Marked This Day

On this day in 1972 the first leap second was introduced. As best my case-of-the-Mondays brain can figure, basically there are a few different ways we record time on this planet. Of course for you philosophers out there, you may be of the school that time is a man-made construct and the manipulation of it may not concern you as you continue on your path to find nirvana. Or perhaps you’re of the Rust Cohle train of thought and believe that time is a flat circle that endlessly repeats itself. Or maybe you just don’t really care why Ptolemy came up with the mean solar day and the true solar day and his calculations were the basis for how tell time today. If that’s the case, then you probably have no interest in knowing that the leap second is added to Coordinated Universal Time (UTC) in order to keep its time of day close to the mean solar time. So I guess there’s no need to go into how the placement and decision on whether or not to include this extra second depends on the Earth’s varyin...

On this day in 1960, Chlorophyll A was synthesized for the first time by Robert Burns Woodward. Supposedly it was a big deal. I’m sure it was, but dissecting exactly how and why it was big deal brings me back to that brief but dark time in my life when I thought about studying organic chemistry. Actually, that never happened. I mean maybe it happened in another dimension or universe where I stumbled upon Woodward’s work as a wee-little tyke and that chance encounter led me to devoting my life to uncovering the vast mysteries that science holds. But that didn't happen either. I don’t think. I wouldn't really know if it had, what with it being a separate universe and all. Still doesn't mean that ole RB wasn't a big deal. Of course, in certain circles Pee Wee Herman is a big deal--albeit for two vastly different reasons. Perception shifts, doesn't it? I mean, when somebody says chlorophyll to me I just think of Billy Madison (more like borophyll), which in turn makes m...

You ever find yourself in the wrong place at the wrong time? Like if you’re shopping and you walk down the junk food aisle for some scrumdiddlyumptious treats, only to be blocked by two amateur shoppers holding a side-by-side conversation about their cats with their carts blocking your path to the sweet, sweet processed carbs your belly is gurgling for. They’re just standing there, oblivious to your cravings, chatting away without a care in the world about how Mr. Mittens keeps pooping in the pantry. (Well don’t put the freaking litter box in there.) That’s the wrong place, wrong time. But really it’s only a mild inconvenience. You just have to walk your lazy butt around the other aisle and pick up your Funyuns® on the other side of the inconsiderate cat-talking shoppers. It might tick you off a bit, but if it ruins your day you probably have some anger issues that you should get checked out. Maybe you need a hug? Because you see, on this day in 1807, lightning struck a gunpowder plant...

Today is a day to pay homage to one of the all-time great television shows. Take one part Scott Bakula, add in a touch of Dean Stockwell, and then mix that up with a soul-teleporting, body-jumping, time-traveling premise and you have one heck of a show. That’s right. Quantum Leap . On this day in 1990, NBC continued its Quantum Leap Week that started on June 24th, officially deciding to air the show for 5 days straight. And why wouldn’t you? It’s quite a legitimate marketing campaign, but it also mirrors the plight of Sam Beckett. He didn’t get a week off of jumping bodies and righting wrongs just because the traditional model of television dictated that shows should only be aired once a week. Yes, they were re-runs, but the show wasn’t syndicated. It was a pretty ingenious idea that also had some artistic reasoning behind it. Which got me thinking of how immersive you could make watching television. For instance, how crazy would watching Friends be if you watched it with the same gr...

Today is the 76th anniversary of the Chicora Meteorite. For you living in mathematically-challenged land (a place I count myself) or in downright lazy-lane plaza (a place I sometimes count myself), in 1938, a big hunk of space-stone fell to Earth in the Chicora Borough of Butler County, Pennsylvania. And I’m talking pretty big. 450 plus tons big. The meteor was an olivine-hypersthene chondrite (a what?) or in layman’s terms a space-rock that had more of some stuff in it than other stuff. Nobody was injured, except for a cow which had the misfortune of being too close to the point of impact. Some reports claim the bovine was killed, while others say it was only injured—so for you bright-side-of-the-road people you can sleep well thinking it survived (hope springs eternal), and for you pessimists, you know that it was probably slaughtered for beef not long after in any case, so it really doesn’t matter. Regardless of the bovine mystery, for some odd reason I really want a multitude of Ma...

