Issue #533 - 28th June 2019
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Contents | — – o o O o o – — |
^ WORD OF THE WEEK
ranygazoo |
Friday 28th June - Matilda of England died, 1189. The coronation of King Edward IV of England, 1461. Artist Peter Paul Rubens born, 1577. Giselle premiered at the Salle Le Petier in Paris, 1841. Astronomer Maria Mitchell died, 1889. Nobel laureate physicist Maria Goeppert-Mayer born, 1906. The Stonewall riots began in New York City, 1969. Businessman Elon Musk born, 1971. Screenwriter and producer Rod Serling died, 1975. Tau Day. Saturday 29th June - Polymath Ramon Llull died, 1315. Sir Anthony Browne, standard bearer to King Henry VII of England, born, 1443. Aztec ruler Moctezuma II killed during the Spanish invasion, 1520. The first Globe Theatre in London burned down after a stage cannon misfired, 1613. Poet Lavinia Stoddard born, 1787. France annexed Tahiti, 1880. Animator Ray Harryhausen born, 1920. Ballet dancer Mikhail Baryshnikov defected to Canada while on tour with the Kirov Ballet, 1974. Actress Katherine Hepburn died, 2003. Sunday 30th June - Nepotianus, ruler of Rome for 28 days, killed, 350. Conquistadors under Hernán Cortés fought their way out of Tenochtitlan, 1520. Poet John Gay born, 1685. Pirate John Quelch hanged, 1704. Acrobat Charles Blondin crossed Niagara Gorge on a tightrope, 1859. Artist Stanley Spencer born, 1891. The first emergency telephone number, 999, was introducted in London, 1937. Writer Nancy Mitford died, 1973. Comedian Katherine Ryan born, 1983. International Asteroid Day. Monday 1st July - Byzantine forces defeated the Ostrogoths and killed King Totila at the Battle of Taginae, 552. Italian noblewoman Clara Gonzaga born, 1464. Lexell's Comet made the closest recorded cometary passage past Earth at about six times the distance to the Moon, 1770. Writer Velma Caldwell Melville born, 1858. Abolitionist and author Harriet Beecher Stowe died, 1896. The first Tour de France bicycle race began, 1903. Actress Julianne Nicholson born, 1971. Architect Richard Buckminster Fuller died. 1983. International Tartan Day. Tuesday 2nd July - Elizabeth Tudor, daughter of King Henry VII of England, born, 1492. Spain ratified the Treaty of Tordesillas with Portugal, 1494. Astrologer Nostradamus died, 1566. Artist Theodoor Rombouts born, 1597. Thomas Savery patented the first commercial steam engine, 1698. Philosopher Jean-Jacques Rousseau died, 1778. Maria Theresa of Austria-Este, last Queen of Bavaria, born, 1849. Sibelius' tone poem Finlandia premiered in Helsinki, 1900. Writer Beryl Bainbridge died, 2010. Wednesday 3rd July - Roman emperor Valentinian I born, 321. William became Duke of Normandy, 1035. French queen consort and regent Maria de' Medici died, 1642. Architect Robert Adam born, 1728. Pitcairn Island was discovered, 1767. American tribal leader Little Crow killed by white settlers, 1863. Author Evelyn Anthony born, 1928. Mallard set the still-current world speed record for a steam locomotive (125.88 mph; 202.58 km/h), 1938. Singer-songwriter Jim Morrison died, 1971. Thursday 4th July - Chinese astronomers recorded supernova SN 1054, now the Crab Nebula, 1054. Composer William Byrd died, 1623. Geographer and surveyor George Everest born, 1790. The United States Military Academy at West Point, New York, opened, 1802. Cartoonist Rube Goldberg born, 1883. Astronomer Giovanni Schiaparelli died, 1910. William Shockley announced the invention of the junction transister, 1951. Tennis player Pam Shriver born, 1962. Singer Bernie Nolan died, 2013.
This week, Katherine Hepburn:I'm an atheist, and that's it. I believe there's nothing we can know except that we should be kind to each other and do what we can for each other.
A mixed bag of quotations. Answers next issue or from the regular address.Last issue's quotations were from films starring Johnny Depp:
- I am in the business of putting old heads on young shoulders, and all my pupils are the creme de la creme.
- TROLL IN THE DUNGEON! TROLL IN THE DUNGEON! Thought you ought to know.
- - Why would anyone kidnap a nun?
