Panic
It's graduation day. You're going to finally get that college diploma. Your family is there for the celebration. There's just one tiny problem. You dropped out of school months ago. You couldn't hack it, for whatever reason. Worse yet, you never let anyone know the reality of your situation.
So what do you do? Get sick and go to the ER? Not a bad idea. Phone in a bomb threat? That's exactly what 22 year old Danielle Shea did.
She panicked. Her relatives had noticed her name was not on the list of names of the graduates. She'd taken money from her family members and then not gone to classes. It would all come out. But maybe if the ceremony was postponed due to a bomb threat, maybe she could...
This is where I get confused. I can't imagine a single scenario where she'd gain anything from a time delay in passing on this bad news. She was going to have to fess up in any event.
I can't give her a panic pass over this. She just didn't want to have to answer for a transgression. Now her answer is going to be a lot more costly in terms of how it will impact the rest of her life.
* * *
The families of the victims of 9/11 are angry that the museum at Ground Zero is going to charge an admission fee of $24 and sell overprices merchandise in its gift shop.
Museums cost money. Money to build. Money to maintain. Government isn't going to pay for every single museum the people want. Nor should it. I can understand why the families of these victims are bothered by what looks like crass commercialization of their losses to open the doors to this shrine to their memories; but it has to be paid for by some means.
Find someone with deep pockets to underwrite the expense in perpetuity, or accept the present solution, flawed as it is. But stop whining about it. It detracts from proper remembrance of your loved ones.
* * *
Random Ponderings:
Perhaps the Momager should do arrange some reading lessons for her charges; obviously college isn't in their future of the Jenner sisters.
If it is true that Ray J is giving four months of profits from his sex tape with Kim K to her as a wedding gift...that's a pretty inventive gift.
Today's Dear Abby column contains:
1. A letter from a woman who wants her husband to stop griping about her spending on her work wardrobe.
2. How should a woman's name change when she gets married.
3. A 17 year old who is sleeping with his "mum's sister."
So why is it that item #3 seems to be drawing the fewest comments, when it is clearly the most important of the issues?
The NBA has made a bold move to rid themselves of Donald Sterling and it was a good move. Hope they rid themselves of this cancer on the sport post-haste.
The small town police commissioner who called President Obama the "N" word has resigned. Hank Williams compared President Obama to Hitler and lost his gig on Monday night football. OTOH, Janeanne Garafalo called George W. Bush's administration a "conspiracy of the 43rd Reich" and no one said a word. Double-standard? I'm much more confused by the fact it is okay for some blacks to use the N word, but some blacks oppose those uses, some apologize for those uses, and some feel any such use is inappropriate. I know I won't be using the N word anytime soon.
A Russian billionaire may wind up paying his ex-wife over $4 billion in the world's biggest divorce settlement ever. Pre-nups, people.
There is no good reason for the Republican leadership in the House of Representatives to block a bill that would provide illegals a path to citizenship through honorable military service. Except of course to pander to their mostly white, mostly anti-immigration rights core of voters.
* * *
May 20th in History:
325 – The First Council of Nicea – the first Ecumenical Council of the Christian Church is held.
491 – Empress Ariadne marries Anastasius I. The widowed Augusta is able to choose her successor for the Byzantine throne, after Zeno (late emperor) dies of dysentery.
526 – An earthquake kills about 250,000 people in what is now Syria and Antiochia.
685 – The Battle of Dun Nechtain is fought between a Pictish army under King Bridei III and the invading Northumbrians under King Ecgfrith, who are decisively defeated.
1217 – The Second Battle of Lincoln is fought near Lincoln, England, resulting in the defeat of Prince Louis of France by William Marshal, 1st Earl of Pembroke.
1293 – King Sancho IV of Castile creates the Study of General Schools of Alcalá.
1449 – The Battle of Alfarrobeira is fought, establishing the House of Braganza as a principal royal family of Portugal.
1497 – John Cabot sets sail from Bristol, England, on his ship Matthew looking for a route to the west (other documents give a May 2 date).