On this day last year, Nik Wallenda pulled off his dare-devil, death-deifying tightrope walk across the Grand Canyon without a safety net or a harness. Well it wasn't technically the Grand Canyon. It was actually a gorge in the Little Colorado River Navajo Tribal Park which, in case you're not too quick on the uptake, is home to the Navajo Nation. I'm not trying to poke holes here though. The exact location doesn't change the difficulty of the stunt. That crazy dude walked across a two-inch cable that spanned 1,400 feet across the gorge and was 1,500 feet above the ground. Which is high. Like Snoop Dogg going to Jamaica and coming back Snoop Lion high. Too high for me. I get that funny feeling in my tummy if I'm looking down from any vantage point over 30 feet. Which circles back to my Houdini point of June 12th. It's all rather entertaining, but certainly not a necessary life skill. Although perhaps it is a bit more useful than Houdini's straight jacket bi...

On this day in 1987, the undisputed King of Late Night, Johnny Carson married for the fourth and final time. The lucky bride was Alexis Maas, who was quite a bit younger than he was when he met her on the beach two years prior outside of his home in Malibu (also where they got married). Must have been a nice little trip to Malibu for Maas. Just hanging out on the beach, nice little vacay. Thhhhheeerreee’s Johnny. Just saying. I would not mind hanging out on the beach, which is already an enjoyable place to be, with an empty glass of wine (meaning I already had some) and then have some rich celebrity come and fill my glass and fall in love with me. I mean if we’re going for a compatible comparison, it’d have to be a bit of an older woman. Hello there, Demi, Michelle, or Diane. (Some of these women are probably married, but it’s my fantasy, so quit raining on it, Party-Poopers). That’d be a pretty good vacation too. Is it also weird that I don’t feel that Johnny was the slightest bit cr...

On this day in 1967, in what should not have been a surprise to anyone, Paul McCartney admitted to ITN that he had taken LSD. I wasn’t around for the Peace and Love of the 60’s, but from what I’ve heard experimentation was pretty common, so chalk up a certain percentage of certainty about The Beatles’ drug use to simple prevalence. Also there was the increasing broadening of subject matter that The Beatles sang about. When they first started out there was “I Want to Hold Your Hand.” A song about the innocent, simple, yet powerful gesture of love—probably not on LSD. “Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds?” “Tangerine trees” and “marmalade skies?” Okay you’re just being descriptive. And you’re possibly a little hungry. “Kaleidoscope eyes.” Umm? Then you get “cellophane flowers” and “rocking horse people eating marshmallow pies.” I don’t think I’m making huge leap in surmising that there was some brain expansion going on when that song was written. Now the album “Lucy in the Sky…” was on was r...

On this day in 1976, a Joseph Mallord William Turner watercolor was auctioned off for 340,000 pounds. I’m not British, or a mathematician, or an economist, but that seems like a pretty heavy chunk of silver to me. For reference’s sake it is the equivalent of $577,593.70. But that’s not accounting for inflation, meaning that some rich guy bought a painting from the early 1800’s in 1976 for approximately $2,406,522.46 today. That’s a heck of a lot of cheddar. But it also makes me wonder about who saw the majority of that half a million dollars. Turner wasn’t some struggling artist who died penniless, unknown, and alone only to be discovered years after his demise and crowned as a genius. He was extremely prolific and left a small fortune behind when he shuffled off this mortal coil. It also seems he had no immediate family, so J.M.W. Turner is not really helping me make my point. In fact using ole Joe as an example for my point is basically the equivalent of an alien ship abducting Sh...

1972. Early morning. Watergate. Democratic National Head Quarters. Five plumbers are arrested for breaking in and the Watergate scandal that brought down Nixon began to unravel. If you need to brush up on your American History and Politics, I suggest you dig into some books. Or you could watch some late night PBS. They show some really good stuff. You can learn all kinds of things. And not just about history. I once learned about super-cooled water that is so pure it doesn't freeze. If you introduce it to an impurity, the water then freezes within seconds. Wowed my mind at 1 o’clock in the morning. But that’s not really here nor there. Fast forward a bit to the summer of 2003. For cyclical purposes—and I do love cycles—let’s say it was June 17th 2003. It could have been. Anywho, I was working in a shipyard that summer and met a variety of different characters. Boatmen who would work in the US for a year and then go live in Mexico for two. Fine, interesting folk. O...

