Monday: Hili dialogue

September 16, 2019 • 6:30 am

It’s Monday, September 16, 2019, and we have five more days of summer remaining. It’s Peach Pie Day, and peach pie was in fact eaten yesterday, along with a fabulous Key Lime pie (pictures soon).

It’s also Mexican Independence Day (the local Mexican community celebrated on Saturday), National Guacamole Day (cultural appropriation; it was developed by Aztecs and you’re not one), National Wife Appreciation Day, International Day for the Preservation of the Ozone Layer, National Collect Rocks Day, National Women’s Friendship Day, and (for crying out loud), Wrinkled Raincoat Day.

Looking up the last day, I found that it celebrates the life of Peter Falk, who played the detective Columbo on the eponymous television series. Columbo, of course, always wore a wrinkled raincoat, and Falk was born on September 16, 1927 (died 2011). See?:

Bad News of the Day (h/t Jószef; click on screenshot): The Trump administration, in a first since the Endangered Species Act was passed, “has authorized a Florida man to bring back the “skin, skull, teeth and claws” of a lion he hunted in Tanzania.” From the Guardian:

Environmental organizations say the move could open the floodgates for importing other endangered species such as lions and rhinos. A freedom of information request made public by the US Fish and Wildlife Services (FWS) also revealed that the hunter, Carl Atkinson, was represented by lawyer John Jackson III, who is also a member of the Trump administration’s International Wildlife Conservation Council, a controversial advisory board that promotes trophy hunting.

Great. . .

Today’s Google Doodle honors the 90th birthday of blues legend B. B. King (born September 16, 1925, died 2015). If you go to the site, or click on the screenshot below, it takes you to a two-minute YouTube animation of King’s life accompanied by his greatest popular hit, “The Thrill is Gone” (it wasn’t his composition, but he did by far the best version, for which he won a Grammy in 1970).


Stuff that happened on September 16 includes:

  • 1620 – Pilgrims set sail from England on the Mayflower.
  • 1810 – With the Grito de Dolores, Father Miguel Hidalgo begins Mexico’s fight for independence from Spain.
  • 1880 – The Cornell Daily Sun prints its first issue in Ithaca, New York. The Sun is the United States’ oldest, continuously-independent college daily.
  • 1908 – The General Motors Corporation is founded.
  • 1959 – The first successful photocopier, the Xerox 914, is introduced in a demonstration on live television from New York City.
  • 1963 – Malaysia is formed from the Federation of Malaya, Singapore, North Borneo (Sabah) and Sarawak. However, Singapore soon leaves this new country.
  • 1966 – The Metropolitan Opera House opens at Lincoln Center in New York City with the world premiere of Samuel Barber’s opera Antony and Cleopatra.
  • 1975 – Papua New Guinea gains independence from Australia.
  • 1976 – Armenian champion swimmer Shavarsh Karapetyan saves 20 people from a trolleybus that had fallen into a Yerevan reservoir.

From Wikipedia; the man truly is a hero.

Karapetyan is a Merited Master of Sports of the USSR, ten-time World Record-breaker in finswimming, became well known in the former USSR for his heroic actions of saving peoples’ lives. On September 16, 1976 while jogging alongside Yerevan Lake with his brother Kamo, also a finswimmer, Karapetyan had just completed his usual distance of 20 km (12 mi) when he heard the sound of a crash and saw a sinking trolleybus which had gone out of control and fallen from a dam wall.

The trolleybus lay at the bottom of the reservoir some 25 metres (80 ft) offshore at a depth of 10 metres (33 ft). Karapetyan swam to it and, despite conditions of almost zero visibility, due to the silt rising from the bottom, broke the back window with his legs. The trolleybus was crowded, it carried 92 passengers, Karapetyan started bringing people to the top, where his brother would get them.

Karapetyan managed to pull out 46 people, 20 of them survived.

The combined effect of cold water and the multiple lacerations from glass shards led to Karapetyan’s hospitalization for 45 days, as he developed pneumonia and sepsis. Subsequent lung complications prevented Karapetyan from continuing his sports career.

Here’s a video showing the great man; it’s not in English (perhaps some of you might understand it), but you can see what he looks like.

  • 1992 – The trial of the deposed Panamanian dictator Manuel Noriega ends in the United States with a 40-year sentence for drug trafficking and money laundering.

