This is my 100th post of the year. This marks the 8th year since this blogs inception in 2009, and the 4th consecutive year that I’ve published 100 or more post in a year.
That is of course, it will be my 100th post of the year if and when I publish it. A few years ago I wrote a post about having 100 posts in draft status. At the end of the post in the only comment, I had written that I had deleted all but 15 of the posts in draft status and hoped never to accumulate nearly as many post there again.
Well it turns out that I have been accumulating posts in draft status again. I currently have 77 posts with that distinction. The majority of these are from 2023, but I do have 14 from this year. As part of my 100th post of the year celebration,I will now list each incompleted post of 2024 by title in Chronological order.
Double Library Day
Team Saturdazzle
(Untitled)
Milwaukee Brewers Catcher William Contreras bringing major league streak to begin season
Crystal Lake Library
(Untitled)
(Untitled)
Anniversary vs. Annual
A to Z 2024 Reflections
(Untitled)
What’s most wrong about the 2024 White Sox
The Newfangled Four - A Spoonful of Sugar (Parody) [From Mary Poppins]
Former Chicago White Sox MVP , The late Dick Allen, elected to the Hall of Fame.
Not everybody needs a college degree (Writers Workshop)
That’s the 14. Some of these may see the light of day and most will be discarded. One of the drafts from last year is scheduled to post tomorrow for the next edition of Wordless Wednesday. I also hope to share the story behind that picture in a subsequent post.
Tomorrow’s post won’t be the last post of the year as I have a Michael Card Christmas Concert video scheduled to drop on 12/25. I’ll probably land somewhere between 103 and 107 2024 posts before the New Year and the whole race to 100 begins again.
The past coupla Saturdays I've tried and failed to put out a Team Saturdazzle post. The truth is my Fridays have been frenzied lately and my Saturdays have been swamped. The phrase 20 pounds in a 5-pound bag aptly describes them. My best friend noticed yesterday that yesterday at least until mid to late afternoon was anything but dazzling and told me to stop what I was doing, go home, and spend a quiet evening with my wife. This worked out well for my best friend and my wife as they are the same person.
So I went home, and we watched a movie together. The Movie was the 1938 Film: You Can't Take It With You. I have blogged about it before here, as the Y entry in "A Month at the Movies" from the 2023 A to Z challenge.
It did Saturdazzle my weekend right up. So much so, that I am taking some time on a Sunday to breathe a little and blog a little. In the A to Z post, I shared the below YouTube video which is a good synopsis and review of the movie.
I have been campaigning sometime now for my first White Sox hero, Dick Allen to get into the the Baseball Hall of Fame at Cooperstown. Last night he finallt got voted in. I'm sure I'll have some more posts to add in the coming days but for now here are three videos I've pulled off of You Tube to commemorate his big moment.
First up a career retrospective from MLB
Next: Local Chicago Newscast reporting Allen's induction
Today is the 161'st anniversary of the Gettysburg address, If I had a bucket list, visiting Gettysburg would definitely be on it.
Last year, during the A to Z challenge, I published this post, which includes a video of the address plus an 8-minute film telling the story behind the movie The Last Full Measure. I included it because The Last Full Measure is a line from the address.
I just knew that if I Googled the Gettysburg Address Rap, I would find something. I was not disappointed. I have included it here as well to help commemorate the day.
Sunday was not just another home game for the Chicago Bears. First of all the game started at 8:30 A.M. Central Time which is very early for a Sunday match up. It started this early because the "home" game was played in London, England. The Bears defeated the Jacksonville Jaguars 35-16 on Sunday. It was also an unusual game for Bears TE Cole Kmet.
Kmet whose Dad played for the Bears among other teams but never played in an actual game grew up in the NW suburbs of Chicago and played football and baseball for St. Viator before going to Notre Dame for college.
Cole Kmet hits HR for St. Viator in 2016 Sectional game
Here is Kmet in an interview in his time with ND.
Here is footage of Kmet while playing with the Irish.
