Letters for George: A Touch of Winter

Saturday, February 13, 2021

A Touch of Winter

DEAR GEORGE: We got our first real dose of winter this week, a storm that brought in ten inches of snow on Wednesday, then one or two more on Thursday. I always find this exciting. It takes me back to childhood in the Upper Peninsula. Snowmen, forts, snowball fights, sledding, snow-shoeing on the river. Iko, who has spent most of his life in New Orleans, finds the snow puzzling, but I think he likes it all right. Here are some photos of our neighborhood in the snow. LOVE, DAVE

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BLOG POSTING SCHEDULE, CONTENT, SOURCES, FOCUS, ETC.

-POSTING SCHEDULE

-Larger main posts at left: usually a new addition every one to two weeks.

-Short posts in right-hand column: changed every three weeks, usually on a Monday or Tuesday.

-SOURCES: Personal photos (e.g., family) are by myself or sometimes by another family member. Nonpersonal photos are usually obtained through Google Images. Nonpersonal factual info most frequently comes from Wikipedia and external links available there or from Google searches. Typically I cite sources at the end of the post. If you want to know a source and haven't located it through info I provide, Wikipedia, Google, or Google Images, please let me know at lundgrdc@gmail.com, and I should be able to help.

-MORE OF MY PHOTOS: www.flickr.com/photos/lundgrdc/

-MORE OF MY POEMS: www.funnypoemsmaybe.blogspot.com

-NAMES: At my family members' request, I use "L" rather than our full last name and sometimes initials for first names. Where there's content deemed personal in a story, I may use pseudonyms.

-MY EMAIL: lundgrdc@gmail.com

MAY 2024 HOLIDAYS

-Sat. May 4. Kentucky Derby. Held annually at Churchill Downs in Louisville, the Derby is the oldest (1875) and most popular horse race in the world. /// -Sun., May 5. Cinco de Mayo. Cinco de Mayo celebrates the MexicanArmy’s victory over the French during the Franco-Mexican War and, in the U.S., celebrates the Mexican culture and heritage. /// -Tues., May 7. VE Day, WW II. Commemorates the end of fighting in Europe with the defeat of the Third Reich. /// -Sun., May 12. Mother’s Day. Julia Ward Howe, author of The Battle Hymn of the Republic, introduced the notion of Mother’s Day in 1870. Woodrow Wilson signed a proclamation officially recognizing the day in 1914. /// -Sat., May 18. Armed Forces Day. Armed Forces Day, honoring currently serving members of the Armed Forces, was introduced in 1949 to replace separate Army, Navy, Marine, and Air Force Days. /// -Mon., May 27. Memorial Day. Made a national holiday in 1971, Memorial Day honors those who died while serving in the U.S. military (2.7 million service members since 1775). (Source: wincalendar.com)

CINCINNATI HISTORY

James Presley Ball Sr., a prominent African-American photographer, abolitionist, and businessman, was born in Frederick County, Virginia, in 1825 to William and Susan Ball. He learned daguerreotype photography from John B. Bailey of Boston, also a “freeman of color”. Ball settled in Cincinnati in 1849 and opened a studio with his brother Thomas. Known as “Ball’s Daguerrean Gallery of the West”, the business developed “from a small gallery to one of the great galleries of the Midwest.” Robert Duncanson worked in Ball’s studio, retouching portraits and coloring photographic prints. In 1855 Ball’s daguerreotypes were shown at the Ohio State Fair and at the Ohio Mechanics Annual Exhibition. In the 1870s Ball ended his partnership with Thomas and moved successively to Mississippi, Louisiana, Missouri, and Minnesota. Ball died in Honolulu in 1904. (wikipedia.org)

OSCAR BEST PICTURE NOMINEES

In Which We Serve (1942), directed by Noel Coward and David Lean; written and produced by Noel Coward; starring Noel Coward, John Mills, Bernard Miles; music by Noel Coward and Clifton Parker; a patriotic British war film based on the exploits of Captain Lord Louis Mountbatten who was in command of the destroyer HMS Kelly; 115 minutes; budget, 240,000 pounds; box office, 300,000 pounds, $2 million (US rentals); nominated for Best Picture and Best Original Screenplay; NY Film Critics Circle Award for Best Film. (wikipedia)

LITTLE LIFE STORIES

am being driven mad because our downstairs smoke detector chirps loudly every forty seconds and I can’t figure out how to stop it. I tried to open the door on the detector to change the battery but, pulling as hard as I dared, I couldn’t do it. When the TV technician visited I asked him if he could do it, but he checked it out, said it was hard-wired, and he didn’t want to get shocked. That was four days ago. Katja plans to call an electrician but hasn’t gotten around to it. I worry that the c

U.P. HISTORY

Michigan Technological University, originally known as the Michigan Mining School, began in Houghton in 1885 to train mining engineers to better operate the local copper mines. The school started with 4 faculty members and 23 students who met on the second floor of a building on Montezuma Avenue in Houghton. By 1931 the college had 591 students who pursued degrees in electrical engineering, mining engineering, metallurgy, civil engineering, mechanical engineering, and chemical engineering. Post-war enrollment bloomed, and enrollment was 1,789 in Houghton and 384 at the Sault branch. Long-dormant PhD programs were revived in the late 1950s, and Michigan Tech moved from a college to a university. In 2019 Michigan Tech established the College of Computing and began construction for its Health Technologies Complex. (mtu.edu)

TRIVIA: Jeopardy

The first episode of Jeopardy premiered in 1964 and the show ran until 1975. “The All New Jeopardy” then ran from 1978 to 1979. Today’s version premiered in 1984. There’s an unofficial fan-run archive that has nearly every clue and competitor from the show’s 37 seasons, and prospective contestants can study up on 412,883 clues. Jeopardy tapes five episodes a day about 46 days a year. By the end of 2019 the show had aired 8,000 episodes. During its run the show has gotten 43 Emmy Awards, more than any other game show. (insider.com)

MY WEEK (Mon., 4/29 - Sun., 5/5/24)

I read “Life’s Darkest Secret” in my poetry class and nodded off in “The Odyssey”. We ate out at Dewey’s (Edgar Allan Poe pizza), Skyline (burrito), and Aunt Annie’s Kitchen (sweet and sour chicken). We FaceTimed with our son J who is excited about their upcoming Italy trip. I had my 6-month appointment with my cardiologist, all looks well. Katja had a tooth extracted at the dentist and no longer smiles. We watched the Kentucky Derby and my choice lost by an eighth of an inch. The premiere of “Maryland” on PBS brought tears to our eyes.