★~♥~♥~★~ El Morno! ♥~★~★~♥
December 5th,2013

★~ Todays Quote: Instead of giving money to found colleges to promote learning, why don’t they pass a constitutional amendment prohibiting anybody from learning anything? If it works as good as the Prohibition one did, why, in five years we would have the smartest race of people on earth. ~ Will Rogers

★~ Repeal Day: 

(Moonshiners developed some pretty clever tricks during the Prohibition. These shoes were known as “cow shoes” because they would leave a series of footprints that looked like cow tracks, making it harder for prohibition agents to tell where bootleggers were going.)

The turn of the twentieth century was a dark and desperate time in America. The Women’s Christian Temperance Union, which had been calling for the prohibition of alcohol for many years, believed that it was the cause of many, if not all, social ills. On January 16th, 1919, Congress passed the Eighteenth Amendment, outlawing alcohol and ostensibly putting an end to drunkenness, crime, mental illness, and poverty.

Prohibition lasted for thirteen long years, but December 5th, 1933 marked a return to the rich traditions of craft fermentation and distillation, the legitimacy of the American bartender as a contributor to the culinary arts, and the responsible enjoyment of alcohol as a sacred social custom.

Cheers!

★~ Day Of The Ninja: ( you probably didn’t even see it coming)

In feudal Japan, ninjas were real, and really sneaky. Under cover of darkness, dressed in black, ninjas were hired assassins and spies. Ninjas didn’t strut around showing off their ninja-ness.

I would suggest wearing black today and going about your day with intense focus and concentration. See how often you can enter and leave a room unnoticed. Eavesdrop on other people’s conversations. Sneak up on someone and give them a kiss from behind or a cuff to the head (depending on your relationship), and if they are the jumpy type be prepared to duck. Another ninja quality is being prepared. Or you could just watch the Tom Cruise movie The Last Samurai.

A couple of Ninja Tips:

Shuriken, or throwing stars, are generally used to stab or slash. When thrown they are just used to create a distraction.

In ninjutsu, calm and steady movements are more effective than speed.

★~ Sacher Torte Day:

And the sweets just keep on comin’!

The story of the world-famous Original Sacher-Torte began in 1832, when the all-mighty “coachman of Europe,” Wenzel Clemens Prince Metternich, ordered the creation of a particularly palatable dessert for his spoiled high-ranking guests.

“Take care that you do NOT make me look a fool tonight”, he warned. That very day, however, his chef was unavailable! The order was reassigned to a 16-year-old cook in his second year of apprenticeship. The quick-witted Franz Sacher presented a soft and fluffy chocolate torte to Wenzel’s guests, who were simple delighted. When Sacher ended his apprenticeship and became a fully qualified chef, he again cooked up his torte and offered it on a large scale. He was successful, and soon the “torte by a man named Sacher” was in great demand. The Original Sacher-Torte made it into the Guinness Book of Records in 1998, when the Hotel Sacher Wien made a single torte with a diameter of 2.5 meters (8.2 feet). Wonder how they put it in the oven to bake?

★~ Today In History:

♥~ 1868 – The first American bicycle school opened in New York City. It announced courses for velocipede riding.

♥~ 1880 – Levi Strauss designed the very first pair of blue jeans. In the U.S. it is estimated that each person owns seven pairs of blue jeans!

♥~ 1876 – The Stillson wrench was patented by D.C. Stillson of Somerville, MA. What the heck is a Stillson wrench you ask? Actually, it was the first practical pipe wrench.

♥~ 1985 –A bottle of 1787 Chateau Lafite claret (initialed by Thomas Jefferson) sold at Christie’s London for 105,000 British Pounds ($157,500).