On this day in 1960, Alfred Hitchcock's Psycho opened in New York. While I don't want to spoil this for anybody, the movie is 54 years old today, causing me to think that sufficient time has passed and I won't be left with nasty comments about ruining the big twist. (SPOILER alert: Norman Bates has some freaking issues). But you never know. Watching Psycho could be on some people's bucket list. Hopefully rather far down the list since, although Psycho is a great movie, it would be rather easy to check off one's list, and I would feel a tad bit sorry for someone if that was the extent of their hopes and desires. But it could be a tandem wish. Like watching Psycho for the first time while trying to break the record for most hula hoop revolutions during the movie's running time. That's a completely admirable, (though decidedly arbitrary and strange) bucket-list wish. And who am I to judge? So to appease those people, I will not divulge any vital infor...

This day in 1922 probably began like any other day for Charles Osborne. The sun rose. Charles woke up and went about the things a 30 year old in the 20's went about. Perhaps sneaking some illegal swigs of bourbon throughout the day--Prohibition and what not. Perhaps that was Charles' biggest concern of the day. Where to find some booze? Or maybe it wasn't. I'm not really sure how difficult it was to find illegal liquor during Prohibition. I don't think it was that hard. But Charles, being the responsible young man that he was probably wasn't imbibing to excess during the day because he had the grisly job of butchering a pig. When this fateful moment arrived, young Charles--perhaps by sheer accident, or perhaps because he'd taken a swig too many, or maybe because that pig was 350 lbs--slipped. 350lbs of live bacon fell on that poor bastard. But the resilient Charles was relatively unscathed. No broken bones or torn ligaments. But Charles Osborne d...

On this day in 1923, Harry Houdini freed himself from a straightjacket while suspended upside down 40 feet above ground in New York City. Now this seems pretty impressive, though I doubt Thomas Jefferson would have even stopped to watch. But then again in 1790 TJ once saw a live, animatronic, to-scale replica of a Titanosaur, a group thought to contain the largest dinosaur ever which was discovered three years ago and was estimated to be about the size of a thirteen story building—even more amazing considering people didn’t even know about Titanosaurs in 1790 and the resources and manpower it would take to create a live animatronic one are mind-bottling. But TJ just looked up and said, “Just an herbivore,” and then walked down the street chewing a piece of straw like he had merely seen a dung beetle. I actually tend to agree with TJ this time. About Houdini, not the Titanosaur. Freeing oneself from a straightjacket while suspended upside down 40 feet above the ground is impressive, and...

On this day in 1983, Professional Bowler Don Genalo needed to knock down three pins out of the five that remained in order to win the Southern California Open. No problem for a talented young buck like Genalo, right? Unfortunately for Don, he miscalculated his score and intentionally gutter-balled thinking he had already won which allowed Jimmie Pritts, Jr to nab the win. This is why till this day, when someone prematurely celebrates a win and then does something stupid preventing said win, it's called "Genaloing." Some examples: Did Terry go home with Angie last night? Naw, man. Totally Genaloed it. He thought she was in the car with him and just took off. Didn't realize she wasn't till he got home. Total Genalo. When players drop the football at the one yard line before crossing the goal line--A Genalo. When you don't show up to a test because you think your average is a 99, but it's actually a 79? Genalo. When you think you've won the lottery, so yo...

In a Marked This Day 1st, I'm going to expound on an event from the very next day of the very same year as yesterday’s post. On June 10th 1869, The Agnes steamed into New Orleans with a whole lot of Henry Peyton Howard's frozen Texas beef on board, which was the first time this had ever been happened. I could go into the process of how, involving ammonia and dry ice, but all you really need to know is that it worked. Frozen beef was delivered via ship and this changed everything. Don’t believe me? Think there would be McDonald's without a way to transport frozen beef? And do you think you would have had a super cool birthday party at McDonald's as wee-tyke in the 80’s if there were no McDonald's? Not without some serious metaphysical maneuvering my friend. No, you would have been stuck at Drunk Uncle Chester’s playing tiddlywinks with Dirty Cousin Roy, who would constantly shove all the winks up his nose. And then you wouldn't have grown into the socially well-a...

On this day in 1869, Charles Elmer Hires sold his first root beer in Philadelphia, which is actually still distributed by Dr. Pepper as Hires Root Beer (though I've never seen it). Apparently Hires was the first to refer to the drink as "beer" instead of tea, to appeal to the working class, which makes sense--you don't see many construction workers drinking tea on a lunch break. Though people can surprise you. Once ran into a tattooed truck driver who offered up a very poignant synopsis of Heidegger's Being and Time. That surprised me. Or when I went to ask a neighbor for sugar and the family answered the door dressed as KISS in full makeup. That was pretty surprising too. Back to Hires though. Apparently he promoted the drink on a Temperance platform, and thought it was the greatest health-giving drink in the world. Now this may sound surprising. But think of the context. Americans used to drink a lot more than they do now. Like a lot more. In 1830, the average A...

