It’s Friday, September 27, 2019, and the week—one with great weather in Chicago—has passed swiftly. (Rain and hail are predicted for today.) It’s National Chocolate Milk Day, a libation I haven’t tasted in years, but one I’d buy every day for junior high-school lunch (it was 2¢ per half pint).
It’s also National Corned Beef Hash Day, Hug a Vegetarian Day (?), World Tourism Day, and Save the Koala Day. The species, Phascolarctos cinereus, is the only living member of the family Phascolarctidae. With fewer than 100,000 individuals left, the species is listed as vulnerable and threatened by habitat destruction. Here’s an orphaned nine-month-old koala baby, being reared for release:
And there’s a Google Doodle today, celebrating Google. If you click on it you go to a search for “Google”. According to C|Net, it’s Google’s 21st birthday, which means the company can buy a beer. From C|Net:
The Doodle shows you what a typical desktop computer looked like 21 years ago when Stanford Ph.D. students and Google co-founders Sergey Brin and Larry Page published a paper called The Anatomy of a Large-Scale Hypertextual Web Search Engine. In it, the pair outlined Google, a prototype “large-scale search engine” that had a database of “at least 24 million pages.”
Stuff that happened on September 27 includes this:
- 1066 – William the Conqueror and his army set sail from the mouth of the Somme river, beginning the Norman conquest of England.
- 1777 – American Revolution: Lancaster, Pennsylvania becomes the capital of the United States for one day after Congress evacuates Philadelphia.
- 1908 – Production of the Model T automobile begins at the Ford Piquette Avenue Plant in Detroit.
- 1962 – Rachel Carson’s book Silent Spring is published, inspiring an environmental movement and the creation of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.
A signed first edition of this book, like that below, goes for around $4000:
- 1975 – The last use of capital punishment in Spain sparks worldwide protests.
- 1998 – The Google internet search engine retroactively claims this date as its birthday. [See note above.]
Notables born on this day include:
- 1722 – Samuel Adams, American philosopher and politician, 4th Governor of Massachusetts (d. 1803)
- 1840 – Thomas Nast, German-American cartoonist (d. 1902)
Here’s Nast’s “The Tammany Tiger Loose”, referring to New York’s corrupt government and published in 1871. Political cartoons were real works of art in those days.
- 1896 – Sam Ervin, American soldier and politician (d. 1985)
- 1924 – Bud Powell, American pianist and composer (d. 1966)
- 1934 – Wilford Brimley, American actor
- 1947 – Meat Loaf, American singer-songwriter, producer, and actor
- 1972 – Gwyneth Paltrow, American actress, blogger, and businesswoman
- 1984 – Avril Lavigne, Canadian singer-songwriter, actress, and fashion designer
- 1921 – Engelbert Humperdinck, German composer and educator (b. 1854)
- 1940 – Julius Wagner-Jauregg, Austrian physician and neuroscientist, Nobel Prize laureate (b. 1857)
- 1944 – Aimee Semple McPherson, Canadian-American evangelist, founded the International Church of the Foursquare Gospel (b. 1890)
- 1956 – Babe Didrikson Zaharias, American basketball player and golfer (b. 1911)
- 1960 – Sylvia Pankhurst, English activist (b. 1882)
- 1993 – Jimmy Doolittle, American general, Medal of Honor recipient (b. 1896)
- 2009 – William Safire, American author and journalist (b. 1929)
- 2017 – Hugh Hefner, American publisher, founder of Playboy Enterprises (b. 1926)
Those who croaked on September 27 include only one notable I could find:
- 1917 – Edgar Degas, French painter and sculptor (b. 1834)
Meanwhile in Dobrzyn, Hili had a visitor who adores cats, and she takes the opportunity to wheedle for noms:
Mateusz: May I be your friend?Hili: Of course: it’s only to my best friends that I reveal which sausages I like best.
Mateusz: Czy mogę być twoim przyjacielem?Hili: Oczywiście, tylko najlepszym przyjaciołom mówię, które kiełbaski lubię najbardziej.
From Amazing Things, a totally awesome Halloween costume: NRA Raccoon, who won’t give up his weapon until it’s pried from his cold, dead paws.
