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Issue #399 - 14 October 2016
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^ WORD OF THE WEEK
skimble-skamble |
Friday 14 October - William the Conqueror won the Battle of Hastings, 1066. Engraver and cartographer Jodocus Hondius born, 1563. Poet Thomas Chaloner died, 1565. Mary, Queen of Scots went on trial for conspiracy against Elizabeth I, 1585. Businessman and founder of Pennsylvania William Penn born, 1644. A.A. Milne's Winnie the Pooh was published, 1926. German field marshal Erwin Rommel committed suicide after being implicated in the 20 July plot to assassinate Hitler, 1944. Actress Mia Wasikowska born, 1989. Paranormal investigator Maurice Grosse died, 2006. World Standards Day. Saturday 15 October - Roman poet Virgil born, 70 BCE. Austrian forces routed the Turkish army, ending the Siege of Vienna, 1529. Inventor of the mercury barometer Evangelista Torricelli born, 1608. Mathematician Humphry Ditton died, 1715. Napoleon began his exile on Saint Helena, 1815. Artist James Tissot born, 1836. Dancer Mata Hari executed on espionage charges, 1917. Actor Dominic West born, 1969. Andy Green set the first supersonic land speed record in the British ThrustSSC, 1997. Actress Betty Driver died, 2011. Spirit Day. Sunday 16 October - Although she was a woman, Jadwiga was crowned 'King' of Poland, 1384. Artist Lucas Cranach the Elder died, 1553. Lexicographer Noah Webster born, 1758. Marie Antoinette, wife of Louis XVI of France, guillotined, 1793. The Cardiff Giant hoax was "discovered", 1869. Sculptor Rembrandt Bugatti born, 1884. The Rodney riots started, in Kingston, Jamaica, 1968. Actor Leo G. Carroll died, 1972. Singer-songwriter Wendy Wilson born, 1989. World Food Day. Monday 17 October - Agrippina the Elder, wife of Germanicus, died, 33. A tornado, possibly of strength T8/F4, struck London, 1091. Poet & courtier Philip Sidney died, 1586. Actor & dramatist Nathan Field born, 1587. Astronomer Johannes Kepler observed a supernova, 1604. Reformist politician John Wilkes born, 1725. 13-year-old prodigy Bobby Fischer beat chess master Donald Byrne in The Game of the Century, 1956. Animator & filmmaker Mike Judge born, 1962. Actress Joan Hickson died, 1998. International Day for the Eradication of Poverty. Tuesday 18 October - Dagobert I was crowned King of the Franks, 629. Composer John Taverner died, 1545. Historian Charles le Beau born, 1701. The War of the Austrian Succession ended with the signing of the Treaty of Aix-la-Chapelle, 1748. Inventor of the mechanical computer Charles Babbage died, 1871. Singer & actress Lotte Lenya born, 1898. The British Broadcasting Company (later Corporation) was founded, 1922. Skier Lindsey Vonn born, 1984. Actress Sylvia Kristel died, 2012. Wednesday 19 October - John, King of England, died, 1216. Poet & critic Leigh Hunt born, 1784. John Jay was sworn in as the first Chief Justice of the United States, 1789. Filmmaking pioneer Auguste Lumière born, 1862. Max Planck discovered the law of black-body radiation, 1900. Physicist & Nobel laureate chemist Ernest Rutherford died, 1937. The convictions of the Guildford Four were quashed, 15 years after they had been jailed, 1989. Actor John Lithgow born, 1945. Scientist & TV host Magnus Pyke died, 1992. Thursday 20 October - Astronomer Michael Maestlin died, 1631. Architect Christopher Wren born, 1632. Pirate Calico Jack was captured by the Royal Navy, 1720. Antiquarian George Ormerod born, 1785. The United States & the United Kingdom signed the Convention of 1818, settling the Canada-US border on the 49th parallel for most of its length, 1818. Heroine Grace Darling died, 1842. Composer & bandleader Jelly Roll Morton born, 1885. Jacqueline Kennedy married Aristotle Onassis, 1968. Actor Burt Lancaster died, 1994.
