It’s Saturday, June 8, 2019, and National Jelly Donut Day, a creditable food item so long as the jelly is good. But Polish pączki are better. And it’s a strange joint holiday: both World Brain Tumor Day and World Oceans Day.
I’m leaving in about a week for three weeks in Hawaii, so be aware that posting will be light starting in eight days, though I’ll keep the Hilis going. With luck there will be some pictures from Oahu and the Big Island, where there will be snorkeling, birds, and exploration. And, of course, food!
On this day in 632 AD, the prophet Muhammad died in Medina. And in 793, Vikings raided the abbey at Lindisfarne, on an island off of NE England. By that time the Lindisfarne Gospels would have been created, and I’m not sure how they survived the Viking invasion. At any rate, June 8, 632, is the accepted date for the raid, and is taken to mark “the beginning of Norse activity in the British Isles.”
On June 8, 1789, James Madison introduced in Congress twelve proposed amendments to the United States Constitution in Congress. Some of these involved additions to the Constitution itself, including changes in wording, while others became the Bill of Rights, including these proposals that became the First Amendment:
Fourthly. That in article 1st, section 9, between clauses 3 and 4, be inserted these clauses, to wit: The civil rights of none shall be abridged on account of religious belief or worship, nor shall any national religion be established, nor shall the full and equal rights of conscience be in any manner, or on any pretext, infringed.
The people shall not be deprived or abridged of their right to speak, to write, or to publish their sentiments; and the freedom of the press, as one of the great bulwarks of liberty, shall be inviolable.
This helped establish the U.S. as a nation founded on secular principles and freedom of speech.
On this day in 1949, according to Wikipedia, “Helen Keller, Dorothy Parker, Danny Kaye, Fredric March, John Garfield, Paul Muni and Edward G. Robinson [were] named in an FBI report as Communist Party members.” Those were the bad old days, which have returned a bit. And speaking of that, on the very same day, Orwell’s novel Nineteen Eighty-Four was published.
On June 8, 1972, during the Vietnam War, Associated Press photographer took a picture of nine-year-old Phan Thị Kim Phúc running down the road, badly burned by napalm dropped by South Vietnamese planes. That photo, below, won a Pulitzer Prize, and you will surely have seen it. Phúc eventually studied in Cuba, and then sought asylum in Canada, where she lives in Toronto with her husband and two children. Can there be a photo more emblemetic of the horrors of war than this one?:
Finally, on this day in 1987, the Labour government of New Zealand, under the New Zealand Nuclear Free Zone, Disarmament, and Arms Control Act 1987, established the country as a nuclear-free zone. This means that no ships either powered by nuclear energy or carrying nuclear weapons can dock in the country, and this extends to American ships as well.
Notables born on this day include Frank Lloyd Wright (1867), Francis Crick (1916), Byron White (1917), Barbara Bush (1925), Joan Rivers (1933), Boz Scaggs (1944), and Kanye West (1977).
I was a big fan of Scaggs, especially of his 1976 album Silk Degrees. In honor of his 75th birthday, a cut from that album: a well known songs that became a top ten hit for Rita Coolidge (Scaggs wrote it).
Those who passed on on June 8 include Thomas Paine (1809), George Sand (1876), Gerard Manley Hopkins (1889), George Mallory and Andrew Irvine (1924; both disappeared while climbing Everest), Satchel Paige (1982), and Anthony Bourdain (2018).
I really miss Bourdain. Like many people, I felt that he was a friend, though of course I never met him. His suicide is still a mystery, but is ineffably sad. At any rate, here’s a short video of Bourdain’s 5 tips for having a great trip to Paris, and it makes me want to go back—soon! (The tips, by the way, are absolutely correct.)
Meanwhile in Dobrzyn, Hili is back to hunting.
A: What do you want to bury there?Hili: Don’t ask.
A: Co tam chcesz zakopać?Hili: Nie pytaj.
