Word of the day

Blague – humbug, pretentious nonsense; practical joke, playful deception.

Wrong season, wrong era for Halloween

Halloween may have made sense in the United States a few decades ago.

Then an autumn celebration which called on children to use their ingenuity to make costumes then call on neighbours whom they knew well for treats was probably fun for all concerned.

But it’s not something which translates successfully to spring in 21st century New Zealand.

It’s just another excuse for children to ask their parents to spend money on tack and wander the neighbourhood exhorting sweets from people they don’t know well, if at all.

It’s the wrong season and the wrong era.

Scrooge was talking about Christmas but his words suit Halloween better: bah, humbug!

Warning – these are punfull

1.  A vulture boards an airplane, carrying two dead raccoons.  The flight attendant looks at him and says, “I’m sorry, sir, only one carrion allowed per passenger.”

 2.  Two fish swim into a concrete wall.  The one turns to the other and says “Dam!

 3.  Two Eskimos sitting in a kayak were chilly, so they lit a fire in the craft.  Unsurprisingly it immediately sank, proving once again that you can’t have your kayak and heat it too.

 4.  Two hydrogen atoms meet.  One says “I’ve lost my electron.” The other says “Are you sure?” The first replies “Yes, I’m positive.”

 5.  Did you hear about the Buddhist who refused Novocain during a root canal?

His goal: transcend dental medication.

 6.  A group of chess enthusiasts checked into a hotel and were standing in the lobby discussing their recent tournament victories.

After about an hour, the manager came out of the office and asked them to disperse.  “But why?” they asked, as they moved off.

“Because,” he said,” I can’t stand chess-nuts boasting in an open foyer.”

 7.  A woman has identical twins and is forced to give them up for adoption.

One of them goes to a family in Egypt and is named “Ahmal.”

The other goes to a family in Spain ; they name him “Juan.” Years later, Juan sends a picture of himself to his birth mother.  Upon receiving the picture, she tells her husband that she wishes she also had a picture of Ahmal.  Her husband responds, “They’re identical twins!  If you’ve seen Juan, you’ve seen Ahmal.”

 8.  A group of friars were behind on their belfry payments, so they opened up a small florist shop to raise funds.  Since everyone liked to buy flowers from the men of God, a rival florist across town thought the competition was unfair.  He asked the good fathers to close down, but they would not.  He went back and begged the friars to close.  They ignored him.

So, the rival florist hired Hugh MacTaggart, the roughest and most vicious thug in town to “persuade” them to close.  Hugh beat up the friars and trashed their store, saying he’d be back if they didn’t close up shop.

Terrified, they did so, thereby proving that only Hugh can prevent florist friars.

9.  Mahatma Gandhi walked barefoot most of the time, which produced an impressive set of calluses on his feet.  He also ate very little, which made him rather frail and, with his odd diet, he suffered from bad breath.  This made him a super calloused fragile mystic hexed by halitosis.

 10.  Someone sent ten different puns to friends with the hope that at least one of the puns would make them laugh.  No pun in ten did.

For meat lovers

Our staff party last night presented another opportunity for an asado.

 For the first time we cooked beef as well as lamb.

The dog is in seventh heaven today with all the left over bones.

39 – 18 to North Otago

The sun shone in North Otago yesterday and so did the rugby team – winning the Meads Cup by beating W(h)anganui 39 -18.

Grip & grin caption contest

This grip and grin with Julia Gillard and John Key looks like a photo in want of a caption.

Photo borrowed from here.

October 31 in history

On October 31:

475  Romulus Augustulus was proclaimed Western Roman Emperor.

1517  Protestant Reformation: Martin Luther posted his 95 theses on the door of the Castle Church in Wittenberg.

1587  Leiden University Library opened.

 

1795  John Keats, British poet, was born (d. 1821).

1822  Emperor Agustín de Iturbide attempted to dissolve the Mexican Empire.

1860  Juliette Low, American founder of the Girl Scouts (d. 1927)

1861  American Civil War: Citing failing health, Union General Winfield Scott resigned as Commander of the United States Army.

1863  The Land Wars resumed as British forces in New Zealand led by General Duncan Cameron began their Invasion of the Waikato.

