• In 1978, running back Preston Pearson and his Dallas Cowboys lost in the Super Bowl to the Pittsburgh Steelers. As it happened, Mr. Pearson and his wife lived in Pittsburgh, and he gave his check for playing in the Super Bowl to his wife to deposit in a Pittsburgh bank. The bank teller looked at the size of the check, then told Mrs. Pearson that she was entitled to a free gift, although she might not want it. She didn’t. The free gift was a recording of the Pittsburgh Steelers fight song.
• Spanish painter Francisco Goya could be both generous and shrewd with his money. When his brother wanted to borrow money from him, Mr. Goya recognized that often relatives are very slow in repaying money borrowed from other family members. Therefore, Mr. Goya gave the money to a friend and told him to lend it to his brother without telling his brother the true source of the money.
• When movie critic Roger Ebert was a child, he met J.C. Penney, the founder of the famous department store. Mr. Penney, then an old man, gave young Roger a penny and some financial advice — if you want dimes and dollars to take care of themselves, you need to take care of pennies and nickels. Roger saved ten cents, then he went to see a movie for nine cents. This left a penny, which he promptly invested in an all-day sucker.
Mothers
• When Olympic gold medal-winning gymnast Kerri Strug was in the fourth grade, she spent six months working on a science project: a biosphere in a large aquarium. Unfortunately, when her brother drove her and her science project to school, he had to hit his brakes to avoid a collision with another car. The aquarium shattered, destroying six months of work, with dirt, water, frogs, and fish scattered everywhere. Fortunately, her mother was able to bring Kerri another aquarium, and they put the science project back together. However, Kerri told her mother, “This is the worst day of my life.” Her mother then said something wise and wonderful: “I’ll be happy if this is your worst day.” (For the worst day, it wasn’t so bad — Kerri’s science project won second prize.)
• Soprano Beverly Sills stopped singing and taking voice lessons after giving birth to two children with handicaps. Muffy, her daughter, was a happy child, but she suffered from deafness. Peter, her son, suffered from mental retardation. Ms. Sills devoted much time to her children, but eventually her husband thought that it would be best if she did more than look after and help their children. Therefore, for her 33rd birthday, he gave her 52 round-trip airplane tickets between Boston, where they lived, and New York, where Estelle Liebling, her voice teacher, lived. Ms. Sills began taking voice lessons again, and she began singing in public again.
• Children’s book writer Phyllis Reynolds Naylor grew up during the Depression, when money was hard to come by. Entering kindergarten, she had only two dresses: one with red checks and one with blue checks. Her mother told her that if she alternated the dresses, wearing one the first day and the other the second day and so on, then everyone would think that she had more dresses than she really had. This made young Phyllis think how clever her mother was.
• Nancy Stanford sat in a rocking chair to read a story to a group of first graders who sat at her feet. As she read the story, she felt a small hand rub her ankle, then her calf. Rather than disturb story time, she decided to continue reading the story to its end, then reprimand the child rubbing her leg. At the end of the story, she looked down, and a little boy told her, “Your leg feels just like my mother’s.” She did not reprimand the child.
• Ezra Stone played the part of teenager Harry Aldrich on The Aldrich Family radio program. Following World War II, because space was lacking, he shared his dressing room with singer Jo Stafford. One day, his mother came to visit and was surprised to find his dressing room closet filled with frilly feminine garments. Mr. Stone, a happily married man, had to convince his mother that he was not keeping a mistress on the side.
In the 1920's, he saved Warner Bros. from bankruptcy and insiders called him "the mortgage lifter". With 27 Hollywood films to his name, what is the name of this four-legged international motion picture star?
The Roc is an enormous legendary bird of prey in the popular mythology of the Middle East.
The Roc appears in Arabic geographies and natural history, popularized in Arabian fairy tales and sailors' folklore. Ibn Battuta tells of a mountain hovering in the air over the China Seas, which was the Roc. The story collection One Thousand and One Nights includes tales of Abd al-Rahman and Sinbad the Sailor, both of which include the Roc.
Source
Billy in Cypress U.S.A. was first, and correct, with:
The Roc is an enormous legendary bird of prey in the popular mythology of the Middle East.
