Boom!

On this day in 2004, a whale exploded.

No, really.

Beware: that link leads to a somewhat graphic picture. It's hard for a whale to explode in a decorous fashion. I feel particularly sorry for the guy who owned that moped.

Animal combustion is, apparently, not as uncommon as you'd think. It's a large enough anomaly to attract a cult following, at any rate. Most documented ani-plosions occur naturally - here and there, though, you stumble upon truly upsetting manmade detonations. Wikipedia claims the project was called off for being too costly and slow to develop. An educated mind, however, can quickly guess the real reason: angry vampires.



Today's event was actually a tie between the above and another ghastly animal-related occurence: Edgar Allan Poe's The Raven was published today in 1845. Here's a nice little site commemorating his life and works. (Poe's, I mean. After inspiring the poem, that raven took the proceeds and retired to the tropics, where he never did another day's work in his whole darn life). Until next time...

January 9th

On this day in 1768, the first modern circus (featuring a central ring where acrobats, clowns, and dancing dogs performed) was born in London. God bless Mr. Philip Astley: without him, countless generations of dissatisfied people would have nowhere to run away to.
I have a childhood desire to be a tightrope walker (aka funambulist) which has recently resurfaced with a passion. What better way to fill a gap year between high school and college? Not one of those animal abusing, overly-expensive-snowcone-dispensing corporate circus, either. I would want to do something more beautiful and experimental, like Cirque du Soleil (though they've gotten almost as ginormous as Ringling, etc. in recent years... at least they're animal friendly). I also have a friend whose siblings travelled with these guys for a while. It's a bit less sparkly than I'd like, but it seems to be the least discriminating option. Cirque du Soleil talent scouts only hang out at the Olympics.
I got a 70s book on circus skills from my local library: the key to funambulism (and most other deathdefying acts, it turns out) is gradually increasing the amount of deathdefyingness involved. So you begin by constructing a tightrope that's about a foot off the ground (around two tree trunks is ideal) and slowly move it up to two feet, then three...

Unfortunately for my budding career, I live on a hill.

Well, if everything else fails, I still have my psychic powers. I worked on my Celtic Cross spread all through Christmas. It's been hit-and-miss, but predominantly hit. Like my sister said, "The more you do it, the more true it becomes."

On this day….

Death of arctic explorer Ernest Shakleton, 1922.

I always confuse my arctic explorers. They all have such long lists of accomplishments, sledding here and climbing there and winning such-and-such medals. Take Ernest: the first human to cross the Trans-Antarctic mountain range, this man also scaled an active volcano, helped discover the Magnetic South Pole, and became a knight. He then died of a heart attack in his bunk. I guess we can’t all go out with a bang. He had a good run, but I still would’ve hoped for a more dramatic ending. Like that fellow who said, “I’m just going outside. I may be some time,” and went out coatless into an ice storm to die so the other members of their stranded party could survive on his flesh. Talk about a stiff upper lip (the fact that it was frozen stiff is inconsequential).I never knew how fascinating last words really were. You can find lists of them here

http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Famous_last_words

and here

http://www.corsinet.com/braincandy/dying.html

Hours of entertainment. My favorite thus far is "Either that wallpaper goes, or I do," spoken by my true love, Oscar Wilde.

Alas! It burns!

Hello, lovelies.