The Friday Irregular
Issue #498 - 19th October 2018

Edited by and copyright ©2018 Simon Lamont
tfir@simonlamont.co.uk

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Contents

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^ WORD OF THE WEEK
Koumpounophobia
  n. the fear of buttons.


^ ON THIS DAY IN HISTORY

Friday 19th October   -   The Vandals under King Gaiseric captured Carthage, 439. King John of England died, 1216. Philosopher Marsilio Ficino born, 1433. Satirist & writer Jonathan Swift died, 1745. Representatives of Lord Cornwallis formally surrendered to George Washington and the comte de Rochambeau, 1781. Poet Leigh Hunt born, 1784. President Richard Nixon declined an Appeal Court decision that he hand over the Watergate tapes to investigators, 1973. Cellist Jacqueline du Pré died, 1987. Sailor Abby Sunderland born, 1993.
 
Saturday 20th October   -   Scholar Thomas Linacre died, 1524. Architect & scientist Christopher Wren born, 1632. Pirate Calico Jack was captured by the Royal Navy, 1720. Noblewoman Pauline Bonaparte, sister of Napoleon, born, 1780. The first code of the American football rules was drafted by Yale, Columbia, Rutgers & Princeton universities, 1873. Explorer & translator Richard Burton died, 1890. Baseball player Mickey Mantle born, 1931. Queen Elizabeth II of the United Kingdom & Commonwealth opened the Sydney Opera House, 1973. Colonel Muammar Gaddafi, Prime Minister of Libya, killed by militants, 2011. World Osteoporosis Day.
 
Sunday 21st October   -   The Siege of Antioch in the First Crusade began, 1097. King Charles VI of France died, 1422. Poet Samuel Taylor Coleridge born, 1772. Admiral Horatio Nelson died at the Battle of Trafalgar, 1805. Florence Nightingale and her 38-strong nursing staff were sent to the Crimean War, 1854. Trumpet player Dizzy Gillespie born, 1917. A Japanese fighter plane made the first kamikaze attack, 1944. Model & showgirl Mandy Rice-Davies born, 1944. Writer Jack Kerouac died, 1969.
 
Monday 22nd October   -   The Japanese capital was relocated to Heian-kyō (present-day Kyoto), 794. Composer Johannes Brassart died, 1455. Astronomer Erasmus Reinhold born, 1511. Four Royal Navy ships ran aground in the Scilly naval disaster, 1707. Actress Sarah Bernhardt born, 1844. Artist Paul Cézanne died, 1906. Dr Crippen was convicted of poisoning his wife, 1910. Nobel laureate writer Doris Lessing born, 1919. Suffragette Hannah Mitchell died, 1956.
 
Tuesday 23rd October   -   Philologist Pieter Burman the Younger born, 1713. Actress Anne Oldfield died, 1730. The War of Jenkins' Ear began, 1739. Adlai Stevenson, 2nd Vice President of the United States, born, 1835. The first American National Women's Rights Convention began in Worcester, Massachusetts, 1850. Writer Théophile Gautier died, 1872. Soccer player Pelé born, 1940. Illustrator Josh Kirby died, 2001. BBC Ceefax, the world's first teletext service, ceased broadcast as the UK's digital TV switchover was completed, 2012. Mole Day (International).
 
Wednesday 24th October   -   Jane Seymour, third wife of Henry VIII of England, died, 1537. Anthony Babington, leader of the eponymous plot against Elizabeth I of England and Ireland, born, 1561. John White, governor of the second Roanoke Colony, returned to England having failed to find the "lost" colonists, 1590. Composer Alessandro Scarlatti died, 1725. Sheffield F.C., the oldest extant association football club, was founded, 1857. Explorer & writer Alexandra David-Néel born, 1868. Engineer Louis Renault died, 1944. Ninety percent of employed women in Iceland went on strike to protest gender pay gaps, 1975. Rapper Drake born, 1986. United Nations Day.
 
Thursday 25th October   -   Poet Geoffrey Chaucer died, 1400. The English under Henry V defeated the French at the Battle of Agincourt during the Hundred Years' War, 1415. Elisabeth Farnese, Queen of Spain, born, 1692. King George II of Great Britain died, 1760. The Charge of the Light Brigade at the Battle of Balaclava, 1854. Artist Pablo Picasso born, 1881. The Daily Mail newspaper published the fraudulent Zinoviev letter, later blamed by the Labour Party for handing an election landslide win to the Conservatives, 1924. Singer Natasha Khan, aka Bat for Lashes, born, 1979. Actor Vincent Price died, 1993.


