The Friday Irregular
Volume 9, Number 21 (TFIr #228)  --  4th June 2004

Edited by and copyright ©2004 Simon Lamont

tfir@simonlamont.co.uk


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ON THIS DAY IN HISTORY

Friday 4 June -  First recorded solar eclipse, 780 BC. Roquefort cheese created, 1070. Captain George Vancouver claimed Puget Sound for Britain, 1792. Completion of the Dunkirk evacuation, 1940. Chinese military suppressed the Tiananmen Square protests, 1989. Happy birthday to: actress Angelina Jolie (29), NHL ice hockey player Derian Hatcher (32), actress Lindsay Frost (42), singer Michelle Phillips (60), actor Bruce Dern (68). Today is: Flag Day in Finland. Independence Day in Tonga. Labor Day in The Bahamas.
 
Saturday 5 June -  The Montgolfier Brothers demonstrated their hot air balloon, 1783. Ada Lovelace met Charles Babbage, 1833. Robert F. Kennedy assassinated, 1968. The Apple II personal computer went on sale, 1977. Mozilla 1.0 web browser released, 2002. Happy birthday to: actor Mark Wahlberg (33), author Ken Follett (55), artist/musician Laurie Anderson (57), novelist Margaret Drabble (65), journalist Bill Moyers (70). Today is: Constitution Day in Denmark. South of England Show (ends Monday). Horse racing: The Derby. United Nations World Environment Day. Feast of Saint Boniface (Catholic). Feast of Núr (Bahá'í).
 
Sunday 6 June -  The Ashmolean Museum in Oxford opened, 1683. YMCA founded, 1844. Antarctic explorer Robert Falcon Scott born, 1868. Soyuz 11 launched, 1971. US government launched investigation into Martha Stewart's ImClone stock sales, 2002. Happy birthday to: cricketer Mike Gatting (47), tennis player Björn Borg (48), actress Sandra Bernhard (49), actor Harvey Fierstein (50), former UK Foreign and Defence Secretary, Baron Carrington of Upton (85). Today is: National Day in Sweden. Rose Harvest Festival in Bulgaria. Queensland Day. Memorial Day in South Korea. D-Day commemorations.
 
Monday 7 June -  Artist Paul Gauguin born, 1848. Architect Charles Rennie Mackintosh born, 1868. The first ship passed through the Panama Canal locks, 1914. End of the Battle of Midway, 1942. Musician Prince changed his name to a symbol, 1993. Happy birthday to: tennis player Anna Kournikova (23), actor Liam Neeson (52), talk show host Jenny Jones (58), singer Tom Jones (64), actress Virginia McKenna (73). Today is: Bank holiday in Ireland. National Day in Malta. Queen's Birthday Holiday in New Zealand. Queen's Official Birthday in Tuvalu. Jefferson Davis' Birthday in Alabama & Mississippi.
 
Tuesday 8 June -  Attila the Hun invaded Italy, 452. Architect Frank Lloyd Wright born, 1867. Herman Hollerith granted patent for his punch card tabulator, 1887. George Orwell's Nineteen Eighty-Four published, 1949. Israeli forces attacked the USS Liberty, 1969. Happy birthday to: actresses Lexa Doig (31) & Julianna Margulies (38), musician Mick Hucknall (44), Dilbert cartoonist Scott Adams (47), comedienne Joan Rivers (71). Today is: Transit of Venus between the Earth and the Sun.
 
Wednesday 9 June -  Tsar Peter the Great born, 1672. Author Charles Dickens died, 1870. Composer Cole Porter born, 1891. Debut appearance of Donald Duck, 1934. Actress Dame Sybil Thorndike died, 1976. Happy birthday to: actress Natalie Portman (23), actors Johnny Depp (41) & Michael J. Fox (43), author Patricia Cornwell (48), guitarist Les Paul (88). Today is: Race Unity Day in the USA. Senior Citizens Day in Oklahoma. Last Quarter Moon.
 
