Motley Moose – Archive

Since 2008 – Progress Through Politics

The Daily F Bomb, Monday 12/23/13

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Interrogatories

When you go to sleep on the night before Christmas, are those visions of sugarplums dancing in your head, or something else? What?

Have you ever been discriminated against on the job by an employer?

It’s National Roots Day. Tell me about your roots. Are they in need of a touch up? Perhaps they are invasive and getting into the plumbing. Perhaps you are spending too much time on ancestry.com? Or maybe there is a team you are rooting for?

Did you ever, in your life, get addicted to a soap opera?

The Twitter Emitter

On This Day

In 1788 , Maryland voted to cede a 100-square-mile area of swampland for the seat of the national government. About two-thirds of the area became the District of Columbia.

In 1823, _ A Visit from St. Nicholas_, also known as The Night Before Christmas, was published anonymously. It is attributed to Clement Clarke Moore, though some think it may have been authored by Henry Livingston, Jr.

In 1913, the Federal Reserve Act was signed into law by President Woodrow Wilson, which created the Federal Reserve.

In 1919, the Sex Disqualification (Removal) Act 1919 became law in the UK. This removed the ability in many fields to disqualify women solely on the basis of their sex.

In 1954, the first successful kidney transplant was performed by J. Hartwell Harrison, M.D. and Joseph E. Murray. (Science!)

In 1977, Cat Stevens converted to Islam and changed his name to Yusuf Islam.

Born on This Day

1727 – Pieter Jan van Liender, Dutch draftsman and painter (d. 1779)

1790 – Alexandre-Jean Dubois-Drahonet, French painter (d. 1834)

1805 – Joseph Smith, Jr., American religious leader (d. 1844)

1858 – Andrea Tavernier, Italian (d. 1932)

photo AndreaTavernier.jpg

1867 – Madam C.J. Walker, African-American philanthropist and makeup tycoon who made her fortune creating makeup for black women. (d. 1919)

1897 – Julien Carette, French actor (d. 1966)

photo JulienCarette.jpg

1885 – Pierre Brissaud, French illustrator (d. 1964)

photo PierreBrissaud.jpg

1891 – Alexandr Rodchenko, Russian painter and photographer (d. 1956)

photo AlexandrRodchenko.jpg

1903 – Fredi Washington, African-American actress and civil rights activist. (d. 1994)

1911 – James Gregory, American actor (d. 2002)

1918 – Helmut Schmidt, Chancellor of Germany

1918 – José Greco, Italian-born flamenco dancer (d. 2001)

1929 – Chet Baker, American jazz trumpet player (d. 1988)

1931 – Ronnie Schell, American actor

1935 – Paul Hornung, American football player

1935 – Esther Phillips, American singer (d. 1984)

1936 – Frederic Forrest, American actor

1940 – Jorma Kaukonen, American musician (Jefferson Airplane, Hot Tuna)

1940 – Eugene Record, American singer (The Chi-Lites) (d. 2005)

1941 – Tim Hardin, American musician (d. 1980)

1943 – Harry Shearer, American actor

1944 – Wesley Clark, American military officer

1949 – Adrian Belew, American musician (King Crimson)

1952 – William Kristol, clueless American political commentator

1958 – Victoria Williams, singer/songwriter

1964 – Eddie Vedder, American musician (Pearl Jam)

1967 – Carla Bruni, Italian-French model and singer and French first lady

Died on This Day

1230 – Berengaria of Navarre, queen of Richard I of England

1615 – Bartolomeo Schedoni, Italian baroque painter (b. 1578)

1840 – Henri Elouis, French painter of miniatures (b. 1755)

1910 – Thérèse Schwartze, Dutch painter (b. 1851)

photo The3010re3000seSchwartze.jpg

1912 – Édouard Détaille, French Academic painter of military scenes (b. 1848)

photo E3010douardDe3010taille.jpg

1932 – Giuseppe Signorini, Italian orientalist painter (b. 1857)

photo GiuseppeSignorini.jpg

1939 – Anthony Fokker, Dutch aircraft manufacturer (b. 1890)

1940 – Filipp Malyavin, Russian painter (b. 1869)

photo FilippMalyavin.jpg

1970 – Charles Ruggles, American actor (b. 1886)

photo CharlesRugglesjog.jpg

1973 – Charles Atlas, Italian-born American bodybuilder (b. 1892)

1979 – Peggy Guggenheim, American art collector (b. 1898)

1982 – Jack Webb, American actor, producer, and director (b. 1920)

1992 – Eddie Hazel, American guitarist (Funkadelic) (b. 1950)

2000 – Billy Barty, American actor (b. 1924)

2000 – Victor Borge, Danish-born comedian and pianist (b. 1909)

2007 – Oscar Peterson, Canadian jazz pianist and composer (b. 1925)

Today is

National Pfeffernuesse Day (similar to Russian Tea Cakes, only not)

Festivus

National Bake Day

Roots Day  


Categories: General.

/ 18 Comments

18 comments

  1. Floja Roja

    If you have visions of anything dancing in your head, shouldn’t you seek medical treatment right away? Can voices in your head be far behind?

    The only place I ever felt discriminated against was good old GM, when I worked for a division thereof a long time ago. They really treated women like children. the highest position they could get was branch manager, their ideas were not listened to (but the same ideas from men brought rewards). I’m sure they paid men more, too, but I didn’t have access to that kind of info.

    I just had my roots done a couple of weeks ago, thank you very much. I was rooting around here looking for that old cookbook of my mom’s. Not for root vegetable recipes, though. I can’t find her cheese souffle recipe, and I want to make it for Christmas.