Kmet was drafted by the Bears in the 2nd round of the 2020 NFL Draft.
C.K. is kind of a Superman for the Bears. In addition to playing starting Tight End, He is also the emergency long snapper. A long snapper is a specialized center who snaps the ball on punts, field goals, and extra points. The Bears usual long snapper suffered a knee injury in the first half of Sundays game. That meant that when Kmet scored 2 touchdowns in the 2nd quarter he had to snap the ball on the subsequent plays for the Bears extra points.
Click here to see Kmet's first touchdown on You Tube.
My wife bought prunes this weekend and I was reminded of this commercial that came out a few years after I was in high school about prunes. It was like the funniest commercial I had ever seen. The problem was when I described it to people even back then, they had never heard of it let alone seen it and thought it was more like a fake commercial from Saturday Night Live. I'll admit it's very much like the change bank.
After Amy brought home the prunes I started looking for the commercial on You Tube Again. I have looked before and never able to find it. I had found this commercial before that Stan Freeberg (Dragonnet) had produced in the 60's (He's also the off screen interviewer)
This is a very funny commercial but still not as funny as the one from the 80's at least in my memory.
I finally found a clip of it. While The YouTube video below Could be of better quality, here is a link to a Facebook page that has a better copy of the commercial
15 years ago today, on July 24th 2009. Mark Buehrle pitched a perfect game for the Chicago White Sox. to commemorate the anniversary enjoy this look at all 27 outs back when White Sox victories were not few and far between.
In late December 2022, my daughter told me about a poetry group that met the first Monday of the month. She and I went in January both enjoyed it so we have been attending ever since. The group meets both in person ad remotely. Emma and I have only attended in person so far.
The structure of the group is that the poets share any poems they are working on the the moderator leads us through the theme of the week and then gives us a prompt to work on. After the group is finished composing, they share the work they just completed. n
In 2023 several poets shared one poem about Elgin, the city I live in, o Valentines Day. Our group was asked to participate in that. In April of last year we all participated in a event called Poetry Alive where we all read several of our poems at a public meeting. My daughter chose not to participate last year i the event but went with the rest of our family to see me read.
Many of the poems I have submitted for Poetry Friday have bee written during or shared at our monthly poetry meetings . For today's Poetry Friday I would like to present the You Tube video of the 2024 Poetry Alive presentation. This year Emma participated as well. We are the 2nd and 3rd poets. There were 4 rounds of recitations. Poetry Alive 2024 took place on the night of my 26th wedding anniversary, so in honor of the occasion, I adapted a song I wrote for her into a poem and recited it in the third round.Poetry Friday is hosted this week by Linda Mitchell at A Word Edgewise.
I am doing my A to Z Reflections in 2 parts this year. The traditional reflection with the index and the pontification will follow. This year I paid homage to John "1 Hand Typing" Holton by having a "song of the day" for each letter of the alphabet at the end of my post. I would post a You Tube video of the song in question and then daily add that song to my Spotify A to Z playlist.
I am adding a bonus song of the day for the reflection called appropriately enough, Reflecting on My Reflection by Allen Levi.
The Leap of Dave A to Z Playlist ia now ready with all 26 songs from the challenge.
I will be back later this week with my traditional reflection. Foe more reflections click here.
For The A to Z Challenge this year, I am focusing on everyday holidays. Each day there are multiple unusual things to celebrate. Every day of the challenge I look for an event taking place that day and pair it with the letter of the day. I have also made up 5 holidays to coincide with the vowel days of the challenge. At the end of each post I will share a special song of the day for that day's letter. At the end of the month, these songs will be assembled in an A to Z keepsake playlist on Spotify. Every day is a celebration, let's unwrap today's together.
April 30th 2024 is the 235th anniversary of George Washington being inaugurated the first President of the United States.
On April 30th 1789 George Washington was innaugurated the first President of the United States of America in Federal Hall in New York City. Here is the transcript of his address ...
