What Would Jimmy Do?

Today is the 78th anniversary of D-Day. Actually, it’s the anniversary of a D-Day, although it’s probably the most well known. 
Today is the anniversary of the Allied invasion of Germany occupied France. Rather than being the name of the operation, “D-Day” is a general term used to denote the beginning date of a military operation. The “D” stands for “day” when the actual date is unknown or classified.

D-Day was originally scheduled for June 5, 1944. But poor weather predictions made General Dwight D. Eisenhower decide to to delay the invasion. Eisenhower’s chief meteorologist, British Capt. James Stagg differed from the other experts and predicted impending rough seas and high winds for the English Channel. The weather conditions, while not ideal, improved on June 6. The improved weather is often cited in the overall success of the invasion.

The code name for D-Day was Operation Overload. It included more than the initial landings and included plans to liberate north-western Europe from Nazi control. In order to pull off the operation, unprecedented international cooperation was needed. By the time the invasion started, over two million troops from 12 countries were involved. It was the largest naval, air and land military operation in history.

Thousand of Americans died during the invasion on D-Day and the following operations. On D+2 (June 8) the U.S. Army created the American St. Laurent Cemetery adjacent to Omaha Beach to begin the burials of those who had died in the past 36 hours. After the war, the cemetery was moved closer to the beach and rededicated as the Normandy American Cemetery. The next of kin of all the deceased were given the option to repatriate their loved ones to the United States or have them be buried at an American cemetery overseas.

Today is an important anniversary in our history — think about those 9,387 Americans buried at Normandy and what they died for — then read today’s news….
Maybe Stephen Ambrose said it best, “At the core, the American citizen soldiers knew the difference between right and wrong, and they didn’t want to live in a world in which wrong prevailed. So they fought, and won, and we, all of us, living and yet to be born, must be forever profoundly grateful.” 
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Once a week, I usually ask if tonight is the night we take the trash out to the curb. If it is, we gather up all the wastebaskets and empty them into a larger bag with the other trash and put it in the big trashcan and roll it to the curb (even though we don’t have “curbs”) for the trash truck to pick up. We have a lot of wastebaskets in our house — I think I counted  10 or 11. Sometimes some of these wastebaskets don’t have much, or anything, in them but we check them anyway. I use one or more of these trash containers multiple times every day. And, like a lot of things, these containers have just become fixtures that we take for granted. I’m not sure who invented the wastebasket or trash can, but in the big scheme of things, I think it’s important to all of us — for a lot years, or centuries, people had to manage without them. For years and years, people just threw the trash in the streets, or buried it in holes and, unfortunately, even dumped their trash into bodies of water. 

During my extensive research, I found that ancient people’s garbage was very different from our trash today. Early in human history, waste was mostly ash from fires, wood, bones, and vegetable waste. The edible portions of any waste was used to feed animals, and what remained was put into the ground to decompose. When archeologists excavated ancient rubbish dumps, they found minuscule amounts of ash, broken tools, and pottery — meaning early civilizations reused and repaired what they could, rather than dumping it. 

About the earliest activity that resembles our trash service today was in 200 AD. To cope with the growing population’s garbage, the Romans came up with a “sanitation force,” consisting of teams of two men walking along streets to pick up and toss the garbage into a wagon that transported it to a remote location. 

Even though laws were passed to prohibit it, trash continued to be dumped in streets and in front of houses. Around 1757, Ben Franklin started the first street cleaning service and encouraged the public to dig pits to dispose of their waste. 
In 1864, health officials in Memphis, Tennessee became aware of a possible connection between the spread of Yellow Fever in the Memphis area and the garbage being dumped throughout the city. To minimize the threat of disease, residents were instructed to take their garbage to specific locations on the edge of town. 
By 1908, dumping waste in the most convenient location was still permitted — people would dump in the ocean, wetlands, or any available wasteland. Most small towns used piggeries, which were small pig farms that consumed food waste. It took 75 pigs to eat about one ton of food waste each day. Whatever wasn’t food waste was usually burned or buried.
After a lot of trial and error, incinerators became more popular and about 300 were in operation in the U. S. and Canada by 1914. Horse-drawn carts were still used to collect trash and take it to the incinerators, but were soon replaced with motor vehicles. 
By the 1920s, “reclaiming,” or filling in wetlands near cities with garbage, ash, and dirt became a popular method of disposal. 

