What Would Jimmy Do?

We don’t go to McDonald’s often — actually we rarely go to McDonald’s. Living overseas years ago, lots of people that I was stationed with would say one of the first things they were going to do when they got back home, was go to McDonald’s. I never missed there not being a McDonald’s around — and back then, if you weren’t in the United States, there wasn’t a McDonald’s.

Of course that’s all changed today and some of the food served in McDona;d’s in other countries seems like I’d be more likely to eat there….
If you happen to be in Malaysia you can get a Mango McFlurry, made with mango and chocolatey Oreo bits, swirled in vanilla ice cream. And you can also order a Thai Green Curry Chicken Burger — chicken topped with Thai green curry sauce. It’s served on an oblong bun. The unofficial national dish in Malaysia is nasa lemak. You can get it at just about any eatery, including McDonald’s. It’s rice cooked in coconut milk, served with fried anchovies, fresh cucumber, and fried, or boiled egg. It comes with sambal (made with chillies, shallots and garlic) and a side of fried chicken.

If you like cheeseburgers and are in India, order the McSpicy Paneer — it’s a crispy patty made with paneer, a popular cheese used in Indian cooking. The sandwich comes with creamy tandoori sauce and lettuce. A staple of south Indian cuisine, dosa is a thin fermented rice and lentil pancake with a spicy potato filling. McDonald’s in India serves a burger with a turmeric-spiced mashed potato and pea patty and chutney inside a bun. And you can have breakfast at McDonald’s in India — they serve scramble eggs with herbs and spices on a toasted bun. Interestingly, their breakfast menu also contains plain scrambled eggs, hash browns and hot cakes.

McDonald’s in Hong Kong specializes in seafood burgers. The Ebi Burgers contain crisp, juicy shrimp patties. They also serve a breaded fish fillet that often has a pineapple ring on top.

If you’re in Bangkok, or probably anywhere in Thailand, they’ve taken McDonald’s signature apple pie shell and stuffed it with a sweet, salty and creamy corn filling — it’s called a Corn Pie. Also on the menu is the Kaprao Crispy Chicken dish. It’s fried Chicken in a sweet and spicy sauce, served with rice. And — they also offer the Samurai Pork Burger, a pork patty covered in teriyaki sauce, topped with lettuce and mayo, served on a bun. 

McDonald’s in the Philippines serves a cheese Omlet sandwich — the Cheesy Eggdesal breakfast sandwich. It consists of a fluffy, folded egg, with melted cheese in the middle, in a soft, toasted bun. One menu item the Filipinos consider a classic is Chicken McDo with McSpaghetti. The dish consist of one piece of crispy chicken served with spaghetti in a minced beef and tomato sauce, topped with cheese. 

South Korea’s McDonald’s feature a pork burger named the Bulgogi Burger — a pork patty covered in sweet, sticky bulgogi sauce, served on a bun with lettuce and mayo. 
The McChicken Sandwich served Saudi Arabian style consists of two haial grilled chicken patties with lettuce, tomato, onion and garlic sauce, served in a flatbread. 
In Australia breakfast at McDonald’s features the Big Brekkie Burger — a beef patty, hash browns, egg, bacon, melted cheese and barbecue sauce on a toasted sesame bun.

And when you get back home to the U.S., head to McDonald’s in Hawaii and have breakfast. The Local Deluxe Breakfast is a plate of rice, scrambled eggs, Spam and Portuguese sausage.
If some of these items make it to Shepherdstown, I might add to my recommended places to eat — now if we could just get a glass of wine to go along with these items….
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We periodically play the lottery — we never win, but maybe that’s a good thing. A lot of people believe there is such a thing as a lottery curse. 
Some people say that the lottery is cursed because your chances of winning are so slim that you’re bound to lose money almost every time. But — I think — the curse of the lottery refers to lottery winners that probably shouldn’t have gotten their hand on winning tickets in the first place. 

There have been instances in which people strike it rich with a winning Mega Millions or Powerball ticket and have lost their money, or something happened to completely upend their lives. But I read somewhere that a lottery curse is even rarer than the odds of winning the lottery in the first place. 