1864  Nevada was admitted as the 36th U.S. state.

1876  A monster cyclone ravaged India, resulting in over 200,000 deaths.

1887  Chiang Kai-shek, Nationalist Chinese leader, former Republic of China president, was born(d. 1975).

 1908 Muriel Duckworth, Canadian activist, was born (d. 2009).

1913 Dedication of the Lincoln Highway, the first road across the United States.

1913 – The Indianapolis Street Car Strike and subsequent riot began.

1917  World War I: Battle of Beersheba – “last successful cavalry charge in history”.

1918  Banat Republic was founded.

1920  Dick Francis, British jockey-turned-novelist, was born (d. 2010).

1923 The first of 160 consecutive days of 100 degrees at Marble Bar, Australia.

1924  World Savings Day was announced in Milan by the Members of the Association at the 1st International Savings Bank Congress (World Society of Savings Banks).

1926 Magician Harry Houdini died of gangrene and peritonitis that developed after his appendix ruptured.

1931  Dan Rather, American television journalist, was born.

1938  Great Depression: In an effort to restore investor confidence, the New York Stock Exchange unveiled a fifteen-point programme aimed to upgrade protection for the investing public.

1940   The Battle of Britain ended.

 

1941  After 14 years of work, drilling was completed on Mount Rushmore.

1941   The destroyer USS Reuben James was torpedoed by a German U-boat near Iceland, killing more than 100 United States Navy sailors.

1941  A fire in a clothing factory in Huddersfield, England killed 49

1943  World War II: An F4U Corsair accomplished the first successful radar-guided interception.

1949  Bob Siebenberg, American drummer (Supertramp), was born.

1954 Algerian War of Independence: The Algerian National Liberation Front began a revolt against French rule.

1956 Suez Crisis: The United Kingdom and France began bombing Egypt to force the reopening of the Suez Canal.

1963  An explosion at the Indiana State Fair Coliseum (now Pepsi Coliseum) in Indianapolis killed 74 people during an ice skating show.

1968  Vietnam War October surprise: Citing progress with the Paris peace talks, US President Lyndon B. Johnson announced  he had ordered a complete cessation of “all air, naval, and artillery bombardment of North Vietnam” effective November 1.

1973  Mountjoy Prison helicopter escape. Three Provisional Irish Republican Army members escaped from Mountjoy Prison aboard a hijacked helicopter.

1984 Indian Prime Minister Indira Gandhi was assassinated by two security guards.

1985 Keri Hulme’s novel The Bone People won the Booker Prize.

1986  The 5th congress of the Communist Party of Sweden was inaugurated. During the course of the congress the party name is changed to the Solidarity Party and the party ceases to be a communist party.

1994  An American Eagle ATR-72 crashed in Roselawn, Indiana, after circling in icy weather, killing 68 passengers and crew.

1996  Fokker F100  TAM Transportes Aéreos Regionais Flight 402 crashed into several houses in São Paulo, Brazil killing 98 including 2 on the ground.

1998 Iraq disarmament crisis began: Iraq announced it would no longer cooperate with United Nations weapons inspectors.

1999  EgyptAir Flight 990 crashed off the coast of Nantucket, Massachusetts, killing all 217 on-board.

 

1999 – Yachtsman Jesse Martin returned to Melbourne after 11 months of circumnavigating the world, solo, non-stop and unassisted.

2000   Singapore Airlines Boeing 747-400 Flight 006 collided with construction equipment upon takeoff in Taipei, Taiwan killing 79 passengers and four crew members.

 

2000 – A chartered Antonov An-26 exploded after takeoff in Northern Angola killing 50.

2000 – Soyuz TM-31 launched, carrying the first resident crew to the International Space Station. The ISS has been continuously crewed since.

2002 A federal grand jury in Houston, Texas indicts former Enron Corp. chief financial officer Andrew Fastow on 78 counts of wire fraud, money laundering, conspiracy and obstruction of justice related to the collapse of his ex-employer.

2003 – Mahathir bin Mohamad resigned as Prime Minister of Malaysia and was replaced by Deputy Prime Minister Abdullah Ahmad Badawi, marking an end to Mahathir’s 22 years in power.

Sourced from NZ History Online & Wikipedia