Ephemeris of Miscellany

The Wonder Years debuted on this date in 1988, thirty-five years ago today. If a similarly nostalgic show debuted today, it would depict the year 2003.  Looking back on the year 1968 now, is the same as looking back on the year 1913 from 1968.   Here's the most unimaginable thing though, somehow the parents in this picture are like 10 years younger than me.  For some reason I can't figure out, I use up a lot of my mental bandwidth everyday thinking about stuff like this! The house today: Excellent article on the nature of nostalgia that's related to The Wonder Years. Huffington Post- 'The Wonder Years' Captured Youth In Suburbia Like Never Before On TV From the article: While I identified with the show’s romanticism, the idea of a nuclear family was far out of reach. “The Wonder Years” brought escapism, but it also brought something else that I’d take with me later as a writer: the irresistible pull of turning back, examining what was lost and finding beauty there. ...

Gandhi was assassinated on this day in 1948. "Be the change that you wish to see in the world." (Maybe that was his assassin's motto as well?) Eight years later Martin Luther King Jr.'s home was bombed in retaliation for the Montgomery bus boycott. Violent ends for each, no doubt, but look at the progress. Today is Martyr's Day in India. Gandhi and said, "We believe as much in the purity of race as we think they do... We believe also that the white race of South Africa should be the predominating race." Not sure if they consider it Martyr's Day in South Africa. ... Gandhi with the Dalai Lama. ... Nadal and Medvedev have been playing for four and a quarter hours. Medvedev won the first two sets, Nadal won the next two. Getting ready to head into the 5th set. Exciting! January 30, 2022 ... Destruction is easy, construction is hard. Bill Maher- "It's easy to spray paint fuck you on a federal building. It's a little harder to work inside. It...

Thomas Paine, our political activist, philosopher, political theorist, and revolutionary, joined us on this day in 1737. He wrote the endlessly quotable, Common Sense. Rep. Jamie Raskin- “Tom Paine, luminary patriot of the Enlightenment and the American Revolution, inspired people in the colonies not only to overthrow the tyranny of faraway kings but to launch a nation founded on principles of democratic self-government, the rights of men and of women, and reason and science. Despite his catalytic role in founding America and our constitutional republic based on common sense, Paine remains too often an overlooked and underappreciated figure in our history."  ... I could watch the best of Federer/Nadal for hours. Waking up at 530 tomorrow morning to hopefully see Nadal beat Medvedev at the Australian Open. (Figuring I can miss the first two sets vs waking up at 330.) https://fb.watch/ima_VGf5Ac/?mibextid=NnVzG8 January 29, 2022 ... So Dershowitz wants the world to know that we can...

Under Donald J. Trump's executive order, a non-Christian mother and child traveling from a Middle Eastern country would be detained at the airport.  ... When I was reading White Noise yesterday, the word "puggish" caught my attention. I put the book down mid-sentence, checked Craigslist for pugs, found one that didn't seem like a scam (a 1 in a 100 chance), called the guy who seemed nice but is going back to work without time to take care of her, met them, he had all of her paperwork in order, and next thing you know there's a 6-month old pug lapping all of our faces. https://m.facebook.com/story.php?story_fbid=pfbid034W147A823VL2aw3APnposhAwCf4rqUGnqqi9e9qMkj7CSEbvd4vRhMiYEiMPTdbcl&id=741063511&mibextid=NnVzG8 January 28, 2022 ... "Trumpthought": an absurd rationalization or advocation for inarguably bad Trump behavior that is accepted without principle, and without hesitation, at the same time that the same behavior exhibited by anyone else wou...

Nellie Bly, left us on this day in 1922. She thinks being crazy to be put into the Women's Lunatic Asylum on Blackwell's Island. She later wrote a book about it, 10 Days In a Mad-House. She also went on a round-the-world trip, mirroring the one written about by Jules Verne, to show it would be done. She was an inventor too, with patents on milk cans and trash cans. I guess she focused mainly on cans. Quite a life! ... This pug came to live with us today! Zuzu named her Hollywood, which morphed into Hollywood Chubby-Chonka Kreider. January 27, 2022 .. Did you catch the new GOP talking point?  Remember that insurrection at the Capitol that left people dead and the place in ruins, that the president egged on, at the exact time Congress was confirming the victory of his opponent, and then sat quietly for the first time in his life through the several hours that it was happening, only chiming in afterward to tell them how much he loved them? Yeah, THAT insurrection. That was SOOOOOO...