FLAG AT HALF-MAST
Perhaps the U.S. flag should now be flown at half-mast for the foreseeable future in honor of all those innocent souls who will die each day in our country because someone in our great nation of "liberty and justice for all", does not like the color of their skin, the language they speak, the god they worship, the lack of money in their pocket, their physical and/or mental illness, the things they believe, the person they love, etc, etc, etc! Or, until again unite the United States of America: " We hold these Truths to be self-evident, that —- ".these words all Men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness.
Mark. said:
Bird of prey.
Randall wrote:
an enormous BIRD
Alan J answered:
A Large Bird of Prey.
Jacqueline replied:
A large bird of prey with a 200 ft wingspan
Dave responded:
Bird. Enormous bird of prey that looked something like an eagle. A roc was so large that they could pick up elephants and fly off with them. Marco Polo wrote about one, which like much of what he wrote was bullshit.
mj wrote:
Before Sesame Street
The Roc was the original Big Bird, reputed to be large enough to prey on
elephants.
Cal in Vermont said:
It is an enormous bird of prey with a 200 foot wing span that preys on elephants and anything else it wants to. Airliners maybe. As nobody has seen one in ages, elephants only have to worry about mice these days.
Deborah, the Master Gardener responded:
The Roc is a gigantic bird of prey. And here I thought is was a fancy face cream that costs a lot of money.
Leo in Boise replied:
A Roc is an enormous, legendary bird of prey.
Jim from CA, retired to ID, wrote:
The Roc is an enormous legendary bird of prey in the popular mythology of the Middle East.
zorch said:
A Roc is a giant bird.
Dave in Tucson
The roc is a mythical bird of prey.
Rosemary in Columbus wrote:
Enormous legendary bird of prey
Roy, fully vaccinated, but I'm in Texas, so the state may be open, but I'm still being socially distant! took the day off.
David of Moon Valley took the day off.
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Joe S (We resisted, we voted, we won. Get over it) took the day off.
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Stephen aus Oz (& peppy tech, too) took the day off.
Kevin K. in Washington DC, Where Republicans cannot see sedition clearly, even now, took the day off.
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James of Alhambra took the day off.
BttbBob has returned to semi-retired status.
~~~~~
“Go Mod Go!’s ALRIGHT delivers 12 thrilling cuts that connect the hip genres of the musical scene of 1960's Mod, Go-Go, Garage Punk, and Yé-Yé. Let the party begin!”
Jamie Kathleen Boyd — vocals
Jake Starr — throat/shakers
Wes Kilgore — keys
Pete Ostle — bass
Dominic Elliott — guitar
Rick Gordon — trumpet
Jeff Gray — tenor sax/flute
Eli Gonzales — bari sax
Shoeless Joe Jackson — trombone/electric trombone
Tom Barrick — drums and percussion
Price: $1 (USD) for track; $8 (USD) for 12-track album
CBS fills the night with even more LIVE'March Madness in April', then pads the left coast with local crap.
Scheduled on a FRESHStephen Colbert are John Cena and Sen. Tammy Duckworth.
Scheduled on a FRESHJames Corden, OBE, are Bob Odenkirk and the Fratellis.
NBC begins the night with a FRESH'The Voice', followed by a FRESH'Debris'.
Scheduled on a FRESHJimmy Fallon are Milo Ventimiglia, the Lucas Brothers, and Kali Uchis.
On a RERUNSeth Meyers (from 3/9/21) are are Don Johnson, Christina Hendricks, Fruit Bats, and John Herndon.
Scheduled on a FRESHLilly Singh is Tig Notaro.
ABC starts the night with a FRESH'American Idol', followed by a RERUN'The Good Doctor'.
Scheduled on a FRESHJimmy Kimmel are David Alan Grier, Topher Grace, and All Time Low.
The CW offers a RERUN'Superman & Lois', followed by a RERUN'Superman & Lois: Legacy Of Hope'.
Faux has a RERUN'9-1-1', followed by a FRESH'America's Most Wanted'.
MY recycles an old 'L&O: SVU', followed by another old 'L&O: SVU'.
A&E has 'Hoarders', followed by a FRESH'Hoarders', then a FRESH'Intervention'.
