Issue ^#768 - 24^th May 2024

Edited by and copyright ©2024 Simon Lamont
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tfir@simonlamont.co.uk

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Unless otherwise indicated dollar values are in US dollars. Currency conversions are at current rates at time of writing and may be rounded.
The Friday Irregular uses Common Era year notation.

^{^} ON THIS DAY IN HISTORY

Friday 24th May     - Day 145/366		-		Astronomer Nicolaus Copernicus died, 1543. Jamestown, England's first permanent colony in North America, was founded, 1607. Actress Mai Zetterling born, 1925. Amy Johnson landed in Darwin, becoming the first woman to fly solo from England to Australia, 1930. Cinematographer Roger Deakins born, 1940. Singer Tina Turner died, 2023.
Saturday 25th May     - Day 146/366		-		The first recorded perihelion passage of Halley's Comet, 240 BCE. Philosopher Ralph Waldo Emerson born, 1803. Gilbert & Sullivan's H.M.S. Pinafore opened at the Opera Comique in London, 1878. Artist and sculptor Rosa Bonheur died, 1899. Ice hockey player & coach Caroline Ouellette born, 1979. Actress Dany Robin died, 1995. International Missing Children's Day. Towel Day.
Sunday 26th May     - Day 147/366		-		A combined Spanish and Amsterdam fleet won the naval Battle of Haarlemmermeer in the Dutch War of Independence, 1573. Diarist and politician Samuel Pepys died, 1703. Mary of Teck, queen consort of King George V of the United Kingdom, born, 1867. The Beatles' Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band album was released, 1967. Actor, animator and screenwriter Matt Stone born, 1971. Journalist Elizabeth Peer died, 1984.
Monday 27th May     - Day 148/366		-		Margaret Pole, Countess of Salisbury, was executed, 1540. Saint Petersburg, Russia, was founded, 1703. Hydrographer Francis Beaufort born, 1774. The Chrysler Building, then the tallest man-made structure, opened in New York City, 1930. Cartoonist and founder of Ripley's Believe It or Not! Robert Ripley died, 1949. Singer-songwriter Siouxsie Sioux born, 1957.
Tuesday 28th May     - Day 149/366		-		The first ships of the Spanish Armada set sail from Lisbon, Portugal, for the English Channel, 1588. William Pitt the Younger, Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, born, 1759. Violinist and composer Leopold Mozart, father of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, died, 1787. Mathias Rust, 18, flew a private plane from Helsinki, Finland, to land near Red Square in Moscow, Russia, without permission, 1987. Tennis player Jodie Burrage born, 1999. Poet and memoirist Maya Angelou died, 2014.
Wednesday 29th May     - Day 150/366		-		The Roman Empire ended with the Fall of Constantinople to the Ottoman army, 1453. Explorer Bartolomeu Dias died, 1500. King Charles II of England born, 1630. Joséphine de Beauharnais, first wife of Napoleon Bonaparte, died, 1814. Edmund Hillary and Sherpa Tenzing Norgay became the first people to summit Mount Everest, 1953. Weather presenter Carol Kirkwood born, 1962. Oak Apple Day in parts of England. International Day of United Nations Peacekeepers.
Thursday 30th May     - Day 151/366		-		The Peasants' Revolt broke out in Essex, 1381. Joan of Arc was executed, 1431. Draughtswoman Antonina Houbraken born, 1686. Aviation pioneer Wilbur Wright died, 1912. The Lincoln Memorial in Washington, D.C., was dedicated, 1922. Bookseller Tim Waterstone born, 1939.

^{^} THE WISDOM OF...

This week, Maya Angelou:

I've learned that people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel.

^{^} FILM QUIZ

A selection of quotations from films containing the word 'hour' in the title, either as a whole word or part of a word. Answers next issue or from the regular address.

• There was a time when the nights were for sleeping. Deep, dreamless sleep. To sleep and wake unafraid.
• - There must be priests in Hell.
  - Can't move for them.
• It is not my job to be jumping on and off of buses, I don't do that, I am not Carl Lewis!
• What do you know man? A stereo's a stereo. Art is forever!
• The shutter is clicked... the flash goes off... and they've stopped time... if just for the blink of an eye.

Last issue's 'office' quotations were from:

• I saw a man strangle a human being - well, an accountant anyway.
      -- The Parole Officer [2001]
• This is a weapons manufacturing firm, violence has no place here!
      -- Office Uprising [2018]
• Mr. Lumbergh told me to talk to payroll and then payroll told me to talk to Mr. Lumbergh and I still haven't received my paycheck and he took my stapler and he never brought it back and then they moved my desk to storage room B and there was garbage on it...
      -- Office Space [1999]
• Hey, God. I know I haven't asked for a lot in this life. Granted, I was born rich... and white... and a man... and straight. Well, except for that one time in Vegas, but that was Vegas.
      -- Office Christmas Party [2016]
• You know something, you ain't nothing special. You got no manners, you treat woman like whores and if you ask me you got no chance of being no officer.
      -- An Officer and a Gentleman [1982]

