In and Out...

I was looking for a topic to write about this morning, and nothing came to mind. It's July 6th... and I wonder what happened on this date... was there anyone of interest born, or did anyone of interest die? (Define "interest" -- as in what does it mean to each person? Obviously it's going to be very different from person to person.)

I did a search to find a website that would list births for each day, and found this particular one. It's wasn't fancy, but it got the job done. I went down the list and decided to find one name in each column that I found the most interesting, or that meant the most to me. For the births it was Nancy Davis (Reagan) in 1923, and for the deaths it was Louis Armstrong in 1971.

It occurred to me that a great game could be made of this by picking a date and having everyone in your mailing list go through the births and deaths column and pick ONE from each that means the most to them. Maybe even off a brief explanation if they feel compelled to do so. It might be an interesting way to see what your friends or family members value.

Also on the website linked above was the video put out by a guy under the name of "Joe American". I've heard about the video, but hadn't seen it before. There's a lot of things he says in his presentation that make perfect sense to the average person in this country, which is probably why it won't make a bit of difference in Washington, DC. If you haven't watched the video, go to the "date in history" page and then click on the play button. (If you only have a dial-up internet connection, you probably won't want to spend all day waiting for the video to load!)

The website for Joe American is a little sparse, and looks like someone got it started and then forgot to finish it, or keep it up. Still, you can visit it if you wish at http://www.joeamerican.us/.

The photo at the top of the page was taken outside of Stanley, Idaho on the fourth of July. The wild flowers are in bloom in the higher elevations, and some of the meadows look more like a sea of violet than of green grass. This is the perfect time to take in the scenery, before the summer heat dries out the lush grass and turns the green of spring to the gold of autumn.