Monday, December 19, 2011

Just A Dog? Last Lunar. Clinton. Hong Kong. Mayflower. Piltdown Man.

For "Mammal Monday":

For all dog lovers:

 

justadog

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Just A Dog? Molly.

US Air Force Captain sees her 8 and a half year old pup, Molly, at the airport.

Molly tells her how much she missed her:

 

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Just A Dog?  Nubs.

Nubs - a Dog and a Marine True Story in Iraq

Nubs Reunion

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Just a Dog? Sako.

Petty Officer Joan Steates and her dog, Sako, who met in Iraq in 2008.

SPCA International video (www.SPCAI.org). An interview with Petty Officer Joan Steates and her dog, Sako, who met in Iraq in 2008. The pair reunited on February 2, 2009 after months apart and Sako's long flight from Iraq. The reunion took place thanks to SPCA International's Operation Baghdad Pups program, which is a special initiative created to provide veterinary care, clearance and transport for animals U.S. service members have come to love during deployment in the Middle East."

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Just a Dog?   Honey.

Honey’s life changed when her hero, Chris Schindler of our Animal Rescue Team, freed her from her heavy chains and from a brutal life in the dogfighting pit.

Chris said:

"One animal stays with me. Her name is Honey.  One of twenty dogs seized in a July dogfighting raid, Honey lived her life either staked in a yard or, worse, fighting for survival in a bloody pit. She had a hole in her cheek to prove it.

Honey was the last dog I freed from the heavy chains that day. I held her in my arms as our team drove to the safety of a nearby kennel. There, we gave her the food, medical care, and rest she needed to save her life. But it was the toys, the treats, and the romps in the grass that changed her life. Now, her wagging tail reassures me that she has healed, inside and out."

HSUS sponsored Honey’s care while the legal proceedings determined her custody and she waited for her new home. Honey was released recently and has just been adopted by a veterinary technician from the facility that cared for her. She now lives a normal and happy life in her forever home – even wearing pink sweaters when she joins her mom at work!"

Pictures at: https://secure.humanesociety.org/site/Donation2?df_id=8122&8122.donation=form1&s_src=fbpost121511

Be a hero for other animals like her -- donate today:

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On This Day:

Last lunar-landing mission ends, Dec 19, 1972:

The Apollo lunar-landing program ends on December 19, 1972, when the last three astronauts to travel to the moon splash down safely in the Pacific Ocean. Apollo 17 had lifted off from Cape Canaveral, Florida, 10 days before.

In July 1969, after three years of preparation, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) accomplished President John F. Kennedy's goal of putting a man on the moon and safely returning him to Earth with Apollo 11. From 1969 to 1972, there were six successful lunar landing missions, and one aborted mission, Apollo 13. During the Apollo 17 mission, astronauts Eugene A. Cernan and Harrison H. Schmitt stayed for a record 75 hours on the surface of the moon, conducting three separate surface excursions in the Lunar Rover vehicle and collecting 243 pounds of rock and soil samples.

Although Apollo 17 was the last lunar landing, the last official Apollo mission was conducted in July 1975, when an Apollo spacecraft successfully rendezvoused and docked with the Soviet Soyuz 19 spacecraft in orbit around the Earth. It was fitting that the Apollo program, which first visited the moon under the banner of "We came in peace for all mankind," should end on a note of peace and international cooperation."

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Britain agrees to return Hong Kong to China, Dec 19, 1984:

"In the Hall of the People in Beijing, British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher and Chinese Premier Zhao Ziyang sign an agreement committing Britain to return Hong Kong to China in 1997 in return for terms guaranteeing a 50-year extension of its capitalist system. Hong Kong--a small peninsula and group of islands jutting out from China's Kwangtung province--was leased by China to Great Britain in 1898 for 99 years."

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President Clinton impeached, Dec 19, 1998:

"After nearly 14 hours of debate, the House of Representatives approves two articles of impeachment against President Bill Clinton, charging him with lying under oath to a federal grand jury and obstructing justice. Clinton, the second president in American history to be impeached, vowed to finish his term.

Five weeks later, on February 12, the Senate voted on whether to remove Clinton from office. The president was acquitted on both articles of impeachment. The prosecution needed a two-thirds majority to convict but failed to achieve even a bare majority. Rejecting the first charge of perjury, 45 Democrats and 10 Republicans voted "not guilty," and on the charge of obstruction of justice the Senate was split 50-50. After the trial concluded, President Clinton said he was "profoundly sorry" for the burden his behavior imposed on Congress and the American people."

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Yesterday:

Mayflower docks at Plymouth Harbor, Dec 18, 1620:

"On December 18, 1620, the British ship Mayflower docked at modern-day Plymouth, Massachusetts, and its passengers prepared to begin their new settlement, Plymouth Colony.