^{^} WEIRD WORLD NEWS

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

• More than 300 dachshunds gathered at Marble Hill House in Twickenham, London, earlier this week (with their owners) to set a new world record for the largest dachshund walk. With the previous record standing at 250 the 342 sausage dogs smashed it. The event also raised funds for animal rescue and rehoming centres. ● Greater spotted eagles which were fitted with trackers have been seen to be avoiding the active warzones in Ukraine as they migrate north to Polesia, a wetland regon bordering Ukraine, Poland, Belarus and Russia. They were also noted to be making fewer stopovers for food and rest, which could affect their ability to breed. ● Vermont State University's Castleton campus has bestowed an honorary degree of "doctor of litter-ature" on Max, a cat who lives with a family close to the main campus entrance, and who has befriended many staff and students over the last four years. He is also known to accompany prospective students on tours of the campus.


• In 1961 Ed Dwight was selected to be the first black astronaut candidate and went through training at NASA but ultimately did not fly on any missions. Last Sunday Dwight, now 90, became the oldest person to go to space, aboard a Blue Origin spacecraft. ● Scientists on the Hephaistos project are claiming to have detected the possible signs of Dyson spheres, alien megastructures built around stars to harness their energy. Such spheres - or partial spheres - are hypothesised to emit excess infrared radiation and the team, studying three astronomical surveys, say they have identified seven potential Dyson spheres out of five million energy sources. There are natural explanations for excess infrared radiation including stellar dust rings and nebulae and the team admit that more analysis is needed. ● If you missed seeing the northern lights you might get another chance in the next couple of weeks as the Sun is still approaching the 'solar maximum' when sunspot activity peaks and the cluster of sunspots responsible for the plasma storm that caused the extensive aurorae should be facing the Earth again.


• A 2,000-year-old body of a young woman found by archaeologists in Dorset has been described as the "smoking gun" evidence of ritual sacrifice in prehistoric Britain. About 20 years old she was found to have damage to one of her ribs and was killed by a stab wound to the neck. Unlike other burials where the body was laid out with respect her body was face down on a crescent-shaped arrangement of animal bones and surrounded by ceramic pots and the remains of joints of meat, likely ritual offerings. ● A new inquiry into deaths on the English Channel island of Alderney during Nazi occupation in World War II which combined data from several sources has found that it is likely that 641-1027 people, most probably near the upper limit, died in labour camps due to the "brutality, sadism and murder" of the Nazi occupiers and their deaths were covered up. ● Scientists at the University of North Carolina Wilmington have used radar satellite images, historical maps, geophysical surveys and sediment cores to locate a long-lost branch of the River Nile closed to the Pyramids at Giza, Egypt. The 'Ahramat' brach was about 40 miles (64km) long, 650-2,300' (200-700m) wide and runs beside 31 pyramids. It is thought that the heavier blocks of stone used to build the pyramids could have been transported along the branch, which the team think was buried in a combination of a massive drought and sandstorms between the pyramids' construction 4,700-3,700 years ago and now. ● Also at Giza archaeologists using ground-penetrating rader have identified a large 'anomaly' comprising two underground structures under the Western Cemetary near the Great Pyramid. They think that the shallower of the two structures could have been an entry into the larger one and are hoping that the site can be excavated to confirm the presence and construction of the structures. ● Leonora Carrington's painting Les Distractions de Dagobert has sold at auction in New York for $28.5m (£22.48m), a new record for the Lancashire-born surrealist artist who died at the age of 94 in 2011. ● One of the 1,500 first edition copies of J.R.R. Tolkien's 1937 novel The Hobbit is to be auctioned this week. It is expected to sell for £7,000-£10,000 ($8,900-$12,700).


• The British Museum has reported the recovery of 626 of the up-to-2000 items missing or believed stolen from its collection after a global operation. Many of the items recovered had been sold on auction site eBay. The museum believes that a former employee altered internal records to cover their tracks as they removed gems from the Greek and Roman department. Part of the museum's problem is that many of their items are not properly catalogued and the sole catalogue is accessible by staff; they are now planning on cataloguing everything, including taking photographic images, and maintaining a separate secure copy of the catalogue. ● The U.S. National Parks Service is hunting for the person who pulled down an historic 113-year-old tramway tower in Death Valley, California, between April 1^st and April 24^th. It is thought that the culprit had got their car stuck in deep mud and used the tower as a base to winch the vehicle out, accidentally pulling down the structure in the process. The aerial tramway was built in 1911 by the Saline Valley Salt Company to transport salt out of the valley and four towers (including the downed one) still exist in Death Valley.


