~★~♥~♥~★~ El Morno! ♥~★~★~♥ ~
May 14th, 2011

Good luck has its storms. George Lukas

★~  Today is Dance Like a Chicken Day: Dancing like a chicken, jumping like a frog . . . What next- Hopping like a kangaroo? El Morn has more moves than Richard Simmons these days.

I have never once in my whole and entire life danced liked a chicken on purpose. And up until I learned about Dance Like a Chicken Day, I had never even heard that upbeat oom-pah song that gets everyone out on the dance floor to dance like a chicken.

When I shared this with a friend, she gasped and clucked, telling me this is not possible and rattled off some of the other names I might have heard the chicken dance called. “The Birdie Dance,” “Tchip-Tchip,” or “The Song of the Chicken.” Nope. My friend then informed me I must be the only person left on the face of the earth who has not heard of—or done—the chicken dance. Is that true? Should I ask for the gifts that I have taken to all the weddings and bar mitzvahs back? After all, I have been denied my right to look like a dressed-up fool having fun dancing like a chicken. Ok maybe that is eggsteam.

Instead I will look at today as an opportunity and a second chance to teach myself to do the chicken dance!  Shall we dance . . .?

★~ Buttermilk Biscuit Day:

I have eaten biscuits!  Today is the day to take time to celebrate the biscuit.  Whether you use a recipe passed down through the generations, crack open a Pillsbury dough can, or follow the directions on the Bisquick box, enjoy your biscuits with butter straight from the oven. Cover them with your favorite jam, whipped cream, or berries and get a yummy start to your day

★~ Today in History:

♥~ 1804 – Captain Meriwether Lewis and Lieutenant William Clark set out from St. Louis, Missouri, set out on their journey.

♥~ 1878 – The trademarked name Vaseline (for a brand of petroleum jelly) was registered by Robert A. Chesebrough. You have probably heard of his Chesebrough-Pond’s company

♥~ 1969 – The last Chevrolet Corvair rolled off the Willow Run assembly line in Ypsilanti, Mich. The last Corvair (the 6000th produced) was an ‘Olympic Gold’ Monza coupe with a black interior. It was also the last car Ralph Nader condemned as “unsafe at any speed.”

♥~ 1985 – The third most widely-used form of contraception in the U.S. celebrated its 25th birthday. The Pill became the leading form of contraception and continues to be the focus of controversy. Even country stars Loretta Lynn and Conway Twitty sang a duet that turned into a big, hit song titled, The Pill.

♥~1989 – Moonlighting, the comedy crime drama starring Cybill Shepherd and Bruce Willis, last aired on ABC-TV. The show had been on the air since March 1985.

♥~ 1988- Gloria Estefan and Miami Sound Machine started a two week run at No.1 on the US singles chart with ‘Anything For You’, a No.10 hit in the UK.

♥~ 1998 – The last episode of the sitcom Seinfeld was shown after nine years on NBC-TV. Commercials in the final show cost sponsors for $2M for 30 seconds.

★~Born Today:

♥~ 1686- Gabriel Fahrenheit, The Fahrenheit temperature scale is named after him.

♥~ 1944 – George Lucas (George Walton Lucas Jr.) film producer, director: Star Wars series, Indiana Jones series, American Graffiti

♥~ 1952 – Robert Zemeckis Academy Award-winning director: Forrest Gump [1994]; Death Becomes Her, Back to the Future trilogy, Who Framed Roger Rabbit, Romancing the Stone, Used Cars, I Wanna Hold Your Hand; script writer [w/Bob Gale]: 1941; executive producer: Tales from the Crypt. (Is it a coincidence that Gump Worsley , Hockey Hall of Famer: goaltender: is also celebrating his birthday today?)

♥~1984 – Mark Zuckerberg, American internet entrepreneur, co-founder of CEO of Facebook

★~ Did You Know: These facts about Star Wars

♥~ Star Wars opened on May 25, 1977, and by the end of August it had grossed $100 million – faster than any other film in history. By 1983 the film had made over $524 million in ticket sales worldwide – making it one of the 10 highest grossing films in history. [note: this article was written in 1993; Star Wars is currently the 24th highest-grossing films]

♥~ Lucas wrote the Star Wars script in two years.  He spent 40 hours a week writing and devoted much of his free time to reading comic books and watching old “Buck Rogers” episodes and other serials looking for film ideas.

♥~ Lucas insisted on casting unknown actors and actresses in all the important parts of the film – which made the studio uneasy. Mark Hamill had more than 100 TV appearances, and Carrie Fisher had studied acting, but neither had had much experience in films. Harrison Ford’s biggest role had been as the drag racer in American Graffiti, and when he read for the part of Han Solo he was working as a carpenter

♥~ The executives at 20th Century Fox hated the film the first time they saw it. Some of the company’s board of directors fell asleep during the first screening; others didn’t understand the film at all. One executive’s wife even suggested that C-3PO be given a moving mouth, because no one would understand how he could talk without moving his lips.

♥~ Princess Leia. Carrie Fisher was a beautiful 19-year-old actress when she was cast to play Princess Leia, but Lucas did everything he could to tone down her femininity. At one point, he even ordered that her breasts be strapped to her chest with electrical tape. “There’s no jiggling in the Empire,” Fisher later joked.

♥~ Lucas got the idea for Chewbacca one morning in the early 1970s while watching his wife Marcia drive off in her car. She had their Alaskan malamute, Indiana (the namesake for Indiana Jones in Raiders of the Lost Ark), and Lucas liked the way the large, shaggy dog looked in the passenger seat. So he decided to create a character in the film that was a cross between Indiana, a bear, and a monkey.

★~Today’s Silly:

A waiter approached the man studying the menu carefully at the fancy restaurant. “May I take your order, sir?” he asked.

“Well, I was wondering how you prepare your chickens.” The man replied.

“Oh, it’s nothing too special, sir,” the waiter confided. “We just tell them straight out that they’re going to die.”

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Today, I’m off to the our Waldorf School Mayfair where I will put on a flower crown, clap for the Maypole dancers, munch tasty food and watch my kid transformed into a circus performer. If you missed this post about a very special Mayfair cake (the cat box cake) you might want to take peak—it was a 2010 Odd exclusive.

What do you have planned for today? Do share if you have the time…Odd loves company! But please DO NOT say, “I CAN”T BELIEVE YOU HAVE NEVER DONE THE CHICKEN DANCE.”  I’m working on it! And no there will not be a video. Forget it. No way.

♥