1498 – Portuguese explorer Vasco da Gama discovers the sea route to India when he arrives at Kozhikode (previously known as Calicut), India.
1520 – The massacre at the festival of Tóxcatl takes place during the Fall of Tenochtitlan, resulting in turning the Aztecs against the Spanish.
1521 – Ignatius Loyola is seriously wounded in the Battle of Pampeluna.
1570 – Cartographer Abraham Ortelius issues Theatrum Orbis Terrarum, the first modern atlas.
1609 – Shakespeare's sonnets are first published in London, perhaps illicitly, by the publisher Thomas Thorpe.
1631 – The city of Magdeburg in Germany is seized by forces of the Holy Roman Empire and most of its inhabitants massacred, in one of the bloodiest incidents of the Thirty Years' War.
1645–The Manchurian Qing army occupied the city Yangzhou and the residents get massacred for 10 days long. Hundred thousands of people get killed by the Qing troops
1775 – Mecklenburg Declaration of Independence is signed in Charlotte, North Carolina
1802 – By the Law of 20 May 1802, Napoleon Bonaparte reinstates slavery in the French colonies, revoking its abolition in the French Revolution
1813 – Napoleon Bonaparte leads his French troops into the Battle of Bautzen in Saxony, Germany, against the combined armies of Russia and Prussia. The battle ends the next day with a French victory.
1840 – York Minster is badly damaged by fire.
1861 – American Civil War: The state of Kentucky proclaims its neutrality, which will last until September 3 when Confederate forces enter the state. Meanwhile, the State of North Carolina secedes from the Union.
1862 – U.S. President Abraham Lincoln signs the Homestead Act into law.
1864 – American Civil War: Battle of Ware Bottom Church – in the Virginia Bermuda Hundred Campaign, 10,000 troops fight in this Confederate victory.
1873 – Levi Strauss and Jacob Davis receive a U.S. patent for blue jeans with copper rivets.
1875 – Signing of the Metre Convention by 17 nations leading to the establishment of the International System of Units.
1882 – The Triple Alliance between the German Empire, Austria-Hungary and the Kingdom of Italy is formed.
1883 – Krakatoa begins to erupt; the volcano explodes three months later, killing more than 36,000 people.
1884 – Dinuzulu kaCetshwayo becomes the king of the Zulu Nation.
1891 – History of cinema: The first public display of Thomas Edison's prototype kinetoscope.
1896 – The six ton chandelier of the Palais Garnier falls on the crowd below resulting in the death of one and the injury of many others.
1899 – The first traffic ticket in the US: New York City taxi driver Jacob German was arrested for speeding while driving 12 miles per hour on Lexington Street.1902 – Cuba gains independence from the United States. Tomás Estrada Palma becomes the country's first President.
1908 – Budi Utomo organization is founded in Dutch East Indies, beginning the Indonesian National Awakening.
1916 – The Saturday Evening Post publishes its first cover with a Norman Rockwell painting (Boy with Baby Carriage).
1920 – Montreal, Quebec radio station XWA broadcasts the first regularly scheduled radio programming in North America.
1927 – Treaty of Jeddah: the United Kingdom recognizes the sovereignty of King Ibn Saud in the Kingdoms of Hejaz and Nejd, which later merge to become the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.
1927 – At 07:52 Charles Lindbergh takes off from Roosevelt Field in Long Island, New York, on the world's first solo non-stop flight across the Atlantic Ocean. He touched down at Le Bourget Field in Paris at 22:22 the next day.
1932 – Amelia Earhart takes off from Newfoundland to begin the world's first solo nonstop flight across the Atlantic Ocean by a female pilot, landing in Ireland the next day.
1940 – The Holocaust: The first prisoners arrive at a new concentration camp at Auschwitz.
1941 – World War II: Battle of Crete – German paratroops invade Crete.
1948 – Chiang Kai-shek is elected as the first President of the Republic of China.
1949 – In the United States, the Armed Forces Security Agency, the predecessor to the National Security Agency, is established.