• In the 1960s a sinkhole opened up in Siberia and has continued to expand thanks to warming temperatures melting the permafrost; today the 'Batagay megaslump', commonly known as the "mouth to hell" is over 0.6 miles (1km) long and growing by at least 33' (10m) a year. As it expands it is also releasing carbon dioxide, contributing to the climate change which caused it. ● There are growing concerns about the electricity demands of data centres and generative artificial intelligence (AI) systems. In 2022 data centres consumed 460 terawatt hours of electricity worldwide, a figure estimated by the International Energy Agency to double by 2026. For comparison the predicted near-1,000 terawatt hours is roughly the electricity demand in Japan, population 125 million. In the UK the National Grid expects demand from data centres to rise six-fold in the next ten years, while in Ireland, where a fifth of the country's electricity production already goes to data centres a moratorium banning the construction of new ones has been introduced. ● A man renovating his new home in Poole, Dorset, was digging in the garden when he unearthed an intact plastic Quavers crisp packet with the date 31 October 1975 printed on the back as part of the terms of a promotion. ● Satellite radar data has shown that ocean water extends for miles beneath the Thwaites Glacier in West Antarctica, commonly known as the "Doomsday Glacier" because of the effect its collapse and melting would have on global sea levels. It is already responsible for 4% of the global sea level rise and if it breaks off and melts the ice contained will add more than 2' (61m), but it also holds back the surrounding ice and could ultimately cause a rise of around 10' (3m).

IN BRIEF: While 342 dachshunds gathered in London 706 people called Kyle assembled in the town of Kyle, Texas, to attempt to set their own record for the largest gathering of people with the same first name; unfortunately they failed, for the fifth time - in 2017 2,325 people called Ivan gathered in Kupres, Bosnia-Herzogovina. ● One of the things guaranteed to annoy Brits is people, usually Americans, incorrectly making tea. American TikToker Kelsey Pomeroy recently decided to show how to brew her "proper cuppa" in celebration of the new series of Bridgerton on Netflix. To British bafflement she added milk to water before boiling it in a pan, and pondered whether one or two teabags per cup was suitable. She then poured the milk/water over the teabag and added sugar before removing the teabag... [Good thing she did not realise that in the era in which Bridgerton is set loose tea was the norm; she would probably have cut the teabag open... -Ed] ● To celebrate the Doctor Who exhibition at Weston Museum volunteers from across the South West have knitted a multicoloured scarf (in the style of Tom Baker's Doctor) 875' (267m) long. ● The Helvellyn Eleven and Henley Cricket Club have played England's highest cricket match, at the top of Helvellyn in the Lake District. As well as their cricket gear they carried a 19st (120kg) artificial pitch up to the 3,117' (950m) peak. The players also aimed to raise £10,000 ($12,700) for research into Charcot-Marie-Tooth disease. The match was drawn. ● A man has been filmed riding a Henry vacuum cleaner he had converted into a mini motorbike. ● Officials in the Japanese town of Fuji Kawaguchiko have erected a large black mesh screen to block the view of Mount Fuji from the car park in front of a supermarket after locals got fed up with tourists using the spot to pose for photographs, blocking the road and leaving tons of litter behind them. ● OpenAI has pulled one of the new voices for its latest version of the ChatGPT AI system after actress Scarlett Johansson formally complained that it was too similar to hers; she had been approached by the company to voice the AI but declined. ● The Vatican has issued new guidelines on recognising alleged supernatural phenomena such as weeping statues and visions of the Virgin Mary. The new advice is that bishops should refer immediately to the Vatican rather than independently claiming such claimed occurences are 'miracles'. ● Bathroom furnishings company Victoria Plumbing has bought out bathroom furnishings company Victoria Plum after the latter went into administration; eight years ago the two companies faced off in court over a trademark dispute. ● A woman has been found living in the roofspace behind the large triangular sign above a Family Fare grocery store in Michigan. She had been there for about a year, had a job and a car, and her living space included a coffee maker, computer and printer. ● If you have a spare $6.6m (£5.2m) the entire town of Campo, California, has been put on the market. ● Also on the market, and considerably smaller, is a two-bedroom house in Jackson Beach, Florida, just 10' (3m) wide. Built after a dispute over the land's planning permission it can be yours for just over $600,000 (£470,000).

UPDATES: The first manned launch of Boeing's Starliner spacecraft has been pushed back again after a small helium leak was discovered in the craft's service module.

^{^} OBITUARIES

Actor Akira Nakao (Ninja Wars, Godzilla vs Destoroyah, Castle of Sand, 81), singer Frank Ifield ("I Remember You", "The Wayward Wind", "Lovesick Blues", 86), film producer Fred Roos (Apocalypse Now, The Outsiders, The Godfather Part II, 89), actor Dabney Coleman (Tootsie, 9 to 5, Yellowstone, 92), actress Barbra Fuller (Adventures of Superman, One Man's Family [radio], The Red Menace, 102).

^{^} DUMBLEDORE BEAR'S LOTTERY PREDICTOR!

Dumbledore Bear, our in-house psychic predicts that the following numbers will be lucky:

2, 20, 22, 28, 44, 57

[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's great aunt had come to visit and the family were sitting down to tea. While the adults were talking Little Jennifer stuck a finger up her nose, pulled out a large bogey and popped it into her mouth.
    "Little Jennifer!" her great aunt said, looking down her nose imperiously, "That is not polite behaviour, young lady!"
    Little Jennifer swallowed then smiled as only she could. "But it's what Mummy and Daddy do all the time!"

---

^{^} ...end of line