This week, Bill Watterson, in Calvin & Hobbes:It's going to be a grim day when the world is run by a generation that doesn't know anything but what it's seen on TV. [Calvin's father]
A mixed bag of quotations. Answers next issue or from the regular address.Last issue's quotations were:
- Hang on, everybody - I wanna try something I saw in a cartoon once!
- Kill one man, you're a murderer, kill a million, a king. Kill them all, a god.
- ...And then one time I ate some rotten berries. Man, there were some strong gases seepin' outta my butt that day!
- I'm not afraid of death. I'm an old physicist - I'm afraid of time.
- United States astronauts train for years. You have twelve days.
- - He's stuck us all at one minute to tea time!
- Tea time, forever!
-- Alice Through the Looking Glass [2016]- Tell me what happened that night! When you looked him in the eye and killed him!
-- Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 2 [2011]- But every once in a while, there's a day when I don't have to be a princess. No lessons, no expectations. A day where anything can happen. A day I can change my fate.
-- Brave [2012]- Um, you're not using those ear brushes to clean your mouth are you, Mr Brown?
-- Paddington [2014]- It is a truth universally acknowledged that when one part of your life starts going okay, another falls spectacularly to pieces.
-- Bridget Jones's Diary [2001]
Strange stories from around the world, some of which might be true...
LOVE IT OR HATE IT... Brexit, the abbreviated form of the British Exit from the EU. People seem to love it or hate it, just like they do Marmite, the yeasty spread. Now the two have been linked, with Unilever, Marmite's parent conglomerate (headquartered in tax-friendly Switzerland) wanting to hike the vendor price of their products - including Pot Noodles, Ben & Jerry's ice cream, PG Tips tea, Persil washing powder, Marmite and others - by 10%, blaming the falling British Pound following the Brexit vote. Supermarket retailer Tesco is challenging them, and the resulting absence of Unilever's products from Tesco's online store - most notably Marmite - has created a storm - dubbed Marmitegate, of course - on Twitter and across social and broadcast media, with jokes that now might be the time for Vegemite (the - arguably inferior - antipodean version of Marmite) or Bovril (a similar spread derived from beef) to take the limelight, calls for a boycott of Pot Noodles, probably-photoshopped pictures of people stockpiling jars of Marmite and Liam Neeson's Taken quotation reworded to "If you let my Marmite go now, that'll be the end of it. But if you don't, I will look for you, I will find you, and I will kill you." The temporary loss of Marmite from one retailer is bad enough, but as one Twitter user put it, "If Theresa May causes a tea bag shortage, the government will fall."
MONKEY BUSINESS. As mentioned in an earlier issue, the 1974 Black Monk of Pontefract was one of Britain's most infamous modern poltergeist cases, allegedly including a girl being dragged up stairs by either the hair or the throat, and portrayed (with not inconsiderable dramatic license) in the 2012 film When the Lights Went Out, having been brought to wider attention with Colin Wilson's 1981 book Poltergeist!: A Study in Destructive Haunting. A group of paranormal investigators recently spent the night at the house and claim to have footage of a pushchair being thrown down the stairs and a picture that could show a monk's arm and rosary beads. Back in June another team reportedly captured the reflection of a hooded figure in a mirror. Three of the later team reportedly fled the house for the safety of a nearby hotel, while after the buggy had been pushed down the same stairs that Diane Pritchard was claimed to have been dragged up, the rest of the investigators refused to go upstairs. As well as providing the basis for the film (and being the location of a prize-winner screening, where nothing much happened), the house has also featured on paranormal entertainment show Most Haunted, and is available for bookings should anyone want to spend the night there - although exorcisms and ouija boards are banned.
CALL THE WINCHESTERS! One of our favourite allegedly haunted houses (and another Most Haunted location) is the Winchester Mystery House in San Jose, California. It was built for Sarah Winchester, widow of the gun manufacturer, and building work on it continued until her death, entirely to her instructions without any architect involvement, reportedly to appease the ghosts of the victims of Winchester rifles; as well as a special seance room it contains hallways and staircases that go nowhere, 47 fireplaces, 2,000 doors (some of which just open onto the wall) and 10,000 windows. The present-day 160-room house is also three storeys shorter than the original, thanks to the 1906 earthquake. A team hired to do restoration work on the house have revealed a boarded-up secret room in an attic. It is thought that Sarah Winchester became trapped in the room during the earthquake, but blamed the spirits of the dead and had it closed off.