1956 – In Operation Redwing, the first United States airborne hydrogen bomb is dropped over Bikini Atoll in the Pacific Ocean.
1965 – PIA Flight 705, a Pakistan International Airlines Boeing 720-040B, crashes while descending to land at Cairo International Airport, killing 121 of the 127 passengers and crew.
1967 – The Popular Movement of the Revolution political party is established in the Democratic Republic of the Congo.
1968 – Operation OAU begins during the Nigerian Civil War
1969 – The Battle of Hamburger Hill in Vietnam ends.
1980 – In a referendum in Quebec, the population rejects by a 60% vote the proposal from its government to move towards independence from Canada.
1983 – First publications of the discovery of the HIV virus that causes AIDS in the journal Science by Luc Montagnier.
1983 – The Church Street bombing in the South African capital Pretoria. The bombing killed 19 and wounded 217.
1985 – Radio Martí, part of the Voice of America service, begins broadcasting to Cuba.
1989 – The Chinese authorities declare martial law in the face of pro-democracy demonstrations, setting the scene for the Tiananmen Square massacre.
1990 – The first post-Communist presidential and parliamentary elections are held in Romania.
1996 – Civil rights: The Supreme Court of the United States rules in Romer v. Evans against a law that would have prevented any city, town or county in the state of Colorado from taking any legislative, executive, or judicial action to protect the rights of gays and lesbians.
2002 – The independence of East Timor is recognized by Portugal, formally ending 23 years of Indonesian rule and three years of provisional UN administration (Portugal itself is the former colonizer of East Timor until 1976).
2006 – Dhaka wildcat strikes: A series of massive strikes begin, involving nearly 1.8 million garment workers in Bangladesh.
2013 – An EF5 tornado strikes the Oklahoma City suburb of Moore, killing 24 people and injuring 377 others.
Famous Folk Born on May 20th:
William Bradford
Seth Pomeroy
William Thornton
Dolley Madison
Honore de Balzac
William Fargo
General Cadmus Wilcox
Emile Berliner
Faisal I of Iraq
Karin Molander
Max Euwe
James Stewart
Gardner Fox
William Redington Hewlett
Peter Copley
Moshe Dayan
Guy Favreau
Edward B. Lewis
Alexi Tupolev
Bud Grant
David Hedison (played Felix Leiter twice, and is the father of Alexandra Hedison, wife of Jodie Foster)
Anthony Zerbe (interesting that both he and David Hedison are in "Licence to Kill" and have the same birthday)
Stan Makita
Sadaharu Oh
Carlos Hathcock (the man who is the model for the U. S. Marine Corps Sniper). RIP, Gunny.
Joe Cocker
Cher
Dave Thomas
Ron Reagan
Jane Wiedlin
Susan Cowsill
Bronson Pinchot
Mindy Cohn
Timothy Olyphant
Michaela McManus
Patrick Ewing, Jr.
My good friend Joel will make mention of some of the people who passed on this date, but I will beat him to the punch and make mention of two notable passings on this date. Gilda Radner died on this date in 1989, from ovarian cancer. On this date in 2011, Randy "The Macho Man" Savage died of previously undiagnosed coronary artery disease. Bright lights both, taken far too soon.
* * *
The Number One Hits of 1971:
George Harrison - My Sweet Lord
Dawn - Knock Three Times
The Osmonds - One Bad Apple
Janis Joplin - Me and Bobby McGee
The Temptations - Just My Imagination (Running Away With Me)
Three Dog Night - Joy to the World
The Rolling Stones - Brown Sugar
The Honey Cone - Want Ads
Carole King - It's Too Late/I Feel The Earth Move
The Raiders - Indian Reservation
James Taylor - You Got a Friend
Bee Gees - How Can You Mend a Broken Heart?