Fellow-Citizens of the Senate and of the House of Representatives:
Among the vicissitudes incident to life no event could have filled me with greater anxieties than that of which the notification was transmitted by your order, and received on the 14th day of the present month. On the one hand, I was summoned by my Country, whose voice I can never hear but with veneration and love, from a retreat which I had chosen with the fondest predilection, and, in my flattering hopes, with an immutable decision, as the asylum of my declining years--a retreat which was rendered every day more necessary as well as more dear to me by the addition of habit to inclination, and of frequent interruptions in my health to the gradual waste committed on it by time. On the other hand, the magnitude and difficulty of the trust to which the voice of my country called me, being sufficient to awaken in the wisest and most experienced of her citizens a distrust-ful scrutiny into his qualifications, could not but overwhelm with despondence one who (inheriting inferior endowments from nature and unpracticed in the duties of civil administration) ought to be peculiarly conscious of his own deficiencies. In this conflict of emotions all I dare aver is that it has been my faithful study to collect my duty from a just appreciation of every circumstance by which it might be affected. All I dare hope is that if, in executing this task, I have been too much swayed by a grateful remembrance of former instances, or by an affectionate sensibility to this transcendent proof of the confidence of my fellow-citizens, and have thence too little consulted my incapacity as well as disinclination for the weighty and untried cares before me, my error will be palliated by the motives which mislead me, and its consequences be judged by my country with some share of the partiality in which they originated.
Such being the impressions under which I have, in obedience to the public summons, repaired to the present station, it would be peculiarly improper to omit in this first
official act my fervent supplications to that Almighty Being who rules over the universe, who presides in the councils of nations, and whose providential aids can supply every human defect, that His benediction may consecrate to the liberties and happiness of the people of the United States a Government instituted by themselves for these essential purposes, and may enable every instrument employed in its administration to execute with success the functions allotted to his charge. In tendering this homage to the Great Author of every public and private good, I assure myself that it expresses your sentiments not less than my own, nor those of my fellow- citizens at large less than either. No people can be bound to acknowledge and adore the Invisible Hand which conducts the affairs of men more than those of the United States. Every step by which they have advanced to the character of an independent nation seems to have been distinguished by some token of providential agency; and in the important revolution just accomplished in the system of their united government the tranquil deliberations and voluntary consent of so many distinct communities from which the event has resulted can not be compared with the means by which most governments have been established without some return of pious gratitude, along with an humble anticipation of the future blessings which the past seem to presage. These reflections, arising out of the present crisis, have forced themselves too strongly on my mind to be suppressed. You will join with me, I trust, in thinking that there are none under the influence of which the proceedings of a new and free government can more auspiciously commence.
By the article establishing the executive department it is made the duty of the President "to recommend to your consideration such measures as he shall judge necessary and expedient." The circumstances under which I now meet you will acquit me from entering into that subject further than to refer to the great constitutional charter under which you are assembled, and which, in defining your powers, designates the objects to which your attention is to be given. It
will be more consistent with those circumstances, and far more congenial with the feelings which actuate me, to substitute, in place of a recommendation of particular measures, the tribute that is due to the talents, the rectitude, and the patriotism which adorn the characters selected to devise and adopt them. In these honorable qualifications I behold the surest pledges that as on one side no local prejudices or attachments, no separate views nor party animosities, will misdirect the comprehensive and equal eye which ought to watch over this great assemblage of communities and interests, so, on another, that the foundation of our national policy will be laid in the pure and immutable principles of private morality, and the preeminence of free government be exemplified by all the attributes which can win the affections of its citizens and command the respect of the world. I dwell on this prospect with every satisfaction which an ardent love for my country can inspire, since there is no truth more thoroughly established than that there exists in the economy and course of nature an indissoluble union between virtue and happiness; between duty and advantage; between the genuine maxims of an honest and magnanimous
policy and the solid rewards of public prosperity and felicity; since we ought to be no less persuaded that the propitious smiles of Heaven can never be expected on a nation that disregards the eternal rules of order and right which Heaven itself has ordained; and since the preservation of the sacred fire of liberty and the destiny of the republican model of government are justly considered, perhaps, as deeply, as finally, staked on the experiment entrusted to the hands of the American people.
