"And Ajax by mad passion borne stern had replied, fierce scorn enhancing scorn to fell extremes…"
From FB:
“I showed my three year old daughter these guys and told her that’s why it was important that she got good grades in school – so she wouldn’t end up at some shitty manual labor job working in the heat (and living in a van down by the river).”
OK, that’s somewhat funny, but it’s not true and is a bit cruel.
These guys are poor and are doing manual labor primarily because their government is horrible and really doesn’t care about the well-being of its citizens.
10 South Riverside Plaza – where my Dad worked from 1971 to 1975ish.
I was born in New Jersey because my Dad was working outside of Philadelphia, but we moved to Naperville, IL six months after I was born.
All of my first formative memories are from Naperville. I remember nothing about New Jersey.
In asking him about it later, he said the reason they lived in Naperville was because it was affordable and there was a train that could take him into downtown Chicago in 30-40 minutes.
I later went back there on an investigation circa 2010 and the place was very swank. We found my old house and I was flooded by happy memories. Hadn’t been back there in 35 years.
From FB:
“People with tiny little angel wings tattooed on their back always crack me up. I think to myself, ‘What if they were real? How stupidly ineffective would they be?'”
From FB:
“
“Saint John’s Eve, starting at sunset on June 23rd, is the eve of celebration before the Feast Day of Saint John the Baptist, whom the Gospel of Luke states was born six months before his cousin, Jesus. The Feast of Saint John closely coincides with the June solstice, which is also referred to as Midsummer in the Northern Hemisphere.
According to Christian tradition, John the Baptist was not himself the light, but was to give testimony concerning the light (i.e. Jesus). Christ’s conception and birth were believed to take place on the ‘growing days’ when the light of the sun was growing stronger after the winter solstice, while John the Baptist’s feast days took place on the ‘lessening days’ when the hours of sunlight began to grow shorter after the summer solstice. Regarding Jesus, John the Baptist himself had proclaimed that, ‘He must increase; but I must decrease’ By the late sixth century, the Feast of John the Baptist had become an important feast, counterbalancing at midsummer the midwinter feast of Christmas.
Fire is the most typical element associated with the Saint John’s Eve celebration. In many countries, bonfires are lit on the evening of June 23rd for people to jump over. These fires (commonly called Saint John’s Fires) were said to repel witches and evil spirits. On this night it was customary in English towns to keep a watch walking about, with the watchmen being provided with torches carried in barred pots on the tops of long poles, which added to the bonfires on the streets and gave the towns a striking appearance in an age when there was no regular street lighting.
The historian John Stow, described the celebration of Saint John’s Day in 16th Century England where, “…the wealthier sort also before their doors near to the said bonfires would set out tables on the vigils furnished with sweet bread and good drink, and on the festival days with meats and drinks plentifully, whereunto they would invite their neighbours and passengers also to sit, and to be merry with them in great familiarity, praising God for his benefits bestowed on them. These were called bonfires (‘good fires’) as well of good amity amongst neighbours that, being before at controversy, were there by the labour of others reconciled, and made of bitter enemies, loving friends, as also for the virtue that a great fire that to purge the infection of the air. On the vigil of St John Baptist and St Peter and Paul the Apostles, every man’s door being shadowed with green birch, long fennel, St John’s Wort, Orpin, white lillies and such like , garnished upon with garlands of beautiful flowers, had also lamps of glass, with oil burinin in them all night, some hung branches of iron curiously wrought, containing hundreds of lamps lit at once, which made goodly show.”
Modest Mussorgsky’s composition ‘Night on Bald Mountain’ was originally titled ‘St. John’s Night on the Bare Mountain.’
In his last version from 1880 he added a hauntingly beautiful quiet ending in which a church bell announces the dawn, and daybreak chases away the evil spirit. ‘Night on Bald Mountain’ has remained an audience favorite ever since its appearance in Walt Disney’s landmark movie, Fantasia.”
Song Of Ajax 