If y'all want a post out of me today, you'll have to pick the subject; I got nuthin'.
Dec. 7th, 2007
On this date 66 years ago...
Dec. 7th, 2007 11:20 am...in the early dawn of a tropical island morning, the day then-US President Franklin Roosevelt rightly promised would live in infamy began. The sun set that evening with 19 US naval vessels severely damaged or demolished, 188 US aircraft destroyed, 2,280 US servicemen and 68 civilians killed, and more than 1,000 military personnel wounded. Today, this memorial (which I have visited) stands over the watery graves that still lie undisturbed from that fateful day.
Remember the fallen. Remember the survivors, dwindling to fewer and fewer now with each passing day. Remember how it brought us into "The Last Good War"...and how that war ended, with a pair of climbing mushroom clouds over Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Remember that freedom is, indeed, by no means free. And work in whatever way you can each day to help hasten the day when all war is ended forever.
Remember the fallen. Remember the survivors, dwindling to fewer and fewer now with each passing day. Remember how it brought us into "The Last Good War"...and how that war ended, with a pair of climbing mushroom clouds over Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Remember that freedom is, indeed, by no means free. And work in whatever way you can each day to help hasten the day when all war is ended forever.
On a somewhat happier note...
Dec. 7th, 2007 02:21 pmWith love and thanks to ![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
chirosinger for the tip: Exactly one year after the attack on Pearl Harbor, Harold Forster Chapin was born.
Poor Harry would have been 65 today (old enough to qualify for Medicare!), had his life not been tragically cut short in June of 1981 by an automobile accident on NYC's notorious Long Island Expressway. I was in the midst of my very first semester at Louisiana State University (I had decided not to wait until fall to start college, and a good thing too, as I would have graduated a semester late in 1985 otherwise) when I read the news in the local paper. I still lament the waste of a tremendous talent...but I also thank whatever God or gods there be that we had him for a time, at least.
What's your favorite Harry Chapin song? Mine's "30,000 Pounds of Bananas," with "Cat's in the Cradle" a close second.
chirosinger for the tip: Exactly one year after the attack on Pearl Harbor, Harold Forster Chapin was born.Poor Harry would have been 65 today (old enough to qualify for Medicare!), had his life not been tragically cut short in June of 1981 by an automobile accident on NYC's notorious Long Island Expressway. I was in the midst of my very first semester at Louisiana State University (I had decided not to wait until fall to start college, and a good thing too, as I would have graduated a semester late in 1985 otherwise) when I read the news in the local paper. I still lament the waste of a tremendous talent...but I also thank whatever God or gods there be that we had him for a time, at least.
What's your favorite Harry Chapin song? Mine's "30,000 Pounds of Bananas," with "Cat's in the Cradle" a close second.
Double the rice, double the help
Dec. 7th, 2007 03:54 pmRegular readers will remember I posted a short while back about FreeRice.com, which has enjoyed an astoundingly (and delightfully) huge response to its free online word game that generates rice donations to feed the world's hungry. At that time, the setup was 10 grains of rice donated for each correct match of a word with its appropriate synonym.
Apparently in response to the unexpected success, the folks at FreeRice.com have, as my homie Emeril Lagasse so famously likes to say, kicked it up a notch by doubling the per-word donation. Now each correct guess gets 20 grains of rice donated. This allows you to accumulate full bowls much more quickly, and should increase overall shipments of rice even more sharply, if it hasn't already.
If you haven't tried it by now, and you're as much of a word-geek as I am, you really shouldn't put it off any longer.
Apparently in response to the unexpected success, the folks at FreeRice.com have, as my homie Emeril Lagasse so famously likes to say, kicked it up a notch by doubling the per-word donation. Now each correct guess gets 20 grains of rice donated. This allows you to accumulate full bowls much more quickly, and should increase overall shipments of rice even more sharply, if it hasn't already.
If you haven't tried it by now, and you're as much of a word-geek as I am, you really shouldn't put it off any longer.
Today's Meme: What's your REAL age?
Dec. 7th, 2007 09:35 pmCourtesy of StumbleUpon: Answer a set of questions and this neat little doohickey calculates your life expectancy and how your body has aged in comparison to your calendar age. Requires active JavaScript and Flash.
I get to live at least to my mid-eighties, it seems...and I'm really only 34!
I get to live at least to my mid-eighties, it seems...and I'm really only 34!