YEE-HAA! Enough of ghostly goings on. 21 years after its release, one Toy Story fan has come up with a theory about the character Andy's mother. Central to the theory is his cowboy hat, which is markedly different from cowboy Woody's. It has white threading around the rim, and a strip around the crown that looks lighter than the rest of the hat, as if there was once something around it. In fact, it looks a lot like a hat that was shown on the bed of cowgirl Jessie's owner in flashback, but without the white ribbon around the crown. According to film writer Jon Negroni, Andy's mother was Jessie's owner when she was a girl, and passed the hat down to her son. Unlike Buzz Lightyear and the other toys, Woody and Jessie are both old and collectibles, so could easily have belonged to his mother's generation as children, indeed in Toy Story 2 she says that Woody is an old family toy. Pixar are know for dropping easter eggs and other secrets into their films, and the mirroring of Andy (eventually) parting with Woody as his mother theoretically did with Jessie would be a strong point dramatically, but until someone at Pixar owns up, this will remain just a theory - albeit a convincing one.
COULROMANIA. Sightings of clowns behaving badly continue. A 30-year-old man was arrested in Norwich over the weekend after someone had been reported to police jumping out at a woman in a park, dressed as a clown. Thames Valley Police received 14 calls to clown-related incidents on Sunday alone. Last Friday four County Durham children were followed to school by a man dressed as a clown, wielding a plastic machete, while two twelve-year-olds, also in County Durham, had various items including two clown masks confiscated after allegedly going to a primary school to scare the children there. Police received reports of men dressed as clowns and wielding baseball bats or knives in Oxfordshire, Gloucestershire and Sussex. A sinister Ronald McDonald clown was photographed lurking outside a Lancashire fast food outlet. Popular touring circus Zippo's has had to issue a statement distancing themselves from the classic image of red-nosed clowns "[as] we prefer comic slapstick characters of the Charlie Chaplin style", despite founder Martin 'Zippo' Burton being President of Clowns International. The craze spread from the eastern US in late summer, and has now reached Canada, the UK and Australia.
IN BRIEF: Indian teenager has 20cm (8") 'tail' (actually an antenatal spinal deformity that then grew outside his body) surgically removed. Herd of 100 goats found on the loose 50 miles (80 km) north of Toronto. Gardener smashes UK record for heaviest outdoors-grown pumpkin with 95 stone (605kg) squash, cultivated from a seed that cost him £1,250 ($1,524) and came from the world record holder 166 stone (1,054kg) pumpkin. Blue shark usually found off South America washes up on Scottish beach. Queen Elizabeth II, Prince Philip, awarded Long Service and Good Conduct medals for 65 years' military service without a criminal record. Man claims to have invented way to make vegan cheese from potatoes, rather than the more common coconut variety. Mirage photographed on Lake Superior claimed to be image of ghost ship. Man makes teddy bear out of cured human placenta ("It feels soft, somewhat between leather and suede but it's more flexible that leather - it's bendy"). Trio of kittens rescued after being abandoned in a crisp box beside a road named McCoy, Dorito and Pringle. Was Samsung's Galaxy Note 7 (now completely pulled from sale after replacements also caught fire) cursed by inclusion of 'crossed fingers' emoji of hand with five fingers and thumb? Poll finds that men are less likely than women to lie when it comes to work, dieting and relationships. Police in Dundee, Scotland, called to chicken crossing road; take it into protective custody, no word on why it was trying to cross the road. Simulacrum of flying pig seen in clouds. Amazon withdraws 'sexy burqa' Hallowe'en costume after complaints. Woman fights off crocodile with flip-flop. Man tries to take selfie with raccoon; raccoon runs off with his phone. You can play vinyl records with the new UK £5 note. Gatwick Airport puts up Christmas tree *IN MID-OCTOBER*...
