What Would Jimmy Do?

Sometime last month there was a news article that every living person who has served as President of the United States is descended from ancestors who owned slave. I discussed this in a blog entry — if you’re interested in reading it, you can the check the archives for June.

But that got me to thinking about our presidents…. I know a fair number of them have been lawyers — I wondered just how many. I figured a bit of my extensive research could come up with the number pretty quick. 
But — like a lot of things the answer isn’t as simple or straightforward as I though it would be. It appears that more than half of all United States Presidents were lawyers before becoming president. 

But — some of the earlier presidents like Thomas Jefferson, John Adams, James Madison and Abraham Lincoln were lawyers, but never attended law school or received a law degree. I should note that many of the first “lawyer presidents” participated in apprenticeships to become lawyers because at the time there was no such thing as law school.
Former presidents who did receive law degrees include Rutherford B. Hayes, William Howard Taft, Richard Nixon, Gerald Ford, Bill Clinton and Barack Obama. It turns out that two other presidents, Theodore Roosevelt and Franklin D. Roosevelt were awarded law degrees by the Columbia Law School in 2008 — more than 100 years after they attended the school.

So my extensive research concluded that 26 of the Presidents have actually worked as lawyers.
I’ve heard it said that lawyers are the foot soldiers of our Constitution — I’ll just let you ponder that along with me….
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Well, I guess yesterday was kind of a slow day for news — apparently there weren’t enough mass shootings to be worth more than just a mention in the news, so one of the stories was about the Barbie Movie. Yea, that’t right — the Barbie Movie.
Our daughter and our granddaughters were/are into Barbie dolls at least to some extent, but I never figured that would lead to a real movie. Maybe someone figures that enough girls have played with Barbie dolls over the years that they’d all pack the theaters…. but for whatever reason it seems that Barbie is shaping up to be one of the biggest movies this summer. 

But — the fact that it is a movie about a doll wasn’t what got it a spot on the news. The movie was set to premier in Vietnam on July 21, but apparently Vietnamese officials saw a trailer or preview of the movie and banned the film. 
According to the news story, The National Film Evaluation Council in Vietnam found a scene in the preview to be controversial. The scene shows a map of the world on the wall behind Barbie — what’s controversial about the map is that it appears to include the highly-disputed “nine-dash line.” According to the newscaster, the line is only eight dashes and extends from a poorly drawn map of Asia. But according to Vietnamese officials, it is a representation of the nine-dash-line. 

The nine-dash-line first showed up on Chinese maps in the late 1940s and, it seems to represent China’s and Taiwan’s claims to the South China Sea. Since it first appeared, China has never explicitly stated what it means. One argument is that the line is a representation of China’s sovereign rights over fishing and natural resources of the area — which is within the parameters of the United Nations Conventions on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS.)  But — other Asian nations in the region are concerned that it is China’s attempt to claim total maritime control of the area. 
China’s maritime claims cause concern because of the economic and geographical importance of the area marked by the nine-dash-line —it links the Pacific Ocean and the Indian Ocean. Vietnam has long challenged China’s claim to the area inside the nine-dash-line. So has the Philippines, that had an international tribunal of arbitrators rule in its favor in 2016 and declare that China had no legal or historical rights to the area within the nine-dash line.

Vietnam’s Film Council announced that the Barbie movie would be banned in the country due the image of the nine-dash-line. The Philippines also threatened to ban the film for the same reason, but said they might change their stance if the controversial scene is edited out. 

Over the years, many countries have made it clear that they believe the line is illegal, invalid, and potentially dangerous, and won’t tolerate Hollywood acknowledging or validating China’s claims in any manner.
So this line depicting China’s claim to own the South China Sea has been around for almost 80 years but it took Barbie to get it on the nightly news…..
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A few nights ago, Claire said she didn’t sleep well — she woke up and couldn’t get back to sleep. I said something like maybe she should count sheep. I hadn’t said that in a long time and in fact I hadn’t even heard the expression for a very long time. Seems like a number of years ago, people said it all the time. I guess that was before we had all the modern electronic gadgets to help us do everything, including sleep, like white noise machines and beds that heat, cool, vibrate, etc. 
But anyhow, I got to wondering why people ever thought counting sheep would help them fall asleep….

