© December 23, 2023 Ridley’s Believe It Or Not
On the international piracy front
which Iran is becoming the main actor, an Iranian drone fired from Iran struck hem
Pluto, a Liberia-flagged, Japanese-owned, and managed by the Netherlands’
Ace-Quantum Chemical Tankers, which is connected to Israeli shipping
tycoon Idan Ofer at approximately
10 a.m. local time today in the Indian Ocean, 200 nautical miles from the coast
of India. With the news of the formation of a multination ship force to
counter missile and drones in the Red Sea and Gulf of Aden, shippers are hoping
that insurers will lower the rates and/or remove the ban of shipping through
the Suez Canal.
On the Gourmet Christmas
Party front, Airbus Atlantic held a party for 2700 employees and an unnamed
restaurant in Montoir-de-Bretagne with a menu that included lobster, scallops,
gone gars, and tournedos to a grateful number of guests, save the 700 who
contracted severe diarrhea and abdominal cramps (if the restaurant was of the
3-5 star quantity the owners must be thanking their lucky stars that its name
was not in the story.)
On the airlines’ lost baggage
front, a passenger’s worse nightmare is that the checked baggage is put on the
wrong plane and does not land with the passenger. In Philadelphia a mother
delivered her 6 year old to Spirit Airlines for a flight to Fort Myer Florida
to visit his grandmother for the holidays who once the boy had landed and called she discovered he had been boarded on a Spirit flight to
Orlando instead—leading us to wonder whether the next sequel to Home Alone will
be named Flight Alone.
On the Putin reelection front
which he is almost certain to win, former Russian member of the Duma, Yekaterina
Duntsova has had her application to run denied due to irregularities in her
petition documents and even she is successful on appeal and is able to run on a
“Peace in Ukraine,” her life expectancy would probably be close to zero.
On the counterfeit drug
front, the FDA which had seized lots of
doses, warning that there are still thousands of doses still out there and is
working with manufacturer of the drug Ozempic to uncover if there are more
counterfeits available.
December 23, 2023 Michael P. Ridley aka The Alaskanpoet
Noted Holidays: National
Panic Saturday: Celebrated on the last Saturday before Christmas when
procrastinators really go into panic as they realize they are out of time to
purchase any gifts for family ad loves ones.
Word
of the Day: The word of the day as we continue with words
starting with “b” is “bourasque” which means a
violent wind or storm or tempest.
Song of the Day: Leaving
the number 1 songs on this day in 1940’s to come back to the number
song in 2002 in the U.S.A. was “Lose Yourself” by Eminem on a run of 8 weeks to share
number 1 status with 8 other songs, while 5 acts, including Eminem, achieved
their first 1st number 1 single. Here is a music video of Eminem
performing “Lose Yourself”: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xFYQQPAOz7Y
December 23 Birthdays: “Know when
to hold, know when to fold”: celebrating
the birthday on this day in 1994 of Maxim Katz in Moscow who moved with his
father at the age of 6 to Israel to yearly visit his grandparents in Moscow to
became a poker sports champion and a deputy of the municipal assembly of
the Moscow district Schukino (2012-2016). Opposed the Russian invasion of
Ukraine and fled the country to Israel where he was tried and convicted in
absentia for failing to register as a foreign agent.
December 23 Historical Events in
Rhyme
1. On this day in 2002 a U.S. M-Q1
Predator drone was shot down by an Iraqi Mig-25/In the first case of a dogfight
between a drone and a conventional aircraft, the drone could not survive/Not
enough speed in the drone and its small radar footprint still too easy to be
seen/But the drone operator miles and miles away from the dogfight scene/Was in
little or no harm and not a scratch received/Though combat between drones and fighter jets is
somewhat rare, a drone armed with an antiaircraft missile can knocking a
fighter jet out of the air achieve.
2. On this
day in 1986 Voyager after taking off with Rutan and Yaeger from Edwards
Air Force Base/On December 14, 1986 returned 9 days, 3 minutes and 44 seconds
later on December 23, 1986 to land in the same place/Without refueling on the
ground or while the airplane was in the air/Rutan before landing made 3 passes over
56,000 spectators on the with only 106 pounds of fuel left to spare/If the
original Rutan Voyager you wish to see/Go to the National Air and Space
Museum in Washington, D.C.
3. On this day in 1979 in what would
become known as the Soviet’s Vietnam/The Soviets occupied the Afghanistan capital
Kabul with the countryside occupied by fighters for Islam/The Soviets waged war
on the civilian Afghans/Bombing and strafing anything that moved in that
primitive mountainous land/Casualties mounted and soon armed with U.S. Stingers
more and more choppers were shot down/Too many body bags heading back to the
Soviet Union to be buried in cemetery grounds/15,000 dead Soviets and 35,000
wounded as the Soviets fled in 1989/ Soon to be followed by the collapse of the
Soviet Union defined.
4. On
this day in 1954 at Brigham Hospital in Boston, Doctors Joseph Murry, J.
Hartwell Harrison and John P. Merrill performed the first living donor to
living donor kidney transplant where the donee lived another 8 years before the
kidney failed not due to issues with the transplant.
5. On this day in 1947 the transistor
was invented at Bell Labs/To quickly the place of vacuum tubes grab/The Transistor
Age was about to begin/With lighter more powerful devices easier to use powered
by transistors not tubes market share would win.
Quote by Ronald Reagan on the need for the Soviets to withdraw from
Afghanistan: “On
a number of occasions I have invited the Soviet leadership to explore all
opportunities to bring peace to Afghanistan. We have welcomed recent
Soviet statements of an intent to withdraw. Unfortunately, their
deeds have yet to match their words. General Secretary Gorbachev and I
discussed this issue during our recent meetings here in Washington. At
that time I asked him to announce a timetable for troop withdrawal, including
dates when this withdrawal would begin and end. I call once again on
the Soviet Union to translate its declared intentions into reality by
promptly and irrevocably withdrawing all Soviet forces from Afghanistan.
Let 1988 be the year of action, the year that will see the Soviet
Union end once and for all its brutal occupation of Afghanistan.
After 8 long years and despite their unrelenting efforts, the Soviets simply
have failed to defeat the Afghan resistance on the battlefield. At the same time,
the world has repeatedly and clearly called for the prompt withdrawal of all
Soviet troops. The United Nations most recently approved by record votes
resolutions against the Soviet occupation and abuse of human rights
in Afghanistan.
The people
of Afghanistan have, as much as any people in history, won the right
to freedom and independence. We applaud their commitment and steadfastness, for
their cause is the cause of free people everywhere. Let us pray that in the
year to come a free and independent Afghanistan will again take its
place among the community of nations.”
© December 23,
2023 Ridley’s Believe It Or Not
www.alaskanpoet.blogspot.com
Poems on Events of the Day
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