AMC offers the movie 'The Bone Collector', followed by the movie 'The Green Mile'.
BBC -
[6:00AM - 11:00AM] STAR TREK: DEEP SPACE NINE
[12:00PM - 4:00PM] STAR TREK: THE NEXT GENERATION
[5:00PM - 11:00PM] LAW & ORDER
[12:00AM - 4:00AM] STAR TREK: THE NEXT GENERATION
[5:00AM] STAR TREK: DEEP SPACE NINE (ALL TIMES ET)
Bravo has 'Below Deck Sailing Yacht', followed by a FRESH'Below Deck Sailing Yacht', then another FRESH'Below Deck Sailing Yacht', followed by still another FRESH'Below Deck Sailing Yacht'.
FX has the movie 'Kingsman: The Golden Circle', followed by the movie 'Thor: The Dark World', then a FRESH'Breeders', and another 'Breeders'.
History has 'Pawn Stars', another 'Pawn Stars', followed by a FRESH'Pawn Stars'.
IFC -
[6:00am - 10:30am] Parks And Recreation
[11:00am - 2:30pm] Saved By The Bell
[3:00pm - 6:30pm] Three's Company
[7:00pm - 12:30am] Two And A Half Men
[1:00am - 2:30am] Three's Company
[3:00am - 5:30am] Community (ALL TIMES ET)
Sundance -
[6:00am] love lust - Heels
[6:15am - 10:15am] hogan's heroes
[10:45am] the taking of pelham 123
[1:15pm] a fistful of dollars
[3:45pm] the good, the bad and the ugly
[8:00pm] young guns
[10:30pm] young guns ii
[1:00am] young guns
[3:30am] young guns ii (ALL TIMES ET)
SyFy has the movie 'Olympus Has Fallen', followed by the movie 'Death Wish'.
While Nomadland picked up Best Picture at the Critics Choice a couple of weeks back—a pretty reliable Oscar top prize indicator—at Sunday night’s SAG, it wasn’t even nominated in that category. Instead, that prize went to Aaron Sorkin’s The Trial of the Chicago 7, possibly bolstering its chances at the Academy show on April 25th.
The ‘Best Picture’ prize at SAG is actually awarded to the Best Ensemble Cast in a Motion Picture, and in accepting the award on behalf of the all-star cast, Frank Llangella, who played Judge Julius Hoffman, recalled Martin Luther King’s words.
The film follows the real-life story of a group of young political activists accused of inciting a riot at the 1968 Democratic National Convention in Chicago, and among its stellar cast are Sacha Baron Cohen as Abbie Hoffman, Yahya Abdul-Mateen II as Bobby Seale, Eddie Redmayne as Tom Hayden, Jeremy Strong as Jerry Rubin and Michael Keaton as U.S. Attorney General Ramsey Clark.
For Keaton, this Chicago 7 ensemble win makes him the first person in SAG history to win three awards for Outstanding Performance by a Cast in a Motion Picture. In 2014, he was part of the winning ensemble for Birdman, and again in 2015 for Spotlight.
Many years in the making, the project began in the hands of Steven Spielberg, who then charged Sorkin with bringing it to fruition.
Saturday Night Live’s April 3 telecast, with Daniel Kaluuya as host and St. Vincent as musical guest, drew a 3.6 household Live+Same Day rating in the 44 metered local markets and a 1.7 adults 18-49 rating in the 25 markets with local people meters.
That was up in the demo and even in households from the season lows marks for last week’s show hosted by Maya Rudolph with Jack Harlow as musical guest (3.6 in HH, 1.5 in 18-49)
Kaluuya won a Golden Globe Award and is Oscar nominated for his lead role in Judas and the Black Messiah. Next week, SNL will be hosted by Carey Mulligan, who is Oscar nominated for her lead role in Promising Young Woman. Kid Cudi will be the musical guest.
SNL remains #1 among all comedies on broadcast and cable in 18-49 and total viewers (L+7) this season for the first time in its history. In social interactions, this season’s SNL is up 13% through 15 episodes vs. the same period last season.
With the help of a few old friends, the box office rekindled some of its old might over the weekend. “Godzilla vs. Kong” scored easily the best opening of the pandemic with an estimated $48.5 million since opening Wednesday, even as it was simultaneously streaming at home.