Besides the ordinary objects submitted to your care, it will remain with your judgment to decide how far an exercise of the occasional power delegated by the fifth article of the Constitution is rendered expedient at the present juncture by the nature of objections which have been urged against the system, or by the degree of inquietude which has given birth to them. Instead of undertaking particular recommendations on this subject, in which I could be guided by no lights derived from official opportunities, I shall again give way to my entire confidence in your discernment and pursuit of the public good;
for I assure myself that whilst you carefully avoid every alteration which might endanger the benefits of an united and effective government, or which ought to await the future lessons of experience, a reverence for the characteristic rights of freemen and a regard for the public harmony will sufficiently influence your deliberations on the question how far the former can be impregnably fortified or the latter be safely and advantageously promoted.
To the preceding observations I have one to add, which will be most properly addressed to the House of Representatives. It concerns myself, and will therefore be as brief as possible. When I was first honored with a call into the service of my country, then on the eve of an arduous struggle for its liberties, the light in which I contemplated my duty required that I should renounce every pecuniary compensation. From this resolution I have in no instance departed; and being still under the impressions which produced it, I must decline as inapplicable to myself any share in the personal emoluments which may be indispensably included in a
permanent provision for the executive department, and must accordingly pray that the pecuniary estimates for the station in which I am placed may during my continuance in it be limited to such actual expenditures as the public good may be thought to require.
Having thus imparted to you my sentiments as they have been awakened by the occasion which brings us together, I shall take my present leave; but not without resorting once more to the benign Parent of the Human Race in humble supplication that, since He has been pleased to favor the American people with opportunities for deliberating in perfect tranquillity, and dispositions for deciding with unparalleled unanimity on a form of government for the security of their union and the advancement of their happiness, so His divine blessing may be equally conspicuous in the enlarged views, the temperate consultations, and the wise measures on which the success of this Government must depend.
The A to Z Challenge is complete! The Spotify Leap of Dave A to Z playlist is complete. They both have been a lot of fun. I will be back soon with my A to Z reflections.
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To go to the home of the A to Z challenge click here, to see the 2024 master list of participating blogs click here. Enjoy the 2024 A to Z challenge, and Happy Holidays!
For The A to Z Challenge this year, I am focusing on everyday holidays. Each day there are multiple unusual things to celebrate. Every day of the challenge I look for an event taking place that day and pair it with the letter of the day. I have also made up 5 holidays to coincide with the vowel days of the challenge. At the end of each post I will share a special song of the day for that day's letter. At the end of the month, these songs will be assembled in an A to Z keepsake playlist on Spotify. Every day is a celebration, let's unwrap today's together.
The first viral video on You Tube was an unauthorized bootleg of the SNL digital short Lazy Sunday. It had over 5,000,000 views between December 2005 and February of 2006 when You Tube took it down. SNL has since put the video up on it's own You Tube Channel.
Like many subsequent viral videos Lazy Sunday spawned some response videos. This one being a shot by shot remake
In 2008 the viral video Charlie bit my finger - Again blew up on You Tube. To date it has 886,000,000 views. My son was 7 when this came out and I must say he was very good at shutting people down before they ever got to teasing him about that.
By 2013 most everyone knew what a viral video was. April 29th 2013 was the first known occurrence of Viral Video Day.
Since then, viral videos have not gone away. Video's like this one my daughter calls Chewbacca Mom. It had 13,00,000 views in the past 7 years.
I know there are just two days left in the A to Z challenge. I say take a moment and watch some You Tube videos. You may just help one go viral!
To go to the home of the A to Z challenge click here, to see the 2024 master list of participating blogs click here. Enjoy the 2024 A to Z challenge, and Happy Holidays!
