~★~♥~♥~★~ El Morno! ♥~★~★~♥ ~
July 11th

★~ Today’s Quote: Be obscure clearly.  E.B. White

★~ Cheer Up the Lonely Day: 

Today is the day to cheer up the lonely and downtrodden. Haven’t we all been there from time to time? Sometimes all it takes to brighten a day is a visit or phone call from a friend. A smile from a stranger or a cheerful hello can turn the day around for someone who may have been feeling forgotten and lonely. Celebrate today by making a genuine effort to connect with and brighten someone else’s day

★~ Day of the Five Billion:

The worlds population reached 5 billion. A croatian boy born on the day was officially recognized as the 5 billionth person. To commemorate this, World Population Day was established in 1989. The world’s population exceeded 7 billion in 2011. It would take 200 years to count to 7 billion outloud.

★~Blueberry Muffin Day:

The pop of a blueberry amongst the sweet and delicious muffin cake makes the oversized, berry laden, blueberry muffin a perfect way to start or end your day. Celebrate blueberry muffin day by enjoying one for breakfast, after breakfast, before lunch, for lunch, after lunch, before dinner, at dinner, after dinner, as dessert, or as a midnight snack Click for more fascinating blueberries facts?

★~ Today in History:

♥~ 1914 – Babe Ruth debuted in the major leagues with the Boston Red Sox. Ruth made $2,900 his rookie season. Just six years later, his paycheck was worth $125,000 when he became a member of the New York Yankees.

♥~ 1960  – “To Kill a Mockingbird,” Harper Lee’s Pulitzer Prize-winning novel about childhood innocence and racial injustice in a small Southern town during the Great Depression, was first published.

♥~ 1964 – 18-year-old Millie Small was riding high on the pop music charts with My Boy Lollipop (#2, 7/04/64). Listen carefully to the tune and you’ll hear Rod Stewart playing harmonica. Millie Small was known as the ’Blue Beat Girl’ in Jamaica, her homeland.

♥~ 1971 – The U.S. Department of Agri­culture was allocated $19,520 to deter­mine if a woman’s place was in the home.

♥~ 1985 – Zippers for stitches were announced by Dr. H. Harlan Stone. The surgeon had used zippers on 28 patients whom he thought might require additional operations because of internal bleeding following initial operations. The zippers, which lasted between five and 14 days, were then replaced with permanent stitches.

★~ Born Today:

♥~ 1767 – John Quincy Adams: Sixth president of the United  States

♥~ 1754 – Thomas Bowdler , a medical doctor, gave up his medical practice to practice surgery on the works of William Shakespeare. He removed all those words “…which cannot with propriety be read aloud in a family” or which are “…unfit to be read aloud by a gentleman to a company of ladies.” He removed all the words and expressions which he considered to be indecent or impious from his ten volumes of Shakespeare’s writings. But that wasn’t enough to satisfy Bowdler. He moved on to Edward Gibbon’s History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, and then he boldly bowdlerized the Old Testament. In doing so, he irritated a lot of people – so many that his name became synonymous with these acts. To  “Bowlderize” something means to self-righteously remove or modify passages one considers vulgar or objectionable.

♥~ 1899 – E.B. (Elwyn Brooks) White author: Stuart Little, Charlotte’s Web, Is Sex Necessary?, The Elements of Style; died Oct 1, 1985

♥~ 1915  –  Yul Brynner (Taidje Khan) Academy & Tony Award-winning actor: The King and I [1956, 1951 resp.]; The Ten Commandments, The Magnificent Seven, Anastasia, The Brothers Karamazov, Futureworld, Westworld; died Oct 10, 1985

♥~ 1934 – Giorgio Armani fashion designer: Outstanding International Designer Award [1981]

♥~ 1956 – Sela Ward actress: Sisters, The Fugitive, Child of Darkness, Child of Light

★~ Did You Know:

♥~ John Quincy Adams  had a pet gator, which was gifted to him by the Marquis de Lafayette. He kept it in a tub in the East Room, claiming that he enjoyed watching “the spectacle of guests fleeing from the room in terror.”

♥~ Quincy Adams got his exercise by taking a daily dip in the Potomac . . . naked. Every morning at 5:00 a.m., the president would walk to the river, strip down, and go for a swim. But as with any intense exercise, skinny-dipping carries its risks. When Adams refused an interview with reporter Ann Royall, she hiked down to the river while he was swimming, gathered his clothes, and sat on them until he agreed to talk. Adams eventually cooperated, making him the first president (naked or clothed) to grant an interview with a female journalist.

♥~ Adams adored the game of billards and installed a billiards table in the White House shortly after becoming president. The new addition quickly became a subject of controversy when Adams billed the government with the $61 tab (which he later reimbursed). Nonetheless, political enemies charged that the pool table symbolized Adams’s aristocratic taste and promoted gambling.

♥~ Lots of people love the Sunshine State. But few take the time to thank John Quincy Adams while sunbathing on the steamy beaches. As Secretary of State, Adams negotiated the Adams-Onis Treaty, which allowed the U.S. to purchase Florida and set a new boundary between the U.S. and New Spain. That’s right – Disney World might not have been built if it weren’t President Adams.

♥~ While Americans decry the ugly effects of partisanism, the truth is that politics used to be a lot dirtier. The election of 1828 – when incumbent John Quincy Adams got crushed by longtime rival Andrew Jackson – is famous for the mudslinging tactics employed by both sides. Adams said Jackson was too dumb to be president, claiming that he spelled Europe “Urope.” He also hurled insults at Jackson’s wife, calling her a “dirty black wench” for getting together with Jackson before divorcing her first husband. Jackson retorted by calling Adams a pimp, claiming that he had once procured an American girl for sexual services for the czar while serving as an ambassador to Russia. Makes Obama and Romney seem downright chummy.

♥~ On a scale of 1 to 10 How awful is it to be president? John Quincy Adams might have said 11. He once stated, “The four most miserable years of my life were my four years in the presidency.” But even if he hated being commander-in-chief, Adams couldn’t bear to be out of the political loop for too long. After finishing his term as president, Adams served 18 more years in the House of Representatives, where he campaigned against further extension of slavery. In fact, he died shortly after suffering a stroke on the house floor.

♥~ Although Adams was nicknamed “Old Eloquent” for his unparalleled public speaking ability, he couldn’t make small talk to save his life. Aware of his own social awkwardness, Adams once wrote in his diary, “I went out this evening in search of conversation, an art of which I never had an adequate idea. Long as I have lived in the world, I never have thought of conversation as a school in which something was to be learned. I never knew how to make, control, or to change it.”

John Quincy Adams was quiet the character wasn’t he? Who is your favorite past United States President, Prime Minister, Dictator…..?

Hope everyone has a terrific Wednesday!

Odd Loves Company,