For “Mammal Monday”:
Animal Trickery: It’s No April Fool’s Joke
“Gray squirrels like this watchful one sometimes pretend to bury acorns several times before really burying them, a trick designed to fool other squirrels that might pilfer stored food.
April Fool’s Day marks a time when lies, trickery and deception are okay, even encouraged, provided they’re done harmlessly and in a spirit of fun. In the nonhuman world, however, trickery can be serious business, a way to live long and prosper. Here are 10 animals that trick enemies, competitors and mates” At: http://blog.nwf.org/2012/03/animal-trickery-its-no-april-fools-joke/ From Wildlife Promise
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Getting a Dog at 82 Years Old - Laughing with Mary Maxwell
“Linda is considering getting a new dog, but at age 82, she isn't sure if it's a good idea. Mary offers her some alternative ideas that may be a bit easier than a new puppy.”
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HeroRATs.
“HeroRATs-in-training may love their job, but that doesn't mean it's always an easy life! Landmine Detection recruits must wake up early every day and practice sniffing for mines and covering ground at APOPO's Landmine Detection Training Field. With a little help from their trainers, they work hard in the hopes that they may one day be sent to APOPO's Mine Action operations.
To learn about the work of APOPO, watch more videos, and meet the featured HeroRATs available for online adoption, check out www.apopo.org!”
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Hero Rats: landmine and tuberculosis detectors:
“Meet the Hero Rats who love to play hide and seek amongst landmines and unexploded bombs, and treasure hunt for positive TB samples. Apopo, a Belgian charity is harnessing the sociability, enthusiasm for repetitive tasks, love of bananas and acute sense of smell of the African Giant Pouched rat to uncover killers.
Working in Mozambique and Tanzania (with plans to establish operations in Colombia and South East Asia) Apopo has already cleared large areas of unexploded ordinance and detected TB in hundreds of samples missed by more costly conventional testing.
To learn about the work of APOPO, watch more videos, and meet the featured HeroRATs available for online adoption, check out www.apopo.org!”
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Baby beavers get a second chance
“Beaver trapping and killing is very common in NC. The law says they must be put back where they came from if rehabilitated. If we couldn't do this, they'd be killed. These beavers have a happy ending. If you want to know the importance of beavers, read this article http://news.discovery.com/animals/beavers-land-111228.html#mkcpgn=rssnws1”
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Exotic Cats Rescued from Cat Mill:
“A potentially dangerous situation was averted when the Davie County sheriff department and The HSUS's Animal Rescue Team helped save an African Serval cat and many other hybrid and domestic cats from a cat mill.
This person was even breeding deformed cats that could not walk, only crawl!”
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Kings of jungle arrive for new life on Colorado plains
"Bolivian lions arrive at new Colorado home. We could not have done it without the support of Jorja Fox and Bob Barker," Creamer added, referring to two Hollywood personalities who have been actively working with ADI.
Barker, former host of "The Price is Right" game show and a longtime animal-rights activist, contributed $2 million to ADI for its animal rescue work and his funding helped construct the new fabric-covered lion house that covers nearly 10 acres at the sanctuary. The Bolivian lions will live in eight enclosures in that structure until they are acclimated to Colorado weather. Then, within a few months, the plan is to release the lions into four 20-acre open-air habitats that surround the lion house.
In addition to the new Latin American lions, the sanctuary has about 270 other wild animals, including 90 bears, 70 tigers, 15 other lions, leopards, lynx, mountain lions, wolves and several more species. Television stars Jorja Fox and Bob Barker cheer in a hangar at Denver International Airport as the plane arrives from Bolivia with the 25 lions.” From: http://www.denverpost.com/breakingnews/ci_17405414?source=rss
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Rescued from Neglect, Meet Possum
“Blind “Possum”, rescued from neglect. Be a hero for other animals like him -- donate today: http://humanesociety.org/hero7”
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“When I think of the great American author Mark Twain,
I think of stories “The Adventures of Huckleberry Fin” and “The Adventures of Tom Sawyer”. I had no idea he was an animal rights activist who cared deeply for all sentient beings! Below are some links to some of his less known publications on anti-vivisection and the treatment of dogs and horses. The links will take you to the full stories. The truth about vivisection is that it is still being practiced today.
According to IDA*, tens of millions of animals are dissected every year, infected, injected, gassed, burned and blinded in hidden laboratories on college campuses and research facilities throughout the U.S. Still more animals are used to test the safety of cosmetics, household cleansers and other consumer products. These innocent primates, dogs, cats, rabbits, rodents and other animals are used against their will as research subjects in experiments and procedures that would be considered sadistically cruel were they not conducted in the name of science.
