"Streets" is a song by American rapper and singer Doja Cat (pictured).
Appearing on her second studio album Hot Pink (2019), it is an R&B;
ballad with lyrics about a desire to return to a former romantic
partner. The song became a sleeper hit around 15 months after the
album's release—specifically, it went viral on the video-sharing
application TikTok. It appeared in over 300,000 TikTok videos as
background music for the "Silhouette Challenge", an online challenge in
which participants danced while illuminated from behind with red
lighting. Driven primarily by streams and digital sales, the song peaked
within the top 20 of many national record charts, including the US
Billboard Hot 100, and received platinum certifications in eight
countries. "Streets" was sent to US contemporary hit radio stations as
Hot Pink's seventh and final single on February 16, 2021. A
corresponding music video premiered the next month, depicting Doja Cat's
own version of the Silhouette Challenge.
Read more: <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Streets_%28song%29>
_______________________________
Today's selected anniversaries:
1854:
Florence Nightingale and a staff of 38 nurses and 15 nuns were
sent to the Ottoman Empire to help treat wounded British soldiers
fighting in the Crimean War.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Florence_Nightingale>
1944:
World War II: The three-week-long Battle of Aachen concluded,
making the city the first on German soil to be captured by the Allies.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Aachen>
1959:
The Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, designed by American
architect Frank Lloyd Wright, opened in New York City.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solomon_R._Guggenheim_Museum>
1966:
A coal tip fell on the village of Aberfan, Wales, killing 144
people, mostly schoolchildren.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aberfan_disaster>
_____________________________
Wiktionary's word of the day:
hide one's light under a bushel:
(idiomatic) To conceal one's positive qualities or talents, especially
due to modesty or shyness; to avoid attention.
<https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/hide_one%27s_light_under_a_bushel>
___________________________
Wikiquote quote of the day:
I came into office at a time of great economic and international
instability. Families and businesses were worried about how to pay
their bills. Putin's illegal war in Ukraine threatens the security of
our whole continent. And our country had been held back for too long by
low economic growth. I was elected by the Conservative Party with a
mandate to change this. We delivered on energy bills and on cutting
national insurance. And we set out a vision for a low tax, high growth
economy — that would take advantage of the freedoms of Brexit. I
recognise though, given the situation, I cannot deliver the mandate on
which I was elected by the Conservative Party. I have therefore spoken
to His Majesty The King to notify him that I am resigning as Leader of
the Conservative Party.
--Liz Truss
<https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Liz_Truss>
Amador Valley High School is a public school in Pleasanton, California,
a city east of San Francisco. Amador Valley is one of three high schools
in the Pleasanton Unified School District, which includes Foothill High
School and Village High School. The school was founded as Amador Valley
Joint Union High School and opened in 1922. Major construction and
renovations were undertaken after district voters approved bonds in
1922, 1965, 1997, and 2016. The school has been named a California
Distinguished School and a National Blue Ribbon School. Amador Valley
offers its students Advanced Placement courses, varsity sports,
vocational training, and a variety of extracurriculars. The school
placed second in RoboSub, an international robotics competition, and
first in We the People, a national civics competition, in 2022. The
Amador Theater, one of Pleasanton's performing arts facilities, has been
hosted at the high school since 1932.
Read more: <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amador_Valley_High_School>
_______________________________
Today's selected anniversaries:
1969:
Experimental results from the Stanford Linear Accelerator
Center were published showing that protons were composed of smaller
particles, the first evidence of quarks.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quark>
1977:
Three members of the American rock band Lynyrd Skynyrd died
when their chartered plane crashed in Gillsburg, Mississippi.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lynyrd_Skynyrd_plane_crash>
1982:
During a UEFA Cup match between FC Spartak Moscow and HFC
Haarlem, a large number of attendees trying to leave the Central Lenin
Stadium resulted in a stampede that caused 66 deaths.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Luzhniki_disaster>
2011:
First Libyan Civil War: Muammar Gaddafi, the deposed Libyan
leader, was captured by rebel forces during the Battle of Sirte, and was
killed shortly thereafter.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Killing_of_Muammar_Gaddafi>
_____________________________
Wiktionary's word of the day:
shoestring:
1. (chiefly US) The string or lace used to secure a shoe to the foot; a
shoelace.