★~ Born Today:

♥~ 1901 – Walt (Walter Elias) Disney cartoonist: 1st color-animated cartoon: Steamboat Willie; creator of: Mickey Mouse, Disneyland; Emmy Award-winning producer: Disneyland film series [1955], Walt Disney’s Wonderful World of Color [1962-1963]; died Dec 15, 1966

♥~ 1932 – ‘Little’ Richard (Pennimann) singer: Good Golly Miss Molly, Tutti Frutti, Slippin’ and Slidin’, Long Tall Sally, Rip It Up, Ready Teddy, The Girl Can’t Help It, Lucille, Keep a Knockin’; preacher

♥~ 1934 – Joan Didion author: Run River, After Henry, Democracy, A Star is Born

♥~ 1973 – Shalom Harlow fashion model [Donna Karen, Ralph Laure, Marc Jacobs, Isaac Mizrahi, Christian Dior]; actress: In & Out, Head Over Heels, Happy Here and Now

♥~ 1985 – Frankie Muniz actor: Malcolm in the Middle, My Dog Skip, The Andy Dick Show, Dr. Dolittle 2

★~  Good to Know: 

♥~   Prohibition, barred making alcohol, selling it, and shipping it for the purposes of consumption. However, it was never illegal It was never illegal to drink during Prohibition. Doctors could prescribe alcohol for medicinal purposes and churches were not banned from using wine during communion.

♥~ Women’s Christian Temperance Union (WCTU) was one of the major forces behind the 18th Amendment. They taught as “scientific fact” that the majority of beer drinkers die from edema (swelling of the organs or body).

♥~  The average human liver weighs somewhere in the vicinity of 3.5 pounds (roughly 1.5 kilograms) and the fact that excessive alcohol consumption can damage the liver is common knowledge. But this cautionary advice wasn’t terrifying enough for temperance newsletters, one of which wrote that “in some cases the liver [of a drinker] reaches an enormous weight, fifteen, and even twenty to twenty-five pounds being not uncommon.”

♥~ Prohibitionist George McCandlish claimed to have once observed two surgeons performing an autopsy on the gray matter of a heavy drinker: “After removing the top of the skull, for the purpose of examining the condition of the brain, they tested it for alcohol by holding a lighted match near it, and immediately the brain took fire and burned with a blue flame, like an alcohol lamp.”

♥~ Speakeasies got their name because you had whisper a code word or name through a locked door in order to be allowed in. New York alone had an estimated 30,000 speakeasies.

♥~ “Blind pig” was a term used for dive bars, where customers would pay to see an attraction (like an animal) and receive a complementary drink.

♥~The Ku Klux Klan strongly supported Prohibition.

♥~ Cocktails gained popularity during Prohibition. offering a way to mask the flavor of poorly made alcoholic. Popular cocktails included: Mary Pickford, French 75, Barbary Coast, Bee’s Knees, and the Sidecar.

♥~  During Prohibition, 18th Amendment supporters tried to have the Bible rewritten by removing all references to alcohol.

♥~ “Cruises to nowhere,” aka “booze cruises,” were popular during prohibition. Ships would sail out to international waters, were they could legally serve alcohol; the ship would typically cruise in circles.

♥~ Al Capone is estimated to have made $60 million in alcohol sales in just 1927 alone.

♥~ On December 5th, 1933 the 21st Amendment was ratified and Prohibition ended. This day is known as Repeal Day.

♥~ After repealing the 18th Amendment, President Roosevelt quipped, “What America needs now is a drink.”

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Did you “get” the picture of the ninja cocktail party^^? It took me a little while. I’m pretty sure you won’t run right out and buy or make a Sacher-Torte, but I bought one a few years ago on Sacher-Torte Day, and it was more than worth the trip to the bakery. So if you every have the chance to try it, you’ll like it.

Cole looked over at Odd tonight and informed me that my Odd banner was too “flossy and bright.” Thank you for sharing Cole. I was wondering what was wrong with it. I defended it as festive; he countered with busy. He did tell me that it just didn’t seem to match my style or Odd’s (which, under the circumstances, seems like a good thing) and then added that it looked commercial. FINE! If you agree, no worries, I’m revising it!

And speaking of rotten children, mine is feeling better and is off to school today. Alone, alone at last! I’m looking forward to a day of putting things back in order before St. Nicholas arrives on Friday and our Christmas season officially starts. I’m hoping for a little snow to keep me motivated.  Update: Poor child, woke up with a temp of 102 and was freezing, covered in blankets and heading to the doctor very soon….

Odd Loves Company!