth usually appear in on the top front. They start appearing as soon as a baby reaches 6 or 7 months old.
~A child will more often than not have 20 teeth by age 2.
~At 7, a child will usually lose its first tooth.
~A famous man did not have teeth made out of wood, but he did have teeth made out if hippopotamus teeth. He also had teeth made out of ivory, lead, human teeth, and cow and sheep’s teeth. Want to know who is he? GEORGE WASHINGSTON is his name.
~The hardest thing in your body is the enamel on your teeth.
~Mammals have two types of teeth, the primary teeth and the permanent teeth.
~Your teeth started forming before you were born.
~The bristles of toothbrushes in the beginning were made from the hair of hogs and cows.
~The actual name for baby teeth is milk teeth.
~A Chinese dentist once built a tower out of 28,000 human teeth.
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LIFE LESSON: Hard work spotlights the character of people. Some turn up their sleeves. Some turn up their noses, and some don’t turn up at all. – Sam Ewing
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QUIP OF THE DAY: Everyone thinks of changing the world, but no one thinks of changing himself. – Tolstoy
THAT’S (ALMOST) ALL FOLKS!
THE LAST WORD: Risk more than others think is safe. Care more than others think is wise. Dream more than others think is practical. Expect more than others think is possible. – Cadet Maxim
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