Paul & Linda McCartney - Uncle Albert/Admiral Halsey
Donny Osmond - Go Away Little Girl
Cher - Gypsys, Tramps and Thieves
Isaac Hayes - Theme from Shaft
Sly and the Family Stone - Family Affair
Melanie - Brand New Key
So what do you do? Get sick and go to the ER? Not a bad idea. Phone in a bomb threat? That's exactly what 22 year old Danielle Shea did.
She panicked. Her relatives had noticed her name was not on the list of names of the graduates. She'd taken money from her family members and then not gone to classes. It would all come out. But maybe if the ceremony was postponed due to a bomb threat, maybe she could...
This is where I get confused. I can't imagine a single scenario where she'd gain anything from a time delay in passing on this bad news. She was going to have to fess up in any event.
I can't give her a panic pass over this. She just didn't want to have to answer for a transgression. Now her answer is going to be a lot more costly in terms of how it will impact the rest of her life.
* * *
The families of the victims of 9/11 are angry that the museum at Ground Zero is going to charge an admission fee of $24 and sell overprices merchandise in its gift shop.
Museums cost money. Money to build. Money to maintain. Government isn't going to pay for every single museum the people want. Nor should it. I can understand why the families of these victims are bothered by what looks like crass commercialization of their losses to open the doors to this shrine to their memories; but it has to be paid for by some means.
Find someone with deep pockets to underwrite the expense in perpetuity, or accept the present solution, flawed as it is. But stop whining about it. It detracts from proper remembrance of your loved ones.
* * *
Random Ponderings:
Perhaps the Momager should do arrange some reading lessons for her charges; obviously college isn't in their future of the Jenner sisters.
If it is true that Ray J is giving four months of profits from his sex tape with Kim K to her as a wedding gift...that's a pretty inventive gift.
Today's Dear Abby column contains:
1. A letter from a woman who wants her husband to stop griping about her spending on her work wardrobe.
2. How should a woman's name change when she gets married.
3. A 17 year old who is sleeping with his "mum's sister."
So why is it that item #3 seems to be drawing the fewest comments, when it is clearly the most important of the issues?
The NBA has made a bold move to rid themselves of Donald Sterling and it was a good move. Hope they rid themselves of this cancer on the sport post-haste.
The small town police commissioner who called President Obama the "N" word has resigned. Hank Williams compared President Obama to Hitler and lost his gig on Monday night football. OTOH, Janeanne Garafalo called George W. Bush's administration a "conspiracy of the 43rd Reich" and no one said a word. Double-standard? I'm much more confused by the fact it is okay for some blacks to use the N word, but some blacks oppose those uses, some apologize for those uses, and some feel any such use is inappropriate. I know I won't be using the N word anytime soon.
A Russian billionaire may wind up paying his ex-wife over $4 billion in the world's biggest divorce settlement ever. Pre-nups, people.
There is no good reason for the Republican leadership in the House of Representatives to block a bill that would provide illegals a path to citizenship through honorable military service. Except of course to pander to their mostly white, mostly anti-immigration rights core of voters.
* * *
May 20th in History:
325 – The First Council of Nicea – the first Ecumenical Council of the Christian Church is held.
491 – Empress Ariadne marries Anastasius I. The widowed Augusta is able to choose her successor for the Byzantine throne, after Zeno (late emperor) dies of dysentery.
526 – An earthquake kills about 250,000 people in what is now Syria and Antiochia.
685 – The Battle of Dun Nechtain is fought between a Pictish army under King Bridei III and the invading Northumbrians under King Ecgfrith, who are decisively defeated.
1217 – The Second Battle of Lincoln is fought near Lincoln, England, resulting in the defeat of Prince Louis of France by William Marshal, 1st Earl of Pembroke.
1293 – King Sancho IV of Castile creates the Study of General Schools of Alcalá.
1449 – The Battle of Alfarrobeira is fought, establishing the House of Braganza as a principal royal family of Portugal.
1497 – John Cabot sets sail from Bristol, England, on his ship Matthew looking for a route to the west (other documents give a May 2 date).
1498 – Portuguese explorer Vasco da Gama discovers the sea route to India when he arrives at Kozhikode (previously known as Calicut), India.