From Laurie Ann:
And from reader Bruce; what to do with dead flies. Oy! This is disrespect to dipterans.
This is the last tweet that I’ll post from Grania; she put it on her site also sent it to me. It’s very like her:
Every time I watch this I love these people a little bit more. https://t.co/EJgBmGbMmW
— Grania Spingies (@Ygern) June 10, 2019
From Gethyn: caught in the act!
This is definitely an affair scene pic.twitter.com/h4IF6ACEkc
— Nature And Animals 🌿 (@animal0lovers) September 25, 2019
From reader Gravelinpector: a conundrum!
If oil is made of decomposed dinosaurs. And plastic is made from oil.
Then toy dinosaurs are made from dinosaurs 🦕
— Dr. Héloïse Stevance 🖤✨(she) (@Sydonahi) September 25, 2019
But I responded in a rare riposte:
Well, not really. There might be some molecules of decomposed dinosaurs in oil, but the vast bulk of it comprises ancient plankton and algae. Still, a cute thought. https://t.co/2oZAghqoH1
— Jerry Coyne (@Evolutionistrue) September 26, 2019
Two tweets from Heather Hastie. She says of the first one, “This is enough to make most people feel good.” Truefact!
https://twitter.com/AwwwwCats/status/1175905732866297858
An excellent caption for a bunch of you meerkats (or is it meerkittens?)
When you've been in the pub all day with your mates and come out into the fresh air.
📹: https://t.co/SLx7gY8VzC pic.twitter.com/uKTkP4JH2h
— Paul Bronks (@SlenderSherbet) September 18, 2019
Two tweets from Matthew. The first shows an octopus dramatically changing color while asleep. The link gives a plausible but probably inaccurate account of what it might be dreaming (do octopuses dream of electric eels?)
This octopus is changing colors in her sleep, and they think she might be dreaming! DUDE. https://t.co/m4D92xI0jh via @LaughingSquid
— Corina Newsome (@hood_naturalist) September 26, 2019
I would have expected this in Portland, but I guess the Seattle-ites have the technical skill:
A hacker broke into an electronic road sign in Seattle on Wednesday, changing the message to read "Impeach the Bastard." https://t.co/7h7hOIinw6
— Jon Cooper 🇺🇸 (@joncoopertweets) September 26, 2019
You placed 8 people who died this date on the born this date list.
Some very nice video. I might ask if that 2 cent chocolate milk was while attending DOD school? Should be the lowest price around.
I remember 2-cent (then 3- and 4-cent) milk at school lunches in the public schools. It was some kind of govt subsidy (don’t know if it was state or national). I thought that was the real price of milk and was surprised when I went to buy some at the store.
In the years PCC is speaking of, I have no idea what the price was then. Going back further to Kindergarten I somehow remember bringing “milk money” to school to pay for the milk. I think it was 2 cents then but not sure.
I only asked about the DOD question because the company I worked for provided supplies to the school lunch program for the overseas DOD schools. I know that PCC’s dad was in the military and they spent a lot of time overseas.
I can’t remember the exact price, but the on-base schools I attended in Germany in the ’70s had very inexpensive milk. $.05 or there abouts.
Perhaps surprising to some, but these schools were very good. Much better than any of the regular public schools I attended.
I can only guess but I knew some of those teachers in DOD. They tended to be the top of the class and were also adventuresome. You have to be to pack up and live thousands of miles from home. I think they were really dedicated to their jobs. They also live a little better than the poorly paid teachers in the states because they get extra money for housing and so forth. Kind of like I did in my job.
Glad to hear your milk was good and inexpensive. I was very much involved in all that in the 90s when I was in Okinawa. We started bringing long shelf life milk directly from the states to all locations in the pacific. Some of the milk has 60 to 90 day shelf life, if you can believe it.
I think you are right on all counts about DOD school teachers from that time period.
I am surprised that back then milk could be packaged to last that long. Was it canned?
RE: plastic dinosaurs, Randall Monroe did an excellent ‘What if’ on this:
https://what-if.xkcd.com/101/
WEIT readers who have not previously seen what if and look at the archive are probably not going to get much work done today….
Small detail: it is munroe with a “u” i believe.
