My favorite character in X-Men 2 was Nightcrawler:

My favorite character in X-Men 3 is Beast:

Possibly I just really like the color blue…

Spoilers ahead, don’t read if you haven’t seen the movie and want to!

Read the rest of this entry »

When I was driving Friday afternoon, I saw these clouds in the distance (pictures were taken with my camera phone):

Drove a couple more miles down the highway and the sky looked like this:

and a couple more miles and it looked like this:

very weird weather!

Random And Odd has come up with three new items for “Stuff Portrait Friday”:

1. Your suitcase/s or travel bag:

Abandoned suitcases, for the time being…

2. Your ground:

Also my dog’s ground and he loves to dig in it.

3. Something you are powerless to:

That would be alcohol, lately. I can stop…but I don’t really want to and I usually drink just a bit too much.

Now THAT was a season finale!

Sawyer, ripping his shirt off and diving into the water to swim to the sail boat…YUM!

But wait, there’s more…don’t read if you haven’t seen it!

Read the rest of this entry »

Thirteen Things about Memorial Day

1. Memorial Day was originally called Decoration Day.
2. It’s a day of remembrance for those who have died in our nation’s service.
3. Memorial Day was officially proclaimed on 5 May 1868 by General John Logan, national commander of the Grand Army of the Republic and was first observed on 30 May 1868, when flowers were placed on the graves of Union and Confederate soldiers at Arlington National Cemetery
4. The first state to officially recognize the holiday was New York in 1873 (Waterloo NY was officially declared the birthplace of Memorial Day by President Lyndon Johnson in May 1966, it’s difficult to prove conclusively the origins.)
5. By 1890 it was recognized by all of the northern states. The South refused to acknowledge the day, honoring their dead on separate days until after World War I (when the holiday changed from honoring just those who died fighting in the Civil War to honoring Americans who died fighting in any war).
6. It is now celebrated in almost every State on the last Monday in May, though several southern states have an additional separate day for honoring the Confederate war dead: 1/19 in Texas, 4/26 in Alabama, Florida, Georgia, and Mississippi; 5/10 in South Carolina; and 6/3 (Jefferson Davis’ birthday) in Louisiana and Tennessee.
7. On the Thursday before Memorial Day, the 1,200 soldiers of the 3d U.S. Infantry place small American flags at each of the more than 260,000 gravestones at Arlington National Cemetery. They patrol 24 hours a day during the weekend to ensure that each flag remains standing.
8. Beginning in 1998, on the Saturday before the observed day for Memorial Day, the Boy Scouts and Girl Scouts place a candle at each of approximately 15,300 grave sites of soldiers buried at Fredericksburg and Spotsylvania National Military Park.
9. To help re-educate and remind Americans of the true meaning of Memorial Day, the “National Moment of Remembrance” resolution was passed in December 2000; this asks that at 3 p.m. local time, for all Americans to voluntarily and informally observe in their own way a moment of remembrance and respect, pausing from whatever they are doing for a moment of silence or listening to “Taps.”
10. A woman named Moina Michael conceived of the idea to wear red poppies on Memorial day in honor of those who died; the money went to benefit servicemen in need.
11. She also wrote a poem: We cherish too, the Poppy red/That grows on fields where valor led,/It seems to signal to the skies/That blood of heroes never dies.
12. Many feel that when Congress made the day into a three-day weekend in with the National Holiday Act of 1971, it made it all the easier for people to be distracted from the spirit and meaning of the day. As the VFW stated in its 2002 Memorial Day address: “Changing the date merely to create three-day weekends has undermined the very meaning of the day. No doubt, this has contributed greatly to the general public’s nonchalant observance of Memorial Day.”
13. When I was a child, I looked forward to the parade on Memorial Day; I even marched in it a few times.

Links to other Thursday Thirteens!

1. your link’ll go here!

The purpose of the meme is to get to know everyone who participates a little bit better every Thursday. Visiting fellow Thirteeners is encouraged! If you participate, leave the link to your Thirteen in others comments. It’s easy, and fun! Be sure to update your Thirteen with links that are left for you, as well! I will link to everyone who participates and leaves a link to their 13 things. Trackbacks, pings, comment links accepted!
Get the Thursday Thirteen code here!

View More Thursday Thirteen Participants