Saturday 25 July 2009

                  

 

                            

July 25th

•Threading the Needle Day

Certainly of interest of those who sew.
It means to either walk a fine and difficult line between two
things or issues, or to do something difficult.

The creator of Thread the Needle Day did not document this day.
So, until he or she is found, you can celebrate today by either
sewing or threading the needle on issues.

ON THIS DAY IN HISTORY:
1603 – James VI of Scotland is crowned the first king of Great Britain.
1722 – The Three Years War begins along the Maine and Massachusetts border.
           Also known as Drummer’s War, it was a series of battles between the
           British and French. The war had little organized leadership, and was
           mostly a series of skirmishes.
1837 – The first commercial use of an electric telegraph is successfully
           demonstrated by William Cooke and Charles Wheatstone between
           Euston and Camden Town in London.
1978 – Louise Brown, the world’s first "test tube baby" is born.
2007 – Pratibha Patil is sworn in as India’s first woman president

 

1750 – Henry Knox, American general (d. 1806)
1894 – Walter Brennan, "The Real McCoys" (d. 1974)
1923 – Estelle Getty "The Golden Girls" (d. 2008)
1954- Walter Payton, NFL football player 
1971 – Roger Creager, American country music singer-songwriter
1982- Brad Renfro, actor 

                         

 

                                 

                   Captain & Tennille
Captain & Tennille are U.S. pop music recording artists who
achieved chart success from 1975–80 with a repertoire of hit
pop songs. The duo consists of "Captain" Daryl Dragon
(born August 27, 1942), and Toni Tennille (born May 8, 1940).
They are probably best known for their singles,
"Love Will Keep Us Together" and "Do That to Me One More Time,"
as well as their television variety series which appeared on the
ABC network in the 1976–77 season.

Toni Tenille
Date of Birth
8 May 1940, Montgomery, Alabama, USA

Birth Name
Cathryn Antoinette Tennille

Height
5′ 11" (1.80 m)

Spouse
Daryl Dragon (11 November 1975 – present)
Kenneth Shearer (2 June 1962 – 1972) (divorced)

Trivia
Grammy-award winning singer
Sang background vocals on Pink Floyd The Wall (1982).
Daughter-in-law of Carmen Dragon.
Backup singer for The Beach Boys in the early 1970s, making
                her arguably the first "Beach Girl".
Married musical partner Daryl Dragon (aka The Captain) at her
                 parents’ urging, when they were about to go on tour
                together and her parents worried about their public image.
                ("Living together" was still largely frowned upon in America
                during the early 1970s.) Neither Tennille nor Dragon took the
                marriage seriously at the time, but came to value it more
                and more as the years went by.

Daryl Dragon
Daryl Frank Dragon (born August 27, 1942  (age 66), Los Angeles, CA)
is a keyboardist, known as Captain in the successful 1970s pop musical
duo Captain & Tennille, with his wife, Toni Tennille.

Dragon is the son of conductor, composer, and arranger, Carmen Dragon –
his godfather was actor comedian Danny Thomas. He is the older brother
of Dennis Dragon, a member of the 1960s pop combo The Dragons
(which included Doug Dragon).

In 1962, he became a member of the band Charles Wright & the Wright
Sounds, a group which included future Watts Band member John
Raynford. Dragon was also a keyboard player with The Beach Boys in
the early 1970s, and got his nickname of "Captain" from the group’s lead
singer Mike Love. He perpetuated this nickname and image by wearing
a nautical captain’s hat.

Dragon also made significant contributions with keyboarding and musical
scoring on the Beach Boys’ twenty-third official album, their 1972 release
Carl and the Passions – "So Tough".

Dragon & Tennille spent most of the ’90s and ’00s in the Lake Tahoe area
in northwestern Nevada, where they had lived for more than a dozen years,
and where, during that time, Toni had the honor of serving as Ambassador
for the Arts for the state. In the mid-’00s, having tired of the often harsh
winters in that area, they temporarily took year-round residence at their
second home, located in the Palm Springs area of Southern California,
until 2008, when they built a house and settled down in Prescott, Arizona,
where Tennille participates in the annual Prescott Jazz Summit.

                               

                                        

          disco
Style of dance music that arose in the mid-1970s, characterized
by hypnotic rhythm, repetitive lyrics, and electronically produced
sounds. Disco (short for discotheque) evolved largely from New
York City underground nightclubs, in which disc jockeys would
play dance records for hours without interruption, taking care to
synchronize the beats so as to make a seamless change between
records. Artists such as Donna Summer, Chic, and the Bee Gees
had many hits in the genre, which peaked with the release of the
film Saturday Night Fever (1977). Disco faded quickly after 1980,
but its powerful influence, especially its sequenced electronic beats,
still continues to affect much of pop music.