1900 | Mark Twain, “Mark Twain on Scientific Research,”Animals’ Friend (London:1894-?) 6 (1900 Apr): 99-100 [Online Edition: Animal Rights History, 2003]. [Letter to Sidney G. Trist (Editor of the Animals' Friend Magazine), in his capacity as Secretary of the London Anti-Vivisection Society; Also published in pamphlet form as Pains of Lowly Life (London: Anti-Vivisection Society, 1900).
"DEAR SIR,—I believe I am not interested to know whether Vivisection produces results that are profitable to the human race or doesn't. To know that the results are profitable to the race would not remove my hostility to it. The pains which it inflicts upon un-consenting animals is the basis of my enmity towards it, and it is to me sufficient justification of the enmity without looking further."
1903 | Mark Twain, A Dog's Tale [First published in Harper's Monthly Magazine (New York, 1900-1913) (1903 Christmas); First Separate Edition: London: Anti-Vivisection Society, 1903] (New York & London, 1904; Digitized by Google, 2006).
“The laboratory was not a book, or a picture, or a place to wash your hands in, as the college president’s dog said—no, that is the lavatory; the laboratory is quite different, and is filled with jars, and bottles, and electrics, and wires, and strange machines; and every week other scientists came there and sat in the place, and used the machines, and discussed, and made what they called experiments and discoveries.…”
1906 | Mark Twain, A Horse’s Tale [First published in two parts in Harper's Monthly Magazine (New York: 1900-1913) 845/846 (1906 Aug-Sep) [First separate edition privately printed in 1906] (New York & London, 1906; Digitized by Google, 2006).
From A Horse’s Tale: “…How many times have I changed hands? I think it is twelve times—I cannot remember; and each time it was down a step lower, and each time I got a harder master.” *IDA In Defense of Animals
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On This Day:
Mark Twain receives steamboat pilot's license, Apr 9, 1859:
“On this day in 1859, a 23-year-old Missouri youth named Samuel Langhorne Clemens receives his steamboat pilot's license.
Clemens had signed on as a pilot's apprentice in 1857 while on his way to Mississippi. He had been commissioned to write a series of comic travel letters for the Keokuk Daily Post, but after writing five, decided he'd rather be a pilot than a writer. He piloted his own boats for two years, until the Civil War halted steamboat traffic. During his time as a pilot, he picked up the term "Mark Twain," a boatman's call noting that the river was only two fathoms deep, the minimum depth for safe navigation. When Clemens returned to writing in 1861, working for the Virginia City Territorial Enterprise, he wrote a humorous travel letter signed by "Mark Twain" and continued to use the pseudonym for nearly 50 years.
Clemens was born in Hannibal, Missouri, and was apprenticed to a printer at age 13. He later worked for his older brother, who established the Hannibal Journal. In 1864, he moved to San Francisco to work as a reporter. There he wrote the story that made him famous, The Celebrated Jumping Frog of Calaveras County.
In 1866, he traveled to Hawaii as a correspondent for the Sacramento Union. Next, he traveled the world writing accounts for papers in California and New York, which he later published as the popular book The Innocents Abroad (1869). In 1870, Clemens married the daughter of a wealthy New York coal merchant and settled in Hartford, Connecticut, where he continued to write travel accounts and lecture. In 1875, his novel Tom Sawyer was published, followed by Life on the Mississippi (1883) and his masterpiece Huckleberry Finn (1885). Bad investments left Clemens bankrupt after the publication of Huckleberry Finn, but he won back his financial standing with his next three books. In 1903, he and his family moved to Italy, where his wife died. Her death left him sad and bitter, and his work, while still humorous, grew distinctly darker. He died in 1910.”
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Robert E. Lee surrenders, Apr 9, 1865:
“At Appomattox, Virginia, Confederate General Robert E. Lee surrenders his 28,000 troops to Union General Ulysses S. Grant, effectively ending the American Civil War. Forced to abandon the Confederate capital of Richmond, blocked from joining the surviving Confederate force in North Carolina, and harassed constantly by Union cavalry, Lee had no other option.
In retreating from the Union army's Appomattox Campaign, the Army of Northern Virginia had stumbled through the Virginia countryside stripped of food and supplies. At one point, Union cavalry forces under General Philip Sheridan had actually outrun Lee's army, blocking their retreat and taking 6,000 prisoners at Sayler's Creek. Desertions were mounting daily, and by April 8 the Confederates were surrounded with no possibility of escape. On April 9, Lee sent a message to Grant announcing his willingness to surrender. The two generals met in the parlor of the Wilmer McLean home at one o'clock in the afternoon.