The first American mass-produced hydraulic rear-load refuse packer compacting truck was introduced in the late 1930s. It was called the Load Packer and was patented in 1938 by Garfield Wood, but because resources were needed for WW II, it wasn’t widely used until the late 1940s.
By 1945, about 100 cities in the U.S. were using sanitary landfills — before then, many used the oceans as dump sites. And burning trash in the yard was still common. 
By 1968, about one-third of the U.S. started sorting their garbage, and recycling became a mainstream concept. 
In 1970, The Clean Air Act was passed in the United States, making many of the early incinerators without air-pollution controls shut down. The no-burn ban began and people slowly stopped burning trash in their yards. And by 1975, all 50 U.S. States had solid waste regulations, even though they differed from state to state.

So today I grumble about which things can be recycled and which get thrown away and what has to get thrown away separate from the other stuff… but — without all those wastebaskets in our house, that job would be even harder and more confusing. Andy Rooney once said that wastebaskets should be inconspicuous and that any list of the ten greatest inventions should save a place for wastebaskets. Andy Rooney was a wise man….
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The other day I was cleaning out a shelf above our computer desk downstairs. Almost a third of one shelf was “directions” sheets and books that came with things we’ve bought over the years. Some of the things we still have and use, some we haven’t had for years and some I don’t even remember ever using. Most of the directions literature say to read them carefully before operating the device. I have to be honest — I don’t remember ever reading any of them.

But before I threw them away, I decided that I should look through them, and I noticed that a lot of the older ones were poorly written — from a grammar point of view. Obviously the machine or whatever it was, was made in a foreign country and the directions were written by someone whose English was his second (or third) language. It seems like most of the newer ones are written in better English. Another thing I noticed was that a lot of the directions/instructions were mostly made up of safety information and warnings. I guess legally, they have to include this information, but I think most people know you should turn off an electric saw before changing the blade and it’s probably not a good idea to put your electric hair dryer in the dishwasher. 

I’m a firm believer in the trial and error method of learning — directions are something I turn to as a last resort, so I’m not sure why I saved all these books and pamphlets. And I’ve noticed that if it turns out that I really do need directions for something, that’s almost always the one that I did throw out.

And while we’re on the subject, I agree that reading and following directions is important — here’s an activity, or a version of it, that I first became aware of in a psychology class in college. It’s been around for years, but if for some reason you haven’t seen it, I encourage you to do it. I remember it being very enlightening when it was presented to our class and generated a lot of discussion — some of us found it funny, some of us were embarrassed.

DIRECTIONS WORKSHEET:
(Materials: you may need: a sheet of notebook paper, a pencil, and a box of crayons.)
Directions:
1. Real all directions before beginning.
2. Take out one sheet of lined paper.
3. Place it on your table/desk so that the holes are on the left side and the margin is at the top.
4. Skipping lines, number your paper 1-7.
5. On the first line, write your name.
6. On the second line, write the name of a flower.
7.On the sixth line, draw three stars using a blue crayon.
8, In the center of the paper, about 5 lines below line seven, draw a box.
9. Write the number of siblings you have to the right of the box.
10. Divide the box into four equal parts with a purple crayon.
11. Color the top right hand section of the box orange.
12. Draw a flower in the bottom left had corner of the box.
13. Color the center of the flower red.
14. Turn your paper upside down.
15. Write out today’s date using all capital letters.
16. Turn your paper right side up again.
17. On line three, draw a small picture of your favorite food.
18. Draw a circle around it.
19. Write the name of your first pet on line four.
20. Draw a star in each corner of your paper, using four different colors.
21. Underline two of the stars.
22. Turn your paper over. 
23. Fold it in half lengthwise.
24. Fold in half the other way.
25. Write your middle name on the outside.
26.Ignore directions one through twenty-five and enjoy watching everyone else do this activity wrong.
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We attended a function recently where there were a lot of people. When we were discussing the number of people, i said something like, yea, there sere was a gaggle of people there. Claire said that a gaggle meant there were a lot geese there… not people.