2. (figuratively, often attributively)
3. An object that is long and thin, like a shoestring (sense 1).
4. (cooking) A long, narrow cut of a food; a julienne.
5. Chiefly in on a shoestring: very little money; a tight budget.
6. (US, chiefly American football, baseball) Of a catch or tackle: made
near the ground, close to a player's shoes.
7. (transitive, American football) To tackle (a player) using a
shoestring tackle (“one made near the ground, close to a player's
shoes”).
8. (transitive, baseball) To catch (a ball) using a shoestring catch
(“one made near the ground, close to a player's shoes”).
<https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/shoestring>
___________________________
Wikiquote quote of the day:
Consider with due attention, for the path is very strait, even
while it is more spacious than the heavens and the earth and what is
between them.
--The Báb
<https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/B%C3%A1b>
Yusuf I (29 June 1318 – 19 October 1354) was the seventh Nasrid ruler
of the Emirate of Granada on the Iberian Peninsula, from 1333 until his
death. He allied with the North African Marinids against Alfonso XI of
Castile. After a naval victory in April 1340, the Marinid-Granadan
alliance was decisively defeated in the Battle of Río Salado
(depicted). In 1342–1344, Alfonso besieged and captured the port of
Algeciras. A ten-year peace treaty followed, but Alfonso broke it and
besieged Gibraltar in 1349. The siege ended when Alfonso died of the
Black Death in March 1350. Yusuf signed a treaty with Alfonso's son and
successor Peter I. Yusuf was assassinated by a madman while praying in
the Great Mosque of Granada. During his reign, the emirate flourished in
the fields of literature, medicine, and law. Yusuf was responsible for
many new buildings, and major cultural figures served in his court.
Modern historians consider his reign and that of his son Muhammad V as
the golden era of the Emirate.
Read more: <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yusuf_I_of_Granada>
_______________________________
Today's selected anniversaries:
1781:
American Revolutionary War: British forces led by Lord
Cornwallis officially surrendered to Franco-American forces under George
Washington and the comte de Rochambeau, ending the Siege of Yorktown.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Siege_of_Yorktown>
1944:
The Guatemalan Revolution began with a small group of army
officers led by Francisco Javier Arana and Jacobo Árbenz launching a
coup against dictator Jorge Ubico.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guatemalan_Revolution>
1965:
A group of ethnic Hutu military officers failed in their
attempt to overthrow the Burundian government.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1965_Burundian_coup_d%27%C3%A9tat_attempt>
2017:
Canadian astronomer Robert Weryk discovered ʻOumuamua
(depicted), the first known interstellar object detected passing through
the Solar System.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/%CA%BBOumuamua>
_____________________________
Wiktionary's word of the day:
come in from the cold:
1. (espionage) Of a spy: to return home after having gone undercover in
enemy territory.
2. (by extension) To gain widespread acceptance in a group or society,
especially where there was not any before.
<https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/come_in_from_the_cold>
___________________________
Wikiquote quote of the day:
There are two worlds: the world that we can measure with line and
rule, and the world we feel with our hearts and imagination.
--Leigh Hunt
<https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Leigh_Hunt>
Offham Hill is a Neolithic archaeological site and scheduled monument
near Lewes, East Sussex. It was first identified as a possible
causewayed enclosure in 1964; like others in England, it was enclosed
with ditches interrupted by gaps, or causeways. Such enclosures may have
been settlements, meeting places, or ritual sites. Offham Hill was
inspected by the Ordnance Survey in 1972 and excavated by Peter Drewett
in 1976. By this time, it had been badly damaged by ploughing and
partially obliterated by a chalk quarry. Most finds came from the
ditches, including about 7,000 worked flints, nearly 300 sherds of
pottery, a human burial, other human bones, and animal remains. The site
and most of the pottery were identified as Neolithic, in part by
radiocarbon dating. Further ploughing after the 1976 excavation led to
the effective destruction of the site. A reanalysis of the site's
artefacts and human remains in 2011 confirmed a construction date in the
mid-fourth millennium BC.