The monster mash, from Warner Bros. and Legendary Entertainment, was the widest domestic release in the past year, playing in more than 3,000 theaters. Many theaters have been reopening over the past few weeks; about 60% of theaters were open this weekend, according to data firm Comscore. Most are operating at 50% capacity or less.
“Godzilla vs. Kong” stomped to $32.2 million from Friday to Sunday, according to studio estimates Sunday. The five-day total far exceeded expectations, and even outpaced the three-day debut ($47.8 million) of the franchise’s last entry, 2019's “Godzilla: King of the Monsters.” Globally, “Godzilla vs. Kong” grossed $120.1 million over the weekend, bringing its two-week worldwide total to $285.4 million.
“Godzilla vs. Kong” had already launched with $123.1 million internationally last weekend, led by especially strong ticket sales in China. There, it opened with $70 million, surpassing the performance of previous entries in the franchise. This weekend, it added another $44 million, Legendary said.
The film drew mostly younger moviegoers. According to the studio, 72% were under the age of 35. “Godzilla vs. Kong,” which has received mostly positive reviews from critics, scored an “A” CinemaScore from audiences.
The Weeknd is donating $1 million to relief efforts in Ethiopia amid the ongoing conflict between the government in Addis Ababa and the Tigray region.
The conflict has resulted in the deaths of thousands and the displacement of more than two million people, according to NPR. Last month, the New York Times obtained an internal U.S. government report that said Ethiopian officials are “leading a systematic campaign of ethnic cleansing” in the Tigray region.
The singer announced his donation via Instagram on Sunday morning and encouraged others to give, too. “My heart breaks for my people of Ethiopia as innocent civilians ranging from small children to the elderly are being senselessly murdered and entire villages are being displaced out of fear and destruction,” The Weeknd wrote. “I will be donating $1 million to provide 2 million meals through the United Nations World Food Programme and encourage those who can to please give as well.”
Both of The Weeknd’s parents immigrated to Canada from Ethiopia, and The Weeknd grew up speaking Amharic, the official language of Ethiopia.
This is not the first time The Weeknd has aided a humanitarian cause. In June 2020, he donated $1 million to COVID-19 relief, giving $500,000 each to MusiCares and the front-line hospital workers of Scarborough Health Network in his hometown. That same month, he gave another $500,000 to the racial justice causes Black Lives Matter, National Bailout and Colin Kaepernick’s Know Your Rights camp. In August 2020, The Weeknd also donated $300,000 to Global Aid for Lebanon to help those affected by the Beirut explosion.
A once-secret unit within the Guantanamo Bay detention center that had fallen into disrepair has been closed and the prisoners moved to another facility on the American base in Cuba, the U.S. military said Sunday.
The prisoners at Camp 7 were transferred to a facility adjacent to where the other detainees on the base are held as part of what U.S. Southern Command said in a statement was an effort to “increase operational efficiency and effectiveness."
Miami-based Southern Command, which oversees the detention center at the southeastern edge of Cuba, did not say how many prisoners were moved. Officials have previously said about 14 men were held in Camp 7. There are 40 prisoners at Guantanamo.
Southern Command said the Camp 7 prisoners were moved to Camp 5 “safely and without incident," but did not say when the transfer occurred. Camp 5, which was largely empty, is next to Camp 6, where the other detainees are held.
Camp 7 opened in December 2006 for prisoners previously held in a network of clandestine CIA detention facilities, often referred to as “black sites,” where they were subjected to brutal interrogation techniques. The military ran it under an agreement with CIA, and Southern Command said intelligence agencies were involved with the transfer.
It appears that Donald Trump (R-Lock Him Up) continued to take enormous sums of money from his supporters even after the 2020 presidential election was over.
A new report from The New York Times reveals that the ex-president issued $122.7 million in refunds to his supporters last year, which amounted to 11 percent of the money Trump’s campaign raised. The publication’s findings were based on a review of Federal Election Commission filings.
Beginning last summer, Trump’s campaign and WinRed—the company that handled online donations—added pre-checked recurring payment boxes to online donations. Contributors weren’t aware that they had to manually uncheck the boxes unless they read the disclaimer. If they didn’t check the fine print, then contributors’ credit cards were charged weekly until the day of the election.