For The A to Z Challenge this year, I am focusing on everyday holidays. Each day there are multiple unusual things to celebrate. Every day of the challenge I look for an event taking place that day and pair it with the letter of the day. I have also made up 5 holidays to coincide with the vowel days of the challenge. At the end of each post I will share a special song of the day for that day's letter. At the end of the month, these songs will be assembled in an A to Z keepsake playlist on Spotify. Every day is a celebration, let's unwrap today's together.
A Very Special Installment Today
Dave Out Loud Presents Undecided, Undeclared & Uncertain Day
21 letters 21 songs assembled in a playlist. 5 more remain. Here is what we have so far.
To go to the home of the A to Z challenge click here, to see the 2024 master list of participating blogs click here. Enjoy the 2024 A to Z challenge, and Happy Holidays!
For The A to Z Challenge this year, I am focusing on everyday holidays. Each day there are multiple unusual things to celebrate. Every day of the challenge I look for an event taking place that day and pair it with the letter of the day. I have also made up 5 holidays to coincide with the vowel days of the challenge. At the end of each post I will share a special song of the day for that day's letter. At the end of the month, these songs will be assembled in an A to Z keepsake playlist on Spotify. Every day is a celebration, let's unwrap today's together.
I'm gonna be honest. Most of these holidays I am highlighting for the challenge. I am going to forget about for next year. Some I've probably already forgotten. World Table Tennis Day is one holiday I don't want to forget. In fact, I am kind of bummed that I probably won't ping some pong today. Ping some pong is what I call playing ping pong or table tennis.
When I think of table tennis the first thing that pops into my head is this commercial from when I was a kid.
Gnip Gnop not only sparked a passion for ping pong but also a passion for gnikaeaps sdrawkcab (speaking backwards) which turned into my love for all things palindromic.
When other people think of ping pong this scene from Forrest Gump may pop in their head ...
I love playing table tennis. I may lack the Gumpian endurance or skill but what I lack in endurance and talent I make up in zeal. In college I played a lot of table tennis, it is a great way to spend time between classes or as a study break. It is both social and athletic. I even had an album that I thought was the best accompaniment for playing ping pong. It was Jacob's Trouble's debut album, Door Into Summer. When I hear other people incorrectly say that this group has better albums, my initial thought is not to play ping pong with. You listen and you tell me if the beat doesn't want to make you ping some pong.
One fun thing to on World Table Tennis Day would be to play a variation called round robin. It is basically a cross between table tennis and musical chairs. You play with 2 paddles and as many people as can fit around a ping pong table. Instead of describing it, here is play in action ...
To get a full ping pong experience play the round robin clip without volume while listening to the Jacob's Trouble and you'll see what I'm talking about. So, ping some pong today if you get a chance and if you can't that's just how the ball bounces.
The song of the day today is Tell It Again by J.J. Heller
20 songs now comprise the A to Z playlist.
To go to the home of the A to Z challenge click here, to see the 2024 master list of participating blogs click here. Enjoy the 2024 A to Z challenge, and Happy Holidays!
For The A to Z Challenge this year, I am focusing on everyday holidays. Each day there are multiple unusual things to celebrate. Every day of the challenge I look for an event taking place that day and pair it with the letter of the day. I have also made up 5 holidays to coincide with the vowel days of the challenge. At the end of each post I will share a special song of the day for that day's letter. At the end of the month, these songs will be assembled in a to z keepsake playlist on Spotify. Every day is a celebration, let's unwrap today's together.
April 12th Yuri Gagarian is the first man in space
63 years ago today the Russians beat the U.S into space again. This time, Yuri Gagarian became the first person in space. This You Tube video shows some footage from the event.
Just in case you don't read Russian, the text below the video translates into English as:
On April 12, 1961, the Vostok spacecraft launched from the Baikonur Cosmodrome for the first time in the world, with pilot-cosmonaut Yuri Alekseevich Gagarin on board. For this feat, he was awarded the title of Hero of the Soviet Union, and starting from April 12, 1962, the day of Gagarin's flight into space was declared a holiday - Cosmonautics Day.