Notables born on this day include:

  • 1853 – Albrecht Kossel, German physician and biochemist, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1927)
  • 1858 – Bonar Law, Canadian-Scottish banker and politician, Prime Minister of the United Kingdom (d. 1923)
  • 1887 – Nadia Boulanger, French composer and educator (d. 1979)
  • 1893 – Albert Szent-Györgyi, Hungarian-American physiologist and biochemist, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1986)
  • 1924 – Lauren Bacall, American actress (d. 2014)
  • 1925 – B.B. King, American singer-songwriter, guitarist, and producer (d. 2015) [See above]
  • 1927 – Peter Falk, American actor (d. 2011)
  • 1927 – Peter Falk, American actor (d. 2011)
  • 1958 – Jennifer Tilly, American actress and poker player
  • 1971 – Amy Poehler, American actress, comedian, and producer

Those who went extinct on this day include:

  • 1911 – Edward Whymper, English-French mountaineer, explorer, and author (b. 1840)
  • 1936 – Jean-Baptiste Charcot, French physician and explorer (b. 1867)
  • 1977 – Maria Callas, Greek operatic soprano (b. 1923)
  • 1980 – Jean Piaget, Swiss psychologist and philosopher (b. 1896)
  • 2009 – Mary Travers, American singer-songwriter (b. 1936)
  • 2016 – Edward Albee, American director and playwright (b. 1928)

Whymper led the first successful climb of the Matterhorn in 1865. On the descent, the rope broke and four of the party fell to their deaths. Here’s a famous painting by Gustave Doré depicting the tragedy:

Meanwhile in Dobrzyn, Hili and Andrzej cuddle up:

A: I have to rest for a moment.
Hili: We can do it together.
In Polish:
Ja: Muszę troszkę odpocząć.
Hili: Możemy to zrobić razem.

From Merilee:

From Gregory, who got this in yesterday’s email from The Guardian, adding that “some headlines should not be juxtaposed”:

A related item from Stephen Muth—bad product placement:

And a cartoon sent by reader Su:

Grania sent me this tweet on April 7 (we’re getting near the end of her tweets now). These “eat me now” tentacles produced by the parasite are one of the wonders of nature.

https://twitter.com/41Strange/status/1114579669901123584

From reader gravelinspector. A lot of work went into 40 seconds of entertaining destruction.

Two tweets from Heather Hastie. Look at this poor Moggie of Size, and it’s being fat-shamed as the staff laughs!

https://twitter.com/AwwwwCats/status/1172948487782227968

And an owl with an antenna (I guess it’s a stick):

Tweets from Matthew. 26 states allow open carry, and I thought that Wal-Mart’s “ban” on those was only to suggest to customers that they not carry weapons it. This video, however, makes it look as if it’s a mandatory ban for the store. (Wal-Mart has also stopped carrying certain kids of gun and ammo.) Well, it’s a start, albeit a small one:

Proud parents: “We DID IT!”

From the kindly Aleppo Catman:

Matthew loves these illusions, and this is a good one. The dots are never green!

37 thoughts on “Monday: Hili dialogue”

  1. That illusion – the green spots remain in my vision when I look to the side!

    Typo in the bit about guns – kid for kind!

    With the snail parasites, it is surely a risk that the caterpillars get shredded & die when eaten by a bird?

    3. “The Lilac Chaser”, one of the most powerful visual illusions. If you look long enough, all the lilac disappears and you are left with just the greenish ball revolving. Moreover, it is an illusion we more or less understand how it works.
      It is, of course, not limited to lilac, any other colour will do, ending up with it’s complementary colour.
      You can experiment with different colours on Michael Bach’s website.
      https://michaelbach.de/ot/

  2. GM started today and GM went on strike today.
    Don’t really understand all the dialogue with that guy in Walmart. Just get him out. Any owner can prevent people bringing guns into their business. Yes, different states attempt to have different laws about it such as posting signs and so forth but you can keep them out. Reality check – they have no business bringing guns into your store and customers oddly enough, don’t like it.

    1. I’ve never seen any open-carry advocate who can explain how an onlooker would be able to tell whether his intent was peaceful or nefarious, so basically they are just dicks. Leave it in the car, buddy, the King of England ain’t in your local Walmart.

      1. Some time ago I saw a guy walking around the grocery store with a gun strapped on. Appeared to have some kind of device locking it down so someone could not come along and shoot him with his own gun. Even back in the so-called wild west days, in some towns they made guys turn in their guns when they came into town. Some made them turn them in to go into the bars. Ah, the good old days.

        1. There are holsters that are designed to try to keep someone else from grabbing your handgun. They require a special technique when you draw the gun. Not foolproof however. People who don’t train sometimes have problems drawing the gun when they want to. Back in my park ranger days we had a holster that prevented someone from grabbing your gun from behind, but then learned that someone could easily grab the gun from your holster if they got close enough and were standing in front of you.

      2. Good point.
        And could end worse if any minor thing ever escalate.
        People are similarly anxious around mean comfort dogs, ex dobermans, due to the unpredictable nature of the situation.

    2. I think he was objecting to the nationwide ban they gave him.

      I’m totally OK with what they did, by the way. If you’re going to carry a lethal weapon designed only for killing people, I don’t want to be in the same supermarket as you.

      1. In my head, I know that the open carry and concealed carry types are the least of our worries when nothing is happening. But my gut reaction is strongly negative. Agree with DrBrydon above that they are dicks.
        And if someone starts shooting, I know that both the shooter & the dicks will be dangerous.

