Quote of the day :
All the mistakes I ever made were when I wanted to say ‘No’ and said ‘Yes’.
~ Moss Hart (US playwright and theatre director)
Picture of the day :
I like this. I saw it on Pinterest and followed it back to Twitter. This clever advertising was spotted by @ABlakeley Andrew Blakeley and posted on Twitter on 22 May 12, though he tells me he didn’t take it himself. His tweet read,
This is my new favourite way of dealing with negative feedback. pic.twitter.com/wezJGClX
The sign reads: "Come in and try the worst meatball sandwich that one guy on Yelp ever had in his life"
As Michael Heppell would say, that’s Brilliant.
Youtube video of the day :
Here’s ‘Walking In A Winter Wonderland’ by Dean Martin
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lkFP0VwpPRY&feature=player_detailpage]
On this day…
Born today :
- Actress, Jenny Agutter
- Author and screenwriter, Peter May
- Composer, musician, sound engineer and producer, Alan Parsons
- Physicist, David Bohm
- Physicist, Robert J. Van de Graaff (1901)
- Businessman, Harvey Samuel Firestone
- Music hall comedian and pantomime dame, Dan Leno
(born as born George Wild Galvin in 1860) - King, John III of Sweden
- Singer, Chris Robinson
- Singer, Anita Ward
- Drummer and vocalist, Peter Criss (Kiss)
- Musician, singer and songwriter, Billy Bragg
- TV presenter, Lesley Judd (Blue Peter)
- Actor, John Spencer
- Actress, singer, JoJo
- Actress, Irene Dunne
- Journalist, Max Lerner
When you choose the lesser of two evils, always remember that it is still an evil.
- … and a lot of footballers and basketball players were born today, which is interesting, given one of the days trends.
Also on this day in history
General Vespasian, a career soldier, became Emperor of Rome in AD 69, the fourth in a year after Nero did his fiddler on the burning roof routine. The first three, Galba, Otho and the glutenous Vitellius all coming to a sticky end. Titus Flavius Caesar Vespasianus Augustus, using his full name, is the one that had the Flavian Amphitheatre built, better known now as the Roman Colosseum.
1192. Richard the Lionheart, on his way back from the crusades and signing a treaty with Saladin, was captured near Vienna and imprisoned by Leopold V of Austria – who got himself excommunicated by Pope Celestine III for detaining a crusader. He was subsequently passed to Henry VI, Holy Roman Emperor (also excommunicated), who demanded a 150,000 marks* ransom. Funnily enough, the French and his brother John offered 60,000 marks if Henry would keep him instead!
*( That’s 65,000lb (32.5 tonnes) of silver, so just over a million ounces, worth about $25 million in the current market – but that was $25 million a thousand years ago… and Wikipedia puts that at 2 or 3 times the annual income of the country at the time. Put in modern terms (and out of context) that’s like someone grabbing David Cameron (or if you prefer, President Obama) on his way home from the UN and asking $6 trillion for his safe return. How much? Ptt, keep him!
This next one is funny – in 1820 the state of Missouri imposed a $1 tax on bachelors.
In 1848 Bonaparte returned to power in France. Not the Bonaparte, but his nephew, Prince Louis Bonaparte. (Napoleon’s brother was the King of Holland). Earlier in the year, after an uprising, King Louis-Philippe legged it for healthier climates, presumably one with less pitchforks and flaming torches. Largely over unemployment, months of mayhem and rebellion followed, only to but brutally suppressed by yet another Louis (General Louis-Eugene Cavaignac).
In a move typical of modern politics, from his safe seat in Britain, the exiled Louis, who was fluent in German, Spanish, French, English and Italian, had his name put in for by-elections and romped in with 5.5 million votes. Because he was beloved? No – because "Most of these knew little about politics and less about most of the candidates, but one thing they recognised was the name Napoleon". Having got his foot in the door, he campaigned for and won, becoming President of France. It should be noted that having got to the highest position in the land Napoleon III cemented it three years later by violating his oath and making himself dictator because he didn’t want to step down from power.
Britain’s longest established restaurant chain began this day in 1928 when Harry Ramsden started his chippy in a hut at Guiseley, near Bradford, West Yorkshire. The original hut still stands, while next to it is the companies main restaurant. Officially the largest and most famous fish and chip shop in the world, it seats 250 people at a time and serves nearly a million customers a year. It’s changed hands a few times and expanded a bit in the past 75 years or so and now Harry Ramsden’s has 28 fish’n’chip outlets across the UK.
It was only as recently as 1955 that Cardiff was proclaimed the capital city of Wales, in a letter by the then Home Secretary Gwilym Lloyd George. Caernarfon, which was considered the earlier capital by some, also applied to become the Welsh capital, but failed in the bid. Before that, the nearest historic capital Wales could claim is the market town of Machynlleth which, in 1404, was the seat of Owain Glyndŵr’s Welsh Parliament, but it has never been officially recognised as such.
In 1957 Elvis Presley was called up to join the US army.
Trending at this moment:
On Twitter is news of a roof cave-in last night during a performance of "The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time" at the Apollo Theatre, London. Fortunately no-one was killed, though a large number were reported injured, some seriously.
On a lighter note, #KobevsMessi went viral. Didn’t mean anything to me but it’s worth a mention. It’s a promotional video for Turkish Airlines and features two American sport stars, basketball player Kobe Bryant and footballer Lionel Messi trying to outdo each others selfie. When I looked at the Youtube clip earlier it had a staggering 132 million views!
Kobe vs. Messi: The Selfie Shootout
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jhFqSlvbKAM&feature=player_detailpage]