Read more: <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Offham_Hill>
_______________________________
Today's selected anniversaries:
1081:
Byzantine–Norman wars: Robert Guiscard led an invasion of the
Byzantine Empire, capturing Dyrrhachium in present-day Albania.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Dyrrhachium_%281081%29>
1587:
Filipino sailors disembarked from the Manila galleon Nuestra
Señora de Buena Esperanza in what is now Morro Bay, California, the
first documented instance of Asians in the Americas.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Landing_of_the_first_Filipinos>
1775:
American Revolutionary War: In an act of retaliation against
ports that supported Patriot activities in the early stages of the war,
the Royal Navy destroyed what is now Portland, Maine.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Burning_of_Falmouth>
1963:
The first cat in space, later known as Félicette, launched
aboard a French Véronique rocket.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/F%C3%A9licette>
_____________________________
Wiktionary's word of the day:
kuspuk:
1. (originally) An Alaska Native (traditionally Yup'ik) garment worn on
the upper body as an overshirt on top of a parka (“long jacket with a
hood”).
2. A lightweight parka-like garment with a hood and a large front pocket
worn by Alaska Native people of all sexes, either as an overshirt or as
a shirt.
<https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/kuspuk>
___________________________
Wikiquote quote of the day:
"I will have no man in my boat," said Starbuck, "who is not
afraid of a whale." By this, he seemed to mean, not only that the most
reliable and useful courage was that which arises from the fair
estimation of the encountered peril, but that an utterly fearless man is
a far more dangerous comrade than a coward.
--Moby-Dick
<https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Moby-Dick>
Megalograptus is a genus of eurypterid, an extinct group of aquatic
arthropods, containing five species, all based on fossil material found
in the United States: M. alveolatus, M. ohioensis (pictured),
M. shideleri, M. welchi and M. williamsae. They were predators, with
the largest and best-known species, M. ohioensis, growing to 78
centimeters (2 ft 7 in). The two most distinctive features of
Megalograptus were its massive and spined forward-facing appendages, and
its sharp spike-shaped telson (the last division of the body). Attached
beneath the non-venomous telson were a pair of rounded blade-formed
lobes which made it capable of grasping. Researchers have been able to
infer the coloration that specimens might have possessed in life,
believed to be brown and black, with M. ohioensis being darker than the
others. Megalograptus lived in near-shore marine environments, where it
used its large appendages to capture prey. The predator may have been
cannibalistic at times, like many modern chelicerates.
Read more: <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Megalograptus>
_______________________________
Today's selected anniversaries:
1777:
American Revolutionary War: British general John Burgoyne's
Saratoga campaign ended with his surrender to the Americans, later
convincing France to enter the war in alliance with the United States.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saratoga_campaign>
1814:
A wooden beer-fermenting vat in London burst, destroying a
second vat and causing a large flood of at least 128,000 imperial
gallons (580,000 l; 154,000 US gal) of porter that killed eight
people.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/London_Beer_Flood>
1964:
Prime Minister Robert Menzies inaugurated the artificial Lake
Burley Griffin in the centre of the Australian capital Canberra.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Burley_Griffin>
1992:
Having gone to the wrong house in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, for a
Halloween party, Japanese exchange student Yoshihito Hattori was shot
and killed by the homeowner.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shooting_of_Yoshihiro_Hattori>
_____________________________
Wiktionary's word of the day:
the die is cast:
(idiomatic) Conclusive action has been taken, so events will proceed in
an irreversible manner; the point of no return has been passed; the
future is determined; there are no more options.
<https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/the_die_is_cast>
___________________________
Wikiquote quote of the day:
The task of the real intellectual consists of analyzing illusions
in order to discover their causes.