It’s almost hard to believe that after winning the lottery, you’d somehow lose all that money — but, it does happen. I did a little extensive research and found some actual examples…..
Jeffrey Dampier won $20 million in the lottery and became a Tampa popcorn entrepreneur. Dampier’s generosity to his sister-in-law, Victoria Jackson, including gifts, apartment rent, etc. apparently wasn’t enough. Jackson and her boyfriend kidnapped and murdered Dampier for his fortune. They were sentenced to life in prison.
Only a few hours after Carl Atwood won $57,000 on the televised lottery program Hoosier Millionaire, the 73-year-old was fatally hit by a pickup truck while walking to the store where he bought the winning ticket.
New Yorker Clarence Kinder, age 77, won $50,000 in the state lottery on a Thursday night — and died from a heart attack the following night.
After collecting the first of his annual $1.24 million checks, Billy Bob Harrell  — a down on his luck Texan who hit the state lottery for $31 million — began spending like there was no tomorrow. He picked up a ranch, a fashionable home, and a never-ending line of family, friends and strangers with their palms outstretched, dogging him day and night. The spending spilled out of control for 20 months, until Harrell, who had had quite enough, locked himself in his bedroom and let a shotgun solve is dilemma.
William “Bud” Post won $16.2 million in the Pennsylvania lottery. When he died of respiratory failure, Post was living on a $450 monthly disability check and was estranged from his family. Not only was his fortune wiped out, but he ended up deeply in debt, and he served a jail term for threatening a bill collector with a shotgun. At one point, Post filed for bankruptcy, and came out of it with a million dollars — and spent it all in short order. 

My extensive research also found out that one in eight American adults play the lottery at least once a week, and almost half buy at least one ticket a year. Even though some think that good luck is balanced out by the bad, most people that win the lottery live normal, quite lives and usually just settle into a comfortable anonymity. 
So you can play the lottery with confidence — buy that lottery ticket secure in the knowledge that a windfall is not like to invite a life of pain, suffering or regret. Of course, keep in mind that you face nearly impossible odds of winning…..
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I often hear and read things that annoy me — but usually I just get annoyed, and then move on. But a few days ago, I read something that is more than annoying to me — it’s truly disturbing. 

Veterans day was November 11 and because it was on a Saturday, the weekend was filled with various “Veterans Day events.”
One of the traditional Veterans Day activities usually includes the President participating in a wreath laying ceremony and saying a few words at Arlington National Cemetery. President Biden spoke to veteran’s families and said, “Most Americans never see the sacrifices that you as family members also make. The will never see this holidays, birthdays, made special even with the empty seat at the dinner table… They’ll never see all of those nights spent waiting for word from a loved one deployed overseas because you are not sure. Too often, the sacrifices go without thanks or without acknowledgement. We must remember only 1% of our society today protects 99% of us.” Typical words we have grown to expect around Veterans Day. 

But at almost exactly the same time, Presidential candidate Donald Trump released these words on his social media platform: “In honor of our great Veterans on Veterans’s Day [sic,] we pledge to you that we will root out the Communists, Marxists, Fascists, and Radical Left Thugs that live like vermin within the confines of our Country, lie, steal and cheat on Elections, and will do anything possible, whether legally or illegally, to destroy America, and the American Dream. The threat from outside forces is far less sinister, dangerous, and grave, than the threat from within.”

These are the exact words used by the two men who will presumably be running for President of the United States. Honesty, I’m not thrilled that either one of them is running — but — the words used by one of he candidates should be very, very disturbing to everyone. 

The fact that these words don’t seem to bother lots of the people is, again, disturbing. This may sound like typical “Trump talk,” but the fact is he’s basically saying that the biggest threat to America is the people that he doesn’t like. He’s always used derogatory terms to describe his “enemies,” but lately he’s been using evil and has now apparently downgraded his description to vermin. 

There’s been a lot written in history books about various “leaders” over the years using language to dehumanize people and encourage their followers to engage in violence. If you think that isn’t happening right here in the United States of America today, maybe you’d better think again. I’ve lived in a lot of places in this world and the countries whose leaders are most admired by Donald Trump are the very countries where I would never want to live. This rhetoric appears to be the new normal for at least one political party, and it scares me — it should scare you, too.
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Sadie Hawkins Day is a “holiday” that is still celebrated today — but not so much as it once was. Sadie Hawkins Day is celebrated every year on November 13 — well, at least in some places. It seems that the date of Sadie Hawkins Day can vary. Some use the first Saturday in November, some celebrate on November 15 because that is the anniversary of the original comic strip that “created” Sadie Hawkins, and some places (especially in the United States) celebrate today — November 13.

