★~♥~♥~★~ El Morno! ♥~★~★~♥ ~
August 1, 2012

★~  Today’s Quote:

“As in the bread and wine, so it is with me.
Within all forms is locked a record of the past
And a promise of the future.
I ask that you lay your blessings upon me, Ancient Ones,
That this season of waning light
And increasing darkness may not be heavy.
So Mote It Be!” Faille, Lammas Ritual

★~ August Full Moon:

August 2012 will host two full moons this months!  Most of the time, a calendar month only features one full moon. But in cycles of nineteen years, or 228 calendar months, seven to eight calendar months harbor two full moons. For the mainland United States, the first full moon of August falls tonight (Wednesday, August 1) at 11:27 p.m. EDT, 10:27 p.m. CDT, 9:27 p.m. MDT or 8:27 p.m. PDT. By Universal Time – the standard clock time at the prime meridian of Greenwich, England – the moon turns full onThursday, August 2, at 3:27 in the morning.  This moon is called the Sturegeon moon by Native American tribes of New England and the Great Lakes because at this time of year the Sturgeon fish were most abundant. The second full moon of August 2012 comes on August 31, at 13:58 Universal Time. The second of two full moons to fall in the same calendar month goes by the moniker of blue moon.

★~ Lammas

The Celts celebrate this festival from sunset August 1 until sunset August 2 and call it Lughnasad after the God Lugh. It is the wake of Lugh, the Sun-King, whose light begins to dwindle after the summer solstice. The Saxon holiday of Lammas celebrates the harvesting of the grain. The first sheaf of wheat is ceremonially reaped, threshed, milled and baked into a loaf. The grain dies so that the people might live. Eating this bread, the bread of the Gods, gives us life.

Lammas is a festival of regrets and farewells, of harvest and preserves. Let go of your regrets, say farewell to what no longer serves you well, and harvest any seeds that you have planted. Make bread, preserve fruits, plant bulbs. Share a loaf of bread or even popcorn with a friend and toast the passing summer with your favorite beverage. One popular Lammas custom is to feed your loved one a piece of bread while saying, “May you always be nourished.”

★~ Girlfriend’s Day:

Happy Girlfriend’s Day! Where would we be without our girlfriends?  Simple put–Girlfriends just get it — no matter what it is.  The girlfriend golden rule is: What happens with your girlfriends stays with your girlfriends!

★~ Raspberry Cream Pie Day:

I made a Raspberry Cream Pie last year using  this easy peasy, light and breezy recipe and Cole gave it a “very good” rating.  Enjoy! .Raspberry Creme Pie Recipe

★~ Today in History:

♥~ 1873 – The first cable streetcar in America began operation on Clay Street Hill in San Francisco, CA.

♥~ 1962 – Spider-Man 50th anniversary. Stan Lee and Steve Ditko introduced a new superhero for Marvel Comics in issue #15 of Amazing Fantasy that hit newsstands in August: Spider-Man. Nerdy teen Peter Parker is bitten by a radioactive spider and soon discovers that he has the proportionate strength and agility of the spider—as well as web-shooting talents and “spidey sense.” The arachnid crime fighter got his own comic book in March 1963 and quickly became the center of a multimedia empire.

♥~ 1981 –  MTV debuted in some two million homes. The first music video was “Video Killed the Radio Star” by The Buggles.

♥~ 1994 – The Rolling Stones started their 43-city Voodoo Lounge world tour before 55,000 fans at RFK Stadium in Washington, DC.

♥~ 2002- Pizza dough spread across Chippewa County, Wisconsin, after hot weather caused yeast to rise and pop open the back of a Tombstone delivery truck. The truck driver didn’t notice for 25 to 30 miles. Police said it “was quite a mess.”

★~Born Today:

♥~ 1770 – William Clark explorer: Lewis and Clark Expedition;

♥~ 1779 – Francis Scott Key attorney, poet: The Star-Spangled Banner: U.S. national anthem; died Jan 11, 1843

♥~ 1939 – Robert James Waller author: The Bridges of Madison County, Slow Waltz in Cedar Bend; professor of economics, business management

♥~ 1942 – Jerome John Garcia was born at San Francisco, CA. Country, bluegrass and folk musician and a guitar player of remarkable ability, Garcia was the leading force behind the legendary Grateful Dead, the band that sustained a veritable industry for its legion of followers. He died Aug 9, 1995, at Forest Knolls, CA, ending a musical career that spanned more than three decades.

★~ Did You Know: Over the years, the IOC has slashed a number of sports from the official Olympic program, including baseball and softball.

♥~ Tug of War: This grade school field day sport was a part of the Olympics between 1900 and 1920 and by all accounts never really left the play ground. The 1904 gold medal–winning American squad was representing the Milwaukee Athletic Club, which upon further investigation was actually composed of ringers recruited from Chicago. Imagine my surprise. Scandal struck again at the 1908 Games when the American squad protested that the police boots worn by the British pullers from the Liverpool Police team were equipped with illegal cleats for extra traction. When the protest failed, the American pullers left the Games in a huff. All told the British teams grabbed five medals to the Americans’ three before the sport fell off the program following the 1920 Games.

♥~ Basque Pelota: Making it’s solo appearance at the Paris Olympic Games (1900), Basque pelota, is a sport where two players use a curved basket to fling a ball against a wall in a racquetball-like game. Unfortunately when it was played at the Paris Games only two teams showed up to play the sport. A duo from Spain, beat a French pair in the Olympic Basque pelota match and won the gold medals. The score of the game was lost to history.

♥~ Croquet: This sport only saw action at the 1900 Paris Games before fading into Olympic oblivion. The host Frenchmen made the most of the opportunity, though; they claimed all seven medals awarded in the sport.

♥~ Roque: Give yourself an A+ if you know what roque is. As far as your El Morno host can figure out this sport is like croquet but played with short mallets on a hard rolled-sand court with a wall off of which players can bank the balls. The sport’s official rules tout it as “the most scientific outdoor sport in existence,” but it didn’t hold up so well at the Olympics. Roque debuted at the 1904 Games in St. Louis, Americans swept the medals, and the sport promptly disappeared.

♥~ Golf: Golf made its Olympic debut in 1900, but it was poorly organized and lost in the shuffle of the Paris Exposition. Men played a 36-hole stroke-play tournament, which American Charles Sands won with a score of 167. Women played a 9-hole round, which American Margaret Ives Abbott won by two strokes with a 47. How poorly organized was the tournament? Abbott apparently never knew she was the first American woman to win an Olympic gold medal. She didn’t even know she’d played in the Olympics; she spent her whole life thinking she’d just won a little golf tournament in Paris.

Golf again received a slot on the program at the 1904 Games, albeit with a men’s team event taking the place of the women’s competition. Americans took five of the six medals available in team and singles events, with Canadian George Lyon’s gold in the singles the only blemish on their record. (This feat is admittedly less impressive when one considers that St. Louis hosted the games, meaning 74 of 77 golfers who entered were American.) Golf will return for the 2016 Games in Rio de Janeiro. (This portion of El Morno was dedicated to Odd Readers Debbie and Mike!

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Did you watch the Olympics gymnastics and swimming last night?  It was so exciting to watch! We tuned it on at exactly the right moment. Cole is disappointed that Olympic pingpong is not being televised–I have tried to be sympathetic but, between you and me, I’m not sure pingpong has a wide television following.

What has surprised you most about the Olympics this year, so far?

Rabbit! Rabbit! I think August is going to be a wonderful month!

♥