Issue ^#777 - 26^th July 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 26th July     - Day 208/366		-		Inca emperor Atahualpa was murdered by conquistadors under Francisco Pizarro, 1533. Explorer Francis Drake recorded discovering a "fair and good" bay, probably on the coast of what is now either Oregon or Washington State, 1579. Pickpocket and fence Mary Frith, aka Moll Cutpurse, died, 1659. Nobel laureate playwright George Bernard Shaw born, 1856. Disney's animated film Alice in Wonderland premiered in London, 1951. Actress Sandra Bullock born, 1964. Esperanto Day (Esperanto-Tago).
Saturday 27th July     - Day 209/366		-		The Bank of England received its Royal Charter, 1694. Charlotte Corday, assassin of French Revolution political theorist and writer Jean-Paul Marat, born, 1768. Chemist, meteorologist and physicist John Dalton died, 1844. Bugs Bunny made his debut in the animated short A Wild Hare, 1940. Figure skater Christopher Dean born, 1958. Astronomer Julie Vinter Hansen died, 1960.
Sunday 28th July     - Day 210/366		-		Sancia of Majorca, queen regent of Naples, died, 1345. The marriage of King Henry VIII of England and Catherine Howard, his fifth wife, 1540. Artist Judith Leyster born, 1609. The Sutton Hoo helmet was discovered, 1939. Cartoonist Jim Davis, creator of Garfield, born, 1945. Actor Bernard Cribbins died, 2022. World Hepatitis Day.
Monday 29th July     - Day 211/366		-		The coronation of the 13-month-old King James VI of Scotland, 1567. Cartographer and publisher of railway guide books George Bradshaw born, 1801. Politician, philanthropist and abolitionist William Wilberforce died, 1833. The First Hague Convention was signed, 1899. Actress Clara Bow born, 1905. Singer "Mama Cass" Elliot died, 1974. International Tiger Day.
Tuesday 30th July     - Day 212/366		-		Scottish Covenanter forces beseiged Hereford, a Royalist stronghold, during the English Civil War, 1645. Willian Penn, founder of the Province of Pennsylvania, died, 1718. Writer and poet Emily Brontë born, 1818. Mathematician Julia Robinson died, 1985. Golfer Samuel Saunders born, 1987. Top of the Pops, the world's longest-running regular music TV show, was broadcast for the last time after 42 years, 2006. International Friendship Day.
Wednesday 31st July     - Day 213/366		-		The earliest recorded eruption of Mount Fuji, 781. Physicist John Canton born, 1718. Composer Franz Liszt died, 1886. The Ranger 7 space probe sent back the first close-up photographs of the Moon, 1964. Actress Emilia Fox born, 1974. Writer Mollie Hunter died, 2012.
Thursday 1st August     - Day 214/366		-		The Old Swiss Confederacy was formed, 1291. Cosimo de' Medici, Lord of Florence, died, 1464. Occultist Edward Kelley born, 1555. Henry Perky was granted the patent for shredded wheat, 1893. Frontierswoman and sharpshooter Calamity Jane died, 1903. Farmer Hannah Hauxwell born, 1926.

^{^} THE WISDOM OF...

This week, George Bernard Shaw:

England and America are two countries separated by the same language.

^{^} FILM QUIZ

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

• As we walked, we talked and talked and talked about politics, about movies, and about why the French could never come close to producing a good rock band.
• - Five, six, grab a crucifix. Seven, eight, better stay up late. Nine, ten, never... never...
  - Never sleep again. Where did you learn that rhyme?
• I love you, Harry. You make me feel like a person. Like I'm me... and I'm beautiful.
• Nice place you got here. Who's your decorator? Darth Vader?
• Hark! I see a voice!

Last issue's 'Saint' (or 'St') quotations were from:

• I can't remember who met who first or who fell in love with who first. All I can remember is the seven of us always together.
      -- St Elmo's Fire [1985]
• Were you in a state of grace when you stole the Bishop's horse?
      -- Saint Joan [1957]
• I don't fear critics.
      -- Yves Saint Laurent [2014]
• - Who are you?
  - Nobody has a clue. Least of all me.
      -- The Saint [1997]
• The telephone is perhaps one of man's most important contributions to the scheme of things.
      -- The Saint Strikes Back [1939]

^{^} WEIRD WORLD NEWS

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

• A giant millipede, not seen in the wild for 126 years and thought to be extinct, has been discovered in a forest on Madagascar. The female Spirostereptus sculptus seen by researchers measured 10.8" (27.5cm) in length, and was one of 21 "lost" species rediscovered on Madagascar as well as previously unknown species. ● Last week a man in Glasgow was filmed climbing a street light to free a trapped seagull. The light, one of several on Sauchiehall Street supposed to resemble trees, has "branches" at the top, each holding a light. ● Marine biologists studying Brazilian sharpnose sharks in the sea off Rio de Janeiro have found that they have high levels of cocaine, up to 100 times greater than previously reported, in their muscles and livers. It is thought that the cocaine gets into the water through illegal labs or users' excrement. ● Last Friday a train at Ascot Station in Berkshire was delayed while workmen retrieved a large escaped tortoise seen on the tracks walking "at pace" towards Bagshot. ● A leucistic, or white, squirrel has been caught on camera outside the library in Ystrad Mynach, Wales. Squirrels are thought to have just a 1-in-100,000 chance of being white-furred.