Sadie Hawkins Day was the idea of cartoonist Al Capp — it became a storyline in his comic strip “Li’l Abner” in 1937. 
The story goes that Sadie Hawkins is a young woman that lived in the fictional town of Dogwatch. She was very shy and introverted, making it difficult to find a romantic partner. So to help Sadie find a husband, her father organized a foot race. The race was open to all the eligible bachelors in town, and Sadie would chase after them. The twist was that if Sadie caught a bachelor, he would be obligated to marry her. The story in the comic strip proved to be very popular and became a cultural phenomenon. It was seen as a way to empower women and challenge traditional gender roles.

In November 1938, the first “girls-ask-boys” Sadie Hawkins Day dance was held and became popular. Over time, Sadie Hawkins Day has evolved into a day where women take the initiative to ask men out on dates or propose marriage. 
Even though Sadie Hawkins Day dances are synonymous with Sadie Hawkins, the day originated from a fictional race — not a dance. 

A similar tradition is associated with February 29th in leap years. Long ago, Leap Day, was know as “Ladies Day” or “Ladies Privilege,” the only period of time when women were free to propose to men. The custom may have been based on a Scottish law in the 1200s or maybe on some Irish legend, but no one really knows for sure. 

But probably Sadie Hawkins Day dances are, or are becoming, a thing of the past. The basic idea that a girl can ask a boy to a dance seems harmless, but if you think about it, this says that in a normal functioning society, men ask — and pay — for women to go on dates. In 2023, that seems a little outdated — and — it becomes more complicated with the emergence of the LGBT community. In a gay couple, who ask who? Admittedly, Sadie Hawkins came along in a “simpler” time, but in fact it was built around the idea of sexism. 

Maybe modern day society has made the issue more complicated, but it seems like the easy solution is to just ask whoever you want to whatever dance you want….
But for now, I guess, it’s still Sadie Hawkins Day.
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People in our neighborhood are from India. I’ve spent a little time in India, and and was aware that today, November 12, is special day — in fact it’s a public holiday in India. 
Diwali, or Deepawali is a festival of lights symbolizing the victory of righteousness and the lifting of spiritual darkness. It’s one of the most popular festivals on the Hindu calendar. 
It commemorates Lord Rama’s return to his kingdom of Ayodhya after completing his 14-year exile.
Many Buddhists in India mark the anniversary of the Emperor Ashoka’s conversion Buddhism around the time of Diwali. 
Followers of Buddhism, Hinduism, Jainism and Sikhism observe various customs that are related to Diwali.
Electric lights, small oil lamps made of clay and their flames are important Diwali symbols — they represent both physical and spiritual aspects of light…..
To our Indian friends, especially, may your life be as colorful and bright as the lights of Diwali. Happy Diwali.
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Today is Veterans Day and to get this out of the way first, it’s not Veteran’s Day or Veterans’ Day, it’s Veterans Day — no apostrophe. It isn’t a day that belongs to one or multiple veterans — it honors all veterans, so lose the apostrophe.

It’s also not the same as Memorial Day — that day is a time to remember those who gave their lives for our country. Veterans Day honors all those who have served the country in war or peace — dead or alive — and it’s especially intended to thank living veterans for their sacrifices.

I’ve mentioned this in years past, but Veterans Day was originally called Armistice Day because it marked the one-year anniversary of the temporary cessation of hostilities between the Allied nations and Germany during World War I. The armistice went into effect at the 11th hour of the 11th month in 1918.

Although not widely known, there is a Women Veterans Day — on June 12. It marks the anniversary of the Women’s Armed Services Integration Act, that President Harry S. Truman signed into law on June 12, 1948. It’s not a nationally recognized holiday, but some states observe the day.
And March 13 is National K9 Veterans Day that honors American military and working dogs throughout history.

Arlington National Cemetery holds an observance on Veteran Day every year at 11 a.m., the time the World War I armistice was signed. During the Veterans Day commemoration at the cemetery, guards lay a wreath on the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier, and veterans organizations hold a parade of colors.
Several other countries also mark the end of World War I on November 11. Canada, Australia, France and Belgium call it Remembrance Day. 
The New York City Veterans Day Parade is both the largest and oldest Veterans Day parade in the country — it takes place along Fifth Avenue.
The first celebration that was referred to as Veteran Day was held in Birmingham, Alabama, on November 11, 1947. The event was organized by a World War II veteran named Raymond Weeks.
Happy Veterans Day.
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You don’t hear about these stunts so much anymore — I guess the Evel Knievels of the world have kind of retired. Anyhow, I’m not sure how it came up, but the question is — who was the first person to go over Niagara Falls in a barrel?