Well, of course, that got me to thinking about the collective names we give to groups of animals — we’ve all used terms like a flock of birds or a heard of cows. But it turns out that most groups of animals do have unique collective nouns to identify that specific group. For example, my extensive research on the subject found that the proper term for a group of eagles is convocation — but most people usually say a flock of eagles.

Some of the names I came up with were pretty surprising — actually more strange, and funny. Apparently most of these names date back to medieval times, but if you want to show off your vast knowledge on the subject sometime here’s some interesting names to choose from — some even seem appropriate, like a stench of skunks…. I’ve also included a possible reason the term was chosen (if I ran across it.)
A colony, cloud, cauldron or camp of Bats
A swarm of Bees
A herd or parade of Elephants
A band of Gorillas (Some believe this can be traced to military terms.)
A cackle of Hyenas (Refers to the animal’s famous laugh-like vocalization?)
A barrel or troop of Monkeys
An Unkindness of Ravens (May refer to ravens’ mythical reputation as tricksters or the false view that they are bad parents?)
An ambush or streak of Tigers (describes the animal’s motion and hunting style?)
A zeal of Zebras
A dray or scurry of Squirrels (describes the animals’ method of movement?)
A stench of Skunks (I’m pretty sure why this term was used.)
A herd, colony, warren, nest, down or husk of Rabbits (Only domesticated rabbits are referred to as a herd.)
A gang or obstinacy of Buffalo (Apparently the Buffalo is notoriously stubborn, so obstinacy became a fitting term.)
A caravan of Camels
A lack of dogs, but a litter of Puppies.
A drove or pace of Donkeys.
A school of Fish.
A gaggle or skein of Geese
A tower of Giraffes (probably makes sense.)
A troop or mob of Kangaroos.
A parliament of Owls

Even insects and bugs have collective group names…. we’ve all referred to colony of Ants and hive of bees, but a group of Bees are also referred to to as a grist or swarm. Here’s some more…
An intrusion of cockroaches.
A business of Flies
A cloud or horde of Gnats
A plague of Locusts
A nest of Hornets
A cloud of Grasshoppers
An army of Caterpillars

Anyhow, you get the idea — just about everything fits in to some group or other and most of those groups have names…. some are obvious, some not so obvious, some are funny or strange and some are appropriate…. like, a gaggle of geese or a brood of hens — and what do you call a group of turkeys? A corporation.
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Well, it’s hard to believe, but tomorrow begins the month of June. June is the first month of summer in the Northern Hemisphere and the first month of winter in the Southern Hemisphere. It’s one of the four months of the year that has exactly 30 days. 

Historically, the middle of May until the middle of June is an unlucky time to marry according to Roman republic beliefs. Legend holds that Ovid, a Roman poet, sought the advice of Jupiter’s high priestess and inquired about the best time for his daughter to marry. The high priestess ordered him to wait until after June 15. However, contrary to Roman beliefs, June is considered one of the best months to get married. 

June has a beetle that bears its name — often called a ‘June Bug,’ the insect is typically found in the U.S. during May and June. 
The Anglo-Saxons called the sixth month “sera monath,” meaning dry month.
The Gaelic word for June is “Meitheamh,” which means middle month.
“Mehefin” is the Welsh (Celtic) word for June and means midsummer or middle of summer.
Following from its Latin origins, the Scots call it “An t-Ogmhios,” which roughly means “the month of the young.”
June’s full Moon, the Strawberry Moon, will occur on Tuesday, June 14.

Many incredibly important and influential people have been born in June — Anne Frank, Marilyn Monroe, George Orwell, George H.W. Bush and Claire Williamson all share a common birth month.
Goodbye May, hello June — let summer begin.
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Today is the first holiday of the summer and it’s probably the most somber day on our calendars. We often read about Memorial Day Weekend being the “unofficial start of summer” and a number of activities, like the Indianapolis 500 race, are held over the Memorial Day Weekend.

But the real purpose of Memorial Day is that it’s a day set aside when Americans pause to remember the men and women who made the ultimate sacrifice in service to their country in wars at home and abroad. 

On May 5, 1868, three years after the end of the Civil War, John Logan a veteran of the war and head of the Grand Army of the Republic (a Union veterans organization) established Decoration Day — to be recognized on May 30. On that date, people on both sides of the war were encouraged to place flowers on the graves of their relatives, friends or comrades who fell during the war. May 30 was chosen because flowers would be in full bloom at that time. 