• Lunar soil samples returned by China's Chang'e 5 mission have been found to contain hydrated salts, minerals "enriched" with water, adding to the evidence from India's 2009 Chandrayaan-1 mission and NASA research that, contrary to the belief following the Apollo missions that the Moon is dry, it may contain reservoirs of water. ● NASA's Curiosity rover, still trundling across the Martian surface, has made an unexpected discovery. The rover, which weighs 1 ton, drove over a rock and accidentally cracked it open while continuing its now-ten-year exploration of Mount Sharp. On May 30^th the Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) team managing Curiosity were studing a panorama of its surroundings when they noticed the cracked rock, which contained yellowish-green crystals not seen before on Mars. It is thought that the crystals are pure sulfur. Sulfates, salts containing sulfur left behind when water evaporates are known to exist on the planet, but NASA scientists are now trying to determine what the presence of pure sulfur means for the red planet's history. On Earth pure sulfur only forms in conditions such as volcanoes or hot springs.


• The discovery of a bullet hole under panelling at Bannockburn House near Stirling, Scotland, is being claimed as evidence of a long-standing legend that Bonnie Prince Charlie was the target of an assassination attempt while sleeping in the room as he took shelter in the house in 1746 after falling ill while his Jacobite army beseiged Stirling. ● Analysis of the deaths of modern-day Egyptologists and Ancient Egyptian funerary literature has suggested a cause behind the so-called Pharaoh's Curse, said to affect anyone who enters their tombs, most notably Howard Carter, Lord Canarvon and several others who entered Tutankhamun's tomb in 1922. With several Egyptologists having contracted blood cancers, and texts referring to 'saffron' cakes causing an invisible 'efflux' taken to refer to yellowcake Uranium-235, it is being suggested that without knowing how they caused illness and death the ancient Egyptians were aware of the dangers of radioactive materials and placed them in tombs to 'guard' them. Geiger counter readings within ancient Egyptian tombs are often higher than the expected natural level of their limestone walls' radiation. ● A newly-published study of two skeletons found in the ruins of Pompeii has suggested that the two people might have survived the eruption of Vesuvius but were killed by the ensuing strong earthquakes. ● 'Apex', the largest and most complete fossil Stegosaurus yet discovered, containing 254 bones with missing parts 3D printed or sculpted, was sold at auction in New York last week for $44.6m (£34.5m), over 11 times its estimate. 'Apex' is 11' (3.4m) tall and 27' (8.2m) long. It is reported that the anonymous buyer will loan it to an institution in the US for public display.


• Police officers in Columbus, Ohio, responding to reports of a break-in at a restaurant in a shopping centre at around 3am discovered that a nearby pet shop had also been broken into, its door left open and several animals including dogs, birds, rabbits, ferrets and gerbils were running loose. They rounded up the animals and arrested a suspect an hour later. He was certainly the man who broke into the pet shop as "we recovered several gerbils inside his pants", according to Sgt Joe Albert. ● A Crawford County, Missouri, sheriff's deputy patrolling Interstate 44 last week was stunned to see a vehicle resembling a classic UFO, with a shiny, metal rounded body, transparent dome and no visible wheels, being driven along the road. The deputy pulled it over and after "a brief conversation about [the driver's] out-of-space, correction, out-of-state registration" and a quick photo for social media, the road-legal car, on its way to New Mexico for the Roswell UFO Festival, was allowed to go on its way, albeit with a warning "about our strict enforcement of warp speed on the interstate and to keep his phasers on stun-only while travelling." The sheriff's office's social media post about the stop has been widely applauded and shared. ● A police investigation into the illegal trade in rare and endangered birds' eggs, started in Europe, has led to the seizure of a collection of 3,404 eggs at a house in Granton, Tasmania, and the arrest of a 62-year-old man. The eggs, which had been blown (hollowed out) were valued at between £207,000 ($267,000) and (£259,000) ($335,000).