      ~PINK PANTHER~

Betty appeared in the first "Color Classic" cartoon ‘Poor Cinderella’,
her only theatrical color appearance (1934).

In a cameo appearance in the feature film Who Framed Roger Rabbit (1988),

in her traditional black and white, and voiced by Mae Questel,

Betty mentioned that work had "gotten slow since cartoons went to color,

‘ but she still had "what it takes."’

 

                                        

                                              

                  

As might be expected of creatures so heavenly in color, the disposition of

bluebirds is particularly angelic. Gentleness and amiability are expressed in

their soft musical voice. Tru-al-ly, tru-al-ly, they sweetly assert when we

can scarcely believe that spring is here; tru-wee, tur-wee they softly call

in autumn when they go roaming through the countryside in flocks of azure.
– Neltje Blanchan, Birds Worth Knowing, 1917

 

             

Series:   Answers To Science Questions Asked of a Third Grade Class

13. We do not raise silk worms in the United States, because we get

our silk from rayon. He is a larger worm and gives more silk.

 

14. One of the main causes of dust is janitors.

 

15. A scout obeys all to whom obedience is due and respects all duly
constipated authorities.

 

  Line old sleeping bags with flannel sheets, you fold in half and hand

sew a flannel sheet into the sleeping bag for incredible warmth!  You’ll

attach all the way around the bottom section that you lie on, the top you

leave loose so you can either "cover up with it" or you can lie on top of

the flannel sheet if it gets too warm.

 

This is the last recipe in this week’s featured food.  Watch for a new Food of the Week!

                               

SUMMER VEGETABLE SKEWERS
Tri-colored bell peppers are the star of this colorful vegetable skewer recipe.

The pepper’s sweet, delicious flavor will soak into the zucchini, as the

garlic-infused olive oil scents the earthy mushrooms. Vegetable skewers

are a welcomed addition to any barbecue or cookout, and a great way to

use fresh seasonal vegetables.

 

Makes 4 Summer Vegetable Skewers
Prep Time: 20 minutes
Cook Time: 15 minutes

Ingredients:
•1/4 cup olive oil
•1 garlic clove, sliced thin
•1/2 tsp dried thyme
•1 large red bell pepper, seeded, cut in eighths
•1 large green bell pepper, seeded, cut in eighths
•1 large yellow bell pepper, seeded, cut in eighths
•2 green zucchini, sliced in eighths
•8 large white mushrooms, halved
•4 long metal grill skewers
•salt and fresh ground black pepper to taste
Preparation:
In a small saucepan, warm the oil and garlic over low heat, until the garlic

begins to bubble. Turn off the heat and add the herbs. Stir and allow to sit

for 30 minutes to infuse the oil.

 

Skewer the vegetables in any order desired. Each skewer should get six

pieces of pepper (2 of each color), four slices of zucchini, and four mushroom

halves. Smaller ones can be made using bamboo skewers that have been

soaked in water overnight.

 

Brush the vegetable skewers with the olive oil, season with salt and fresh

ground black pepper to taste, and cook on a preheated grill until the

vegetables are tender.

Q:  I’ve added an extension to my deck and need to match the stain color. Can this be done?

     
A:  Even if you don’t remember the name of the original stain, you can match it.

Take a sample—the larger the better—to your favorite home improvement center.

An in-store associate will be happy to help you find the best option. If you’re

trying to match a semi-transparent stain, apply the new stain to the new decking,

then finish with a coat across the whole deck, including the older pre-stained area,

to get uniform color.

 

1. For cleaning smelly hands after chopping onions or garlic, just rub

     them on a stainless steel spoon. The steel is supposed to absorb the odor.

2. Fresh coffee beans can also absorb nasty odors from your hands.

3. If you happen to over-salt a pot of soup, just drop in a peeled potato.

     The potato will absorb the excess salt.

4. When boiling eggs, add a pinch of salt to keep the shells from cracking.

5. Never put citrus fruits or tomatoes in the fridge. The low temperatures

     degrade the aroma and flavor of these persnickety fruits.

         

        NAUTICAL

     PHRASE

                                Taken aback
                                       Meaning

      Surprised or startled by a sudden turn of events.

                                     Origin

‘Aback’ means in a backward direction – toward the rear.

It is a word that has fallen almost into disuse, apart from
in the phrase ‘taken aback’. Originally ‘aback’ was two
words: ‘a’ and ‘back’, but these became merged into a
single word in the 15th century. The word ‘around’ and
the now archaic ‘adown’ were formed in the same way.

‘Taken aback’ is an allusion to something that is startling
enough to make us jump back in surprise. The first to be
‘taken aback’ were not people though but ships. The sails
of a ship are said to be ‘aback’ when the wind blows them
flat against the masts and spars that support them.
A use of this was recorded in the London Gazette in 1697:

        "I braced my main topsails aback."