Turns out that the first person to ride over the falls in a barrel and live to tell the tale wasn’t some daredevil, or performer, but a widowed school teacher.
Annie Edson Taylor was a 63-year-old schoolteacher. After her husband died in the Civil War, Annie was strapped for cash when she learned about the popularity of two big waterfalls located on the border of upstate New York and Canada. So needing money, and looking for fame, she came up with the idea she would go over Niagara Falls in a barrel.

She used an oaken barrel that was (crudely) cushioned inside. She tested the barrel by sending it over the falls with a cat inside. The traumatized cat survived the plunge — so — on October 24, 1901 (her 63rd birthday) she climbed inside the barrel and was set adrift from a rowboat upstream from the falls. Less then twenty minutes later, she was recovered from the bottom of the falls — bleeding from the head, but not seriously injured.
Unfortunately, the fame and fortune she was seeking never came — Annie died in poverty.
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There seems to have been a lot in the news lately about terrible things politicians and people related to them have (supposedly) done. There’s been all sorts of uproars about President Biden’s son, Hillary Clinton, various senators and governors, etc. But I guess these things have been going on about as long as our country has existed.

Rumors exist, even today, that Mary Todd Lincoln, wife of Abraham, was suspected of bing a Confederate Spy. I’d heard this a few times over the years and never thought much about it, but decided it deserved some of my extensive research — here’s what I found…

Abraham Lincoln is usually regarded as savior of the United States, but his wife, Mary Todd Lincoln is remembered as a shrew and ranked by historians as the worst First Lady in American history. 
Being the president’s wife is tough job — the hours are long and the demands are exhausting. Most first ladies manage to get through it ok, but for Mary Todd Lincoln, it was an agonizing experience. She was subject of relentless criticism, suffered borderline mental illness, and numerous personal tragedies. 

Mary loved her husband — she married him despite the disapproval of her family and social peers. She admired Lincoln as a good, honest, talented man and was excited that he won the presidency in 1860. But because Mary was a native of Kentucky, that meant that she was a Southerner by birth, and rumors swirled throughout the Civil War that the first lady was, in fact, a Confederate Spy.
It’s easy to see how these rumors got started — historians believe Mary sincerely agreed with and supported President Lincoln’s political beliefs and, like him, wanted the nation to become whole again. But one of Mary’s brothers, three half-brothers, and three brothers-in-law all served in the Confederate army during the Civil War. Because of that, people wondered if she could truly support the Union, so not surprisingly, some people — including many of Lincoln’s political enemies —started a whisper campaign that maybe Mary wasn’t the Unionist she said she was. 

The whispered rumor that Mary Todd Lincoln was a Confederate spy was just one of many things that made her time in the White House miserable. The Belles of Washington Society considered her silly and uncouth and took every opportunity to criticize her. For example, when she hosted a large party in the White House as the war raged, she was condemned for her extravagance, and because two of her sons were sick at the time, she was castigated as being unmotherly and “cold.” All of this was made worse by Mary’s many emotional and physical issues. She suffered from excruciating headaches and she also experienced violent mood swings. These mood swings caused more than one White House aide to describe her as unpredictable and difficult to get along with.
On top of all that, she lost three of her four sons to various ailments — and — witnessed the assassination of her husband, at the hands of John Wilkes Booth. Mary Todd Lincoln never fully recovered from that incident.

After Lincoln’t death, she returned to Illinois and fell into a deep depression. Her sole surviving son, Robert, committed her to an insane asylum — she was released three months later, but never forgave him for his betrayal. She died on July 16, 1882, at her sister’s home in Illinois — she was 63.
Mary Todd Lincoln was a flawed woman that did her best under difficult circumstances. It’s probably unfair, and inaccurate, for her character to be questioned by untrue rumors regarding her patriotism.
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Rainbows are pretty cool — you can almost never see one without pointing it out to others around you. Of all the places I’ve been, Hawaii is the place I’ve seen the most rainbows — you can pretty much count on seeing one every day when you’re there. Once when on a cruise, a rainbow seemed to follows us for several days — we kept seeing it in various ports, as well as while we were at sea.

Rainbows are more than just pretty arches in the sky — they’ve been a part of mythology, science and art for I don’t know how long. 
In the bible, the rainbow is an integral part of the story of Noah’s Ark and the great flood. After 40 days and nights of continuous rain, the world was flooded. Only Noah, his family, and an ark filled with pairs of animals survived. When the waters subsided, the ark came to rest and when Noah and his family emerged from the ark, they were met with a rainbow. It’s written that God made Noah a promise that he would never again flood the Earth and He created the rainbow as a symbol of His promise to humankind.