--Arthur Miller
<https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Arthur_Miller>
The Borodino-class battlecruisers were a group of four battlecruisers
ordered by the Imperial Russian Navy before World War I for service
with the Baltic Fleet. Construction of the ships was delayed by a lack
of capacity among domestic factories and the need to order some
components from abroad. The start of the war in 1914 slowed their
construction still further. All of the ships were launched in
1915–1916, but it became evident that Russian industry would not be
able to complete them during the war. The Russian Revolution of 1917
halted all work on the ships. Although some consideration was given to
finishing the hulls that were nearest to completion, they were all
eventually sold for scrap by the Soviet Union. The Soviet Navy proposed
to convert Izmail (pictured), the ship closest to completion, to an
aircraft carrier in 1925, but the plan was cancelled after political
manoeuvring by the Red Army led to funding not being available.
(This article is part of a featured topic: Battlecruisers of the
world.).
Read more: <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Featured_topics/Battlecruisers_of_t…>
_______________________________
Today's selected anniversaries:
1834:
Most of the Palace of Westminster in London was destroyed in a
fire caused by the burning of wooden tally sticks.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Burning_of_Parliament>
1944:
A four-day air battle over Taiwan ended with a decisive
American victory, destroying hundreds of Japanese aircraft and military
facilities.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Formosa_Air_Battle>
2017:
The Maltese journalist and anti-corruption activist Daphne
Caruana Galizia was killed in a car bomb attack in Bidnija.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daphne_Caruana_Galizia>
_____________________________
Wiktionary's word of the day:
egg:
1. (countable, zoology)
2. An approximately spherical or ellipsoidal body produced by birds,
insects, reptiles, and other animals, housing the embryo within a
membrane or shell during its development.
3. (specifically, countable) The edible egg (sense 1.1) of a domestic
fowl such as a duck, goose, or, especially, a chicken; (uncountable) the
contents of such an egg or eggs used as food.
4. (by extension, countable) A food item shaped to resemble an egg
(sense 1.1.1), such as a chocolate egg.
5. (also cytology) Synonym of ovum (“the female gamete of an animal”);
an egg cell.
6. (countable) A thing which looks like or is shaped like an egg (sense
1.1).
7. A swelling on one's head, usually large or noticeable, resulting from
an injury.
8. (architecture) Chiefly in egg and dart: an ornamental oval moulding
alternating in a row with dart or triangular shapes.
9. (chiefly sports) A score of zero; specifically (cricket), a batter's
failure to score; a duck egg or duck's egg.
10. (military, dated) A bomb or mine.
11. (countable, figuratively)
12. Senses relating to people.
13. (informal, dated) A person; a fellow. [...]
14. (Internet slang, derogatory, dated) A user of the microblogging
service Twitter identified by the default avatar (historically an image
of an egg (sense 1.1.1)) rather than a custom image; hence, a newbie or
noob.
15. (transgender slang) A person regarded as having not yet realized
they are transgender, or who has not yet come out as transgender or is
in the early stages of transitioning; also, one's lack of awareness that
one is transgender.
16. (New Zealand, derogatory) A foolish or obnoxious person.
17. (derogatory, obsolete) A young person.
18. (archaic) Something regarded as containing a (usually bad) thing at
an early stage.
19. (computing) One of the blocks of data injected into a program's
address space for use by certain forms of shellcode, such as
"omelettes". […]
<https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/egg>
___________________________
Wikiquote quote of the day:
All power tends to develop into a government in itself. Power
that controls the economy should be in the hands of elected
representatives of the people, not in the hands of an industrial
oligarchy. Industrial power should be decentralized. It should be
scattered into many hands so that the fortunes of the people will not be
dependent on the whim or caprice, the political prejudices, the
emotional stability of a few self-appointed men.
--William O. Douglas
<https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/William_O._Douglas>
The Second Punic War (218–201 BC) was the second of three wars fought
between Carthage and Rome, the two main powers of the western
Mediterranean in the 3rd century BC. For 17 years the two states
struggled for supremacy. After immense materiel and human losses on both
sides the Carthaginians were defeated. Macedonia, Syracuse and several
Numidian kingdoms were drawn into the fighting, and Iberian and Gallic
forces fought on both sides. There were three main military theatres
during the war: Italy, where Hannibal defeated the Roman legions
repeatedly, with occasional subsidiary campaigns on the islands of
Sicily and Sardinia and in Greece; Iberia, where Hasdrubal, a younger
brother of Hannibal, defended the Carthaginian colonial cities with
mixed success before moving into Italy; and North Africa, where Rome
finally won the war. A peace treaty stripped the Carthaginians of all
overseas territories, and prohibited them from waging war outside
Africa. (This article is part of a featured topic: Punic Wars.).