From Facebook:
From Facebook (h/t: Doc Bill):
Nilou has found a CondorCam, monitoring the raising of a California Condor chick. You can watch a livestream of the nest site at the video below the tweet. The camera is currently offline but be sure to watch it when it’s back up. As you see below, condor chicks are really ugly, but the adults are magnificent:
Hello World! Watch A Wild Baby California Condor Grow Up Streaming Live, work @USFWSPacific @CornellBirds @SantaBarbaraZoo Western Foundation of Vertebrate Zoology @DisneyAnimals @CondorFriends#birds #birding #ornithology #conservation #EndangeredSpecies https://t.co/fQ2EYl0n8a pic.twitter.com/gs3nOCr4OH
— 𝐓𝐡𝐞𝐫𝐞 𝐢𝐬 𝐧𝐨 “𝐏𝐥𝐚𝐧𝐞𝐭 𝐁” (@GrrlScientist) June 6, 2019
Tweets from Heather Hastie. Oy, what a face on that cat! (I think this is Maru and Hana.)
https://twitter.com/Mr_Meowwwgi/status/1136357102052622336
What a great kid!
This little boy knows how to make any animal feel safe #DodoHeroes 😍 pic.twitter.com/qVl4GFqdyC
— The Dodo (@dodo) June 5, 2019
Tweets from Matthew. Look at this jenga-playing d*g—so patient!
this is secret, she's better at jenga than you
(my_aussie_gal IG) pic.twitter.com/IG3nUOGgzn— Humor And Animals (@humorandanimals) June 6, 2019
Is this the world’s slowest frog?
#FridayFact for #FrogFriday! Not all frogs leap away from potential predators!
Here demonstrated by the slooooow escape of a Sticky #Frog (Kalophrynus interlineatus), from southern Vietnam! Real time!
Frog: "If I move *real* slow, you might not notice me go" pic.twitter.com/apKCRP5ZZh
— Jodi Rowley (@jodirowley) June 6, 2019
One vicious cricket!
Carnivorous Japanese bush cricket – she goes straight for the neck like a big cat – although probably to prevent biting and/or escape behaviour? https://t.co/zwO7FYBYVB
— Michael Siva-Jothy (@sivajothy) June 4, 2019
Tweets from Grania. This first one is almost too weird to be true, but it is true.
https://twitter.com/41Strange/status/1136877841574875136
What a stupid boss!
New Boss: "We're firing you because you're fat."
Female employee: "Are you firing fat guy employee too?"
New Boss: "LOL, no it's different for guys."
Lawsuit in 3…2…1… pic.twitter.com/6BwFRbEuXs
— Keith Lee (@associatesmind) June 7, 2019
The dates of the Viking raid are mixed up.
Please note the U.S. Constitution was written and ratified by the necessary number of states without a Bill of Rights. A vote taken at the Convention was against doing a Bill of Rights. So, why was it done later? To appease the anti-federalist and get them to shut up about having a second convention. Hundreds of possible rights were submitted during ratification, most of which were discarded with the final number being ten.
“You know what I hate? I hate people who don’t walk on escalators.
“An escalator is there to help you walk faster: not to avoid walking entirely, you fat useless hump.”
– Bourdain
Truth
in re / from this post’s last tweet:
” … … and I’m good at my job.”
Enough.
Enough said, too.
O yeah: ” LAWSUIT in 3 … 2 … 1 … ”
Blue
Shooby-dooby-doobidy-ba-babababa…bah!
Just trying to jam with you Blue ;). You’re like a master of freeform jazz…
The Ornette Coleman of the WEIT commentariat.
I was thinking along the lines of Sun Ra…
This “assessment” of … …
… … You Two is a .s t i t c h. ! and
my knowing of the Particular Other Two Named
quite a lovely compliment, Men.
Interestingly, my attorney’s name when
I, Ofherod, ‘ad had need to lawyer up against
Commander / Doctor Edinsmaier
within the decade – long 1990s then, was
Mr J a z z y Jinx. Yeah. Mr Jazzy Jinx.
Blue
🙂
After reading that, I knew there was no way this is going to end well, and not just for the poster. All of the remaining staff and their customers are probably screwed.