- Were they Catholics?- - We're learning English.
- He may be, Ursula. You are making holes in the furniture.- In life, going downhill is an uphill job.
- All this talk of blood and slaying has put me off my tea.
-- Alice in Wonderland [2010]- There's nothing more reliable than a man whose loyalty can be bought for hard cash.
-- The Ninth Gate [1999]- Nancy, you are going to get some sleep tonight if it kills me.
-- A Nightmare on Elm Street [1984]- - Are you a seeker? A seeker after truth?
- I'm more of a chaser, really.
-- Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them [2016]- Me? I'm dishonest, and a dishonest man you can always trust to be dishonest. Honestly. It's the honest ones you want to watch out for, because you can never predict when they're going to do something incredibly... stupid.
-- Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl [2003]
Strange stories from around the world, some of which might be true...
- HISTORY! A 50-year-mystery from the Yukon has been solved, and suggests that a million years ago hyenas roamed the (now) Canadian Arctic. In 1973 two teeth were discovered in the Yukon Old Crow Basin by paleontologists who suspected they might be from a hyena, but no other evidence of hyenas was among the 50,000 specimens gathered, and the teeth ended up on display at the Canadian Museum of Nature in Ottowa, where paleontologist Grant Zazula saw them. He brought them to the attention of Lars Werdelin of the Swedish Museum of Natural History and Jack Tseng of the University of Buffalo. Tseng is an evolutionary biologist who specialises in hyenas and knew immediately that the paloeontologists who found them were right; they were from a hyena. It was known that hyenas existed in Mongolia and Mexico and the Yukon teeth confirm that the species crossed the then land bridge between Russia and North America on the Bering Strait, then spread south to Mexico. ● At about 4am last Sunday residents of Ahlbach, Germany, were awoken by an explosion and the ground shaking as if in an earthquake. A 33'- (10m)-wide, 13'- (4m)-deep crater was found in a cornfield. Police and military specialists spent the day examining the crater, eventually concluding that it had been caused by a previously-unexploded 550lb (250kg) World War II bomb with a detonator that finally triggered as it decomposed. The field was close to the former site of a railway depot that would have been a target. ● Paleontologists called to examine fossilised dinosaur bones dug up by construction workers near a retirement home in Denver, Colorado, have confirmed that the partial skeleton is of a 68 million year old adult triceratops. In 2017 a torosaurus - closely related to the triceratops - was discovered at a different Denver building site and an unidientified dinosaur egg was found when Coors Field, home of the Colorado Rockies baseball team, was built in the early 1990s; since they moved to the stadium the Rockies mascot has been a purple dinosaur called 'Dinger' who emerges from a large egg before games.
- NATURE! A black bear got into a Missoula County, Montana, home through an unlocked door earlier this month, and managed to push the deadbolt closed behind him before wrecking the room while the homeowners called the police. According to the sheriff's office Facebook page "When deputies knocked on the window, the bear was not the least bit impressed. He slowly stretched, yawned and, unamused, looked towards the door." Officers managed to get the door open in the hope that the bear would leave of his own accord, but he was reported as going through two closets before settling in for a sleep on the shelf in a third. Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks Department staff were called, who managed to tranquillise the bear before he was safely removed and returned to the wild. The sheriff's department issued a warning that it was a reminder to lock doors. ● Residents of the Nottinghamshire village of Ruddington are preparing to celebrate the tenth birthday of King Wilbur of Ruddington. Wilbur is a ginger cat. His original owner, Cathy Applebee, told reporters that when she brought home two rescue kittens five years ago Wilbur "took umbrage, packed his bags and left home", since when he has been adopted by the village who feed and care for him - although Applebee still takes him to the vet if he is ill, and routinely visits the local building society, the pub and other places, and even has his own Facebook page. Wilbur has also been known to hold up traffic in four directions as he casually strolls across the village's main crossroads. His birthday party - or parties, there are two planned - will include the sale of t-shirts, knitted Wilburs and other merchandise to raise money for heart charities and to fund defibrillators for the village. ● If you have ever wondered why your dog gives you a sad look that just craves attention, a paper in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Science has the answer. Dogs have evolved a pair of muscles around the eyes seemingly to communicate with humans; the muscles are not present in wolves, from which dogs diverged as they were domesticated 33,000+ years ago, although wolves facial musculature does have fibres that the muscles probably developed from. The finding builds on a 2017 paper that showed dogs moved their eyebrows more often when a human was paying them attention and less often when they were being ignored or given food (because if there's one thing dogs find more exciting than their owners, it is food).