Rainbows are (usually) symbols of luck and hope in most cultures. 
Maybe the best-known rainbow story comes from the Irish. It’s about how the rainbow leads to a Leprechaun’s pot of gold safely tucked away at the other end. One version of the story tells how faeries placed a pot of gold at the end of every rainbow and commanded Leprechauns to safeguard it.
In Asian cultures, rainbows are generally viewed as good luck omens. In Feng Shui, a double rainbow signifies meaningful and great things coming your way.
In Norse mythology, Bifröst is a rainbow bridge. The colored arc connects the Earth and Asgard (the realm of Nordic gods.) The gods travel to Earth on this bridge and Earthly warriors will eventually join the gods during Ragnarök (apocalypse) in the final battle.

But not everyone sees rainbows as good luck — some cultures view them as bad omens. Locations that suffer from periodic floods or cyclones don’t necessarily agree that rainbows are symbols of good luck. And some people believe that you should never point at a rainbow or you’ll have bad luck.

Rainbows are formed from water — whenever light (usually sunlight) hits a rain droplet, it creates a rainbow. If you have enough rain droplets, you can see a rainbow lighting up the sky. This is why rainbows often/usually form after a storm.
Rainbows are technically an arch of light. If you view a rainbow from an airplane, it looks like a circle of light. From land, you only see half of the rainbow’s arch — so rainbows really have no end….

The ingredients needed to make a rainbow are light and water. Since no planets that we know of has liquid water, Earth is (probably) the only planet in our solar system with rainbows.
Light has to be reflected twice to create a double rainbow, so you usually see double rainbows when the sun is low in the sky. The band between the rainbows in a double rainbow is called Alexander’s band — named after Alexander of Aphrodisias.

Aristotle had a theory on rainbows as part of his color theory. He thought the colors were related to the four elements — and — because Aristotle was a pretty smart guy, his theory was widely believed until Issac Newton came along. During an experiment with prisms, Newton discovered that a rainbow had sever colors in it —red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo, and violet. Actually, these are the only colors the human eye can see, and they are colors that make up a rainbow.

Just about everyone likes rainbows and there’s been a lot of songs written about rainbows…. I think one contains lyrics something like, somewhere over the rainbow, skies are blue, and dreams that you dream really do come true…. so I guess it wouldn’t hurt to make a wish next time you see a rainbow.
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Today is election day. A few blogs back I mentioned that “Election Day” has become part of the month of November — and — the reason, surprisingly, is because of the farmers. I found that interesting, so I thought that today — election day — might be a good time to explore other interesting things about elections and Election Day.
Although elections are held on other days, “Election Day” is the first Tuesday after the first Monday of November.

Why a Tuesday in November? In 1792, a law officially designated this day as Election Day each year because this guaranteed that no more than 34 days could pass between the first Wednesday in December, which is when the Electoral College met to vote on the President  and Vice President. An early November date was also considered a wise idea because it enabled more voters to go to the polls. Back then, most Americans were farmers, so this date ensured that farmers weren’t trying  to find time to vote during the busy harvest season, but the date wasn’t so late in the year that voters needed to battle winter storms while they walked, rode horses or drove buggies to the polls.

America’s early elections didn’t resemble the ones we have today…. In 1758, a young candidate in Virginia for the House of Burgesses footed a huge liquor bill to woo voters on Election Day. George Washington spent his entire campaign budget — 50 pounds — on 160 gallons of liquor served to 391 voters. Buying votes with booze was already a custom in England, and Washington was also following a Virginia tradition where barrels of liquor were rolled to courthouse lawns and polling places on Election Day.

In years when federal elections aren’t held, not all states feel the need to have an election on a traditional Election Day. In 2015, Oklahoma, Rhode Island and Louisiana held elections later in the month.
Felons in both Maine and Vermont are allowed to vote and have had the privilege since those states were founded in 1820 and 1872, respectively.
The legal voting age across the United States was once 21 but in 1943, Georgia became the first state to lower the legal voting age to 18. This became an official part of the U.S. Constitution when the Twenty-Sixth Amendment was ratified in 1971.
The Nineteenth Amendment was adopted in 1920, giving women the right to vote, and since 1964, more women voters have gone to the polls than male voters — during presidential election years. 
And while on the subject of elections, Gerald Ford is the only person who served as president and vice president without having been elected to either office.

So the history of elections in the U.S. is interesting, but the important thing is that today is Election Day. Go vote!! A lot of people in the world don’t have such a privilege.
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