If the wind were to turn suddenly so that a sailing ship was
facing unexpectedly into the wind, the ship was said to be
‘taken aback’. An early example of that in print comes from
an author called Eeles in the Philosophical Transactions
of the Royal Society, 1754:

    "If they luff up, they will be taken aback,
    and run the hazard of being dismasted."

Note: ‘to luff’ is to bring the head of a ship nearer to the wind.

The figurative use of the phrase, meaning surprised rather than
physically pushed back, came in the 19th century.
It appeared in The Times in March 1831:

"Whigs, Tories, and Radicals, were all taken aback with
astonishment, that the Ministers had not come forward
with some moderate plan of reform."

Charles Dickens also used it in his American Notes in 1842:

"I don’t think I was ever so taken aback in all my life."

                    

           

                           Bink E Berde
               Age: Seven and a half years old July 2004

                                   Gender: Male
                    Kind: Solomon Island Eclectus
                  Home: San Francisco, California

Please allow me to introduce Bink E Berde,
my 7-1/2-year-old Solomon Island Eclectus male.
This is a photo of Bink E at his former job as the
world’s first parrotlegal – note his very own leather
briefcase. He’s a very special, outgoing boy with
a steady and loving disposition.
Bink E currently participates in animal assisted
therapy visits through the San Francisco SPCA.
He has a real sixth sense about the people he
visits and always seems to know who has a real
need for close contact with him. At those times,
Bink E will stretch and contort his little body so
he can gently hop onto the hand or arm of his
choice. Bink E Berde has a way of lighting up
every room he enters and is a very special companion.

      Quote of the Day

                                   

             "Success seems to be largely a matter
              of hanging on after others have let go."
                                                – William Feather

                                            

                                             

 

 

                          

                          

               What a unique idea!  Postcards will never go out of style.

                     

Johnny Carson would like his epitaph to read "I’ll be right back."

         Movie Star LEGENDS Trivia

Lillian Gish has the longest film career of any male
OR female star – 75 years.

Laurence Olivier has the longest career span of any
male legend – 59 years.

The list includes four living female legends:
Elizabeth Taylor, Shirley Temple, Lauren Bacall and Sophia Loren.

The list includes two living male legends:
Kirk Douglas and Sidney Poitier.

Marlon Brando, Sidney Poitier and Sophia Loren all had screen
debuts in 1950.

Jack Lemmon, Paul Newman, Shirley MacLaine
and Clint Eastwood made their screen debuts after 1950
and therefore didn’t qualify as legends.

Ten screen legends also made five duos:
Katharine Hepburn/Spencer Tracy, Humphrey Bogart/Lauren Bacall,
Fred Astaire/Ginger Rogers and Clark Gable/Carole Lombard.
The Marx Brothers are the only legendary team on the list.

Thirteen legends made the transition from silent movies to sound films:
Joan Crawford, Greta Garbo, Barbara Stanwyck, Lillian Gish,
Carole Lombard, Mary Pickford, Clark Gable, Charlie Chaplin,
Gary Cooper, John Wayne, the Marx Brothers, Buster Keaton
and Edward G. Robinson.

Thirteen legends were born outside America:

Audrey Hepburn in Belgium, Elizabeth Taylor in England,

Ingrid Bergman in Sweden, Greta Garbo in Sweden,

Marlene Dietrich – Germany,
Claudette Colbert – France, Vivien Leigh – India, Sophia Loren – Italy,
Mary Pickford – Canada, Cary Grant – England,
Charlie Chaplin – England, Laurence Olivier – England and
Edward G. Robinson – Romania

 

Eight legends were born in New York:
Barbara Stanwyck, Mae West, Rita Hayworth, Lauren Bacall,
Humphrey Bogart, James Cagney, Burt Lancaster
and the Marx Brothers.

“Tales of Manhattan” features the largest number of legends:
In 1942, Twentieth Century Fox made a movie entitled Tales of Manhattan,

featuring an all-star cast including Edward G. Robinson, Ginger Rogers,

Rita Hayward, Henry Fonda, Charles Laughton, W. C. Fields, and

Paul Robeson, among others. This was the "full version" film that included

equences not seen on the original issue in movie houses. It was issued on

VHS [8935] by Fox. It involves all the people who became involved in a

tuxedo or coat with tails that makes the rounds of all these people.

Each person has their own "story" with regard to this garment. 

                  

              

    ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥

Everything you say is an affirmation. Everything you think is an affirmation.

                                        Everything!

 

What you want to do is to get control of what you are saying

and thinking, so these things bring you good experiences in life rather

than rotten experiences.

                            ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