- SCIENCE! One of the buzzwords of modern life is 'smart', applied to seemingly any technology that is programmable. GE sells 'smart' lightbulbs, which can be set to turn on at off at specific times, dim on voice command and play ELO's greatest hits on request [OK, we made up the last one. -Ed]. Like most programmable devices, GE's smart bulbs may occasionally need to be rebooted, and they have quite a procedure for that; no small 'reset' switch here. You have to turn them on and off five times, for specific durations - 8 seconds on, 2 seconds off. After ensuring that the bulb has been off for at least 5 seconds to begin with. That is assuming the bulb is the latest version. Earlier versions needed to 'on' cycle to be 2 seconds the first three and final time. Of course there is no indicator on the bulb which version it is... ● NASA has put an atomic clock the size of a toaster into orbit, where it will spend the next year and, if proven feasible, could revolutionise deep-space probes. Today probes are tracked with radio signals sent from Earth and immediately returned. The signal time allows for exact location tracking and course correction orders to be sent, but if probes carried a reliable atomic clock the communication could be cut in half and onboard computers could do their own navigational calculations. Up until now the smallest atomic clocks have been the size of a refridgerator. ● Declassified Cold War spy satellite images have shown that the Himalayan glaciers have been shrinking in height by an average 20" (51cm) per year since 2000, a loss of 8bn tonnes of ice a year on average, twice that between 1975 and 2000, almost entirely attributable to climate change. Loss has been greater at lower levels than higher altitudes. With reduced glaciation water supply during droughts will be lessened across some of the most highly-populated regions of the world.
- PEOPLE! On June 9 Tiffani Adams was flying from Quebec to Toronto aboard an Air Canada plane. She fell asleep during the flight and awoke, still buckled into her seat, to find herself alone and cold aboard the plane, which had landed and then been parked a few hours earlier. She phoned a friend to explain where she was, but her phone died mid-call, and, with the aircraft powered down, was unable to charge it. Her friend, Deanna Dale, called Toronto Pearson Airport to say that they had a passenger still on the plane. Ms Adams was eventually discovered by a "shocked" baggage cart operator. Air Canada offered her a limousine and hotel accomodation, but she lives in Toronto so chose to go home. The airline have phoned her at least twice to apologise and launched an investigation. ● Pink fan Denise Jones, 32, went to Anfield Stadium in Liverpool on Tuesday to see her idol's concert, despite being 36 weeks and five days pregnant. She went into labour during the support act and paramedics had to rush her to a private area under the Kop stand where she gave birth minutes later. She and her baby were then taken to Liverpool Women's Hospital. Jones told local paper the Liverpool Echo that the original plan was to name her daughter Dolly Louise but she would now be Dolly Pink, and admitted that "I'm just a bit gutted I missed the concert." ● Military rulers in Sudan ordered the country's Internet access blacked out amid violent street protests three weeks ago, but lawyer Adel-Adheem Hassan recently won a court ruling that the shutdown was illegal because sole Sudanese telecoms operator Zain Sudan had failed to show written orders for it to be shut down. Unfortunately for the rest of Sudan he had brought the case in just his name, so as of this week he is the only person in the country with legal Internet access. He plans to return to court next week to have it restored for everyone else.
- CRIME! Police in Birmingham who stopped an erratically-driven car discovered a half-full pint glass of Guinness in the driver's cup holder as well as several cans of stout and a quantity of drugs in the car. The 54-year-old man was arrested on suspicion of "drink drive and possession with intent to supply" and Acocks Green Police tweeted a photo of the Guinness, car and drugs, captioned "This man is going to have a headache in interview this morning!" ● A lingerie thief in the Harvey Nichols store in Manchester during the Manchester Day Parade decided to strip off behind a rack of clothes, don the stolen items and get dressed again. Unfortunately for her, she failed to notice that behind her were the second-floor store windows. The crowd on the street below, distracted from the parade to cheer her on drew the attention of police who alerted the shop's security and detained her. ● Zamira Hajiyeva, wife of Jahangir Hajiyeva, the former chairman of the International Bank of Azerbaijan (IBA) who has been jailed for fraud and embezzlement, became the subject of the UK's first Unexplained Wealth Order last year amid reports that as well as having an expensive property portfolio she had spent £16m ($20.3m) during a number of spending sprees at Harrods in London, far in excess of her husband's salary of £55,000 ($69,760). She is now the subject of an extradition hearing at Westminster Magistrates' Court where the Azerbaijan government claims she was part of an organised crime gang that used 28 IBA credit cards to embezzle £76m ($96.4m). Her barrister, Hugo Keith QC, seems to be missing the point of the case, declaring in court that "spending money is not a crime". Well, no, but obtaining it illegally before you spend it most certainly is.