Thursday 10 June -  First Oxford v Cambridge University boat race, 1829. Alcoholics Anonymous founded, 1935. Saab produced their first car, 1947. Actress Judy Garland born, 1922. Actor Michael Rennie died, 1971. Happy birthday to: figure skater Tara Lipinski (22), supermodel Linda Evangelista & actress Elizabeth Hurley (both 39), actor Jürgen Prochnow (63), writer Maurice Sendak (76). Today is: Royal Cornwall Show (ends Saturday). Cricket: Start of the 3rd Test, England v New Zealand, Trent Bridge. Time Observance Day in Japan. Portugal Day in Portugal, Camões and the Portuguese Communities. Birth of HRH the Duke of Edinburgh (1921, Union Flag flown in the UK).

THE WISDOM OF...

This week, George Orwell, from Nineteen Eighty-Four, published this week in 1949:
On the contrary, war hysteria is continuous and universal in all countries, and such acts as raping, looting, the slaughter of children, the reduction of whole populations to slavery, and reprisals against prisoners which extend even to boiling and burying alive, are looked upon as normal, and, when they are committed by one's own side and not by the enemy, meritorious.

TOTALLY TRIVIAL...

Owls are divided into two main families - the 'typical' owls, or which there are around 167 species, and the 'barn' owls, with 14 species. Although they are primarily nocturnal, some, such as the Short-Eared and Snowy Owl hunt by day. Owls can be found all over the world except for Antarctica, and feed entirely on animals, from insects to mammals the size of rabbits; with a single barn owl capable of eating over 1,000 mice a year. Owls range in size from the US deserts' Elf Owl, which is as small as a sparrow, up to Blakiston's Fish Owl, a rare species native to Japan, which has a wingspan of up to 2 metres. In literature, owls are often associated with wisdom and death, especially in groups, or parliaments, although (so-far) non-fatal appearances include Hedwig and Errol in J.K. Rowling's Harry Potter books, Winnie the Pooh's wise friend Wol and the parliament of talking owls in C.S. Lewis' The Silver Chair. Athena, the ancient Greek goddess of wisdom was symbolised by an owl, and nursing pioneer Florence Nightingale kept a pet owl, which she carried in her pocket.

FILM QUIZ

A mixed bag of quotations this week. Answers next week or from the regular address.

Last issue's lines were:


WEIRD WORLD NEWS

Strange stories from around the world, some of which might be true...

DUMB CRIMS... This week's DCotW, Matthew Richards, from Hope, Wisconsin, successfully held up a convenience store last week, armed with a shotgun, and so brazen he did not wear a mask. Where his innate dumbness shone though, was the next day, when he went for a job interview at the same store. Owner Jeff Shaw recognised him instantly, but kept up the pretence of the interview so he could get a copy of Richards' details, and called the police after Richards had left. Richards was arrested at home a couple of hours later. Howard Jameson, 40, has been charged in Texas with impersonating a doctor and practising medicine without a licence after faking his way into a hospital two years ago. Since his deception started Jameson had notched up the highest patient survival and satisfaction ratings of all the staff there.

MAKE IT IN, ER, MOROCCO... Careers Scotland, part of Scottish Enterprise, a quango set up to encourage the manufacturing industry in Scotland, recently sent staff to attend a number of job fairs wearing 'Make it in Scotland' T-shirts to drum up interest in jobs within the sector. Now their union is accusing Scottish Enterprise of double standards because the T-shirts were made in Morocco. Scottish Enterprise responded that "We are under obligation to get the best products at a competitive price and sometimes this means sourcing them overseas." Perhaps the penny's finally dropped about just why manufacturing in Scotland is failing...

YET ANOTHER HIGH FLIER... Confirming our theory that this is the summer for surviving high falls (TFIrs passim) a Taiwanese man has survived a 12-storey drop with only light injuries after falling off his balcony while changing a lightbulb. Chang Shih-chi, 68, bounced off an awning onto electric wires and finally a car.

SPORTS ROUND-UP... This weekend sees an unusual event taking place in London - the Shoreditch Urban Open golf tournament. 64 players will tee off with leather balls from mats, negotiating hazards such as car parks, skips and road signs, with fire hydrant covers replacing the holes. Sponsored by Ladbrokes.com the winner will take home the Austin Moss Memorial trophy.