Even when I was younger, I often wondered why count sheep? why not count cats, or cows, or dogs? Why sheep? Actually, from what I can tell, no one really knows for sure. But one interesting theory is that counting sheep started in a 12th century book of fables. One of the fables in the book was about a king that demanded stories from his personal storyteller one night when he could’t fall asleep. But the storyteller himself wanted to go to sleep and decided to tell him a tale about a farmer who went to a market and bought 2,000 sheep. These 2,000 sheep had to be transported across a flooded river, but there was only a small boat on shore that could only carry two sheep at a time. So the farmer would have to complete the crossing a thousand times, over and over…. and as the storyteller began to tell this part of the story, he fell asleep. This annoyed the king a lot, and the storyteller was immediately woken up to continue. The story was so repetitive and mundane that it successfully lulled the king to sleep. 

But the most popular theory as to the phrase’s origin is that (many) shepherds in medieval Britain used communal grazing land and they were obligated to keep a headcount of their sheep each night. So before they went to sleep, they counted their sheep to ensure that they were all accounted for.

Like most things, there’s at least two schools of thought about ways to fall asleep. Some think counting helps, others think it makes the problem worse. But today, sheep seem a little outdated — if people count something, it’s probably not sheep…. when politicians have problems sleeping, they probably count voters.
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Some friends of ours are currently on a cruise — actually, a couple of cruises, I think. That reminded me of a conversation I had with another friend not too long ago, after he and his wife had returned from their first cruise. We were talking about his experience and he mentioned that there was a “Friends of Bill W.” meeting listed for every day of their cruise. My friend didn’t know who Bill W. was…. he was curious as to who he was (and he probably wondered how he had made so many friends.)

We’ve been on a number of cruises on a number of cruise lines. On every ship, there are always meeting announcements in the ship’s daily schedule for various groups, e.g., the Jones family reunion, bridge clubs, maybe some educational courses, etc. One meeting that was always on the schedule was “Friends of Bill W.”

William “Bill W.” Wilson is the co-founder of of Alcoholics anonymous (AA) — along with Dr. Bob Smith. Apparently when AA members started approaching cruise directors about holding meetings during the sailing and publicizing it in the ship’s announcements, the cruise lines were hesitant. The cruise companies were afraid that blatantly announcing an AA meeting might upset some of the passengers. That’s when the euphemism “Friends of Bill W.” began to be used. We haven’t been on a cruise for a few years, but apparently these “insider announcements” have expanded to include “Friends of Jimmy K.” and “Friends of Dorothy.”
“Jimmy K.” refers to James Kinnon who founded Narcotics Anonymous. NA is patterned after AA, including the same principle of anonymity reflecting that no addict is above any other.

Friends of Dorothy was completely new to me — my extensive research determined that it was originally for gay men, but now encompasses the entire LGBT community. There doesn’t seem to be a clear answer to who “Dorothy” is or why that name was chosen. It seems that the phrase “friends of Dorothy” dates back to at least WWII as a way of discussing sexual orientation without outsiders knowing. It’s interesting that in Britain, the term was “friends of Mr. King” — i.e., a “Queen.”
One theory is that the phrase refers to Dorothy from the Wizard of Oz. Dorothy was accepting of others who were “different” such as the Cowardly Lion who was forced to hide his real identity and live a lie. The lion had a line in the movie declaring “We’re friends of Dorothy.”