^ THE WISDOM OF...

This week, Pablo Picasso:
I paint things as I think of them, not as I see them.


^ FILM QUIZ

A selection of quotations from films with a common actor or actress. Answers next issue or from the regular address. Last issue's quotations were from films starring Robin Williams:


^ WEIRD WORLD NEWS

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

IN BRIEF: Apple fixes bagel emoji. ● Company behind Bloodhound supersonic vehicle aiming be first car to pass 1,000mph (1,609 km/h) goes into administration. ● Bottle of 1945 Romanée-Conti Burgundy wine auctions for $558,000 (£424,000) in New York. ● Claim that putting a couple of items of clothing in a tumble dryer with a couple of ice cubes will steam creases out, so no ironing needed. ● Someone stuck googly eyes on the statue of Nathaneal Greene in Savannah, Georgia. ● Earlier this week 84 ice cream van drivers in Crewe beat the world record for the longest parade of ice cream vans. ● Postcard sent from Taunton, Somerset, to Bugle, Cornwall, about 100 miles apart, delivered 21 years late. ● Gift bags given to members of the public chosen by ballot to enter grounds of Windsor Castle to follow proceedings of Princess Eugenie's wedding this week turn up on auction site eBay within 24 hours. ● UK Parliament's Education Committee interviews school robot in gimmick with pre-arranged questions. ● Snapchat adds selfie filters for cats. ● Bank of England to follow plastic £5, £10 notes (and £20 notes in 2020) with plastic £50 notes. ● US embassy in Canberra accidentally emails cat photo instead of invitation. ● Claimed photo of time traveller in 1943 Cornwall beach photo allegedly looking at mobile phone, more probably rolling a cigarette. ● Cafe in Manchester selling toasties filled with curry, apple and custard, Nutella or instant noodles. ● Company behind underwear claimed to remove smell of farts now selling jeans with the same purpose - for £100 ($131).

TRUMPWATCH - Some of the stranger things in reports about the US president. A dating app for supporters of Donald Trump that featured on - where else? - Fox News has been found to have poor security that exposed the names of the 1,600 or so people registered, their photos, personal messages and login tokens, pretty much everything except credit card numbers. SAD. ● During Kanye West's much-mocked White House meeting with Trump, he wanted to show the president a picture of an electric plane on his phone, but chose to log into the device in full view of cameras, revealing that his password was '000000'... SAD. ● An op-ed piece by Trump published by USA Today contained, according to CNN, "the record for the number of falsehoods from a President ever published in a newspaper." The online version of the article contained links, many of which were to pages that explicitly contradicted the claims being made about the administration's healthcare policies and record. The links were later removed. STABLE GENIUS.

UPDATES: A second 47-year-old plastic washing-up liquid bottle was reported washed up, on an Isle of Man beach shortly after the last issue went out. ● The family of Olive Harrison, the gardener whose 1898 application for a scholarship at the Royal Horticultural Society was turned down because she was a woman, have come forward to fill in her story. Having 'won' the scholarship after coming first on a course at Swanley College of Horticulture she took a second course there when the RHS turned her down and then became a gardener at Northfield Manor in Birmingham until she married and gave up her career to raise her four children. Her granddaughter remembers her as someone who helped her with her garden and knew all the plants' names, and there is a memorial stone to her in Settle, where she moved to in the 1960s. ● The unidentified European woman who paid £1m ($1.3m) at auction for an original print of Banksy's Girl With Balloon only for it to pass halfway through a shredder hidden in the frame, shortly after the hammer drop, has decided to keep it. The piece, officially retitled Love is in the Bin, is almost certainly now worth more than the sale price, as the only artwork created during its own auction.