Lee and Grant, both holding the highest rank in their respective armies, had known each other slightly during the Mexican War and exchanged awkward personal inquiries. Characteristically, Grant arrived in his muddy field uniform while Lee had turned out in full dress attire, complete with sash and sword. Lee asked for the terms, and Grant hurriedly wrote them out. All officers and men were to be pardoned, and they would be sent home with their private property--most important, the horses, which could be used for a late spring planting. Officers would keep their side arms, and Lee's starving men would be given Union rations.
Shushing a band that had begun to play in celebration, General Grant told his officers, "The war is over. The Rebels are our countrymen again." Although scattered resistance continued for several weeks, for all practical purposes the Civil War had come to an end.”
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Prince Charles and Camilla Parker Bowles wed, Apr 9, 2005:
“Nearly eight years after Princess Diana's death in a car crash was mourned the world over, Prince Charles, her widower and heir to the British throne, weds his longtime mistress, Camilla Parker Bowles. The marriage, a private civil ceremony, took place at Windsor Guildhall, 30 miles outside of London. The ceremony was originally supposed to take place on April 8, but had to be rescheduled so as not to conflict with the funeral of Pope John Paul II.
After the civil ceremony, which the queen did not attend, Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams blessed the union on behalf of the Church of England in a separate blessing ceremony. An estimated 750 guests attended the ceremony, which was held at St. George's Chapel in Windsor and was attended by both of Charles' parents, Queen Elizabeth II and Prince Philip.
Twenty years earlier, on July 29, 1981, Prince Charles married his first wife, Lady Diana Spencer, who, at 20 years old, was 12 years his junior. Their lavish wedding attracted a television audience of 750 million, making it the most popular program broadcast to that time. Diana's shy manner and beauty charmed audiences, sparking the international admiration she enjoyed for the rest of her life.
It has since come to light that Charles and Diana's "fairy-tale" marriage was less than happy, involving infidelity on both sides, and the pair separated in 1992. In an interview several years later, Diana said "there were three of us in the marriage," likely referring to Charles' drawn-out affair with Parker Bowles. In 1996, about a year before Diana's death, the couple divorced.
Prince Charles met his second wife, then Camilla Shand, at a polo match in 1970. They began dating, but Charles soon joined the navy and the relationship fizzled. Though she married army officer Andrew Parker Bowles in 1973, she remained friendly with Prince Charles and it is widely believed that an amorous relationship continued between the two even after his 1981 wedding to Diana. Camilla and Andrew Parker Bowles divorced in 1995.
Camilla's lack of popularity with the British public made news long before 1999, when she made her first public appearance as his companion. Though she technically became the Princess of Wales with the marriage, Parker Bowles has announced her preference for the title Duchess of Cornwall, in deference to the beloved late princess. Should Charles become king, she will become Queen Camilla, though she has already announced her intention to use the title Princess Consort, most likely in response to public opinion polls showing resistance to the idea of a "Queen Camilla."
After the service, which ended with the singing of "God Save the Queen," Queen Elizabeth hosted a two-hour reception in the State Apartments at Windsor Castle. The couple then left for a honeymoon at the Balmoral Estate in Scotland. Princes William and Harry, who were both said to be happy about the marriage, decorated the Bentley in which the couple left the reception.”
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Yesterday:
A day of ‘agains’! Again, Ray clipped the hedge, the rain had made it grow exceedingly. Again, Jay tried to stop my bedroom ceiling fan from wobbling, to no avail. So I don’t use the fan, just the lights. Ray and I attached the trim on the front of the cargo trailer, while Jay attached a water filler, again. We had to remove the first one, and buy a different size, to match the neck of the water tank. Then he clamped the fill hose and vent tube to the water filler and water tank. He was going to run the electric weed-eater, but it wouldn’t start. Hoping that it was the switch, he wired it direct, but it still wouldn't start. So again, I have to buy a shop vac, weed-eater and ceiling fan. The old ones served me well, though. The ceiling fan I bought a month ago was for Ray’s place. The old shop vac had started smoking.
Again, I spent some time copying Live Writer drafts from my old computer to an email folder. Now they are accessible from either computer, or even my laptop. Over the years I had saved too many snippets of info in LW drafts. So I was going through them, discarding, or amalgamating, then copying them. Unfortunately, when I started doing this, I saved some to Blogger drafts, but I don’t like writing or editing from Blogger.
Again, for several days in a row, a lovely “No AC, and No Heat” day.
1 comment:
Seems like everything goes bad or wrong at the same time.
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