But for whatever reason, these “friends” meetings are popular on cruise ships. Most cruise lines provide meeting space as a service members. 
The use of “friends” by all these support groups is probably no accident — after all, “that’s what friends are for.” 
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Well, we’ve made it into the Dog Days of Summer and through the 4th of July and tonight is the last night the first full Moon of the summer season will look “full.” This month’s full Buck Moon rose after sunset on July 3rd — the eve of Independence Day and the first “official” Dog Day of this summer.  

July’s full Buck Moon will be 224,895.4 miles from Earth — that means that August’s Blue Moon will be the only supermoon this year that will be closer to our planet. This month’s full Moon is called the Buck Moon because the antlers of male deer are in full growth mode at this time. (Bucks shed and regrow their antlers each year, producing a larger and more impressive set as the years go by.)
The Cherokee people refer to this month’s Moon as the Month of the Ripe Corn Moon.

While on the subject of the Moon, if you believe in such things, astrologically speaking, the emotional, spiritual, and intuitive effects of a supermoon can be felt on a deep level by earthlings.
I’m not sure I understand what it means, but apparently the astrological meaning of July 2023’s full Moon is: The Capricorn full Moon aspects Mercury, Jupiter, and Saturn (currently in retrograde.) These planets add a positive element to the overall vibe. We’ll opt to take cautious steps towards manifesting our desires, meaning we won’t go overboard with our goals and will remain practical in order to not exceed our expectations.
I guess that’s good advice, but I think I’ll just go out a look at the Moon — full Moons are pretty cool…..
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Today in Independence Day — back in 1776 the Continental Congress voted in favor of declaring independence from Great Britain.
Before the declaration, America was part of the Kingdom of Great Britain (now known as the United Kingdom.) In the 1600s, people came from Great Britain to settle in what is now North America. Between 1607 and 1732, the British founded 13 colonies — Virginia, New York, Massachusetts, Maryland, Rhode Island, Connecticut, New Hampshire, Delaware, North Carolina, South Carolina, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, and Georgia. As those colonies grew, the residents thought the British government treated them unfairly — e.g., they had to pay taxes on items such as tea and allow British soldiers to stay in their homes. The colonists were required to follow these laws but couldn’t do anything to change them. Finally, in 1775, the colonists rebelled — resulting in the Revolutionary War between the the colonies and Great Britain. 

The colonists decided they needed to declare their independence in writing to explain their reasons and gain support from other countries. On July 4, 1776, a small group of representatives from the colonies — called the Continental Congress — adopted the Declaration of Independence. 
The document was written by a committee led by Thomas Jefferson and was signed by people from all 13 colonies. 

The Declaration of Independence is recognized around the world as an important message of self-governance — and — human rights. Maybe the most important sentence in the Declaration of Independence is the second…. that all people are created equally and have rights that include life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. That sentence was written by Thomas Jefferson.

So today, we celebrate Independence Day like we always have — with picnics, parades and fireworks. John Adams, who helped write the declaration, in a letter to his wife, predicted that the colonists’ independence would be celebrated by future generations as an annual festival with parades and bonfires. Looks like John was right. Happy Fourth!!
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Today is kind of a special day — it’s the official beginning of the Dog Days of Summer. A lot of us have heard this expression most of our lives and it traditionally refers to a period of particularly hot and humid weather occurring during the summer months of July and August.  

But which days are really the “dog days,” and why are they called dog days? Well this is another one of those subjects that just begged for some of my extensive research — here’s what I found….
So why are they referred to as dog days? Some think it’s a reference to the hot, sultry days that are “not fit for a dog,” and some believe it’s the time of year when the extreme heat drives dogs mad. Of course, that’s not true…..

The phrase actually comes from the stars — specifically, Sirius, the Dog Star. During the “dog days” period, the Sun occupies the same region of the sky as Sirius, the brightest star visible from any part of the Earth. Sirius is a part of the constellation Canis Major, the Greater Dog. In the summer, Sirius rises and sets with the Sun. And on July 23rd, it is in conjunction with the Sun — because the star is so bright, the ancient Romans believed it actually gave off heat and added to the Sun’s warmth and that’s what accounted for the long stretch of sultry weather. The Romans referred to this time as diēs caniculãrēs, or “dog days.” The term came to mean the 20 days before and 20 days after the alignment of Sirius with the Sun — July 3 to August 11 each year.

