Muhammad Ali lit the flame to open the Olympic Games in Atlanta, Georgia (1996)
TOSSING THE CABER
Tossing the caber is a key element of any Highland Games. The caber itself is a tree trunk (denuded of its branches) of unspecified size--though it has to be of a length and weight to challenge even the strongest athlete. (Occasionally, cabers are submerged overnight in nearby lochs to increase their weight.) Athletes are presented with the caber in its vertical position, and their challenge is to upend the trunk in a perfect longitdinal revolution, so that the caber's top faces them.A perfect toss should land directly in front of the tosser, at "12 o'clock," without deviating to the right or left. Tossers are given three attempts with a caber, of which the best throw is scored. If a new caber cannot be tossed, it may be progressively shortened until an athlete is successful, after which the caber may never be modified. Perhaps the most famous challenge is presented by the Braemar Caber, which weighs 54.5 kg (120 lbs.) and is 5.79 m (19 ft.) long. It was first successfully tossed by 51-year-old George Clark in 1951.
Science without religion is lame, religion without science is blind. Albert Einstein (1879-1955)
So it turns out that today's dentist appointment was for the first of four deep-scale cleanings. The lower-right-hand corner is both very clean and very sore.
Off to check the PO box, then home to work on Spectres.
...that a human being walked on the moon for the first time.
I don't remember it, but I'm assured by girasole and bronxbob350 that my three-month-old self was plunked down in front of the TV watching every second of it.
Space travel hasn't gone in the direction we expected it to 40 years ago, but it has progressed, as evidenced by the cool things happening on the surface of Mars right now. And the footsteps taken by Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin in 1969 were indeed a big step for humanity.
Current Music
"Monday Night Blues" by the Don't Quit Your Day Job Players
This week's installment of "The Summer of the Rift" has us re-creating an old-time game show, as cohosts John S. Drew, Andrea K. Lipinski, Keith R.A. DeCandido, Dan Persons, and Orenthal Hawkins are joined by two of our listeners as contestants -- Julio Angel Ortiz and Ethan Parker -- in a Rift version of Match Game. You'll laugh, you'll cry, you'll kiss an hour of your life goodbye.....
Check out our ridiculous attempt to re-create the 1970s (but it's audio, so the clothes are better...) by grabbing it off iTunes or going to the Rift web site or podOmatic's Rift page.