Read more: <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Featured_topics/Punic_Wars>
_______________________________
Today's selected anniversaries:
1932:
Air India, the flag carrier airline of India, began operations
under the name Tata Airlines.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Air_India>
1954:
Hurricane Hazel (flooding pictured) made landfall in the
Carolinas in the United States before moving north to Toronto in Canada
later the same day, killing 176 people in the two countries.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hurricane_Hazel>
2007:
New Zealand Police conducted several anti-terrorism raids in
relation to the discovery of an alleged paramilitary training camp in
the Urewera mountain ranges, arresting 17 people and seizing four guns
and 230 rounds of ammunition.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2007_New_Zealand_police_raids>
2013:
A 7.2-magnitude earthquake struck Bohol in the Philippines,
resulting in 222 deaths.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2013_Bohol_earthquake>
_____________________________
Wiktionary's word of the day:
hundreds and thousands:
1. An indefinite but emphatically large number.
2. (Australia, Britain, New Zealand) Tiny balls or strands of
multicoloured sugar, sprinkled over ice cream, desserts or party foods.
<https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/hundreds_and_thousands>
___________________________
Wikiquote quote of the day:
People are the common denominator of progress … no improvement
is possible with unimproved people, and advance is certain when people
are liberated and educated.
--John Kenneth Galbraith
<https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/John_Kenneth_Galbraith>
The Sayfo, or Assyrian genocide, was the mass slaughter and deportation
of Assyrian and Syriac Christians in southeastern Anatolia and Persia's
Azerbaijan province committed by Ottoman forces and Kurdish tribes
during World War I. The Assyrians lived in mountainous and remote areas
and were divided into several mutually antagonistic churches. Mass
killing of Assyrian civilians began in January 1915, by the Ottoman
military and pro-Ottoman Kurds. Attacks on, massacres of and
deportations of Christian populations continued until 1919, usually
facing only sporadic armed resistance. Ottoman Assyrians living in
present-day Iraq and Syria were not targeted. The Sayfo occurred
concurrently with and was closely related to the Armenian genocide.
Motives included a perceived lack of loyalty among some Assyrian
communities to the Ottoman Empire and a desire to appropriate their
land. In 1919 the Assyrians said that roughly 250,000 were killed in the
genocide, about half the pre-war population.
Read more: <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sayfo>
_______________________________
Today's selected anniversaries:
1947:
American test pilot Chuck Yeager became the first person to
break the sound barrier, reaching Mach 1.06 on board the Bell X-1, an
experimental rocket-powered aircraft.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chuck_Yeager>
1980:
The 6th Congress of the Workers' Party concluded, having
anointed North Korean president Kim Il-sung's son Kim Jong-il as his
successor.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/6th_Congress_of_the_Workers%27_Party_of_Korea>
2011:
Michael Woodford was dismissed as the CEO of the optics
manufacturer Olympus after uncovering internal financial misconduct,
escalating the corporate scandal into one of the largest in Japanese
business history.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Olympus_scandal>
2012:
Felix Baumgartner jumped from a helium balloon in the
stratosphere to become the first person to break the sound barrier
without vehicular power.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Felix_Baumgartner>
_____________________________
Wiktionary's word of the day:
Ukrainian:
1. Relating to Ukraine or its people.
2. A citizen of Ukraine or a person of Ukrainian ethnicity.
3. The East Slavic language of Ukrainians, and the official language of
Ukraine.
<https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Ukrainian>
___________________________
Wikiquote quote of the day:
Our duty today is to our country and our children and our
constitution. We are obligated to seek answers directly from the man who
set this all in motion, and every American is entitled to those answers
— so we can act now to protect our republic. So this afternoon, I am
offering this resolution: that the committee direct the chairman to
issue a subpoena for relevant documents and testimony under oath from
Donald John Trump in connection with the January 6th attack on the
United States Capital.
