Tuesday, March 19, 2013

scupper \SKUHP-er\, verb:

1. Informal. to prevent from happening or succeeding; ruin; wreck.
2. Military. to overwhelm; surprise and destroy, disable, or massacre.

Scupper first entered English as a nautical noun in the late 1400s. The verb senses did not enter English until the nineteenth and twentieth centuries.

Irish handcuffs

• when a person is carrying an alcoholic beverage in both hands at the same time.

Hemish O'Maley was in Irish handcuffs last night at the pub. He always had a Guinness in each hand.

Trivia
What evidence is there on Mount Everest of the Tethys Sea, which existed before the collision of tectonic plates below the earth’s surface thrust the mountain skyward?

• A diagonal strip of marine limestone—the remains of the ancient sea—that climbers and geologists refer to as the Yellow Band. It’s located beneath Everest’s 29,035-foot summit, between about 25,000 and 27,000 feet.

History

• bank robbery: the first recorded bank heist took place in NYC; Edward Smith escaped with some $245,000, but was later caught and imprisoned (1831)
• SS Georgiana: Confederate ship was wrecked (1863); it was discovered on the same date in 1965 by underwater archeologist E. Lee Spence in his teenage years
• 25th Academy Awards: was the first televised Oscar ceremony (1953)
• Sarajevo: became a reunited city after four years when the Serbs were ousted by the Moslem-Croatians
• invasion of Iraq: began (on March 20 local time in Iraq, 2003)
• GRB 080319B: gamma-ray burst was detected, thus setting a record for farthest object that could be seen by the naked eye (2008)

Birthdays

• William Bradford 1589
• David Livingston 1813
• Sir Richard Burton 1821
• Albert Ryder 1847
• Wyatt Earp 1848
• William Jennings Bryan 1860
• Charles M. Russell 1864
• Edith Nourse Rogers 1881
• Earl Warren 1891
• Jackie ‘Moms’ Mabley 1894
• John Sirica 1904
• Adolph Eichmann 1906
• Patricia Morrison 1914
• Irving Wallace 1916
• Martha Carson 1921
• Tige Andrews 1923
• Hans Kung 1928 - Theologian
• Patrick McGoohan 1928 - Actor, director
• Gene Taylor 1929
• Bill Henderson 1930
• Ornette Coleman 1930 - Jazz saxophonist
• Gay Brewer Jr. 1932
• Philip Roth 1933 - Author
• Renee Taylor 1933 - Actress
• Nancy Malone 1935
• Phyllis Newman 1935 - Actress, singer
• Ursula Andress 1936 - Actress
• Clarence "Frogman" Henry 1937 - Singer
• Robin Luke 1942
• Paul Atkinson 1946 - Musician (The Zombies)
• Ruth Pointer 1946 - Singer (The Pointer Sisters)
• Glenn Close 1947 - Actress
• Chris Brubeck 1952
• Bruce Willis 1955 - Actor ("Die Hard", "The Sixth Sense")
• Derek Longmuir 1955 - (The Bay City Rollers)
• Terry Hall 1959 - (Specials, Fun Boy 3, Colourfield)
• Gert Bettens 1970 - Musician (K's Choice)
• Vida Guerra 1974 - bootay model
• Zach Lind 1976 - Musician (Jimmy Eat World)
• Anne V 1987 - Sports Illustrated swimsuit model
• Craig Lamar Traylor 1989 - Actor ("Malcolm in the Middle")