    I used to turn on the TV when I got home from school, so I did watch them, but I never really got addicted. It seemed that you really only had to pay attention on Mondays and Fridays, and the rest of the week very little would happen. Dark Shadows was my favorite afternoon show, it was different (and how) from the rest. Later I got into nighttime soaps. I’d get together every week and watch Dynasty with a group of gay friends. That show was hilarious when it started. Other than that, no. I was an old movie watcher more than a soap watcher.

  2. Gee

    This morning, a guy asked me whether this is winter or spring, it being in the 60s.  But I think the temperature will be diving throughout the day, and Christmas day will be cold enough to satisfy everyone.

    When you go to sleep on the night before Christmas, are those visions of sugarplums dancing in your head, or something else? What?

    Have you ever been discriminated against on the job by an employer?

    It’s National Roots Day. Tell me about your roots. Are they in need of a touch up? Perhaps they are invasive and getting into the plumbing. Perhaps you are spending too much time on ancestry.com? Or maybe there is a team you are rooting for?

    Did you ever, in your life, get addicted to a soap opera?

    I don’t know what those things are.  They may just be floaters.

    No, I don’t think so.

    Those roots do get into the plumbing every spring, in fact.  And I have been spending time on Ancestry.com.  I’ve gone back as far as I can without having to get an upgrade with international documents in it, so I’ve been expanding the tree sideways, filling in distant cousins and such.  Btw, if you’re working on this kind of stuff, Find-a-Grave has become very useful for filling in correct dates, at least in the 19th and 20th centuries.  Not as much before that.

    No.  My mom watched a lot of them, though, and when I was a kid I got to know The Edge of Night and General Hospital a bit.  I don’t know that I’ve ever been addicted to anything on TV, except maybe Deadwood.

  3. JanF

       Is it too ridiculous to pray that we’re close to the end of America’s redneck fetish?

       – ¡socratic! (@socratic) December 20, 2013

    Although the Tweets are funny, the sentiments expressed by Phil “The Blah People Used to  Be So Happy” Robertson are distressing. A little historical context from Ta-Nehisi Coates:

    I am sure Robertson did see plenty of black people who were singing and happy. And I am also sure that very few black people approached Robertson to complain about “doggone white people.” […]

    That is because governance in Phil Robertson’s Louisiana was premised on terrorism. As late as 1890, the majority of people in Louisiana were black. As late as 1902, they still lived under threat of slavery through debt peonage and the convict-lease system. Virtually all of them were pilfered of their vote and their tax dollars. Plunder and second slavery were enforced by violence, as when the besiegers of Colfax massacred 50 black freedmen with rifles and cannon and tossed their bodies into a river. Even today the Colfax Massacre is honored in Louisiana as the rightful “end of carpetbag misrule.”

    The black people who Phil Robertson knew were warred upon. If they valued their lives, and the lives of their families, the last thing they would have done was voiced a complaint about “white people” to a man like Robertson.

    May I say also that I wish there were a way to keep the Sunday pro-football sports tweets out of my stream? A Washington State politician (like many others) seems to think that losing a football game gives you permission to lose your sense of perspective: “”Losing a football game sucks,” Fitzgibbon wrote in the now-deleted tweet, according to the Associated Press. “Losing to a desert racist wasteland sucks a lot.”

    I have some Tweets then I have to go do stuff before I can come back and read the hovers:

    This ties into your Paul Ryan Tweet:

    Have a great day, Floja Roja!!

  4. Gee

    In 1788 , Maryland voted to cede a 100-square-mile area of swampland for the seat of the national government. About two-thirds of the area became the District of Columbia.

    That other 1/3 was from Virginia, but was returned to them.  I dunno why.

  5. Gee

    In 1977, Cat Stevens converted to Islam and changed his name to Yusuf Islam.

    “Oh, baby baby, it’s a wild world,

    So cover you head, there’s a good girl.”

  6. Gee

    1940 – Jorma Kaukonen, American musician (Jefferson Airplane, Hot Tuna)

    Thanks for the video.  I appreciate it!  🙂  And the Eddie Hazel, too.

    Also, my had is off to the “Pest de resistance.”

  7. Gee

    1952 – William Kristol, clueless American political commentator

    Speaking of being continuously wrong without losing enthusiasm!  I’ve seen Jon Stewart take him apart piece by piece.  He seemed absolutely defenseless in the face of facts, and yet he persists in being clueless.

  8. Gee

    1939 – Anthony Fokker, Dutch aircraft manufacturer (b. 1890)

    I knew a little kid who walked into a store that sold model airplane kits and proclaimed loudly, “I want a Fokker!  I want a Fokker!”

  9. JG in MD

    When you go to sleep on the night before Christmas, are those visions of sugarplums dancing in your head, or something else? What?

    Have you ever been discriminated against on the job by an employer?

    It’s National Roots Day. Tell me about your roots. Are they in need of a touch up? Perhaps they are invasive and getting into the plumbing. Perhaps you are spending too much time on ancestry.com? Or maybe there is a team you are rooting for?

    Did you ever, in your life, get addicted to a soap opera?

    When’s Christmas again? I always forget.

    When I was an assistant photo editor I sat next to the photo editor. He ignored me for a year, even communicating by memo. Yes, I was young and weird, but that’s no excuse. I had skillz I didn’t get to use.

    Roots day. I haz roots. They’re so tangled I’ve given up on them. Ancestors, not hair. As for the trees, it’s their branches that block my view, not their roots.

    No soap opera, just Star Trek in all its forms. And Babylon 5, which was underappreciated.

     

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