^ ENTERTAINMENT BRIEFS

Leaked footage from Star Wars: Episode IX hints at Emperor Palpatine cameo. ● Jennifer Garner claims Alias reboot on the cards, and she wants at least a guest appearance. ● Hologram of Amy Winehouse to tour with live band; fans' opinion divided. ● Ant McPartlin, wife, granted divorce in 30s court hearing. ● David Bowie statue in Aylesbury vandalised for second time. ● Blue Peter turns 60, marks event with reunion of former presenters. ● Anna Burns becomes first winner of Man Booker Prize from Northern Ireland, for Troubles-set novel Milkman. ● Foo Fighters invite 10-year-old fan Collier Cash Rule onstage during gig, so impressed with his skills Dave Grohl gives him a guitar. ● Hannah Berry named UK comics laureate, vows to fight "stigma" surrounding comics & graphic novels. ● Frugal-living actor Chow Yun-fat to donate entire net worth of 5.6bn Hong Kong dollars (£542m; $710m) to charity. ● Musician Perry Serpa releasing album based on fictional album described in Nick Hornby's 2009 book Juliet, Naked. ● Netflix cancels Marvel's Iron Fist after second series. ● Julian Fellowes writing series of TV dramas based on paintings in the Queen's collection, with Simon Cowell's company Syco, for ITV. ● Musical The Assassination of Katie Hopkins, based on the fictional death of rentagob journalist, named best musical at UK Theatre Awards. ● Lindsey Buckingham suing Fleetwood Mac for breach of oral contract, breach of fiduciary duty & intentional interference with prospective economic advantage, other charges, after they fired him and were allegedly instructed not to speak to him. ● Guadeloupe author Maryse Conde wins alternative Nobel Literature Prize. ● Michael Bublé announces intention to retire from music industry following son's successful battle with cancer as "my whole being's changed". ● Netflix gained 7m new customers in 2018 Q3 on back of 135% increase in original new content. ● Peter Jackson's restored, colourised World War I footage documentary to get extended 3D screenings in cinemas after planned one-off screening sold out; 2D version will be broadcast by the BBC on November 11. ● Ralph Fiennes to receive European Achievement in World Cinema award at 2018 European Film Awards. ● Rob Lowe to play American police chief relocated to UK in ITV's Wild Bill. ● The Beatles' Sgt Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band named most popular British album in history by Official Charts Company, based on physical, digital sales and streaming, ahead of Adele's 21 & Oasis' (What's the Story) Morning Glory?. ● Sony reportedly fix messaging bug that let PS4 console be crashed with specific message. ● Idris Elba joining Cats movie as McCavity, the Mystery Cat. ● Lady Gaga, talent agent Christian Carino, engaged. ● Christian Schwochow to direct Mars colonisation drama series Children of Mars after completing series 3 of The Crown. ● Tilda Swinton admits that elderly actor Lutz Ebersdorf who played psychoanalyst Dr Josef Klemperer in Suspiria remake was actually her in full prosthetics. ● Palme d'Or winner Shoplifters picks up most popular international feature award at Vancouver Film Festival. ● Online video site YouTube (more than 400 hours of content uploaded by users every minute) goes down for 2 hours; Twitterati predict apocalypse. ● Chris Chibnall wants J.K. Rowling to write Doctor Who episode; consolidated viewing figures give Jodie Whittaker's debut episode the largest audience for the show since the 2005 reboot premiered with Christopher Eccleston. ● Epic Games suing Fortnite player Brandon Lucas, who uses YouTube channel, website, to promote, profit from, cheating at Fortnite online Battle Royale game (in 2006 Blizzard won a similar lawsuit over MDY Industries' WoWGlider bot software cheat for World of Warcraft).


^ OBITUARIES

Technologist & philanthropist Paul Allen (Seattle Seahawks, Portland Trailblazers, co-founder of Microsoft, 65), novelist Arto Paasilinna (The Year of the Hare, 76), environmentalist Ian Kiernan (Clean Up Australia, Clean Up the World, 78), politician Pik Botha (South African Minister of Foreign Affairs 1977-1994, 86), brewer William Coors (grandson of Coors Brewing Company founder Adolph Coors, 102).


^ DUMBLEDORE BEAR'S LOTTERY PREDICTOR!

Dumbledore Bear, our in-house psychic predicts that the following numbers will be lucky:
16, 18, 49, 51, 55, 59
[UK National Lottery, number range 1-59]
You can get your very own prediction at http://www.simonlamont.co.uk/tfir/dumbledore.htm.


^ AND FINALLY...

    Little Jennifer had come home from school with a full-blown pout on. "What's the matter, Little Jennifer?" her father asked her.
    "Miss sent me to the headmaster's office, Daddy!"
    "Why? What did you do?"
    "Nothing, Daddy! We were doing maths and Miss asked me what 7+8 is. So I said 15."
    "But that's correct."
    "I know, Daddy! She said it was, but then she asked me what 8+7 is."
    "Well that's a bloody stupid question - it's the same thing."
    "That's exactly what I said!"


^ ...end of line