~★~♥~♥~★~ El Morno! ♥~★~★~♥ ~
November 30, 2011

★~ Today’s Quote:  I have been through some terrible things in my life, some of which actually happened. Mark Twain

★~ Computer Security Day:

Dearly departed Joe had a hate/hate relationship with our old desktop, and had no interest in learning anything about computers. I told him and I told him (as Cole use to say) never to click on anything that flashed or darted around on the screen, begging him to be the 10th one to click and win a fantastic prize.

Unfortunately, the words that came out of my mouth did not compute in Joe’s brain. One night, he came running downstairs flush with excitement. He had just won a big-screen television. Before I could say “crap, you clicked,” he was explaining how he had played an elaborate game that took him to several sites (10 to be exact), where he had answered questions and passed elimination tests. After passing all the tests, he had WON. I asked him how he knew he had won, and he told me that the words “YOU WON” were flashing enthusiastically on our computer.

When I told him gently, and then later not so gently, and then much later very loudly, that he had not won, he wouldn’t believe me. I have come to learn that this kind of denial is common among casual computer users.

Billy Idolwas started back in 1988 (when three people had computers) to raise awareness of security issues. The Association for Computer Security Day has a list of 50 ways you can protect your computer and save the sanity of loved ones, who will have to spend hours getting “YOU WON” off the computer, while those that clicked look out the window, eagerly awaiting the UPS truck.

One of the easiest ways to protect your computer is to not click on unknown or unfamiliar links that someone (even a friend) has sent you. Instead, cut and paste these links and open them in your web browser. Because so many people don’t know what a web browser is, here is a video that I think explains a web browser in simple, clear terms (don’t feel silly…I once called the library to clarify which part of the egg was the egg white).

★~ National Mousse Day:

Celebrate the 80th anniversary of one of America’s favorite all-purpose cookbooks, The Joy of Cooking, by making something different for dessert: mousse. The Joy of Cooking’s website has a recipe for a White Chocolate Mousse with Toasted Almonds  that looks challenging but delicious. I think I’ll head on over to Whole Foods or Trader Joe’s instead of mousseing around with this recipe, and buy some ready-made mousse.

★~ Today in History:

♥~ 1931 – The Joy Of Cooking 80th anniversary was self-published by Irma Rombauer (1877–1962). Rombauer was a comforting voice for cooks during the Depression, and the book grew into an institution. The first commercial edition of the book appeared in 1936, and it offered a revolutionary “action format” (chronologically ordered ingredients followed by instructions) now commonplace in cookbooks. The numerous editions overseen by Rombauer and later her daughter and grandson sold more than 14 million copies.

♥~ 1887 – The musician: guitar, singer was played — in Chicago, IL. The game was really called indoor baseball; it used a broomstick for a bat and a boxing glove for a ball.

♥~ 1968 – Diana Ross and The Supremes hit the #1 spot on the music charts with Love Child. The somewhat controversial tune (for the times) stayed at the top for two weeks.

♥~ 1985 – The world’s largest beer mug was unveiled by the Selangor Pewter Company of Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. The 6-foot tankard holds 615 gallons.

★~Born Today:

♥~ 1835 – The man who said: “Writing is the easiest thing in the world. … Just try it sometime. I sit up with a pipe in my mouth and a board on my knees and I scribble away.” That’s American writer Samuel Clemens, who wrote under the pen names Thomas Jefferson Snodgrass, Sergeant Fathom, Rambler, and W. Epaminondas Adrastus Blab. But his most famous pen name of them all, and the one we know him by today:Mark Twain. He was born on this day 175 years ago in a log cabin in Florida, Missouri (1835). Mark Twain loved the story of Joan of Arc, and he hated the writings of Jane Austen. He once said that every time he read Pride and Prejudice,he wanted to dig up Austen and “beat her over the skull with her own shin bone.” He was famously cantankerous and famously witty, he’s sometimes referred to as “America’s first stand-up comic.”

♥~ 1874-  Lucy Maud Montgomery, Canadian children’s author, born in Clifton, Prince Edward Island.She wrote more than 500 short stories and poems, and 20 novels. Nineteen of these novels were set on Prince Edward Island, including her first, Anne of Green Gables(1908), about an old farm couple who think they have arranged to adopt a boy to help out with their farm in rural Prince Edward Island, and instead end up with Anne, a spunky red-headed orphan girl

♥~ 1874 – Winston Leonard Spencer Churchill, British statesman and the first man to be made an honorary citizen of the US (by an act of Congress, Apr 9, 1963), was born at Blenheim Palace, Oxfordshire, England. Dedicated to Britain and total victory over Germany, Churchill as minister of defense and prime minister was a strong leader during WWII. A stirring public speaker, Churchill said upon becoming prime minister in 1940, “I have nothing to offer but blood, toil, tears and sweat.”

♥~ 1929 –  Dick Clark, Producer, TV personality (“American Bandstand”),

♥~ 1936 – Abbie Hoffman activist: 1960s cultural revolutionary [Yippie]; one of the Chicago Eight; author: Revolution for the Hell of It, Steal this Book; died Apr 12, 1989

♥~ 1955 – Billy Idol (Broad) musician: guitar, singer: Mony, Mony, Eyes Without a Face, Dancing with Myself, White Wedding, Rebel Yell, To Be a Lover, Speed, Cradle of Love; songwriter: Hot in the City

★~ Did You Know: 

“What is a web browser” answers a common question and might be helpful to some and a good share for those of us who are often asked this common question.

♥~ By the year 2012 there will be approximately 17 billion devices connected to the Internet.

♥~ A virus is a computer program that is designed to replicate itself from file to file (or disk to disk) on a single computer. Viruses spread quickly to many files within a computer, but they do not spread between computers unless people exchange infected files over a network or share an infected floppy diskette. This is why its important to have anti-virus protection such as Zonealarm anti virus on your computer. A virus can not appear on your computer all by itself. viruses happen when you share infected files or diskettes, or by downloading infected files from the Internet.

♥~A worm is a computer program that exploits a computer network to copy itself from one computer to another. The worm infects as many machines as possible on the network, rather than spreading many copies of itself on a single computer, as a computer virus does

♥~ This how the typical computer worm works: The user unknowingly runs a worm program. The worm accesses a “directory” source, such as an e-mail address list, to obtain a list of target computers on the network. The worm sends itself to each of the target computers. A user on a target computer receives a copy of the worm in e-mail, unknowingly runs the worm e-mail attachment, and starts the process over again.

♥~Trojan horses are software programs that are designed to appear like normal computer programs, yet, when run, can cause some type of harm to the host computer. Most often, Trojan horses either steal information (such as passwords or files) from the computer or damage the contents of the computer (by deleting files). Because Trojan horses do not attempt to replicate themselves like viruses or worms, they are placed into their own class of computer threat. Like viruses and worms, Trojan horses can be written in virtually any computer language.

♥~ Another kind of computer “virus” is when well meaning computer users resend e-mails or share virus hysteria. Check Snoops.com before sending our dire warnings of virus infection most of them are not true.

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Hope everyone has a wonderful Wednesday! If you have a morno moment share your thoughts with us by leaving a comment! Odd Loves Company.

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