★~♥~♥~★~ El Morno! ♥~★~★~♥ ~ 
June 9, 2014

★~ Today’s Quote:  The pursuit of greatness … is as much or more about flair, grotesque mistakes, eccentricity, and passion as it is about ‘failproof’ systems. In short, reduce to zero the odds of nothing going wrong and you’ll also reduce to zero the odds of anything interesting happening.”  ~  Tom Peters

★~ Donald Duck Day:

Donald Duck is an upbeat Duck with a very short fuse. When he loses his temper and takes action against ghosts, sharks, or mountain goats, his opponents know he is not ducking around.  Sometime Donald is a silly duck and can be a bit of a tease, but it’s all in good fun. Donald is a good fisherduck and loves to play hockey, but his favorite place to be is in his hammock. “Aw phooey!” “What’s the big idea?” “Hi ya toots!” and “Oh boy, oh boy, oh boy!” are a few of Donald’s favorite expressions. Donald has always had second billing to Mickey Mouse — he would have loved to have been Walt Disney’s favorite, but Walt Disney never let anyone forget it all started with the Mouse! Donald felt that was a lot of quack!

How do you celebrate Donald’s big day? I will leave that up to your imagination of course!

★~ Strawberry Rhubarb Pie Day:

A prolific and precocious springtime “fruit”, rhubarb looks like stalks of pinkish green or even magenta celery. Its flavor, however, is much more tart, making it ideal company for sugar in sweet dishes like crisps, compotes, and pie – from which it gets its second name, “pie plant.”  When mixed with strawberries,  the combination of “sweet and tangy” creates a delicious result.

For all things Rhubarb check out

The Rhubarb Compendium
Strawberry Rhubarb Pie
Strawberry Rhubarb Coffee Cake
Strawberry Rhubarb White Chocolate Crisp
Strawberry Rhubarb Jam

★~ Today in History:

♥ ~ 1790 – The first copyright for a book was given to The Philadelphia Spelling Book.

♥ ~ 1973 – The first Triple Crown winner in 25 years of horse racing won the Belmont Stakes in New York. The thoroughbred that clinched horse racing’s most prestigious honor was Secretariat.

♥ ~ 2002 – It was announced that Rolling Stone Mick Jagger was to be knighted for his services to music.

♥~ 2008 – Engineers from the Los Alamos National Laboratory and IBM Corp. unveiled the world’s fastest supercomputer. The $100-million machine, named Roadrunner, performed 1,000 trillion calculations per second in a sustained exercise.

♥~ 2010 – The Chicago Blackhawks defeated the Philadelphia Flyers in overtime to win the Stanley Cup. It was the Blackhawks’ first Stanley Cup win since 1961. They beat the Flyers 4 games to 2.

★~ Born Today:

♥~ 1926 – Mona Freeman actress: National Velvet, Black Beauty, Dear Ruth, Battle Cry

♥~ 1931 – Jackie Mason (Jacob Moshe Maza) comedian: Chicken Soup, The World According to Me, The Jerk, Caddyshack 2, History of the World: Part 1; ordained rabbi

♥~ 1961 – Michael J. Fox actor: Back to the Future, The Secret of My Success, Bright Lights Big City, Doc Hollywood, Greedy, For Love or Money, Family Ties, Boston Legal, Scrubs; voice of bulldog puppy in Homeward Bound: The Incredible Journey; founded The Michael J. Fox Foundation for Parkinson’s Research [2000])

♥ ~ 1963 – Johnny Depp (John Christopher Depp III) actor: Pirates of the Caribbean series, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, Arizona Dreams, Nick of Time, Dead Man, Ed Wood, Donnie Brasco, Don Juan DeMarco, What’s Eating Gilbert Grape, Freddy’s Dead: The Final Nightmare, Edward Scissorhands, Platoon, A Nightmare on Elm Street, 21 Jump Street, Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas

★~ Good to Know: 

[youtube]http://youtu.be/KRnlIaDp3P0[/youtube]

♥~ The word rhubarb comes from the Latin word “rhababarum” which means “root of the babarians.”

♥~ The Romans labelled people who ate rhubarb “barbarians.”

♥~ The Chinese were cultivating rhubarb as early as 2700 BC.

♥~ Rhubarb is a member of the buckwheat family and botanically speaking, it’s a vegetable, not a fruit.

♥~ In the United States, rhubarb  production is concentrated in Washington, Oregon, and Michigan, with small commercial acreage in many northern states field and greenhouse forced production.

♥~ The rhubarb plant is a herbaceous perennial and, in temperate climates, is one of the earliest vegetable crops, usually in April.

♥~ The plant is native to Asia and grows wild along the banks of the River Volga.

♥~ Rhubarb became popular as a food in the 17th Century when cheap sugar became available.

♥~ Rhubarb can be stored in a plastic bag in the fridge for 2 – 3 weeks.

♥~ Rhubarb can be frozen raw, or blanched for 1 minute in boiling water, or stewed to take up less space.

♥~ Rhubarb can be used as a laxative.

♥~ Rhubarb leaves are considered toxic, but a human would have to eat about 5kg of bitter leaves to reach a lethal dose.

♥~ Rhubarb Cooking Tip: 1 pound of fresh rhubarb yields about 3 cups chopped or 2 cups cooked.

♥~ Rhubarb is also commonly referred to as a “pie plant” after one of its most popular applications…pie.

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Graduation Week has begun for my Senior and my road warrior parents will be in Chicago in two sleeps. All good. All exciting. And I have at least a million things to do. I did a quick graduation slide show picture count and discovered the slide show was going to be about 4 hours long if we dedicated 1 second per picture. Oy Vey! Jesus, Mary, and Joseph! Holy Ruthless! I need to cut a lot of pictures. See. Katybeth. Run. But I am running with a big smile because, you know,  it all goes by in a blink  😉

Wishing you a very Merry Monday!

Odd Loves Company!

♥~