On May 30, 1868, the first official National Decoration Day ceremony was held at Arlington National Cemetery, where the Grand Army of the Republic placed flowers on the graves of both Union and Confederate soldiers buried there. General Ulysses S. Grant presided over the ceremony.

When I was growing up in Maysville, Oklahoma, I remember on Memorial Day almost everyone was wearing a red poppy flower — people, mostly veterans, would distribute them to everyone… most people contributed some amount of money as a donation. The idea of of using red poppies to commemorate fallen soldiers first appeared in the poem, “In Flander’s Field,” written by Lieutenant Colonel John McCrae in 1915. In 1924, when faced with a shortage poppies, the first artificial poppy factory was created in Pittsburg, Pennsylvania. It employed veterans who needed work. The poppies I remember as a kid were made of paper….

I mentioned that Memorial Day was formerly known as Decoration Day intended to commemorate the Union and Confederate soldiers that died in the Civil War. Originally, the northern states observed Decoration Day with a lot more enthusiasm than the Confederate states — even today, apart from the federal Memorial Day, some southern states also celebrate Confederate Memorial Day in honor of those who died fighting for the Confederate states during the Civil War. Different states observe this holiday on different days. 

In 2000, Congress passed the National Moment of Remembrance Act that requests all Americans to stop what they are doing at 3:00 pm on Memorial Day to observe a minute of silence to remember and honor those who died in service to the United States. 

So today is a day we pay homage to all those who didn’t come home — a day of solemn contemplation of the cost of freedom. Maybe Lee Greenwood said it best in song….”And I’m proud to be an American, where at least I know I’m free. And I won’t forget the men who died, who gave that right to me.”
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We had a friend visit from Seattle a couple of weeks ago and he mentioned that in Seattle, homeless people were camping out on the sidewalks in front of multi-million dollar apartment buildings. That led to a discussion about “slums and crime.”

There is a saying that “slums are nurseries of crime.” The theory being that physically run-down neighborhoods have often had much higher crime rates that neighborhoods where more affluent people have had newer and more upscale housing. 

But maybe the question should be, do bad physical surroundings promote bad behavior or does bad behavior cause physical surroundings to deteriorate and prevent people from earning higher incomes that would enable them to live in better surroundings?

A lot of the government’s policy, for many years, has been based on the view that physical surroundings promote crime and other activities detrimental to society and to the individuals who engage in these activities. There have been massive and costly government programs to demolish slums or “blighted” areas and to relocate individuals from those areas into either newly built government housing projects or to scatter individuals and families from bad neighborhoods into good neighborhoods.

The demolition of any neighborhood will of course destroy not only the physical structures of that neighborhood but also the human relationships that make it a viable community as its inhabitants are scattered to the winds.

A study of people who had been displaced from a close-knit community in Boston found about half of them disturbed or depressed. While many of them found better housing elsewhere, 86 percent of them paid higher rents than before they had been forced out of their former neighborhoods.

The rationale for transferring people and resources is that what ends up being built is more valuable than what was torn down.
Time and again, moving slum dwellers into brand new public housing projects has only created new centers of crime in those projects.

Whether moving people into government housing projects, giving them vouchers to subsidize their living in middle-class neighborhoods, or moving large numbers of them from one city to another, it appears that changing people’s location doesn’t change their behavior.
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Memorial Day is approaching, and one event always held on Memorial Day weekend is the Indianapolis 500 race. There’s been some controversy about it being held that particular weekend because it takes away from the somber reason for the holiday, but the race continues to be run on Memorial Day weekend. 

While I’m not a huge race fan, when I was younger I got into “stock car races” and always enjoyed them, so one of the rings I always wanted to do was attend the Indy 500. I’d flown over the race track a number of times and it was much larger than any stock car track I’d ever seen. I remember being impressed that there was a 9-hole golf course in the middle. 

Anyhow I got my chance in 1971 — I was back in Washington over the Memorial Day weekend, so myself and a friend flew to Indianapolis and attended the race. It was the 55th 500 Mile International Sweepstakes held at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway. Al Unser Sr. dominated most of the race and won for the second consecutive year. He became the fourth driver to win the race in back-to-back years. 