  3. JAC

    “1959 – The first successful photocopier, the Xerox 914, is introduced in a demonstration on live television from New York City”

    They had a Xerox 914 in an episode of Mad Men, the day the copier arrived to great excitement & inconvenience. It was certainly a noisier & much more ‘mechanical’ machine than the silent, smooth device depicted in the lying ads of the day! The 914 was known to catch fire regularly & Xerox supplied, in Xerox speak: a “scorch eliminator” with every copier – that’s a small fire extinguisher to you & me.**

    If you missed the Mad Men TV series, set in the ’60s NYC advertising industry, then you must binge watch all 92 episodes immediately. Essential viewing.

    Here’s a little bit of Mad Men featuring the day the pompous, besuited, tin god Xerox photocopier “engineer” came to call:

    https://youtu.be/gNT6ilohwiY

    And the reality – disgruntled user can’t get what’s on his computer monitor to print on the networked printer. So he resorts to a novel approach…

    https://youtu.be/exsKbDQei-s

    ** Copy/paste of my comment of 52 weeks ago 🙂

  4. [ rude mic grab ]

    Imma let ya finish, but Chet Baker recorded the best version of The Thrill Is Gone, ever.

    1. -> https://youtu.be/fw1991aZ3us

      [ releases mic ]
      [ has yet to record anything musical ]

      ^^^^in case that comes across the wrong way, I’m doing the Kanye West (?) meme where he disgracefully interrupts Taylor Swift at an award show.

  5. Russian finswimming hero YouTube translation:

    Click “settings” cog wheel [inside video frame, bottom right] & a menu opens

    Select “Subtitles/CC” option from the menu

    Click “Auto-generate” sub-option & a new menu appears

    Scroll to your preferred language & select it

    Then enable Closed Captions [if not already enabled] by clicking the “CC” symbol to the left of the cog wheel

    Translation appears bottom of video frame

    вуаля!

  6. Alas, National Wife Appreciation Day was actually Sunday, although I appreciate my wife every day, so I think I’m safe.

    The web site helpfully suggests that I might also like “Slap an irritating co-worker day”, which is on October 23rd. I wonder if hallmark do a card …

  7. I assume that the double-listing of Peter Falk in today’s deaths is an homage to Columbo’s signature, “Just one more thing. . . .”

    3. ‘Wrinkled Raincoat Day’ – the only one of the whole lot that makes any damn sense. 😉

      cr

  8. I’m sure there’s a not insignificant correlation between the regions where open carry is most popular and those parts of the county where Wal-Mart is effectively the only game in town. So it’s amusing to see some of these people exclaiming that they plan to take their business elsewhere. Yeah good luck with that.

  9. Does anyone know of a way that people in the US can send contributions to the Cat Man of Aleppo?

  10. Tweet by @mel_faith1:

    “Watch! This man is being banned from Wal-Mart for open carrying… not even able to buy the items already in his cart. And it takes like 5 officers… why lol

    Gotta follow the rules! Even the dumbass ones”

    This is Gun Rights Activist fake news creation class 101.

    The chap asked to leave a Walmart store by Lexington PD [& banned for life from all Walmart stores] is a Jake Aaron Adkins testing how far he can go. He like [reportedly] thousands of other open carry advocates have been strolling around Walmart stores, since the request not to Open Carry in store, pushing the staff & management into a difficult corner.

    Anyway here is a sample of Adkins’ behaviour that day in the store before the snippet being used by the Tweeter above:

    https://www.tiktok.com/@jakeaaronadkins/video/6684708896801557766

    And prior to that snippet, Adkins had made himself comfortable on a chair in the firearms department of the store while Open Carrying & had started a kind of show on his facebook denigrating Walmart etc. His show wasn’t a short affair!

    You can imagine how distressing this would be to shoppers – an insolent, loud, armed man protesting in a supermarket, only weeks after the Walmart mass shooting resulted in 46 deaths & injuries. Of course Walmart banned him! FULL DETAILED STORY HERE [NB I haven’t got time today to check all I’ve written above for complete accuracy as I prefer to do normally. Bear that in mind.]

  11. Coincidental twofer: Albert Szent-Györgyi in a somewhat wrinkled raincoat in 1917 (after having shot himself in the arm to get out of the medical service in WWI).

    Also of note in addition to his scientific accomplshments per his W’pedia page – he offered to donate his Nobal winnings to the Finns during the Winter War of 1940; active in he Hungarian Resistance during WWII helping (like Raoul Wallenberg) Jews escape, where he was unsuccessfully targeted for arrest by Hitler; Vietnam war protester.

    I once wondered if there were any military figures who had served in WWI, WWII and Vietnam. Probably not, but here’s a war protester who was active in all three.

    2. There’s at least one fictional character who served in WWI, WWII and *Korea*, M*A*S*H’s Sherman Potter. (I am not sure the time line works out right, though.)

      1. A fictional TV character who served in four wars was Jack Jones, from the BBCs “Dad’s Army”.

        https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dad's_Army

        Lance Corporal Jack Jones (Clive Dunn), the local butcher, born in 1870. Jones was an old campaigner who enlisted as a drummer boy at the age of 14 and participated, as a boy soldier, in the Gordon Relief Expedition of 1884–85 and, as a man soldier, in Kitchener’s campaign in the Sudan in 1896–98. Jones also served during the Boer War and the Great War.

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