IN BRIEF: Anyone who has bought software or online services will have seen an end-user license agreement (EULA), even if few people read them in detail. Paper towel dispenser company Tork has now attached a EULA to their dispensers to try to stop people refilling them with towels from other suppliers. ● Blackburn Rovers fan Andy Maxfield has broken the world record for pushing a walk-behind lawnmower the furthest distance in 24 hours, breaking the previous record of 57.6 miles (92.7km) by doing laps around his team's soccer pitch. ● Cat survives 40-mile (64.4km) trip stuck in car engine compartment. ● The first day of summer saw almost 2' (61cm) of snow falling in Colorado. ● SpaceX founder Elon Musk tweets "Occupy Mars" above picture of the Moon... ● Mexican rescue dog Frida who saved 12 people's lives, located 40 bodies in earthquake and other operations across Mexico, Guatemala, Haiti and Ecuador, and became a symbol hope, retires "with honour" after nine years' service. ● First footage (and only second ever sighting) of giant squid in US waters taken by oceanographers in Gulf of Mexico. ● Potentially record-breaking heatwave across western European mainland sees France postponing exams, closing schools. ● US Christian group Return to Order gathers 20,000-signature petition against TV adaptation of Neil Gaiman and Terry Pratchett's Good Omens (demon and angel unite to stop Armageddon), sends it to Netflix - who are nothing to do with it; it is a BBC/Amazon co-production. Netflix respond with joke "promise" to halt production immediately.● Seals trained to 'sing' "Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star" and Star Wars theme. [No "Kiss From a Rose"? -Ed] ● Japanese railway shutdown blamed on "rogue slug" shorting power circuit. ● Tesco customer notices best before date on sachet of burger relish given as '20140'; supermarket explain that it had been converted to the Julian calendar last used 350 years ago for traceability by their supplier.
TRUMPWATCH. Trump shares video showing him as president forever. ● Federal judge denies Justice Department's request to put emoluments lawsuit against Trump on hold, and denies request for appeals. ● Messaging system used to send presidential warnings to public found to be easily spoofed. ● Robert Mueller to testify to both Judiciary and Intelligence Congressional committees in public on July 17. ● Much-criticised-by-Trump London mayor Sadiq Khan tells room full of teachers at Together for Education event in Westminster "For those of you that have your phones on, if somebody starts tweeting about me - a 6ft 3 child in the White House - can you let me know?" to laughter and applause. ● Petition with 34,000+ signatures calling for Kellyanne Conway's resignation presented to House Committee on Oversight and Reform ahead of Hatch Act hearing. ● Trump tweets praise for himself for stock market rally, tags Wall Street Journal as '@WallStreetJour' - The Wall Street Journal's Twitter tag is @WSJ; @WallStreetJour belongs to a fake Russian Twitter account... ● Leaked cache of almost 100 internal vetting documents, outsourced by Mike Pence to small team of 20-something Republican National Congress researchers, show Trump ignored red flag warnings about many of his appointees' lack of management ability, ties to industry or ties to Russia; White House does not deny it. Further evidence comes from email sent by Environmental Protection Agency to Kelly Craft, Trump-appointed US ambassador to Canada, which was replied to by her husband, whos is a coal magnate. ● Trump's Iran woes rumble on as he declares a fresh round of sanctions targetting Iran's leader, the "Ayatollah Khomeini" - who died in 1989; Iran's living leader is Ayatollah Khamenai, who mocked the sanctions - as he never leaves the country the ban on entering America will not affect him. Trump also says he wants open dialogue with Iran, but Iran government dismiss any chance with sanctions in place. Even Fox News doubting Trump's explanation for calling off air strike and only being told potential casualties after launch (Trump tried claiming he called it off before planes were in the air; nobody believes him). ● Republican Texas Respresentative Michael McCaul describe immigration camps as the "worst" he's even seen through 15 years in Congress and as a federal prosecutor before that. Wayfair Inc. e-commerce facing employee walkout over doing business with BCFS, the contractor managing the Southern border immigration camps. Fox News' Shep Smith comments that were the children in the camps prisoners-of-war the Trump administration, which claims they do not need toothbrushes, soap, towels or beds, would be in contravention of the Geneva Conventions. Acting commissioner of the US Customs and Border Protection agency John Sanders quitting amid backlash. With impeccable timing Melania Trump announces 21 ambassadors within government agencies for her 'Be Best' initiative to improve children's lives... Trump, of course, thinks his government is doing "a fantastic job" on the border. ● Mike Pence tells TV interviewer that the Trump administration "will always follow the science" on climate change [pseudoscience, maybe... -Ed], in the week it was revealed that dozens of government-funded studies which reveal amongst other things the threat to food supplies and health, have been buried by the administration. ● Trump sends letter to his second-favourite dictator [after his beloved Vlad], Kim Jong-un; days later Pyongyang accuses US of "extremely hostile acts" that "viciously slandered" North Korea.
