Month: August 2023

07
Aug
2023

First MONDAY in August

Today is Kadooment Day in Barbados. It marks the finale of the six-week Crop Over festival and is one of the most colorful and energetic of the Caribbean carnivals.

The Crop Over Festival is the traditional end of the Sugar cane season and has been celebrated for over 200 years. Sugar cane was first introduced to Barbados at the end of the seventeenth century. It made Barbados home to one of the world’s biggest sugar industries. This meant a large workforce was needed and slaves and indentured servants were brought from Africa. It was these workers who also brought the traditional harvest festival of Crop Over from Africa.

On Grand Kadooment, a parade of Masquerade Bands with about 1,500 revelers takes place on the streets cheered on by the throngs of onlookers trying to make themselves heard over beat of the the calypso music. At the end of the parade the bands are judged and while there is a keenly contested Designer of the Year prize, for most the focus is on having fun.

Today is the birthday, in 1928, of Herb Reed, bass singer from American vocal group The Platters who had the 1959 UK & US No.1 single ‘Smoke Gets In Your Eyes’. The Platters were one of the first African-American groups to be accepted as a major chart group and were, for a period of time, the most successful vocal group in the world. Reed died aged 83 on June 4th 2012. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rAUJSc6unAg

Posted by Tom in doo-wop, Humor, Music
03
Aug
2023

THURSSSSSSSSS-DAY

Today is Emancipation Day in Bermuda – the first day of a two-day holiday. This holiday marks the end of slavery in the British Empire. Slavery was abolished throughout the British Empire by the Slavery Abolition Act 1833, which came into effect on August 1st 1834. The territories controlled at that time by the East India Company, Ceylon (modern-day Sri Lanka) and St. Helen’s were excluded. Slavery was not abolished in these regions until 1843.

Tomorrow is Mary Prince Day in Bermuda. This holiday takes place on the day after Emancipation Day and coincides with the second day of Cup Match, an annual cricket match between Somerset and St. George’s.

Mary Prince was a Bermudian slave who published her autobiography, “The History of Mary Prince, A West Indian Slave“. Published in 1831, the book was a first-hand account of the brutality of slavery in Bermuda and the first account of the life of a black woman to be published in England.

Read the names…

Go north, young man.

SIGNZZ

Today is the birthday, in 1946, of John York, The Byrds, (1965 UK & US No.1 single ‘Mr Tambourine Man’) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PnstCrL1_e0

Posted by Tom in Humor, Music, sixties and seventies
02
Aug
2023

What can we say about WEDNESDAY?

Today is Republic Day in North Macedonia. It marks two important events in the history of Macedonia that took place on this day – the Ilinden Uprising in 1903 and the establishment of the Republic in 1944.

Macedonia had come under the control of the Ottoman Empire in the 14th century. On August 2nd 1903, an uprising against the Ottomans was led by the Internal Macedonian Revolutionary Organization (VMRO). The Ilinden uprising resulted in the liberation of the town of Krushevo, where the first republic in the Balkans was proclaimed. The republic was short-lived, lasting only 10 days before the Ottomans took back Krushevo.

On August 2nd 1944, during the second world war, the Anti-Fascist Assembly for the National Liberation of Macedonia (ASNOM) proclaimed the People’s Republic of Macedonia as part of the People’s Federal Republic of Yugoslavia.

Karma

It’s getting rough out there…

Today is the birthday, in 1937, of Canadian multi-instrumentalist and a master of the Lowrey organ, Garth Hudson, The The Hawks (Ronnie Hawkins’s backing group), who then became known as The Band and also backed Bob Dylan on his US tour in 1965 and world tour in 1966. The Band had the 1969 US No.25 single ‘Up On Cripple Creek’, 1970 UK No.16 single ‘Rag Mama Rag’. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NKu0OTDvQ-w

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Posted by Tom in Humor, Music, sixties and seventies
01
Aug
2023

August begins on TUESDAY!

Today is a national public holiday in Switzerland.

It marks the annual celebration of Swiss National (or Confederation) Day. In German the day is known as ‘ Schweizer Bundesfeier‘; in French as ‘Fête nationale Suisse‘; in Italian as ‘Festa nazionale svizzera‘ and Romansh as ‘ Fiasta naziunala Svizra‘.

August 1st was chosen because this was said to be the day, in 1291, on which the three forest cantons of Uri, Schwyz, and Unterwalden signed the Federal Charter on the Rütli field, near to Lake Lucerne.

The charter does not specifically mention August 1st as the date, but instead refers to “at the beginning of the month of August 1291”. The charter united the signatories in the struggle against Habsburg rule, the family then possessing the Duchy of Austria in the Holy Roman Empire. The signing of the charter has now become regarded as the foundation of Switzerland.

stretchhhhhh

BADA BING!!

I don’t think I can’t travel to Florida anymore because the time difference is too much. It’s 1860 there.

Church sign… God loves you even when Christians don’t.

How about a carpet with permanent vacuum lines so it always looks clean?

Starting your day with an early morning run is a great way to make sure your day can’t get any worse than it started.

Bury me with my old records. It will be my vinyl resting place.

OK, so naked running. Apparently, this means running without GPS, music, or any other tech. I wish I knew this an hour ago.

Definition of Irony: Using a device that transmits inordinate amounts of complex information tens of thousands of miles via antennas, fiber, cables, and satellites to convey to others that you “don’t trust science”.

Imagine being so fragile that you’re mad at Barbie.

My wife wanted to embarrass me in front of her friends. She said I wasn’t good in bed. She was shocked when they all disagreed with her.

You should never judge a book by its cover. I had an English textbook once and the people on the cover looked like they were having a really good time. That turned out not to be true.

My folks came to visit and are upset that I have parental controls set up and they can’t watch FOX NEWS without putting in the code. So they are watching my shows because they refuse to type in 666.

Today is the birthday, in 1942, of American singer-songwriter and guitarist Jerry Garcia, the Grateful Dead. He was ranked 13th in Rolling Stone’s “100 Greatest Guitarists of All Time” cover story. Garcia also founded a variety of side projects, including the Saunders–Garcia Band, the Jerry Garcia Band, Old and in the Way, the Garcia/Grisman acoustic duo, Legion of Mary, and the New Riders of the Purple Sage. Garcia died from a drugs-related heart attack on 9 August 1995. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pafY6sZt0FE

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Posted by Tom in Humor, Music, sixties and seventies