The Daily Dose/May 27, 2019
By Gaylon Kent
America’s Funniest Guy
Leading Off
Today is Memorial Day, a day set aside to honor those who died fighting our nation’s battles.
Our family is pretty lucky: everybody we sent to war has come back. This dates back to our 5x great-grandfather Absolam Kent who fought in the Revolution, and Dad and Grandpa – also Gaylon Kents – in World Wars II and I, not to mention uncles on both sides of the family who fought in War II and Vietnam, and my brother, who survived rounding up Iraqi prisoners in Desert Storm, though other battles would later take his life. Perhaps your family has been lucky, too, and had everybody come back. Perhaps not. Perhaps Memorial Day is a sad remembrance for you.
Either way, we’d like to suggest you go out and find a Memorial Day ceremony to take in. Some modest research should turn up one, perhaps a ceremony put on by a local American Legion or VFW post or a parade down Main Street. It doesn’t have to be much and it doesn’t have to take up your entire day, but go do something. We’re betting you will have found it worthwhile to show yourself this was more than just a day off from work.
We can still stuff ourselves into our Navy dress blues, so we will be standing post as the monument sentry in our American Legion post’s ceremony at the local cemetery. It’s one of the most useful things we do each year, though putting on the cracker jacks again reminds you that these are still the most gawd-awful, inconvenient garments in history, probably invented by Satan on the seventh day while Providence rested. The bell bottoms look sharp, but boy, pockets are as infrequent as they are inconvenient and you always end up stuffing stuff into your sock. I did get some suspenders this year, for a sharper look, because while there are 13 buttons on the front of the pants there are not, conveniently, belt loops.
But we whine. A good Memorial Day to all.
Today At The Site
The Diary of a Nobody: It’s sold out at the hotel and Sparrow and The Wife have a productive day in the yard. Today’s Diary.
Ten minutes later the website she booked with called asking the same thing, altho she phrased real fancy-pants like, inquiring if I would be willing to grant the guest the courtesy of a no-charge cancellation…Her tone indicated the fate of the entire western world could be at stake, maybe the entire planet…Well, I hadn’t been granted any more authority in the last ten minutes, so I told her the same thing I told the original caller: they would have to call back in the morning…She tried to charm me into waiving the fee – she even thanked me for taking the call, which was as silly as it was unnecessary – but I was firm and there isn’t a Supreme Internet Commissioner she could appeal to, so she hung up.
It’s Sparrow, an average man passing an average life.
The drivel simply does not stop: please click on the button to read The Diary of a Nobody. $5.99 includes all entries, past, present, and future.
Click here to read excerpts and a sample chapter.
On This Date
In 1930 – The Chrysler Building in New York City opens, the tallest building in the world at 1,046 feet. Located at the corner of Lexington Avenue and 43rd Street on the east side of Manhattan, it was would be the tallest building in the world for eleven months, eclipsed by the Empire State Building the following May 1. The record is now held by the Burj Khalifa in Dubai, at 2,717 feet.
In 1873 – Survivor wins the first Preakness Stakes at Pimlico Race Course in Baltimore. Ridden by George Barbee, Survivor ran the 1 1/2 miles in 2:43. Prior to it becoming the second leg of the Triple Crown, the Preakness had been run before the Kentucky Derby eleven times and on the same day twice. The Preakness was run at a variety of distances over the years before settling at its present distance of 1 3/16 miles in 1925.
In 1962 – Mr Acker Bilk is at #1 on the Billboard Hot 100 for the only week with Stranger on the Shore. The song also went to #1 in Britain, where it remains the biggest selling instrumental hit, and was Billboard’s #1 song of the year. While not the line of demarcation the Beatles drew, Stranger on the Shore was the first song by a British act to hit #1 on the Hot 100 and while Bilk had three other Hot 100 hits, none got higher than #59, making Bilk one of the few acts whose only Top 40 hit went to #1.
Quotebook
A ship does not sail with yesterday’s wind.
Louis L’Amour
The Walking Drum
Answer To The Last Trivia Question
Jesse Owens won gold medals in the 100 and 200-meter dashes, the 4×100-meter relay, and the long jump at the 1936 Berlin Olympics.
Today’s Stumper
What is now the tallest building in the United States? – Answer next time!