Those are not bunnies (Oryctolagus cuniculus), not even Kung fu bunnies, but hares (Lepus europaeus (?)), and March hares at that.
Known for their fanatic, probably testosterone pumped, fights. It allows the observer to come quite close, since they are nearly oblivious to their surroundings during these fights.
Your comment prompted me to do some googling and I find that while the fights are “testosterone pumped” it’s probably a fight between a male and female, with the female either fighting off the male or testing him https://news.nationalgeographic.com/2017/01/hares-fighting-mating-behavior/.
Trés sportif!
What a wonderful video!
I must say that I always assumed the March hares I could approach so easily in the early mating season were males fighting for ‘reproductive rights’. My excuse for thinking that is that it so widespread among mammals (deer, ibex, lions, monkeys, etc) where the sex of the protagonists is not in doubt. I also note these are snow hares, not ‘european hares’. Let us say I’m half, but not fully, convinced.
But it definitely is a thing to keep in mind.
Thanks for the wonderful video.
Though the hares in the video are identified as Mountain hares (which seems to be another common name for arctic or snow hares)I read that European hares also engage in this boxing behavior for the same reasons (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/European_hare#Mating_and_reproduction. It seems to be generic thing with hares. The European hare also undergoes some coat color change in cold weather.
Since the race is as important as the pugilistics for finding suitable suitors, perhaps females should be named after the goddess Atalanta, who “uninterested in marriage, agreed to marry only if her suitors could outrun her in a footrace.” In the myth, the losing suitors were killed; here, they’re given the Muhammad Ali treatment.
Must say that appears to be well known that it is usually males and females fighting, and that my assumption was wrong.I’ll have to revise my interpretation accordingly. Thanks!
Jenga is an outstanding, brilliant game, not just for dogs, but for us humans too (and no, I’m not particularly good at it).
It is even better if played by different teams. It can disclose a lot about the character of the players there.
I note that the dog only pulls pieces, not building a higher tower. Still very impressive.
Re. the frog video:
“Here demonstrated by the slooooow escape of a Sticky #Frog (Kalophrynus interlineatus), from southern Vietnam! Real time!”
Why’s this frog trying to escape from southern Vietnam? Is there some kind of frog-purge going on there that frog-rights activists haven’t reported on?
I googled it but the result just said ‘stop trying to spin this lame joke out’. Outrageous.
Fuck. I didn’t spot the comma. Otherwise that would’ve been quite, quite hilarious I assure you.
I’ll never forget going into a bakery shop in London shortly after arriving in England and asking for a jelly donut. After several seconds of blank stares one of the kind souls there pointed out that they were called “jam” donuts in that part of the world,”jelly” being an entirely different comestible from what we Yanks are used to.
Sub
In 1949 “Helen Keller, Dorothy Parker, Danny Kaye, . . .[were] named in an FBI report as Communist Party members.” I remember at the time, the early 1950s, my father, who ran a small clothes shop, solemnly telling 8 y.o. me to never ever make up stories about his dad being a communist. Those were dangerous days.
I remember those times as well. I think it was sometime in 1950, when I was 5,I went to the 4th of July fireworks with my family. When the band played the Star Spangled Banner, we all had to stand and put our right hand over our heart. When I asked why, they said it was so people wouldn’t think we were Communists. I said, “Well, then would we see who WAS a communist, because they wouldn’t have their hands over their hearts?” They said, “no, because the communists would all pretend not be communists, so would put their hand over their heart.” Then I said, we should not put our hand over hearts, because then everyone would know we weren’t communists, because a real communist would just pretend. But, they told me it didn’t work that way. I didn’t understand.
😎
You are obviously far too logical in your reasoning. Have you ever read ‘Catch-22’?
cr
Judging by the odd phrasing of the above, I think it’s just a typo that you omitted the name of the photographer: Nick Ut.
No wonder the Vikings raided England, what with emanating cries of “A Norse! A Norse! My Kingdom for a Norse!”