Ridley's Believe It Or Not-This Day In History-Day Of The Dude March 6, 2014

Ridley's Believe It Or Not--March 6, 2014:  Another day in the creeping shadows of St. Patrick's Day.  Found these worthy holidays and due to popular demand-- in the Iditarod, the Last Great Race on Earth, 64 year old Sonny Lindner has lost his lead and is now in second place one hour behind Jeff King, a spry young 58 year old musher, with both mushers at Ruby, Alaska checkpoint, 475 miles from the start and 505 miles left to go to Nome.  Hope you enjoy the holidays, factoids and quote for the day and emulating Lindner and King, after your milk and Oreos go to the gym today.

           1. Day of the Dude--celebrated by Dudes, the followers of Dudeism.

           2. World Book Day--designated by UNESCO to promote reading and now celebrated by over 100 countries; another good excuse not that you need one to read to children today or read and watch them seeing you read--do as I read not as I watch TV.

           3. Oreo Cookie Day--here is a another  holiday you can sink your teeth into, celebrating 102 years of the Oreo cookie and a good excuse not that you need one to add to the total of close to 400 billion sold since introduction.

            4. National Dentist Day--after powering down numerous Oreos perfect complement to honoring you dentist by making an appointment for the potential resulting dental cavities.

           On this day in:
              a. 1899 aspirin (acetylsalicylic acid) was patented by William Hoffman of Bayer AG, to the relief of future hangover, arthritis, heart attack and stroke sufferers the world over--really one of the great omnipotent drugs of all time. In a classic example of why war often does not pay, Bayer's patent rights in the U.S. were seized upon the declaration of war against Germany in 1917, auctioned of, and the rights to the name Bayer and logo in the U.S. were sold back to Bayer AG in 1994 for $1 billion.  
              b. 1992 the computer virus Michelangelo was released into the wild and until finally eradicated by 1997 forcing savvy computer users to either not use their computer on March 6 or reset the computer to March 7.
              c. 2013 Microsoft was fined € 561 million for failing to provide a browser selection choice screen for Windows 7 for 14 months following its release, denying some 15 million European users the ability to easily select an alternative browser.
If only we could take aspirin to relieve the pain of our dysfunctional government: "Democracy is supposed to give you the feeling of choice, like Painkiller X and Painkiller Y. But they're both just aspirin." Gore Vidal, noted American novelist and essayist. Sadly how true the observation.

Please enjoy the 140 character poems on events of interest on my twitter account below (if you like them, retweet and join almost 140 growing followers and please follow me) and follow my blogs. Always good, incisive and entertaining poems on my blogs--click on links below. www.alaskanpoet.blogspot.com for an original poem to honor Bode Miller and the human spirit just posted; an original poem for Cupid on Valentine's Day; an original poem to honor Cory Remsburg, and original poem to honor Martin Luther King, Jr. Just posted for your enjoyment on Rhymes On The Newsworthy Times poems on Sally Jewell, Department of Interior, telling the residents of King Cove, Alaska to take a hike in placing wildlife over their lives; on students protesting Keystone XL as the world's largest oil producer militarily occupies the Crimea: the banning the wearing of the American flag on Cinco de Mayo; Putin winning the Great Game against Obama; Obama need for fund raising trumping Russian moves into Crimea; Potomac fever infecting the Governors’ Conference; the Cal Ripken, Jr. equivalent in the House, John Dingell after almost 60 years announcing his retirement; FCC plan to investigate diversity of news coverage to the great concern of the media (now shelved due to outrage in the media); Nebraska judge saving Obama by enjoining Keystone XL;  Kerry calling global warming the new weapon of mass destruction; chaos in the Ukraine; OC Sheriff's Deputies getting paid for donning and doffing their uniforms;  Chairman of OC Board of Supervisors double dipping to join numerous other comments on news events always in rhyme of course.

©March 6, 2014 Michael P. Ridley aka the Alaskanpoet

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