In the days before the election, the campaign “made that disclaimer increasingly opaque,” The Times writes, and even added a second pre-checked box that doubled the donation. Banks soon became “inundated with fraud complaints” from Trump supporters who didn’t realize they had agreed to recurring contributions. The Times reports that in late 2020, several banks and one of the U.S.’s leading credit card companies revealed that these cases constituted up to three percent of all fraud complaints.
Trump amassed $255.4 million from his supporters in the eight weeks after the election, raising over $2 million per day from early November to Dec. 14, the day the Electoral College vote was finalized. The Trump campaign’s daily average refund in December was $720,000. In comparison, Joe Biden’s campaign refunded 2.2 percent of its 2020 donations.
There is perhaps no story that has brought out more schadenfreude than the downfall of Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-Predator). As Rolling Stone noted earlier today, the right-wing Florida congressman, Trump supporter, and QAnon hero is currently under investigation by the Justice Department for allegations that he used Apple Pay and Cash App to pay multiple women for ecstasy-fueled sexual encounters at various Florida hotels, including possibly a 17-year-old girl.
No charges have been filed against Gaetz, and in a statement released by Gaetz’s office, a spokesperson said, “Matt Gaetz has never paid for sex. Matt Gaetz refutes all the disgusting allegations completely. Matt Gaetz has never ever been on any such websites whatsoever. Matt Gaetz cherishes the relationships in his past and looks forward to marrying the love of his life.”
Yet the allegations have shone a light on the website Seeking Arrangements, a sugar dating website that Gaetz and former tax collector Joel Greenberg, who was indicted last year on a federal sex trafficking charge, were said to have used to meet the women.
Founded in 2006 by CEO Brandon Wade, Seeking Arrangements matches aspiring sugar babies, typically younger women, with sugar daddies, usually older men, who lavish them with gifts and various luxury goods in exchange for their attention. The website has been the center of various political scandals, most notably the 2013 extramarital sexting scandal involving Anthony Weiner and Sydney Leathers, who was later outed by TMZ for having a profile on the site.
Though not technically considered escorting, sugar dating is highly stigmatized and often considered a form of sex work, including by Leathers herself, who found herself reliving the trauma she’d experienced eight years ago in the media after hearing about the Gaetz story.
Remember last week, when people from Portland to Seattle reported seeing a brilliant fireball flying across the night sky, creating a social media mystery about what it might be? Many assumed it was a meteor, and at least one Twitter user in the moment thought it was a plane that had caught fire midflight.
It was pretty quickly surmised to be a rocket belonging to Elon Musk and his SpaceX company, which had delivered satellites to orbit earlier in March then burned up upon reentry to Earth's atmosphere.
But that led to another obvious question: Where would all that Musk junk end up? We now know the answer: on a farm in Eastern Washington.
Officials in Grant County said a 5-foot-long "composite-overwrapped pressure vessel" was retrieved from a private field in Ephrata, Wash. It was discovered by the property owner, who wished to remain anonymous.
"Media and treasure hunters: we are not disclosing specifics," the Grant County Sheriff's Office tweeted, along with a picture of the object, which is used for storing helium. "The property owner simply wants to be left alone."
A couple visiting an art gallery at a mall in Seoul, South Korea, mistakenly vandalized a canvas painting by the American graffiti artist JonOne, the head of the exhibition told Reuters on Friday.
The couple, who are in their 20s, were visiting the exhibit on March 28 when they mistook the containers of paint and paintbrushes - which were intentionally displayed in front of JonOne's artwork - as signs for the public to contribute, according to ABC News.
A surveillance camera captured the couple picking up paint and adding it to the artwork. Their marks can be seen in the form of dark-green splotches, ABC News reported.
Police reviewed the surveillance footage and arrested the couple at the mall, and they were later released without being charged, Kang Wook, the CEO of Contents Creator of Culture, which co-organized the exhibit, told ABC News.
"They thought they were allowed to do that as participatory art and made a mistake," Kang told the outlet. "We are currently in discussions with the artist about whether to restore it."
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U.S.A. was first, and correct, with:
has returned to semi-retired status.
In memory.
