February 3, 2023 Ridley's Believe It Or Not

 

The Chinese “weather balloon” is still drifting across the U.S. with cameras clicking and gathering all manner of data whose path seems not completely controlled by the win with Reds and hopefully Blues wondering when are we going to bring the balloon down. Elon Musk is a happy man today as a jury has ruled in a lawsuit against him by Tesla shareholders that he is not liable for his tweet in 2018 on his intent to take Tesla private at $420 a share. The 6 week of additional winter forecasted by Punxsutawney Phil is getting a head start as massive winter cold fronts are hitting the Midwest and Northeast but not hard enough to rattle the climate change warriors. Number 2 Stanford Women Basketball head north to play the Cougars tonight at 7:00 P.M. and the Huskeys on Sunday noon unfortunately televised only on the PAC 12 Network which almost no Sports Bars in Southern California subscribe to. I hope you enjoy today’s Ridley's Believe It Or Not  and find it worthy to read and if not reply “Unsubscribe” to be removed.  
Ridley’s Believe It Or Not February 3, 2023
          Noted Holidays: Wear Red Day,  an observance to wear red not in support of the Reds but created by the American Heart Association in 2003 and first celebrated on February 6, 2004 and on the first Friday in February thereafter to create awareness that heart attacks are the leading cause of death among women and promote exercise and diet healthy for hearts.
          Word of the Day: The word of the day is “affabulation” which means the moral of a fable or story which explains why Aesop’s Fables are still very popular today.
          Number 1 Song of the Day: The number 1 song on this day in 1969 was “I Heard It Through the Grapevine” by Marvin Gaye on a run of 4 weeks following 3 weeks in December 1968  to share with 16 other songs achieving number 1 status, while 814 acts achieved their first number 1 song.  Here is a recording with lyrics of Marvin Gaye performing  “I Heard It Through the Grapevine”:   https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cXWHpbpNdHE
          Noted Birthdays: Elizabeth Holmes, noted entrepreneur and fraudster, born on this day in 1984, who left Stanford after her freshman year to found Theranos, a medical device company that fraudulent touted to investors that the technology could determine a variety of diseases with one drop of blood. From a net worth of $9 billion based on the valuation of company from private rounds of financing of millions of dollars, she went down to 0 when the fact the technology did not work was finally exposed she was charged with multiple counts of wire fraud, convicted and sentenced to 135 months in prison starting when she arrives in a federal prison on April 27 of this year.
          Notable Events that occurred on February 3:
          1.     1959— In what would become known as “The Day the Music Died” Buddy Holly, Richie Valens and J.P. Richardson aka “The Big Bopper” took off after performing in Clear Lake Iowa heading to Moorhead, Minnesota only to crash and kill all aboard less than 6 miles from the airport.
          2.     1961—The “Doomsday” plane able to control all U.S. bombers and missiles in the event that SAC Headquarters was destroyed took off and before it landed another “Doomsday” plane would replace it for the next 30 years.
          3.     1984—Doctor John Buster and a research team from the Harbor-UCLA Medical Center made the first transfer in history of a live embryo from one woman to another resulting in a live birth.
          4.     1995—Eileen Collins became the first female captain of a Space Shuttle mission when the Space Shuttle Discovery docked with Russia’s MIR Space Station.
          5.     1998—Approaching the cable car servicing the Cavalese Ski Resort near Trento, Italy, a Marine Corps EA-7 Prowler flying too low so pilot and navigator could get a better view of the mountain and skiers hit a cable supporting the car, sending 20 skiers to their deaths after a fall of 80 meters. Surprisingly the plane made it back to base with wing and tail damage. The two Marines were acquitted of involuntary manslaughter and negligent homicide but expelled from the Marine Corps.
          Quotes of the Day: Bob Dylan on Buddy Holly:  “When I was 16 or 17, I went to see Buddy Holly play and I was three feet away from him… and he LOOKED at me… Buddy Holly was a poet – way ahead of his time.”

Michael P. Ridley aka the Alaskanpoet
www.alaskanpoet.blogspot.com
Poems on events of the day
Commissioned unique poems