Saturday, December 23, 2023

December 21, 2023 Ridley's Believe It Or Not

 

© December 21, 2023  Ridley’s Believe It Or Not

             Starting on Thursday U.S. Airlines are starting their peak loads as millions of Americans will be taking to the skies to visit families and friends for Christmas with the weather in some areas not wanting to cooperate.  
             On the false sense of security front, Toyota is recalling some 1 million vehicles to fix faulty sensors in the passenger seat that may cause the passenger air bag in a collision to not deploy causing serious injury to the passenger.
              On the made in America front, the Biden Administration announced that Nippon Steel’s $14.4 billion deal to acquire U.S. Steel will undergo “close scrutiny.
             On the green energy front, U.S. scientists have announced that they have replicated nuclear fusion 3 times which involves the joining of 2 atoms to produce a heavier one and release large amounts of energy in the process without creating radioactive waste which if could ever be commercialized would be a powerful weapon to produce limitless amounts of energy without the need for fossil fuels.
             On the Sandy Koufax and Don Drysdale 1966 holdout front when the 2 future Hall of Famers were holding out for a combined $1 million 3 year contracts and settled for $130,000 and $105,000 rescpectfully, the L.A. Dodgers after signing Angel pitcher/homerun hitter Ohtani to a creative 10 year $700 million contract announced they have signed Japanese free agent pitcher Yoshinobu Yamamoto to a 12 year $325 million contract which fans are going to have to be on the hook with higher admission prices and costs for beer and Dodger Dogs.  
            On the California shoplifting front, Jesse Otero, a 44 year old California homeless drug addict who has been arrested some 90 times for shoplifting and supports his habit by selling his stolen good but rarely steels more than $950 to avoid jail was back in the news after being arrested for shoplifting hours after being released.
             On the corruption front in Chicago, former 79 year old Chicago Alderman Ed Burke was found guilty on 13 of 14 counts of extortion of using his political influence to steer business to his law firm and faces over 100 years in prison.
             December 21, 2023  Michael P. Ridley aka The Alaskanpoet 
             Noted Holidays: Winter Solstice: Celebrating the first day of winter when either one of the poles is tilted the furthest away from the Sun to give us the shortest day of the year in Northern Hemisphere.
             Word of the Day: The word of the day as we continue with words starting with “b” is “borborygmus” which means a rumbling in the intestines.
              Song of the Day: Leaving the number 1 songs  on this day in 1940’s to come back to the number song in 2004 in the U.S.A.  was  “Drop It Like It’s Hot”  by Snoop Dog feat. Pharrell on a run of 3 weeks to share number 1 status with 11 other songs, while 13 acts, including Snoop Dog and Pharrell, achieved their 1st number 1 single. Here is a music video with lyrics of Snoop Dog feat. Pharrell performing Drop It Like It’s Hot”: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GtUVQei3nX4
               December 21 Birthdays: “Can’t Fire the Foreclosure King”: celebrating the birthday on this day in 1962 of Steve Mnuchin, former partner at Goldman Sachs, former hedge fund manager that acquired IndyMac which during the 2008-09 financial crisis foreclosed on 36,000 residences, ran a film production company, became the campaign finance director for Trump’s 2016 campaign and in a rarity served in Trump’s Cabinet during his entire term as the Treasury Secretary.
               December 21 Historical Events in Rhyme
               1.      On this day in 2023, after killing his father in Prague, David Kozák, a graduate of Charles University's Faculty of the Arts/ Went to the school armed with a semi-automatic rifle to a mass shooing start/At faculty and students, killing 15 and injuring 25/As police arrived he would not be taken alive/After a shootout with police he committed suicide/Latter police found a gun at his home whose ballistics matched those of father and 2 year old daughter who 6 days earlier had been shot and died.   
    
 
         2.      On this day in 2004 at Forward Operating Base Marez near Mosul, Iraq/a jihadist wearing a suicide vest dressed as a member of Iraq’s security forces launch a Paradise seeking suicide attack/Entered a mess hall tent to his vest detonate/14 U.S. soldiers, 4 Iraqi soldiers and 4 Haliburton instantly met a mortal fate/Only wounded 72 others further away from the explosion in the tent/When a jihadist dressed as an ally has a suicide vest so hard to fatalities prevent.
                3.      On this day in 1967 Louis Washkansky having had a human heart transplant surgery performed 18 days ago/Had regained consciousness and had talked with his wife and recovery was being to show/the new heart was pumping without external electrical shocks/After day 5 in post op he was dosed with immune suppressants to rejection of the heart block/With a weakened immune system pneumonia reared its head; On day 18 Washkansky sadly was dead.
               4.      On this day in 1913 Arthur Wynne’s “word cross” the first crossword puzzle in the New York World was published/Soon thousands would be opening their papers to the challenge of choosing the words be relished/Solving a crossword puzzle is hard for many to resist/But if it is the Sunday NYT Crossword it helps to be a skilled cruciverbalist.
                5.      On this day in 1907 in Iliquique, Chile thousands of saltpeter mine workers had gone on strike over working conditions and pay/Had assembled with their wives and children at the Santa Maria School and would not move away/Mine owners would not negotiate until the strikers returned to the mines/Told the strikers police if they didn’t leave police would start shooting at the end of 2 hours time/They didn’t and a massacre of machine gun and rifle bullets erupted through the air/Men, women or children killed by company cops that didn’t care/Crushed the strike at a cost of at least 2000 dead/Set the union movement back for decades before labor progress moved slowly ahead.
                Quote on Accepting Dangers of Heart Transplants by Christian Bernard: “For a dying man it is not a difficult decision [to agree to become the world's first heart transplant] ... because he knows he is at the end. If a lion chases you to the bank of a river filled with crocodiles, you will leap into the water convinced you have a chance to swim to the other side. But you would not accept such odds if there were no lion.

 

              © December 21, 2023 Ridley’s Believe It Or Not
                 
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