Actually, the appearance of Sirius doesn’t affect the weather here on Earth, but its appearance during the hottest part of summer over time has added to the lore surrounding the star — even today. 
For us today, when Sirius makes its appearance, it just mean’s it’s probably going to be hot and sultry. But to the ancient Greeks and Romans, Sirius’s appearance signaled a time when evil was brought to their lands in the form of drought, disease, or discomfort.
Virgil, the Roman poet, wrote, “…fiery Sirius, bringer of drought and plague to frail mortals, rises and saddens the sky with sinister light.” Obviously, this is a superstition, but in 2009 a Finnish study was conducted to determine if the claim that the rate of infections was higher during the Dog Days had any merit. Here’s what the report concluded — “The study was conducted in order to challenge the myth that the rate of infections is higher during the dog days. To our surprise, the myth was found to be true.” 

So make of that what you want — maybe the Canadian wildfires aren’t the only thing we should be concerned about this summer.
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Looking at the news shortly after I got up this morning, the first story I saw was that a block party in Baltimore, celebrating  Independence Day, was marred by a horrendous mass shooting. The suspect has not been apprehended yet, but I suspect it was a young man with an extremely disturbing social media history but was still able to legally obtain firearms.
As you can imagine, everyone is shocked.
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Continuing this year’s trend to talk about and welcome each month — today’s topic is…..July!
Tomorrow, July 2nd, is the exact middle of the year — of course, that’s true every year, so you can be sorry, or relieved, that the year is half over. And, if your New Year’s resolutions you made back in January haven’t panned out, tomorrow is a good day to try again.

The month of July is named after Roman leader Julius Caesar. Before the month became July, it was known as Quintiles. Quintiles is the Latin word for five — it was the fifth month on the Gregorian calendar. Actually, Julius Caesar modified the calendar, adding the months of January and February and the Julian calendar is still in use today. 

July (in the northern hemisphere) is usually the hottest month of the year. The hottest temperature ever recorded in the United States was in Greenland Ranch, California — 134ªF on July 10th, 1913.

Over the years, a lot of notable “firsts” have occurred in July — like the first atomic bomb being detonated (in New Mexico on July 16th, 1945) and the first rabies vaccine being administered (by Louis Pasteur) on July 6th, 1885. And of course I should mention that the first bikini debuted in Paris on July 5th, 1946. But — arguably — the most exciting July event took place in 1969 when Neil Armstrong was the first human to set foot on the moon on July 20th.
On the down side, 7 US Presidents have passed away in July — the most of any month.

July’s full Moon — the Full Buck Moon — will make its appearance in a couple of nights, on July 3. 
Aphelion — when the Earth is farthest it will get from the Sun for the entire year — occurs on July 6th. On that date, the Earth will be 94,506,364 miles away from the Sun.

And according to superstition, if ant hills are high in July, the coming winter will be hard. So we can look forward to Canada Day, Independence Day, Bastille Day, International Town Criers Day, World Emoji Day and the start of the Dog Days of Summer…. welcome, July.
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Both you faithful readers know that this is one of the most anticipated times of the year around here. yea, it’s coming up on America;s birthday, but more importantly, for a few days to a few weeks we are treated to a wonderful view of a Porta-Potty when we step out our front door. The big 4th of July party held annually across the street will be on July 1 this year instead of the traditional July 4. I’m not sure what this change will do to the Porta-Potty schedule. 

For those of you that anxiously check in here to see if it has arrived — I’m happy to announce that the Porta-Potty is here!!!
Feel free to stop by and view it’s beauty from our front porch or yard anytime. 
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