As Google Stadia game streaming service prepares for November launch and Sony partner with Microsoft to produce rival service consumer affairs bodies warn of risks of data harvesting on a scale far beyond that already seen with social media companies. ● Musicians including Hole, Soundgarden, estates of Tom Petty and Tupac Shakur suing Universal Music over master recordings, unreleased music, other items lost in 2008 warehouse fire, full details of which only recently came to light. ● Marvel films boss Kevin Feige reveals that phase 3 of the Marvel Cinematic Universe did not end with Avengers: Endgame, will end with Spider-Man: Far From Home; Avengers: Endgame to be re-released in extended version. ● Birmingham Museum and Art Gallery exhibition marking 50 years of Black Sabbath includes recreation of super fan Stephen Knowles' living room, some of the 1000+ Black Sabbath t-shirts he has collected. ● Bruce Springsteen's Western Stars beats Madonna's Madame X to top UK album chart knocking Lewis Capaldi to #3; Ed Sheeran, Justin Bieber collaboration holds #1 UK singles spot for sixth week. ● 'Constructed language' conference takes place in Cambridge, includes discussions on languages including Klingon (Star Trek), Sindarin (The Lord of the Rings and Dothraki (Game of Thrones) [HIjol! -Ed] ● Danny Boyle rules out making any more Trainspotting films "at the moment", also reveals that a TV prequel series based on The Beach has been written by Amy Seimetz, yet to be greenlit. ● DC shuttering DC Vertigo, DC Ink and DC Zoom imprints in favour of age-related ones - DC Kids (8-12), DC (13+) and DC Black Label (17+). ● Toy Story 4 breaks global box office record for animated film, taking $238m (£187m) over opening weekend. ● Disneyland's new Star Wars: Galaxy's Edge ride filled to capacity within first 50 minutes of opening, 'virtual queues' in operation until 4:45pm. ● Dominican-American poet Elizabeth Acevedo become first writer of colour to win Carnegie Medal, for debut novel The Poet X. ● Sir Elton John awarded the Legion d'Honneur by French government; Disney reveal live/CG The Lion King will include a new song by him. ● 'Lost' Freddie Mercury track "Time Waits For No One" unearthed, broadcast on BBC Radio 2. ● The Eagles, disbanded after Glenn Frey's 2016 death, start UK leg of world tour with Frey's son Deacon taking his father's place. ● James Wan confirms Aquaman spinoff The Trench in development, describes it as "going to play more as a monster horror movie than it will a superhero film". ● UK parliamentary culture select committee slam The Jeremy Kyle Show producers for using lie detector tests without knowing their accuracy [~50%, but easily fooled -Ed]; as reported in a previous TFIr Kyle himself had refused to give evidence. ● League of Legends players in Iran find themselves blocked because subscriptions are paid to California-based Riot Games and sanctions stopped them. ● Mark Rylance resigns from Royal Shakespeare Company in protest at sponsorship by oil company BP. ● Marvel launch Marvel Spotlight superhero plays for high school drama productions. ● After In Touch tabloid magazine incorrectly reported Mila Kunis, Ashton Kutcher to separate, couple troll them with humorous Instagram video of them 'discovering' that they are splitting and captioned "Have fun selling magazines this week. Maybe next week my wife will be having twins. For the third time. But who's counting." ● Emily Ruskovich wins €100,000 (£89,600 ;$113,700) International Dublin Literary Award for debut novel Idaho. ● David Gilmour auctions 126 of his guitars, raises more than $21m (£16.55m) for ClientEarth nonprofit environmental law organisation. ● Ray Winstone joins cast for Marvel's upcoming Avengers prequel Black Widow. ● Warner Bros, Wachowskis, reported to be planning fourth The Matrix film, with Michael