Sunday, February 22, 2015

Speak of Good Deeds in Heaven, Keep Peace on Earth.

Today is the fourth day of the Chinese New Year is the day to welcome the kitchen god, the god of fortune and other gods. Families should stay at home to prepare abundant fruits, burn incense and light candles to welcome the gods. The sacrifices provided to the god of fortune should include goat head and carp.

(this is the picture of my kitchen god)

On the fourth day of the Lunar New Year, families can finally clean their house. They collect all the rubbish to one place and throw them all, which symbolize that they throw away all the bad luck and possible poverty of this year. And in some rural areas in North China, people will light a fire on a stick and throw the stick into a river to put off the fire. This shows that there will not be any fire disaster in this family in the whole year.


Don't forget to stake out a claim to your favorite seat on the sofa

The Oscars are on tonight!


February 22, 1934 -
Frank Capra's romantic comedy It Happened One Night, starring Clark Gable and Claudette Colbert, premiered at Radio City Music Hall on this date .



While shooting the scene where he undresses, Clark Gable had trouble removing his undershirt while keeping his humorous flow going and took too long. As a result the undershirt was abandoned altogether. It then became cool to not wear an undershirt which resulted in a large drop in undershirt sales around the country. Legend has it that in response, some underwear manufacturers tried to sue Columbia.


February 22, 1977 -
The single New Kid in Town, the first release from the album Hotel California, was the Eagles' first to be certified gold for selling more than 1 million copies on this date.



Glen Frey mentioned in a interview at the time that the song was about Steely Dan whom the band saw as a new and upcoming group that was possibly taking over the spotlight from the Eagles (there has been some dispute as to whether or not Glen Frey was joking.) Given that the two bands shared a manager (Irving Azoff) and that the Eagles proclaimed their admiration for Steely Dan, this was more friendly rivalry than feud.


February 22, 2001 -
Mira Nair's wonderful Monsoon Wedding, opened in both Los Angeles and New York on this date.



An entire subplot (the relationship between the groom's parents played by Soni Razdan and Roshan Seth) had to be dropped in order to fit the shooting into the thirty-day schedule.


February 22, 2002 -
Charles Martin Chuck Jones, director of many of the classic short animated cartoons starring Bugs Bunny, Daffy Duck and the Road Runner & Wile E. Coyote, died on this date.



At 85, Chuck signed a long-term contract with Warner Bros. to supervise the animation department. His thoughts on the contract were: "At 85 you can only think ahead for the next 50 years or so.".


Today in History:
If the freedom of speech is taken away then dumb and silent we may be led, like sheep to the slaughter. - George Washington

Young George Washington was born on February 11, 1731 (or so he thought.)



Unfortunately for him, England had been stubbornly holding onto the Julian calendar - they wanted none of that Papist Gregorian calendar crap. But England finally wanted to get with the times, so in 1752, Parliament adopted the Gregorian calendar. Many prominent colonists supported the new system; including Benjamin Franklin and George Washington. Washington updated his own birthday from the old February 11th to the Gregorian February 22.



But wait, there's more - the calendar switch of 1752 included another significant change. Under the Julian system, the year began on March 25. That means a colonist who went to bed on March 24, 1700, would wake up on March 25, 1701. The new Gregorian rules set the start of the year to January 1st. This created some confusion, since anyone who was born between January 1st and March 25th in the old system would have the wrong birth year in the new one - thus George's new birthday was February 22, 1732.



So you have to wish the Father of Our Country birthday greetings for the third time this month.



Much heavy drinking ensued.


On February 22, 1862, Jefferson Davis was officially inaugurated for a six-year term as the President of the Confederate States of America in Richmond, Virginia.

He was previously inaugurated as a provisional president on February 18, 1861.

I guess his mother was proud of him.


February 22, 1980 -
During the XIII Olympic Winter Games in Lake Placid, New York, the United States hockey team defeats the Soviet Union hockey team 4-3 on this date.



It is considered to be one of the greatest upsets in sports history (the Miracle on Ice.)


February 22, 1987 -
Andy Warhol
died of complications after gallbladder surgery, though the details are hazy. The official cause was listed as cardiac arrhythmia, but speculation includes his fear of hospitals as well as possible Cefoxitin allergy. Mr. Warhol is best known for painting pictures of Campbell's Soup cans and Marilyn Monroe, although never together. Warhol's death brings him a bonus 15 minutes of fame.





His work can be seen in museums and galleries around the world to this very day.



Campbell's Soup cans can still be found in the canned goods section of your favorite supermarket to this very day.


February 22, 1994 -
CIA agent Aldrich Ames and his wife were charged by the United States Department of Justice with spying for the Soviet Union on this date.

Somehow by 1989 Ames had acquired unexplainable wealth from his spying and did very little to conceal the spying, he somehow managed to evade being caught for five more years.


February 22, 1997 -
The first cloning of an advanced mammal, a sheep known as Dolly, was announced in the news media, on this date. Dolly, actually born on July 5, 1996, was cloned from a mammary cell -



Dolly was purportedly named after Dolly Parton.

I guess that's a compliment.



And so it goes.


Before I let you go - Here is the definitive cover version of Kashmir (among other Zeppelin songs) by 12 year xylophone players.



The men don't know, but the little girls (and boys) understand

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