WEIRD WAR NEWS ... FBI now routinely issuing national terror alerts for stolen propane tankers. A British army unit praised for killing 35 Iraqi attackers in the first bayonet charge since the Falklands War has been forced to admit that the bayonets were the only weapons they had left, as they were out of ammunition. Both British and US forces are suffering from a shortage of bullets, with the US army having to outsource its supply. CORRECTION: The item we ran a while ago about Rumsfield banning camera phones from the army was apparently a hoax from a satirical site that a number of reputable news sources (one of which we got it from) had fallen for.

ON THE MOVE... A British Airways 747 out of Miami was forced to make an emergency landing at Shannon Airport, Ireland, last Sunday after fumes from rotting fruit in the cargo hold set off a fire alert and the automatic extinguishers. The plane was inspected and flew on to Heathrow later. SpaceShipOne, backed by Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen, is set to become the first privately-funded vehicle to reach space and return safely to Earth later this month. Because it will only be carrying a single pilot for the three minutes of weightlessness the mission will not qualify for the X Prize - a US$10m (GBP5.43m) prize for the first privately-funded passenger space flight, but if the flight is a success an attempt at the X Prize will be made at a later date. German police called to recover child's cuddly tiger from busy road after it was accidentally thrown out of a car window. Also in Germany police who pulled a driver over for driving too slowly found that not only was he unlicensed, he was also 102 years old. Honda have recalled over 8,000 motorbikes because a fault could lead the speedometers to read too low.

STORIES WHICH ALSO CAUGHT OUR EYE THIS WEEK: 2-year-old boy pronounced dead after falling into a canal found to be breathing over an hour later by funeral home workers. More woes for Britain's Royal Mail - a campaign to keep open a local post office in Brightside, Sheffield, collected a 1,000 name petition, which was duly sent to the head post office three miles away. It never arrived, and the Post Office is now investigating what happened. Australian scientists develop energy source from rotting bananas. Romanian woman finds, returns library book her late father had borrowed from Iasi's National College Library in the 1930s. Woman's wig blows off during rollercoaster ride, jams wheels, trapping passengers 75ft in the air. Cartoon Network survey of British adults finds Lego the most popular children's toy, ahead of Action Man (a British version of G.I. Joe), Barbie and Ken, and the Scalextric car racing system. The Viennese Vegetable Orchestra gave its debut performance last week, with performers playing instruments carved out of fresh vegetables, including a carrot flute, a leek violin, a pumpkin double bass and a cucumber saxophone. After the performance concluded the 9-person orchestra made soup out of their instruments. Montreal scientists playing seascape sounds from speakers around the city to see if it helps people sleep by drowning out traffic noise. Californian amateur mathematician finds world's largest (so far) prime number, at 7.2 million digits - it's 2^24,036,583 - 1.


ENTERTAINMENT BRIEFS

Film: Mel Gibson likely to face more criticism, this time for planned Boudicca (Boadicea) film. X Men/Van Helsing star Hugh Jackman wins 2004 TDF-Astaire award for best male dancer in a theatre show (The Boy From Oz). Ben Affleck pulls out of UK promotion for Jersey Girl with bronchitis; no celebrities showed up for UK premiere. Weinsteins discussing moving Miramax from Disney to Fox. The Day After Tomorrow fails to knock Shrek 2 from top of US box office, topped UK box office last weekend, but certain to fall this weekend as Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban set an opening-day record on Monday. Shrek 2 passed Shrek's total US gross in first 15 days. Rumours spreading that the original Star Wars trilogy DVD set out later this year will have the films digitally altered to fit in with the more recent prequels and Lucas' contemporary vision, rather than be the original theatrical versions. DVD sales up again, VHS sales down 51% (in US) against same time last year. Fahrenheit 9/11 now has three domestic US distributors, likely to hit cinemas late June (it already had overseas distributors before Disney dropped it); trailer now online at http://www.michaelmoore.com. Marvel settles Spider-Man merchandising dispute with Sony. Christopher Lee criticises Hollywood's lead casting of 20-something actors, calling them "inexperienced." Giovanni Ribisi, Thora Birch cast for thriller The Triangle. Some UK cinemas using night-vision goggles to catch Harry Potter pirates. Reese Witherspoon in talks for supernatural thriller The Reckoning. The Motorcycle Diaries to open Edinburgh Film Festival (18-29 August). Ron Howard, Brian grazer, Akiva Goldsman reuniting to make film of Dan Brown's The Da Vinci Code. Daniel Radcliffe believes Harry Potter could die in the final book/film.