B. Jordan taking lead role; not stated whether it will be a sequel, prequel, spinoff or reboot. ● Rusty revolver found in field near Auvers-sur-Oise, France, in 1965, speculated to be the one Vincent van Gogh shot himself with (he died of the injury days later) auctions for €162,500 (£144,000; $182,000). ● Lucasfilm Story Group's Pablo Hidalgo spots mistake in The Empire Strikes Back that had seemingly gone unnoticed for 39 years - when Luke Skywalker's lightsaber is half-buried in the Wampa cave you can see the words "NEW YORK" on its base [It was built around a Graflex camera flash holder with "MADE IN NEW YORK" inscribed; the first part was covered by prop elements.] ● Full-size Commodore 64 console due for Christmas, will be based on C64 Mini but include keyboard, better joystick and more games, including text adventure. ● Audiobook sales in UK rose 43% in 2018; bestselling title was Michelle Obama's Becoming. ● Despite Toy Story 4's success, Chinese box office topped by 2001 Studio Ghibli film Spirited Away, which took almost twice as much as Disney/Pixar's film; although it has been available on DVD and pirated downloads Spirited Away has not been on general release in China until now.
BET Awards - Album of the Year: Cardi B, Invasion of Privacy; Best Group: Migos; Best Female Hip Hop Artist: Cardi B; Best Male Hip Hop Artist: Nipsey Hussle; Best Female R&B/Pop Artist: Beyoncé; Best Male R&B/Pop Artist: Bruno Mars; Viewers' Choice Award: Ella Mai, "Trip"; Best Movie: BlacKkKlansman; Video of the Year: Childish Gambino, "This Is America"; Best Actress: Regina King; Best Actor: Michael B. Jordan; Best New International Act (Fan Voted Category): Sho Madjozi; Best International Act: Burna Boy; Dr Bobby Jones Best Gospel/Inspirational Award: Snoop Dogg ft Rance Allen, "Blessing Me Again"; Young Stars Award: Marsai Martin; Best New Artist: Lil Baby; Best Collaboration: Travis Scott ft Drake, "Sicko Mode"; Video Director of the Year: Karena Evans; Sportswoman of the Year: Serena Williams; BET Her Award: H.E.R., "Hard Place"; Humanitarian Award: Nipsey Hussle; Icon Award: Tyler Perry; Lifetime Achievement Award: Mary J. Blige.
Hollywood publicist David Lust (clients included Nancy Travis, Jessica Walters, Illeana Douglas, 55), Thomas 'TC' Campbell (falsely convicted of Glasgow's "Ice Cream Wars" murders, pardoned and released in 2004 after 20 years in jail, 66), actor Douglas Fielding (Z-Cars, Holding On, Privateer 2: The Darkening, 73), civil rights campaigner Ivan Cooper (Northern Ireland Civil Rights Association, one of the leaders of the "Bloody Sunday" march, 75) music executive and manager Elliot Roberts (Asylum Records, Joni Mitchell, Neil Young, 76), actor William Simons (Heartbeat, Crown Court, No Place For Jennifer, 79), actor Bryan Marshall (The Spy Who Loved Me, Quatermass and the Pit, BMX Bandits, 81), Disney script supervisor Edle Bakke (Tron, MacGyver, The Magical World of Disney, 91), author Judith Krantz (Scruples, Princess Daisy, Till We Meet Again, 91).
^ DUMBLEDORE BEAR'S LOTTERY PREDICTOR!
Dumbledore Bear, our in-house psychic predicts that the following numbers will be lucky:6, 19, 24, 34, 35, 40[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 class were learning about words used to describe people. "Alright, children," the teacher said, "who can tell me what we call someone who keeps telling jokes?"
Little Simon's hand went up. "A comedian, Miss."
"Very good, Little Simon. Now, what do we call someone who keeps your secrets?"
After a moment Little Emily's hand went up. "A confidential, Miss?"
"Close, Little Emily, it's 'confidant'. Now, who can tell me what we call someone who keeps on talking when nobody is interested in what they're saying?"
Little Jennifer smiled as only she could and her hand shot up. "That's a teacher, Miss!"
^ ...end of line