February 17 - 18, 2001 - All the Rest

ALL THE REST – February 17 & 18

Today's Quotations — DOUBT

True wisdom is less presuming than folly. The wise man doubteth often, and changeth his mind; the fool is obstinate, and doubteth not; he knoweth all things but his own ignorance.

— Akhenaton

Who never doubted, never half believed. Where doubt is, there truth is -- it is her shadow.

— Philip James Bailey

Doubt is the vestibule through which all must pass before they can enter into the temple of wisdom.

— Charles Caleb Colton

Doubt is the father of invention.

— Galileo

Doubt, the essential preliminary of all improvement and discovery, must accompany the stages of man's onward progress. The faculty of doubting and questioning, without which those of comparison and judgment would be useless, is itself a divine prerogative of the reason.

— Albert Pike

Today's Word – OUBLIETTE

ou·bli·ette noun A dungeon with a trap door in the ceiling as its only means of entrance or exit. [French, from oublier, to forget, from Old French oblider, from Vulgar Latin *oblºt³reºt³re, from Latin oblºtus, past participle of oblºvºscº.]

Visitors can also gain entrance to El Badi Palace, begun in 1578. With its huge pools, its hammam (steam bath) as big as a church, and its oubliettes for political prisoners, the palace took 30 years to construct--and 10 years to pillage."

Wanderer in Marrakesh
by Edmund White

Definitions from American Heritage Dictionary

Today's Fact

Over the next several days the facts here on the DM will be about Serendipitous Discoveries.
This is the first fact on this subject.

Serendipity
Discoveries
The Microwave Oven

Serendipity, or chance discovery. This has been the means of a number of scientific discoveries both great and small.

SERENDIPITY 3

Many have touted the microwave oven as one of the twenty or so greatest discoveries of this century. The microwave oven came to us by serendipitous means. The Raytheon Company of Waltham, Mass. was given a military contract to do research on Radar for military use. The use of microwaves for cooking was discovered by accident by Percy LeBaron Spencer while working at Raytheon. After standing in front of a magnetron, the power tube that drives radar, he discovered that a chocolate candy bar in his pants pocket had melted into a gooey brown mess.

To further investigate the possibility of the cooking potential of radar he brought an egg to work the following day. The egg was placed in a kettle with a hole in the side. The kettle was placed next to the magnetron. A passing engineer took the lid off of the kettle to see what was inside. He was rewarded with a face full of half cooked egg. The shell of the egg was exploded by the steam pressure within the egg shell. His next experiment was with popcorn. A handful of kernels pooped into a mass of popcorn. This was the beginning of the development of the microwave. Spencer received a patent on the microwave oven on October 8, 1945.

In 1947 the Raytheon company marketed its first microwave oven. Since it was essentially a radar set adapted to cooking it was sold as a Radar Range. The first ovens sold were made for hospitals, catering trades and army canteens. They weighed 750 pounds and stood 5 and a half feet high. The cost for one of these mammoth ovens was $3000.00.

The first microwave oven designed for home use was marketed by Tappan in 1955. This unit sold for $1,295.00 and was the size of a refrigerator. The 220 volt machine required an electrician to wire it and a plumber to plumb in the water cooled power tube. From 1953 to 1967 less than 11,000 microwave ovens were sold in the United States. In August of 1967 Amana introduced the first countertop model of the microwave oven. The Radarange, retailed for $495, weighed 91 pounds and was about 15 inches tall. From that time on the microwave oven has been a success, but it never replaced the oven as Amana engineers had expected. Today the number of American households with microwaves has grown, from about 10 percent in 1977 to nearly 90 percent today. One thing that has not changed with the microwave oven - even today popcorn is still the among the first and most frequent items to find its way to the microwave oven.
world.

Sources: Encyclopaedia Britannica | The New Shell Book of Firsts

The Daily Miscellany Times

February 17, 1909
Old News = History

Geronimo Dies

Geronimo, the legendary Apache warrior chief, died today at his ranch on an Oklahoma reservation. Geronomo was eighty years old. His death was far from his beloved homeland that he fought to defend.
Geronomo shrewdly and fiercely resisted white settler incursions in the Chiricahua Apache lands in Arizona and New Mexico. After the Chiricahua were forced onto a bleak desert reservation in 1876,
Geronomo repeatedly broke out on hit-and-run guerrilla raids. In 1881 he led the last Apache uprising after US troops slew an Apache holy man.
Geronomo finally surrendered in 1886 and took to ranching. The great warrior was selling Apache souvenirs at the Louisiana Purchase Exposition five years ago. In 1905 he rode in President Roosevelt's inaugural procession.

