Marked This Day

On this day in 1961, Ham became the first chimp to reach space while aboard the Mercury Redstone rocket. People say things like “so easy a monkey could do it”--which is a stupid thing to say considering that monkeys can actually do numerous things that most humans cannot. When was the last time you swung from a tree or walked across a wire as easily as that little monkey from The Hangover 2 or threw your own feces at someone? Okay then. But Ham didn’t just sit in a tin can and get to experience a few minutes of weightlessness. He wasn’t an astrophysicist or anything, but he did have to learn how and when to push a lever. Sounds pretty easy? Well consider being a chimpanzee getting shot into space? Not that easy anymore is it? Plus, even it was rather simple, he was the first of his kind to go to space. Space. Have you been to space? I haven’t. I just saw The Martian . It was pretty good. Not sure it should have been classified as a comedy at the Golden Globes, but there were jokes. St...

On this day in 1869, Pat Garrett left Louisiana after a bitter family-estate battle left him without a claim to the luxury of the family plantation. Not that Garrett had much of a choice in this case. When your family pretty much boots you out of the business, it’s sink or swim. But he could have gone East. Or to Mexico. Instead he went to Texas. And after Texas to Lincoln County, New Mexico where he became Sheriff and ran into a notorious nuisance named Billy the Kid. It’s weird to think about events after the fact as some chain reaction of destiny or chance. For instance, had Pat not gone West when he did, he may never have met and killed Billy the Kid. He may have never become famous. May not have been remembered at all. But he also may not have been shot to death by his business associate in 1908. Decisions are strange things. The dots that can be connected years down the road are pretty amazing. You may think that you are just running to the store because you forgot the milk, but ...

So you’re having a bad day. You only have twenty minutes for lunch and the line at Chick-fil-A is stretched out for miles. You stubbed your toe after getting a paper cut. Your significant other cheated on you. You found out the kid wasn’t yours (although context might make that a good day). Whatever the reason, you’re feeling a little frustrated, a bit perturbed, a tad down in the dumps. Well let me just assure that there is very little chance that you day is going as badly as Robert Falcon Scott’s did on this day in 1912. On this day Scott found out he was the second person to reach the South Pole. Problem is he wanted to be the first. But Roald Amundsen reached the destination more than a month before. You travel through freezing conditions and suffer all kind of hardships only to find out you were second fiddle. That would probably chap your ass--although I’m sure the South Pole would chap your everything pretty naturally. But it got worse for poor R.F.Scott. The South Pole was not ...

On this day in 2013, the first official portrait of Catherine, Duchess of Cambridge was unveiled by painter Paul Emsley. If you’re not much of a Royal-Stalking Anglophile you might not realize that I’m talking about Kate Middleton. You also might not realize that apparently a royal portrait is a very big deal. And people weren’t very happy with this one. The Duchess’s smile is more of a smirk and the shading might be a little...shady. But in any case, how awesome is it to have your portrait commissioned? You have to be a pretty big deal to get someone to spend months painting something that the local drunk at Costco could capture for you on your iPhone. But then why would you want to commemorate your trip to Costco and risk the local drunk stealing your iPhone? Or you have to marry a Royal. There is air of regalness to a painted portrait. They do seem to be a bit stuffy though. I like those portraits where the subject is on a fire-breathing dragon or standing next a unicorn blowing rai...

On this day in 1968, a duck hunter in Texas accidentally shot and killed a whooping crane. Problem being whooping cranes were and continue to be on the endangered lists. This wasn’t a Dick Cheney incident. The guy meant to shoot the bird; he just thought it was a duck. Not on the endangered list. I’m no JJ Audubon, but the birds don’t look all that similar to me. Of course distance might have had something to do with it. I mean from far enough away I could be mistaken for Ryan Gosling (keeping the bird theme). Gosling and I are dead ringers if your vantage point is from 300 yards away with no sight-enhancing apparatus. Of course, I also look extremely similar to Mr. Bean at the same distance. So I get how such an accident could have been an honest mistake. The guy owned up to it too. Turned the bird into the proper authorities. Didn’t hide from it or try to cover it up--MO’s that are all too common these days. Maybe people were brainwashed by Shaggy’s “It Wasn’t Me.” Or maybe it’s been...

On this day in 2013, Gerard Depardieu became a Russian citizen because he was pissed (video pun) off about the high taxes in France. You may know Gerard from such cinematic classics as My Father the Hero where his teenage daughter (Katherine Heigl) pretends he is her boyfriend to impress an older guy. Um. Eww. Or Bogus where he plays a boy’s imaginary friend. Or perhaps you just know him as the burly French guy with giant bulbous nose. But he’s a pretty serious French actor. He was excellent in The Count of Monte Cristo miniseries. He’s played Cyrano --I believe they used a prosthetic nose anyway. In any case, he peaced out and became Russian. Taxes can be a pain, so I can’t really blame him. I understand that they are necessary and certain amenities and services need to be paid for, but damn if it doesn’t chap your ass a little when you see all that money going to not you. So I get it. And I’m sure he’s not the only French guy to become Russian. But it does seem an odd switch. I’m ...