On September 27, 2010, by decision of the 65th session of the UN General Assembly, April 12 was proclaimed the International Day of Human Space Flight, which will be celebrated annually at the international level.
I decided to copy a couple of the you-tube comments and show them in Russian , and then in Russian printed phonetically in English and then finally translated by google translate into English.
The first comment is from @elenadushyna8975 from 1 year ago
Все молодцы!! И Королев! И Гагарин! И все остальные неизвестные, кто причастны к этому великому событию!!!
Vse molodtsy!! I Korolev! I Gagarin! I vse ostal'nyye neizvestnyye, kto prichastny k etomu velikomu sobytiyu!!!
Well done everyone!! And Korolev! And Gagarin! And all the other unknowns who are involved in this great event!!!
The second comment is from LarussaShudrova from 8 years ago
Спасибо за воспоминания! Спасибо! Помню, какую испытала гордость за страну, когда передавали по радио сообщение о полёте человека в космос. В душе всё пело.
Spasibo za vospominaniya! Spasibo! Pomnyu, kakuyu ispytala gordost' za stranu, kogda peredavali po radio soobshcheniye o polote cheloveka v kosmos. V dushe vso pelo.
Thank you for the memories! Thank you! I remember how proud I felt for the country when they broadcast a message on the radio about man’s flight into space. Everything was singing in my soul.
What strikes me about the coverage and the comments is the great sense of accomplishment. I lived in Russia for 2 years from 1992 to 1994 right after the Soviet Union was dissolved. It became clear to me fairly quickly is that people are very similar regardless of what country they are from and being proud of your country is certainly not something the U.S. has a monopoly on.
The song of the day is Keep Me Running performed by Ashley Cleveland
Randy Stonehill wrote and performed the song on his 1976 album Welcome to Paradise. The below video features a young Stonehill performing the song.
Stonehill turned 72 earlier this year and I made this post to celebrate.
To go to the home of the A to Z challenge click here, to see the 2024 master list of participating blogs click here. Enjoy the 2024 A to Z challenge, and Happy Holidays!
For The A to Z Challenge this year, I am focusing on everyday holidays. Each day there are multiple unusual things to celebrate. Every day of the challenge I look for an event taking place that day and pair it with the letter of the day. I have also made up 5 holidays to coincide with the vowel days of the challenge. At the end of each post I will share a special song of the day for that day's letter. At the end of the month, these songs will be assembled in a to z keepsake playlist on Spotify. Every day is a celebration, let's unwrap today's together.
April 11th is Dave and Amy Roller's wedding anniversary.
I was trying to justify not pulling a random holiday from the April 11th list and just writing about my wedding anniversary when I realized there is no justification needed. The 3rd sentence in the above paragraph says it all, " Every day of the challenge I look for an event taking place that day and pair it with the letter of the day." My anniversary is an event taking place today and my titling the post Just Married (26 years ago), I have, in the words of Paul Hollywood, ticked all the boxes.
Yesterday morning my daughter was getting ready for her writing class at the same time I was getting ready for school. She went towards the door and then came back saying, she had forgotten her glasses. Before I could stop myself I blurted out the line, "He can't see without his glasses".
This is a line from the 1991 movie "My Girl". My son recites this line quite a bit. A, because he like's to make fun of it and B, because it annoys his sisters. If you've ever been a brother or a sister you don't need me to say, not necessarily in that order.
As I was driving to work, while ruminating on that film, a memory popped in my head from almost 33 years ago when that film was in theatres. At the time I was in a long distance relationship, and because it was the winter Holidays we were both in the Chicago area where our families both lived .
We went to the Woodfield Mall to see the aforementioned film. After the film I remember telling her on an escalator talking about the film and in that context said something about wanting to grow old with her, (my girlfriend). I don't know which direction we were on in the escalator, but things started going downhill after that. Because, shortly after I made that comment to her we were broken up, and I'm not sure but I don't think I even saw her again after that.
I remember going back to my parents house and calling up my best friend and spilling all the sordid details. You ever have a friend you could tell anything, do anything with, share your secrets and keep theirs? That's what I had with my best friend back in January of 1992. 26 years ago today I married her.