"Source: On This Day"

The Daily Miscellany Times

February 18, 1546
Old News = History

Luther Dies of Overwork

Martin Luther, the father of the reformation, has died at his birthday birthplace in Eisleben, Germany at the age of 63. He was worn out from overwork. When he was 22, Luther was nearly killed by lightening and joined an Augustinian monastery.
In 1511 he was appointed professor of scripture at Wittenberg. Luther's dedication to the common man brought his teachings into increasing conflict with the Roman Catholic Church. Due to this effort he was excommunicated from the Church in 1521. He refused to recant, under penalty of possible death, and sought refuge at Wittenberg. The
elector Frederick III of Saxony refused to send him to Rome for execution.
Luther set about reforming the church in the German states. He abolished confession and private mass. He abandoned monasteries and allowed the priests to marry. Luther, himself, married a former nun, and together they raised six children.

Luther was also responsible for bringing the Bible within the reach of ordinary people by translating it into everyday German. He lived to see most of northern Europe abandon Rome for the new Protestant churches.

"Source: On This Day"

Today's SMILE

"What sunshine is to flowers, smiles are to humanity. These are but trifles, to be sure; but, scattered along life's pathway, the good they do is inconceivable."

Joseph Addison

A cheerful heart is good medicine,
but a crushed spirit dries up the bones.
Proverbs 17:22 (NIV)





The Thinker

One day a planet is discovered out Antares way whose sole inhabitant is an enormous humanoid, three miles high and made of granite. At first it is mistaken for an immense statue left by some vanished race of giants, for it squats motionless on a yellow plain, exhibiting no outward sign of life. It has legs, but it never rises to walk on them. It has a mouth, but never eats or speaks. It has what appears to be a perfectly functional brain, the size of a condominium, but the organ lies dormant, electrochemical activity at a standstill. Yet it lives. This puzzles the scientists, who try everything they can think of to get some sign of life from the behemoth--in vain. It just squats, motionless and seemingly thoughtless, until one day a xenobiologist, frustrated beyond endurance, screams, "How could evolution give legs, mouth and brain to a creature that doesn't use them?"

It happens that he's the first one to ask a direct question in the thing's presence. It rises with a thunderous rumble to its full height, scattering the clouds, thinks for a second, booms, "IT COULDN'T, " and squats down again.

"My goodness," exclaims the xenobiologist, "of course! It only stands to reason!

Pirates:

Many years ago there was a small town that had several bakerys. One of these was run by the aunts of a man named Penn. He and his aunts baked the best pies in the state. Not only that, but they were also the least expensive. Now the other bakers could make equally delicious pies, but Penn always sold more, for no one could beat........

the 'pie rates of Penn's aunts'.

An elderly woman went into the doctor's office. When the doctor asked why she was there, she replied, "I'd like to have some birth control pills." Taken aback, the doctor thought for a minute and then said, "Excuse me, Mrs. Smith, but you're 75 years old. What possible use could you have for birth control pills?" The woman responded, "They help me sleep better." The doctor thought some more and continued, "How in the world do birth control pills help you to sleep?" The woman said, "I put them in my granddaughter's orange juice and I sleep better at night."

I've heard it said that the way to pick a barber in a barbershop is to choose the one with the worst haircut--they cut each others' hair.

How then should one select a psychiatrist in a clinic?

What is 1 + 2 ?

Question: What is 1 + 2 ?

Politician: Well, if you look at the seasonally adjusted figures, you'll find that it's reasonably in line with government predictions.

Physicist: I won't tell you until you tell me what you want to use it for.

Lawyer: It makes one and a half each.

New Police Unit.

The Western Australian Police have just launched a new unit that roves around dealing with trouble spots. It was launched on New Year's Eve with an assignment to control crowds at a large concert; it made the TV news, with an officer proudly saying they were the:

Police "Fast Action Responce Team"

Gotta love that acronym.

felix@nice.usergroup.ethz.ch    | RHF Joke Archives

TRUE FACT ...

Humans begin laughing at two to three months of age. Six year olds laugh about 300 times per day, while adults laugh from 15 to 100 times per day.

SOURCE: NYT, Dr. William F. Fry, Stanford University

Sometimes I wake up grumpy;
Other times I let her sleep.

Daily Miscellany Comics

Have A Great Day

Phillip Bower

Soul Food February 17 & 18

Today in History February 17
Today in History February 18

The above links probably will not function before February 17, 2001.
It should function for a year following that date.

Send Mail to pbower@neo.rr.com

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Copyright Information: Phillip Bower is not the author of the humor, and does not claim to own any copyright privileges to the jokes. Sources of jokes are listed when known. Birthday's and Happenings for the date, and quotations are public knowledge and collected from numerous sources. Quotations are public knowledge and sources are listed when known. Weekendspirations are written by Tim Knappenberger who has copyright privileges. Cathy Vinson authors Whispers from the Wilderness and owns copyright privileges. Weekendspirations and Whispers from the Wilderness are used with permission by the respective authors. Other devotions are written by Phillip Bower unless otherwise stated. In all cases credit is given when known. The Daily Miscellany is nonprofit. Submissions by readers is welcome.