1520 – The massacre at the festival of Tóxcatl takes place during the Fall of Tenochtitlan, resulting in turning the Aztecs against the Spanish.
1521 – Ignatius Loyola is seriously wounded in the Battle of Pampeluna.
1570 – Cartographer Abraham Ortelius issues Theatrum Orbis Terrarum, the first modern atlas.
1609 – Shakespeare's sonnets are first published in London, perhaps illicitly, by the publisher Thomas Thorpe.
1631 – The city of Magdeburg in Germany is seized by forces of the Holy Roman Empire and most of its inhabitants massacred, in one of the bloodiest incidents of the Thirty Years' War.
1645–The Manchurian Qing army occupied the city Yangzhou and the residents get massacred for 10 days long. Hundred thousands of people get killed by the Qing troops
1775 – Mecklenburg Declaration of Independence is signed in Charlotte, North Carolina
1802 – By the Law of 20 May 1802, Napoleon Bonaparte reinstates slavery in the French colonies, revoking its abolition in the French Revolution
1813 – Napoleon Bonaparte leads his French troops into the Battle of Bautzen in Saxony, Germany, against the combined armies of Russia and Prussia. The battle ends the next day with a French victory.
1840 – York Minster is badly damaged by fire.
1861 – American Civil War: The state of Kentucky proclaims its neutrality, which will last until September 3 when Confederate forces enter the state. Meanwhile, the State of North Carolina secedes from the Union.
1862 – U.S. President Abraham Lincoln signs the Homestead Act into law.
1864 – American Civil War: Battle of Ware Bottom Church – in the Virginia Bermuda Hundred Campaign, 10,000 troops fight in this Confederate victory.
1873 – Levi Strauss and Jacob Davis receive a U.S. patent for blue jeans with copper rivets.
1875 – Signing of the Metre Convention by 17 nations leading to the establishment of the International System of Units.
1882 – The Triple Alliance between the German Empire, Austria-Hungary and the Kingdom of Italy is formed.
1883 – Krakatoa begins to erupt; the volcano explodes three months later, killing more than 36,000 people.
1884 – Dinuzulu kaCetshwayo becomes the king of the Zulu Nation.
1891 – History of cinema: The first public display of Thomas Edison's prototype kinetoscope.
1896 – The six ton chandelier of the Palais Garnier falls on the crowd below resulting in the death of one and the injury of many others.
1899 – The first traffic ticket in the US: New York City taxi driver Jacob German was arrested for speeding while driving 12 miles per hour on Lexington Street.1902 – Cuba gains independence from the United States. Tomás Estrada Palma becomes the country's first President.
1908 – Budi Utomo organization is founded in Dutch East Indies, beginning the Indonesian National Awakening.
1916 – The Saturday Evening Post publishes its first cover with a Norman Rockwell painting (Boy with Baby Carriage).
1920 – Montreal, Quebec radio station XWA broadcasts the first regularly scheduled radio programming in North America.
1927 – Treaty of Jeddah: the United Kingdom recognizes the sovereignty of King Ibn Saud in the Kingdoms of Hejaz and Nejd, which later merge to become the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.
1927 – At 07:52 Charles Lindbergh takes off from Roosevelt Field in Long Island, New York, on the world's first solo non-stop flight across the Atlantic Ocean. He touched down at Le Bourget Field in Paris at 22:22 the next day.
1932 – Amelia Earhart takes off from Newfoundland to begin the world's first solo nonstop flight across the Atlantic Ocean by a female pilot, landing in Ireland the next day.
1940 – The Holocaust: The first prisoners arrive at a new concentration camp at Auschwitz.
1941 – World War II: Battle of Crete – German paratroops invade Crete.
1948 – Chiang Kai-shek is elected as the first President of the Republic of China.
1949 – In the United States, the Armed Forces Security Agency, the predecessor to the National Security Agency, is established.
1956 – In Operation Redwing, the first United States airborne hydrogen bomb is dropped over Bikini Atoll in the Pacific Ocean.
