Word of the Day for Saturday, May 24, 2008

ruminate \ROO-muh-nayt\, intransitive verb:

1. To chew the cud; to chew again what has been slightly chewed and swallowed."Cattle free to ruminate." --Wordsworth.
2. To think again and again; to muse; to meditate; to ponder; to reflect.
3. To chew over again.
4. To meditate or ponder over; to muse on.

Early Nerd Special

• Midnight showing on the day of release of a highly-anticipated film, typically of the science-fiction/fantasy genre.

"I'd like one adult ticket to the Early Nerd Special of 'Star Wars Episode 3'."

Trivia
What Broadway musical was performed entirely on roller skates?

• Andrew Lloyd Webber's Starlight Express, which ran on Broadway for 761 performances in the late 1980s.

Today in History

• "Mary Had a Little Lamb": nursery rhyme was published by Sarah Josepha Hale; it was instantly popular, and Hale went on to write dozens of novels and poetry books (1830)
• Brooklyn Bridge: opened to traffic (1883)
• Concorde: supersonic passenger aircraft began flying to Washington, DC (1976)
• US Senate: Democrats gained control for the first time since 1994 (2001)

Today's Birthdays

• Queen Victoria (1819-1901): Britain's longest-reigning queen
• Jan Christiaan Smuts (1870-1950): founder of Het Volk who became prime minister of South Africa
• Mikhail Sholokhov (1905-1984): Nobel Prize-winning novelist, The Silent Don
• Tommy Chong (70): comic actor/musician, Cheech and Chong; actors Priscilla Presley (63), Alfred Molina (55), Kristin Scott Thomas (48), John C. Reilly (43) and Eric Close (40)
• Bob Dylan (67): singer/songwriter; other musicians born on this date include Patti LaBelle (64), Rosanne Cash (53) and Heavy D (41)