(Roughly) Daily

Thanks to Theodore Gray (co-founder with Stephen Wolfram of Wolfram Research, and co-creator of the extraordinary Mathematica), a nifty set of periodic table applications and artifacts…

One can spell one’s name “periodically”…

… see a periodic table table…

…or just learn what there is to know about the elements.

As we realize that, after all, it *is* elementary, Watson, we might wish a revolutionary Happy Birthday to the Polish mathematician, physician, classical scholar, translator, artist, Catholic cleric, jurist, governor, military leader, diplomat, and economist Nicolaus Copernicus, whose avocational interest in astronomy led him to formulate a scientifically-based heliocentric cosmology that displaced the Earth from the center of the universe.  He was born on this date in 1473.

In fact, Greek, Indian and Muslim thinkers had published heliocentric hypotheses centuries before Copernicus.  But his publication of a scientific theory of heliocentrism– his epochal book, De Revolutionibus Orbium Coelestium (On the Revolutions of the Celestial Spheres)– was the starting point of modern astronomy and of the Scientific Revolution.

Nicolaus Copernicus

Celebrating the 25th anniversary of the “Harpers Index,” the full quarter-century:  online, indexed, and searchable.

As we wonder at the appositeness of it all, we might check our local listings, as it was on this date in 1972 that John Lennon and Yoko Ono concluded a week as co-hosts of The Mike Douglas Show…

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From the ever-illuminating Cockeyed.com, a step-by-step guide to updating one’s tin foil helmet by applying the appropriate converter box to protect against the threat posed by the imminent conversion of television broadcasting in the United States from analog to digital.  Readers have only until the revised switch-over date, June 12, to make these enhancements, so had best hop to.

As we adjust the internal webbing, and your correspondent re-establishes radio contact on return from a remote (and beautiful) wedding, we might recall the it was on this date in 1933 that Blondie Boopadoop married Dagwood Bumstead in the comic strip “Blondie”  (three years before, on this same date, Lee Falk’s “The Phantom” made it’s funny pages debut– 25 years to the the day before “BC” premiered)…

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A guest post from Scenarios and Strategy…

In this brief moment of radio contact between two trips out of range, a brief story…  From my friend Don Laurie, a tale that’s altogether too appropriate to our times:

Young Chuck moved to Montana and bought a horse from a farmer for $100. The farmer agreed to deliver the horse the
next day.

The next day he drove up and said, “Sorry son, but I have some bad news, the horse died.”

Chuck replied, “Well, then just give me my money back.”

The farmer said, “Can’t do that.  I went and spent it already.

Chuck said, “Ok, then, just bring me the dead horse.”

The farmer asked, “What ya gonna do with him?

Chuck said, “I’m going to raffle him off.”

The farmer said, “You can’t raffle off a dead horse!”

Chuck said, “Sure I can.  Watch me.  I just won’t tell anybody he’s dead.”

A month later, the farmer met up with Chuck and asked, “What happened with that dead horse?”

Chuck said, “I raffled him off.  I sold 500 tickets at two dollars a piece and made a profit of $998.”

The farmer said, “Didn’t anyone complain?”

Chuck said, “Just the guy who won.  So I gave him his two dollars back.”

Chuck grew up, moved east, and got a job working for Fannie Mae.

Ba-boom!

(For my part, I should be back on the ranch by sometime later next week…)

In the spirit of the Buddhist teaching, “if you meet the Buddha on the road, kill him” (on this, the 200th birthday of Charles Darwin), an essay from MacArthur Fellow Carla Safina:  “Darwinism Must Die So That Evolution May Live.”

And on a lighter (well, at least more poignant) note, this retrospective reminder that while some change is progress, some isn’t (or in this case, wasn’t)…

From reader JO:

Ben and Jerry created “Yes Pecan!” ice cream flavor for Obama. They then asked people to fill in the blank to the following:

For George W. the best Ben and Jerry’s flavor would be “__________________”.

Here are some of the responses:

– Grape Depression

– Abu Grape

– Cluster Fudge

– Nut’n Accomplished

– Iraqi Road

– Chock ‘n Awe

– WireTapioca

– Impeach Cobbler

– Guantanmallow

– imPeachmint

– Good Riddance You Lousy Motherf**ker… Swirl

– Heck of a Job, Brownie!

– Neocon Politan

– RockyRoad to Fascism

– The Reese’s-cession

– Cookie D’oh!

– The Housing Crunch

– Nougular Proliferation

– Death by Chocolate… and Torture

– Credit Crunch

– Country Pumpkin

– Chunky Monkey in Chief

– George Bush Doesn’t Care About Dark Chocolate

– WM Delicious

– Chocolate Chimp

– Bloody Sundae

– Caramel Preemptive Stripe

As we ask for a waffle cone, we might note that today’s a nifty day to sing “A Hymn in Praise of Neptune,” as it was on this date in 1567 that Elizabethan poet and composer Thomas Campion was born. (C.f.:  Auden’s 1972 collection of Campion’s work, The Selected Songs)

Thomas Campion

N.B.–  Your correspondent is headed for realms Bahamian, where, he is told, connectivity with be watery at best.  Thus, it’s likely that these notes won’t resume until sometime next week…

To keep readers amused in the meantime, a treat from our friends north of the border:  the CBC’s “Concerts on Demand”…