1965 – PIA Flight 705, a Pakistan International Airlines Boeing 720-040B, crashes while descending to land at Cairo International Airport, killing 121 of the 127 passengers and crew.
1967 – The Popular Movement of the Revolution political party is established in the Democratic Republic of the Congo.
1968 – Operation OAU begins during the Nigerian Civil War
1969 – The Battle of Hamburger Hill in Vietnam ends.
1980 – In a referendum in Quebec, the population rejects by a 60% vote the proposal from its government to move towards independence from Canada.
1983 – First publications of the discovery of the HIV virus that causes AIDS in the journal Science by Luc Montagnier.
1983 – The Church Street bombing in the South African capital Pretoria. The bombing killed 19 and wounded 217.
1985 – Radio Martí, part of the Voice of America service, begins broadcasting to Cuba.
1989 – The Chinese authorities declare martial law in the face of pro-democracy demonstrations, setting the scene for the Tiananmen Square massacre.
1990 – The first post-Communist presidential and parliamentary elections are held in Romania.
1996 – Civil rights: The Supreme Court of the United States rules in Romer v. Evans against a law that would have prevented any city, town or county in the state of Colorado from taking any legislative, executive, or judicial action to protect the rights of gays and lesbians.
2002 – The independence of East Timor is recognized by Portugal, formally ending 23 years of Indonesian rule and three years of provisional UN administration (Portugal itself is the former colonizer of East Timor until 1976).
2006 – Dhaka wildcat strikes: A series of massive strikes begin, involving nearly 1.8 million garment workers in Bangladesh.
2013 – An EF5 tornado strikes the Oklahoma City suburb of Moore, killing 24 people and injuring 377 others.
Famous Folk Born on May 20th:
William Bradford
Seth Pomeroy
William Thornton
Dolley Madison
Honore de Balzac
William Fargo
General Cadmus Wilcox
Emile Berliner
Faisal I of Iraq
Karin Molander
Max Euwe
James Stewart
Gardner Fox
William Redington Hewlett
Peter Copley
Moshe Dayan
Guy Favreau
Edward B. Lewis
Alexi Tupolev
Bud Grant
David Hedison (played Felix Leiter twice, and is the father of Alexandra Hedison, wife of Jodie Foster)
Anthony Zerbe (interesting that both he and David Hedison are in "Licence to Kill" and have the same birthday)
Stan Makita
Sadaharu Oh
Carlos Hathcock (the man who is the model for the U. S. Marine Corps Sniper). RIP, Gunny.
Joe Cocker
Cher
Dave Thomas
Ron Reagan
Jane Wiedlin
Susan Cowsill
Bronson Pinchot
Mindy Cohn
Timothy Olyphant
Michaela McManus
Patrick Ewing, Jr.
My good friend Joel will make mention of some of the people who passed on this date, but I will beat him to the punch and make mention of two notable passings on this date. Gilda Radner died on this date in 1989, from ovarian cancer. On this date in 2011, Randy "The Macho Man" Savage died of previously undiagnosed coronary artery disease. Bright lights both, taken far too soon.
* * *
The Number One Hits of 1971:
George Harrison - My Sweet Lord
Dawn - Knock Three Times
The Osmonds - One Bad Apple
Janis Joplin - Me and Bobby McGee
The Temptations - Just My Imagination (Running Away With Me)
Three Dog Night - Joy to the World
The Rolling Stones - Brown Sugar
The Honey Cone - Want Ads
Carole King - It's Too Late/I Feel The Earth Move
The Raiders - Indian Reservation
James Taylor - You Got a Friend
Bee Gees - How Can You Mend a Broken Heart?
Paul & Linda McCartney - Uncle Albert/Admiral Halsey
Donny Osmond - Go Away Little Girl
Rod Stewart - Maggie MayCher - Gypsys, Tramps and Thieves
Isaac Hayes - Theme from Shaft
Sly and the Family Stone - Family Affair
Melanie - Brand New Key
posted by me at 1:28 PM
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