• It has long been assumed that about half of the oxygen in the atmosphere was created by marine plants photosynthesising in the upper layers of the ocean, but researchers have now confirmed a discovery first made in 2013 but passed over as implausible, that potato-sized metallic nodules on the seabed at depths of up to 3 miles (5km), well below the penetration depth of sunlight, are splitting seawater into hydrogen and oxygen, in a similar way to batteries when submerged. A campaign has been launched to stop companies from mining the nodules. ● Britain's royal estate has published a report detailing its ongoing climate-friendly reforms in the first full year of King Charles' reign. Among other measures solar panels have been installed on the roof of Windsor Castle, gas lamps replaced by energy-efficient electric lights and the two royal Bentley cars are being converted to run on biofuels as an interim measure while the change to electric car use is being researched. Where practicable Sustainable Aviation Fuel will be used for royal flights. While electricity use has risen, natural gas use has fallen by 3% and emissions from heating have also dropped. ● Temperatures in Delhi, India, throughout May and June hovered around a record 50^oC (122^oF). ● Last Sunday the world experienced a record global average temperature of 17.09^oC (62.76^oF), according to unconfirmed preliminary data. ● Scientists in Denmark are developing battery technology based on potassium silicate (K₂SIO₂), rather than lithium. Lithium is expensive, rare and prone to burst into flames. Potassium silicate is found in normal rocks on 90% of the planet's land surface. If viable, K₂SIO₂ solid-state batteries would not only be cheaper and safer than lithium, they would be smaller and quicker to charge. ● If you missed out on seeing the northern lights a few months ago, they may well be visible at latitudes as low as northern Britain in the middle of next week, although not as brightly as in May.

IN BRIEF: Doctors in India have removed 77 needles from a 19-year-old woman's head after she was admitted to hospital suffering from severe headaches. It is thought they had been inserted by a quack doctor. ● A 2x4 Lego brick, 3D-printed using dust sourced from a 4.5-billion-year-old meteorite, has gone on display at the Leicester Square Lego store in London, as a demonstration of how astronauts on the Moon could 3D-print building materials (presumably not Lego bricks though...) using lunar dust. ● Photographs of tour groups at the Myrtles Plantation in Louisiana, said to be one of America's most haunted houses, are being claimed to show the ghosts of a former inhabitant and her daughter [Though both look like double exposures to us... -Ed]. ● In a House of Commons debate earlier this week newly-elected Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer referred to the opposition leader Rishi Sunak as "Prime Minister"... [Easy enough mistake to make after four years in opposition himself... -Ed]. Both laughed it off. ● On Monday a copy of Alan Byde's book Canoe Building in Glass-Reinforced Plastic was returned to the Orkney Library in Scotland. It had been borrowed in early 1977. The library did not say if any overdue fine was charged... ● A metal detectorist on an Oregon beach thought he had found a geocached object when he discovered a metal lidded jar containing a piece of paper on top of its contents six inches under then sand, until he read the paper and found that the jar contained some of the ashes of a 22-year-old man who died in 2011, and had asked to be buried on the beach. The note, written by his mother, asked anyone finding it to "respectfully" rebury it, which the detectorist did. ● In 1948 22-year-old Rosemary Fowler (then Rosemary Brown), a PhD student physicist at the University of Bristol discovered the Kaon subatomic particle, which revolutionised particle physics, led to the Standard Model and paved the way for the later discovery of other particles including the Higgs boson. She then got married and gave up her PhD studies to raise her family. At a ceremony near her Cambridge home this week Fowler, now 98, was given an honorary doctorate to acknowledge her contribution to the field. ● Loughborough University student Zara Lachlan, 21, is hoping to become the youngest person and first woman to row unsupported from Europe to South America and the youngest woman to row solo across the Atlantic. She will set off from Portugal in October, aiming to reach French Guiana while raising money for the Women in Sport charity. As well as 20'-30' (6m-9m) waves mid-ocean she will have to evade a pod of Orcas known to sink small boats off Portugal and sharks off South America. ● As part of the Olympics opening ceremony on Sunday the Olympic torch will be carried part of the way along the River Marne, east of Paris, aboard the longest rowing boat in the world. The 144'- (43.9m)-long Stampfli Express seats 24 rowers (one of whom will be carrying the torch instead).

^{^} OBITUARIES

Journalist, broadcaster and firefighter Beccy Barr (Bloomberg News, BBC North West Tonight, left the BBC to follow in her father's footsteps and train as a firefighter, 46), actress Roberta Taylor (Eastenders, The Bill, The Witches [1990], 76), actress and martial arts expert Cheng Pei-pei (Come Drink With Me, Golden Swallow, Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, 78), singer Abdul "Duke" Fakir (last-surviving founder member of The Four Tops, "Reach Out, I'll Be There", "Baby I Need Your Lovin'", 88), musician John Mayall OBE (The Bluesbreakers, Blues From Laurel Canyon, The Turning Point, 90), snooker player Ray Reardon MBE (six-time world champion, inaugural BBC Pot Black winner, the Welsh Open trophy was renamed in his honour in 2016, 91), comedian Bob Newhart (The Bob Newhart Show, Elf, "The Driving Instructor", 94), industrial designer Kenneth Grange (Kodak Instamatic camera, InterCity 125 train, the AdShell bus shelter, 95), actress Yvonne Furneaux (La Dolce Vita, Repulsion, The Mummy [1959], 98).

^{^} DUMBLEDORE BEAR'S LOTTERY PREDICTOR!

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

6, 32, 36, 37, 40, 51

[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 and Little Mary were talking. "I keep having terrible nightmares," Little Mary said. "Every night for the last week I've dreamed that great big monsters creep into my room and play with my favourite teddy bear! I don't know what to do!"
    Little Jennifer looked thoughtful for a moment then smiled as only she could. "I think you should hide the bear."

---

^{^} ...end of line