TV: British MPs mulling ban on junk food TV advertising during children's programming. US remake of The Office bombs out with worst test audience ratings in NBC's history. Now only six episodes will be made, and will be used as filler if other shows are cancelled. Derren Brown's live 'seance' hoax broadcast on british TV Monday draws over 700 complaints, mostly from religious groups. UK's Ofcom government media watchdog considering cinema-style TV ratings system. Final episode of Friends drew 8.6m UK viewers, followed by first show of Big Brother 5 which drew 6.7m, but subsequent ratings have plummeted to around 3.3m. Man banned from being the 'phone a friend' on Croatian Who Wants to be a Millionaire after helping people win too much. Viewing figures for Eastenders slumped. Neil Fox confirms third series for Pop Idol.

Music & Radio: Bono rules out rumoured Live Aid 2 as too expensive, unlikely to raise enough money. Coldplay top UK legit downloads, with over 500,000 songs sold so far this year. The year's Glastonbury Festival to include Morrissey, Basement Jaxx, PJ Harvey, Paul McCartney, Oasis, Sister Sledge, James Brown, the English National Opera, Muse, Hothouse Flowers, Groove Armada, Chemical Brothers and Goldfrapp amongst others. Chinese ministers demand vetting rights to Britney Spears' costumes ahead of concerts. Kelly Osbourne working on second album. Mary J Blige, Avril Lavigne, Paul Weller announce UK tours. Blondie blocks supporting band from tour because the lead singer is a blonde. Manic Street Preachers' seventh studio album due out in October. Q magazine poll names Oasis' Definitely, Maybe Best British Album Ever ahead of The Beatles' Revolver. World Darts champion Phil "The Power" Taylor to release rap single Better That the Best. Manchester council cracking down on flyposters, considering suing record labels.

Books: Booker Prize launches international fiction award.

Obits: children's book author/illustrator James Rice (70), TV writer Jack Rosenthal (72), bass Nicolai Ghiaurov (74), TV producer Philip Jones (76), novelist Kamala Markandaya (79), composer Ronald Smith (82), poet/folk musician Charles Chase (89), actress Irene Manning (91), artist Luciano Minguzzi (93), Indian poet Dom Moraes (age not given).

TECH BRIEFS

UK planes grounded by ATC software upgrade glitch. MS releases beta of Media Player 10, scraps True Fantasy Live Online Xbox game. Sun to open source Solaris, no date given. AOL to release Mozilla-based Netscape 7.2 in the summer, no significant changes. Electronic Arts to release special edition of Madden NFL including ports of some earlier console versions. Amazon launching stock photograph store. Netsky P worm disguising itself as a Harry Potter game. Broadband take-up in UK passed four million mark. Sony to pull out of PDA market outside Japan. Nokia announce mid-air message system (a row of LEDs on the back of the phone creates the message as the phone is waved, persistence of vision allows it to be read). Greek telcos determined to be 3G-enabled ahead of Olympics. Toshiba to launch 60GB 1.8" hard drive aimed at digital music players.

WEBSITE OF THE WEEK

This week, an ESP test that, frankly, freaked us out here at Lamont Towers:
http://sprott.physics.wisc.edu/pickover/esp.html

THE AMAZING NOT-QUITE-RANDOM LOTTERY PREDICTOR!

Madame Jennifer, our in-house psychic predicts the following numbers will be lucky:
1, 21, 22, 33, 36 & 39.
You can consult Madame Jennifer online at the Daily Irregular:
http://www.gizmo1.demon.co.uk/li/

AND FINALLY...

A man and a woman, who have never met before, find themselves assigned to the same sleeping room on a transcontinental train. Though initially embarrassed and uneasy over sharing a room, the two are tired and fall asleep quickly, he in the upper bunk and she in the lower.

In the early hours of the morning he reaches down and gently wakes the woman saying, "Ma'am, I'm sorry to bother you, but could you reach into the closet and get me a second blanket? I'm awfully cold."

"I have a better idea," she replies, "Just for tonight, let's pretend that we're married."

"Wow! That's a great idea!" he exclaims.

"Good," she replies. "Get your own damn blanket!"



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