Unless I’m very mistaken, thr “NRA Racoon” is Rocket from Guardians of the Galaxy. Awesome costume, though.
Yes, that is definitely Rocket.
I agree. It’s definitely Rocket.
I used to own the Incredible Hulk issue in which this character was introduced (sometime in the early ’80s, I think). I think PCC(E) would appreciate it, because it opened with the words, “Now somewhere off in the black holes of Sirius Major there lived a young boy named Rocket Raccoon…”
Hulk #271.
A CGC graded 9.8 goes for around $600 nowadays. Before the Guardian movie(s), they went for around $75.
There is a nice 1968 illustrated book on political cartoon history, “The Ungentlemanly Art: A History of American Political Cartoons” by stephen hess and milton kaplan. Likely out of print but you might look for it in second hand book stores. Full disclosure – Kaplan was my cousin. He was curator of prints and photographs at the library of congress and provided historical prints and photographs as coauthor for a number of large format history books in the 1950s and 60s including the civil war book “Divided We Fought” with hirst milhollon.
Today’s Guardian has a koala news story from New South Wales, where a young koala was hit by a car and dragged at speed for several miles. Happily, the koala suffered only minor abrasions, and is currently recovering at a koala hospital before being returned to the wild:
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2019/sep/26/wazza-the-koala-survives-110kmh-trip-on-nsw-highway-with-only-a-gravel-rash
That’s because koalas are badass and don’t give a fuck (song originally made by the brilliant zefrank1):
A Frank Z pastiche, musically?
I don’t have Facebook, so I can’t access the post, but are you sure that costume is supposed to be “NRA Raccoon” and not Rocket Raccoon from the Guardians of the Galaxy series?
Yeah, pretty sure it’s Rocket. Not sure if he’d be an NRA supporter or not. I think he’d support his right to bear arms, but prefer others not. Make it easier to steal things.
He’d support his right to bears’ arms too.
-Ryan
I laughed! 🙂
NRA Raccoon was more interesting but surely it’s the character from Guardians of the Galaxy. My hope is that kids or their parents would not be making NRA statements on Halloween. On the other hand, perhaps arming local wildlife is where the NRA are going next.
Yeah, it’s Rocket, but what a cool costume! Man, I’d wear that proudly were I still of Trick-or-Treating age.
Totally. A talking raccoon who’s also a bad-ass, weapon-wielding wild man? Hell yeah!
“Rocket Raccoon” — as opposed to the young boy from the Black Hills of Dakota name of “Rocky Raccoon,” who shot a man who called himself “Dan,” who’d run off with Rocky’s girl, whose name was “Magill,” though she called herself “Lil,” yet everyone knew her as “Nancy”? 🙂
He was named as a nod to that song 🙂
Love the Meeerkats ,what caused the wooblyness ?,haven’t been at the over ripe apples have they?
Me too.
I think the wooblyness is just because they are so young.
The political cartoon gave me a flashback to last night. Had to give our 7 year old cat, Coco Chanel, and our 7 month old kitty, Leia, a dose of medicine for worms.
It wasn’t pretty. I thought I could hold the kitty no problem. She’s tiny. I wrapped her up firmly in my arms while my wife squirted the dose into her mouth. My god cats are strong. Even tiny ones. I’m pretty strong but she struggled so hard I thought I might crush her trying to contain her, so I eased up and she escaped. I’ve got the bloody scratches to remember it all by. Luckily, my wife managed to get the dose down before she got away from me.
After that we didn’t fool around with the big cat. She’s a killer. We wrapped her tightly in a towel, like a mummy, with just her head sticking out. It was still hard!
In 3 weeks we have to give them another dose. I’m scared!
Vets and vet techs do these maneuvers routinely. You might want to consult on technique. There may be some clever tricks. One thought…can you put the meds in food, or do they have to absorb through the nasal tissues?
Putting it in food generally doesn’t work. Cats are relatively picky eaters / drinkers. This stuff is a single dose liquid. It needs to all get down, one chance.
Yep, vets have a trick for this kind of procedure. I call it the kitty straight jacket because it looks pretty much like a straight jacket. The other trick they use is multiple humans to hold the cat. And of course they have the experience of doing it regularly.