The X Factor producers admit that group brought in to replace replace kicked-out duo were put together from four singers who auditioned individually. Series of 12 Mr Men books to be released based on the twelve TV incarnations of Doctor Who. Original The Crystal Maze host Richard O'Brien to appear in video message at start of new charity episode hosted by Stephen Merchant. Sir Paul McCartney, The Who, The Rolling Stones, Neil Young, Bob Dylan play Desert Trip festival in California; Bob Dylan named as 2016 Nobel Prize winner for literature. Moneypenny actress Naomie Harris wants Daniel Craig to return as James Bond for a fifth film. Fisrt batch of tickets for Glastonbury 2017 sells out in 23 minutes, despite no acts being announced yet. Bros set to follow sell-out reunion show with UK tour. Paapa Essiedu, first black actor to play Hamlet for the RSC wins Best Performance at UK Theatre Awards; Vanessa Redgrave, Sir Ian McKellen receive honorary awards. Craig David tops UK album chart with comeback album Following My Intuition ahead of Bon Iver, The Shires, Van Morrison and Radiohead; James Arthur tops UK singles' chart with Say You Won't Let Go ahead of The Weekend ft. Daft Punk, The Chainsmokers ft. Halsey, Calvin Harris and Ariana Grande ft. Nicki Minaj. Amazon Echo owners discover way to hear otherwise disabled snippets of new Lady Gaga album. Jaime Winston, Samantha Spiro to portray Barbara Windsor (at different ages) in BBC drama Babs. The Girl on the Train tops US box office ahead of Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children and Deepwater Horizon. Newcastle and Gateshead chosen to host £5m ($6.1m) Great Exhibition of the North in 2018. Graham Norton to host Children in Need. Original star Michael Crawford makes surprise on-stage appearance at 30th anniversary celebration production of The Phantom of the Opera. Sir Rod Stewart receives knighthood at Buckingham Palace for services to music and charity. Will Young quits Strictly Come Dancing for personal reasons. Mother of Jim Carrey's late girlfriend sues him for wrongful death. ITV considering producing six series of Victoria to match Downton Abbey success, recasting lead halfway through to reflect ageing queen. Magdalena McGuire wins 2016 Impress Prize for New Writers with The Shape of Your Song.
Musician Angus R. Grant (Shooglenifty, 49), film historian Bill Warren (Leonard Maltin's Movie Guide, Keep Watching the Skies! American Science Fiction Movies of the Fifties, 73), artist Michiyo Yasuda (colourist at Studio Ghibly; Spirited Away, &al., 77), Bhumibol Adulyadej (King of Thailand since 1946; the world's longest-serving head of state, 88), actor & voice artist Pierre Tchernia (Asterix, 88), playwright Dario Fo (Accidental Death of an Anarchist, Can't Pay? Won't Pay?, 90), film director Andrzej Wajda (Kanal, Katyń, 90), author Alistair Urquhart (The Forgotten Highlander, 97), cinematographer Wolfgang Suschitzsky (Get Carter, 104).
There have been a lot of films and TV shows based in the Marvel cinematic universe in recent years, and it can be a little confusing keeping track of what happened when. C|NET has provided a nifty timeline to help.- https://www.cnet.com/how-to/marvel-cinematic-universe-timeline-avengers/
^ DUMBLEDORE BEAR'S LOTTERY PREDICTOR!
Dumbledore Bear, our in-house psychic predicts that the following numbers will be lucky:11, 19, 20, 21, 28, 31[UK National Lottery, number range 1-59]
You can get your very own prediction at http://www.simonlamont.co.uk/tfir/dumbledore.htm.
Little Jennifer's teacher was in the habit of drawing one, two or three stars at the top of her pupils' homework to give them and their parents a simpler way of seeing how well they were doing. One day Little Jennifer came home, and showed her mother her geography homework. Instead of any stars there was a big zero written at the top of the page.
"Oh, Little Jennifer," her mother said, "you usually get at least one star. What happened?"
Without missing a beat Little Jennifer replied, "Well, mummy, my homework was so good that Miss ran out of stars and drew a big moon instead!"
^ ...end of line