The famous Mayflower story began in 1606, when a group of reform-minded Puritans in Nottinghamshire, England, founded their own church, separate from the state-sanctioned Church of England. Accused of treason, they were forced to leave the country and settle in the more tolerant Netherlands. After 12 years of struggling to adapt and make a decent living, the group sought financial backing from some London merchants to set up a colony in America. On September 6, 1620, 102 passengers–dubbed Pilgrims by William Bradford, a passenger who would become the first governor of Plymouth Colony–crowded on the Mayflower to begin the long, hard journey to a new life in the New World.

On November 11, 1620, the Mayflower anchored at what is now Provincetown Harbor, Cape Cod. Before going ashore, 41 male passengers–heads of families, single men and three male servants–signed the famous Mayflower Compact, agreeing to submit to a government chosen by common consent and to obey all laws made for the good of the colony. Over the next month, several small scouting groups were sent ashore to collect firewood and scout out a good place to build a settlement. Around December 10, one of these groups found a harbor they liked on the western side of Cape Cod Bay. They returned to the Mayflower to tell the other passengers, but bad weather prevented them from docking until December 18. After exploring the region, the settlers chose a cleared area previously occupied by members of a local Native American tribe, the Wampanoag. The tribe had abandoned the village several years earlier, after an outbreak of European disease. That winter of 1620-1621 was brutal, as the Pilgrims struggled to build their settlement, find food and ward off sickness. By spring, 50 of the original 102 Mayflower passengers were dead. The remaining settlers made contact with returning members of the Wampanoag tribe and in March they signed a peace treaty with a tribal chief, Massasoit. Aided by the Wampanoag, especially the English-speaking Squanto, the Pilgrims were able to plant crops–especially corn and beans–that were vital to their survival. The Mayflower and its crew left Plymouth to return to England on April 5, 1621.

Over the next several decades, more and more settlers made the trek across the Atlantic to Plymouth, which gradually grew into a prosperous shipbuilding and fishing center. In 1691, Plymouth was incorporated into the new Massachusetts Bay Association, ending its history as an independent colony."

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Piltdown Man 'discovered', Dec 18, 1912:

"After three years of digging in the Piltdown gravel pit in Sussex, England, amateur archaeologist Charles Dawson announces the discovery of two skulls that appear to belong to a primitive hominid and ancestor of man, along with a canine tooth, a tool carved from an elephant's tusk, and fossil teeth from a number of prehistoric animals.

Despite muted criticism from a minority of paleontologists, the majority of the scientific community hailed the so-called Piltdown Man as the missing evolutionary link between ape and man. The remains were estimated to be up to a million years old. For the next decade, scientists heralded the finding of Eoanthropus dawsoni, or "Dawson's Dawn-man" in Latin, as confirmation of Darwin's still-controversial theory of human evolution.

In the 1920s and '30s, however, the Piltdown gravels were found to be much less ancient than believed, and other finds of human ancestors around the world seemed to call the authenticity of the Piltdown Man into question. In 1953, at an international congress of paleontologists, the Piltdown Man was first openly called a fraud. An intensive study of the remains showed that they were made up of a modern human cranium--no more than 600 years old; the jaw and teeth of an orangutan; and the tooth of a chimpanzee. Microscopic tests indicated that the teeth had been doctored with a file-like tool to make them seem more human. Scientists also found that the bones had been treated with chemicals to make them appear older. Other fossils found in the Piltdown quarry proved to be authentic but of types not found in Britain.

The person who orchestrated the hoax never came forward, but in 1996 a trunk in storage at the British Museum was found to contain fossils treated in the exact same manner as the Piltdown remains. The trunk bore the initials M.A.C.H., which seemed to suggest that Martin A.C. Hinton, a volunteer at the British Museum in 1912 and later a curator of zoology at the institution, was likely the culprit. Some theorized that he was attempting to embarrass Arthur Smith Woodward, curator of the British Museum's paleontology department, because Woodward had refused Hinton's request for a weekly pay raise."

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Mistys-new-coat-2

It was a bit chilly when Misty and I went down to Jay's to pick him up, so she wore her new barn coat.  It just slips over her head and Velcro's around her middle.  She acted like she wore clothes every day and seemed more frisky. I think she was showing it off.

 

Made-two-shelves Jay and I made two little stands out of some furniture grade lumber.  One is for the new computer's monitor so the mini-keyboard can be slid under it, just like my old computer has, on right.

The other stand was to raise the air cleaner, lamp and router, and to make a shelf to put extra printer paper and stuff.

two-monitor-stands

This how it looks.  All the wires are not connected yet, so they aren't held up by the thick long twist ties that go to the eyes that we had attached under the desks.  Even the new printer isn't plugged in yet, as I am running out of outlets.

 

Back-door-draft-proofedRay and I re-attached the vinyl siding which had come loose when Jay was adjusting the back door's jamb, and then he foamed the space between the jam and the door frame. He will 'carve' it later.

When Prime came back from Adoption Day her carrier was put on the living room floor so she could walk out of it.  Yesterday, when I picked up the carrier to put it away, Prime shot like a lightening bolt to Misty's bed under my bed, and wasn't seen for a couple of hours. 

She doesn't want to go back to Adoption Day.

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