--Liz Cheney
<https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Liz_Cheney>
Adiantum viridimontanum, the Green Mountain maidenhair fern, is a rare
fern found in outcrops of serpentine rock in New England and Quebec. It
is named after the site of its discovery in the Green Mountains in
Vermont. Until 1991, it was grouped with the western maidenhair fern
A. aleuticum, which itself was classified as a variety of the northern
maidenhair fern A. pedatum. A. viridimontanum is a hybrid species and
the other two ferns are distinct species, although it is difficult to
distinguish between the three in the field. Due to the limited
distribution of A. viridimontanum and its similarity to other species,
little is known of its ecology. It thrives on sunny, disturbed areas
where ultramafic rock is covered with thin soil, such as roadcuts, talus
slopes, and asbestos mines. Individual plants seem long-lived, and new
ones only infrequently reach maturity. One of four species endemic to
serpentine in eastern North America, it is considered vulnerable due to
its habitat restrictions.
Read more: <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adiantum_viridimontanum>
_______________________________
Today's selected anniversaries:
1307:
Agents of King Philip IV of France launched a raid on the
Knights Templar at dawn, arresting many members, subsequently torturing
them into giving false confessions and burning them at the stake.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Knights_Templar>
1972:
Uruguayan Air Force Flight 571 crashed into a remote area in
the Andes mountains near the border of Chile and Argentina; the 16
remaining survivors were not rescued until more than two months later.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Uruguayan_Air_Force_Flight_571>
2011:
The Dragon King of Bhutan, Jigme Khesar Namgyel Wangchuck
married Jetsun Pema at the Punakha Dzong.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Punakha_Dzong>
_____________________________
Wiktionary's word of the day:
guttle:
1. (transitive) Often followed by down or up: to swallow (something)
greedily; to gobble, to guzzle.
2. (intransitive) To eat voraciously; to gorge.
3. (Britain, dialectal)
4. An act of swallowing voraciously.
5. One who eats voraciously; a glutton.
6. (obsolete, rare) Something which is eaten voraciously. [...]
<https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/guttle>
___________________________
Wikiquote quote of the day:
Prayers offered in times of peace are silent conversations,
Appeals for love, or love's release, in private invocations But all that
is changed now. Gone like a memory from the day before the fires.
People hungry for the voice of God Hear lunatics and liars.Wartime
prayers. Wartime prayers In every language spoken. For every family
scattered and broken.
--Paul Simon
<https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Paul_Simon>
Operation Sandwedge was a proposed surveillance campaign that would have
targeted people that U.S. president Richard Nixon considered.
Read more: <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Nixon>
_______________________________
Today's selected anniversaries:
1492:
Believing he had reached the East Indies, Christopher Columbus
made landfall on an island in the Caribbean, sparking a series of events
that led to the European colonization of the Americas.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christopher_Columbus>
1892:
The Pledge of Allegiance of the United States was first used in
public schools to coincide with the opening of the World's Columbian
Exposition in Chicago.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pledge_of_Allegiance>
1917:
First World War: New Zealand troops suffered more than 2,000
casualties, including more than 800 deaths, in the First Battle of
Passchendaele, making it the nation's largest loss of life in one day.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First_Battle_of_Passchendaele>
1979:
Typhoon Tip, the largest and most intense tropical cyclone ever
recorded, reached a worldwide record-low sea-level pressure of 870 mbar
(25.69 inHg) in the western Pacific Ocean.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Typhoon_Tip>
_____________________________
Wiktionary's word of the day:
tapas:
A variety of Spanish small savoury food items or snacks such as
croquettes, cured meat, potato salad, and seafood, originally served
with sherry and now often with other alcoholic beverages as well. [...]
<https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/tapas>
___________________________
Wikiquote quote of the day:
I'd like to be remembered as somebody who entertained — who
took one out of oneself — for a few minutes, a few hours —
transported you into a different venue — gave you relief, gave you
entertainment, and gave you joy and laughter — and tears — all those
things. I would like to be remembered as somebody who was — capable
— of doing that.
--Angela Lansbury
<https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Angela_Lansbury>