On this day in 1946, American comedian Henry Morgan became the first person to take his shirt off on TV. Now, I've looked up ole Henry Morgan, and he was not exactly Paul Newman. But you've got to reward guts. You can't reward only guts. That can be dangerous. I once knew a kid who had the guts to pick a fight with anyone, no matter the size. Unfortunately, he didn't have the brains to realize that throwing pebbles at the Andre the Giant of the 3rd grade was a recipe for a broken arm and a wedgie. You need a little brains to go along with guts. And Morgan seemed to have those too. He could be quite a tricky curmudgeon. Like when he once told parents to leave the room, and then told their kids to run away from home. That's funny stuff. But if you don't admire his guts, or his wit, you should admire him for the fact that he was a shirtless pioneer. Every time you ladies oogle Channing's Tatum or say "Alright, Alright, Alright" to McConaughey's pe...

Every now again, I come across something so earth-shattering, so insanely important and relevant to our human experience in this crazy, mixed-up world that I struggle to make sense of it. On this day in 1988, American Heinrich Medicus recorded the longest champagne cork flight in human history (probably alien history too--if they drink champagne). Medicus sent his cork flying 177' 9". That's more than half a football field. And the record still stands to this day because some records are just too difficult to surpass. Joltin' Joe's hit streak--not going anywhere. Joey Chestnutt's 69 hot dogs plus buns in 10 minutes, well that was set just last year, so who knows. But knowing about Heinrich Medicus and his flying cork is not just life-changing news because it reminds us that some greatness cannot be duplicated; the knowledge also affords a more practical implementation. You know that guy who is just super excited to open the champagne at parties. He often goes b...

On this day in 1784, Elisabeth Thible, a French Opera singer, became the first woman to fly in an untethered Montgolfier hot-air balloon over Lyon, France. This was a mere eight months after the first manned flight, and supposedly Mme. Thible was dressed as the goddess Minerva and sang two duets from a celebrated opera at the time--which is all quite impressive. In fact, I'm sure Gustav III of Sweden, who witnessed the flight, found it thus. But guess who else was in France at that time? One Thomas Jefferson. There's no record of his actually being there, but if I know old TJ, I wouldn't be surprised if he'd been sitting right next to Gustav disguised as a French poet. You can rest assured that he would not have been impressed. TJ once saw George Washington start a fire by causing intense friction on some logs with his wooden teeth to keep his troops from freezing to death while simultaneously trapping a squad of British soldiers by shooting a tree branch in the exact r...

On this day in 1953, the 83rd United States Congress determined that Alexander Cartwright was the true founder of baseball and not Abner Doubleday as had previously been popularized by legend and myth. Abner Doubleday still wins the cool name award, and pretty much caused the Hall of Fame to be in Cooperstown (his hometown), but I can't help but feel a tad bit sorry for Alexander Cartwright. Though he does share initials with a certain wrestler from Bayside, I wonder if AC spent the last forty years of his life wandering around Cali and Hawaii mumbling about he how created baseball, not that pretentious soldier Abner. But it seems there were multiple individuals responsible for the game’s creation, and Cartwright eventually was recognized as the actual inventor, so maybe I shouldn't feel too bad. Walter Camp and James Naismith must've been shaking their heads. Fishy stuff. Basically the plot of Grandma’s Boy without Grandma’s intervention to prove who the real creator of ba...

On this day in 1928, Velveeta cheese was created by Kraft. While I'm pretty sure this was the result of some botched experiment to make real cheese last longer, it's not really what I am concerned about. What concerns me is the fact that Ro-Tel wasn't around until 1943 and didn't become widely available until the late fifties, early sixties. Which means that poor Velveeta was just hanging around for 20 something years until Ro-tel was all, "Get me all up in dat cheese." (Ro-Tel says "dat"). That's a long time to wait before getting together with what completes you. Of course Jerry McGuire took a whole two plus hours, a Bruce Springsteen song, and a few mad sprints to realize that Renee Zellweger completed him. But people are different than food. I mean peanut butter and jelly had to have been a package deal from the get-go, while other couplings probably took a little longer...looking at you Arnold Palmer. So maybe people aren't different tha...