Incidentally, our vet is scared of our adult cat. He is comically cautious with her. She’s actually never hurt anyone, let alone him, but she looks and sounds very threatening when she disagrees with what is happening to her. There is actually a note in her file warning that she is a problem cat. She’s black listed! But the techs aren’t scared of her at all.
On the other hand they love to board her, even though they don’t officially do boarding. They nicknamed her Tiger because she is so fierce at play. But she’s one of those cats that actually takes care not to scratch when dealing with humans.
Coco sounds like a real keeper. 😎
The same night i had to give each of my cats a worming tablet ,thank jeebus i only have to do it every three months .once you get the tablet in their mouths you hold their jaws together and stroke their throats .
You must live in a high-worm-density locale. We gave our cats worm pills once and never saw the little buggers again.
🐾🐾
Oil is from algae and plankton? Never knew that…I knew it didn’t come from dinosaurs, but I thought it was created from ancient mega-flora, not microscopic life. Very cool to know; good for the next cocktail party. Though I don’t really go to those…or at least am not invited. 😉
Don’t go to cocktail parties? Me neither. But, with great trivia like this, you’ve just got to express yourself. Try holding your own cocktail party. I’d come. 😎
Alright, I’ll let you know when the libations begin. 🍸 🤪
Well, it is Friday after all, so beers will be consumed around here.
Petroleum & natural gas are one of the products of sedimentation & thus former lakes & former sea sediments, at great depth, are where the action is. BUT the raw ingredients can include terrestrial, coastal higher-order plants although it is indeed mainly marine/lake algae & plankton.
When the creationists heard about this they immediately declared that oil forms rapidly without biological materials or they ascribe to GodDidItYouDumbAssWhenHeCreatedEarthIsm:
ABIOGENIC PETROLEUM
Strangely enough no ‘Creation Geologist’ has predicted drilling spots based on ‘Creation Science.’ There is a company in Dallas called Zion Oil & Gas which has drilled for oil in Israel for two decades on Biblical principles [hints they ‘see’ in the bibble] with a remarkable lack of success. i.e. zero viable oil strikes, but plenty of dollars coming their way via mug Christian investors.
Their last press release, Nov 20th 2018, was another washout, but they are ever hopeful the dollars keep coming although the share values continue to creep downwards. THE NEWSLETTER ANNOUNCEMENT
I expect they have [or they will] be delisted from the Nasdaq unless they do some shenanigans with the share value – which they probably will do, being good Christians 🙂
Thanks for this very interesting info. Zion oil and gas? Hilarious! Sad, but hilarious.
There’s a Christian sucker born every minute.
That feller Mosaes ,not only did he make those poor Hebrews wander around the Middle East for forty years ,he finally settled on the one bit of the middle East without any oil .lol.
Absolutely true at one time up until the discovery of the land-based Heletz oil field in 1955 & the Meged oil field in the 2000s [there may be other Israeli oil fields I don’t know of].
The latter is quite interesting as it sits on the border with the West Bank just about & is being drilled by the Givot Olam founder Tovia Luskin who “was drawn to the Meged site after interpreting a geological survey of the area in 1988 as confirming a biblical passage in the Book of Deuteronomy (33:15) and its associated commentary by Rashi” [Wiki] – although I think this is post-rationalising after his strike & it’s the same bit of Deuteronomy as the Zion outfit flaunts, but have found nothing with.
Tovia Luskin has special devices & methods employed at his drill sites to not annoy God on the Sabbath. Where there’s huge profit it’s important to reinterpret the scriptures!
There’s enormous quantities of gas & oil under Israeli off-shore waters & off-shore Gaza & off Lebanon & Cyprus – being tapped now. Some of the boundaries are disputed of course.
I must add that I think Tovia Luskin invoked the Hebrew Bible so that he more easily gets & keeps his drilling licences. Who would dare go against the revealed word of God?
Damn and blast ,reality ruins another great joke .
As if I needed an excuse to have corned beef hash and eggs tonight!
toy dinosaurs not being made from dinosaurs?
buzzkill 😉
It doesn’t strike me as normal cat behavior for a mother cat to let another cat so close to her very young kittens. Or am I wrong?