But — who won the race in 1971 wasn’t the big story. The race was marred by a crash involving the pace car at the start of the race. If you follow racing at all, you probably remember the event. The pace car, a bright orange 1971 Dodge Challenger, was provided by, and driven by a local Dodge dealer — Eldon Palmer. (Prior to 1971, car manufacturers provided the pace car — for advertising purposes, but Chrysler, Ford and GM sensed the impending end of the muscle car era and chose not to supply an official pace car.) 

Sitting next to Palmer was the owner of the Indianapolis Motor Speedway, Tony Hulman Jr. and in the back seat were astronaut John Glenn and ABC sportscaster Chris Schenkel.

Palmer had practiced braking in the pits before the race and positioned either a flag or cone at the point where he should have started to brake. However, before the pace lap and the start of the race, somebody removed the marker, so Palmer ended up braking late and careening out of control into a photographers stand — 29 people were injured, two seriously. 

Palmer reportedly felt so awful after the incident that he held on to the Dodge Challenger for years. Only a few years ago did he restore it and sell it to an Indiana collector, Steven Cage. The car is currently in his museum in Fishers, Indiana, just outside of Indianapolis. Eldon Palmer died in 2016 — he was 87.

While we’re on the subject of the Indy 500, I guess this would be a good time to talk about a couple of traditions associated with the event. You’ve probably noticed that the winner always drinks milk to celebrate — not champagne, but milk. The first three-time winner of the 500 was Louis Meyer, winning for the third time in 1936. In Victory Lane, he asked for buttermilk. His mother had told him years earlier that milk was good to drink on hot day, so that’s what he requested.

A dairy industry executive saw a photo of Meyer drinking milk and decided to offer it to the winner every year. The Indiana Dairy Association became an official sponsor in the 1950s and today every driver is asked what kind of milk they prefer — whole or skim — just in case they win. It’s interesting that buttermilk and chocolate milk are not options. But since most of the milk gets poured on the winner’s head anyway, the flavor probably really doesn’t matter.

The command to “start your engines” started in 1946 — the first race after World War II. The command was, “Gentlemen, start your engines.” In 1977, the command became “In company with the first lady ever to qualify at Indianapolis, gentlemen, start you engines,” to accommodate the first female driver, Janet Guthrie. Today, the command is “Drivers, start your engines,” or “Ladies and gentlemen, start your engines.”

Anyhow, the Indianapolis 500 is an American tradition, not intended to take away from Memorial Day remembrances. Every year when I watch the race, I always think of something Steven Wright said, “I watched the Indy 500, and I was thinking that if they left earlier they wouldn’t have to go so fast.”
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As you probably know, there are a number of days every year that celebrate wine — like Malbec Day, National Drink Wine Day, etc. And today is another one of those days. Not that we need an “official” reason to celebrate over a bottle of wine, but we again have one — today is National Wine Day. It’s celebrated annually on May 25.

Wine has been enjoyed by humans for thousands of years. According to the wineries, the drink is popular not only because it tastes wonderful, but also because of its nutritional value and psychotropic effects. Wine is frequently cited in in the Bible.
California leads U.S. wine production and is home to over 4,000 wineries. But wineries exist all across the U.S. with at least three in every state. According to my extensive research, the most frequently visited winery today is Biltmore Estate in Asheville, North Carolina — over one million people visit every year.

There are over a dozen different sizes of wine bottles, many named after Biblical kings or other historical figures. The largest wine bottle size (30 liters) is named “Melchizedek” or “Midas” and holds 200 glasses of wine.
Almost 70% of wine bottles are sealed with natural cork — the majority of the cork comes from Portugal.
One bottle of wine is made of, on average, 600 grapes….

The exact origin of National Wine Day is unknown, but it dates back to at least 2009 and we can all use an “official” reason to have a glass…. or two.
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This is a particularly terrible day for all of us, especially the people in Uvalde, Texas. But apparently it’s just another ho-hum day for our leaders in Washington — although I’m sure they’ll offer their thoughts and prayers….
I suppose every generation says this, but I’m pretty sure that I grew up in a world that no longer exists.
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Update:
My apologies to our leaders — in addition to thoughts and prayers the flags are also being lowered to half staff.
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