Lots has changed since I saw My Girl with someone who out turned out not to be my girl at all. Woodfield Mall no longer has movie theatres, My parents no longer live at my boyhood home, I no longer need to use a landline to call my best friend, cause quite often we are together and when were not I just tell my phone to call her.
But Amy and I are growing old together. As Rowlf the Dog sang so eloquently in 1979, "The urge was righteous but the face was wrong." But in my case something better didn't come along, she had been there all along.
Amy and I love movies. We watch them, re watch them, quote them, and watch them again. One movie we enjoy is The Wedding Singer, a movie about friends who fell in love, like us. In the final scene he confesses his love in a song he wrote called "Grow Old With You."
Songs also play a part of our friendship. When I was living in Russia, I once wrote her a song about our friendship which is really a love song, we just didn't know it yet. I wrote her another song and sang it for her as I proposed. I wrote another song and a choir from our church sang it as we walked down the aisle after we had just been declared man and wife.
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Our marriage is not perfect. A few years ago we read a book together, called "When Sinner's say I do". The basic premise imperfect people cannot have a perfect relationship. I certainly am not perfect. She tells me she's not perfect, so I believe her. She is certainly the person I want to spend the rest of my life with. This August we will celebrate 34 years of friendship. Each day I grow older with my dear friend Amy is worthy of a celebration. Not just a celebration, but each day with Amy is a Holiday in itself.
Today's song of the day is Jack and Jill Part II by the Gray Havens
I chose the songs for the A to Z playlist this February and March, and just decided today that I was going to write about Amy and Myself for J. So I didn't really plan a connection between the holiday and the song of the day. It turns out there is one, but it's very slight. After Amy and I were married for a couple years, we moved into our first house and preceded to have our 2nd and third child. During that time we were attending a church that met at Crystal Lake South High School. I don't know if you've ever attended a church at a school before. I have on several occasions. One thing that happens is all the accoutrements of the school for the most part stay right where they are even on Sunday. So over the years we saw many homecoming posters and other things on the wall of our "church building". One such poster was celebrating the fact that one of their seniors had just made it into the top 20 of Season 5 of American Idol.
This young man, David Radford, would later become part of the folk duo, The Gray Havens along with his wife Licia. Like I said it's a slight connection. The Spotify playlist is big enough now to have a top 10.
Yes as far as Holidays are concerned, the anniversary of the day I married my best friend is a pretty big one. Feel free to comment and tell me about your love story if you care to.
To go to the home of the A to Z challenge click here, to see the 2024 master list of participating blogs click here. Enjoy the 2024 A to Z challenge, and Happy Holidays!
For The A to Z Challenge this year, I am focusing on everyday holidays. Each day there are multiple unusual things to celebrate. Every day of the challenge I look for an event taking place that day and pair it with the letter of the day. I have also made up 5 holidays to coincide with the vowel days of the challenge. At the end of each post I will share a special song of the day for that day's letter. At the end of the month, these songs will be assembled in a to z keepsake playlist on Spotify. Every day is a celebration, let's unwrap today's together.
April 10th is Indicted Illinois Governors Day
In U.S. history there have been 25 state governors who have been convicted of federal crimes. 4 of these have come from the state of Illinois. . That's righr 4 of the last 10 Illinois governors have served in federal prisons.
As a non public official of the state of Illinois with all the power invested in me by this great state, I proclaim April 10th as Indicted Illinois Governors Day.
There have actually been 5 Illinois governors to be indicted.
Joel Aldrich Matteson, the 10th governor of Illinois (1853-1857) was charged in 1859 in the Canal Scrip Fraud Scandal. Matteson redeemed Scrip for the Canal for himself. He was indicted but then acquitted and returned the majority of the funds to the state.
Otto Kerner Jr, was governor of Illinois from 1961-1968. In 1972 He was a Judge on the U.S. Court of Appeals when he was indicted on multiple charges including mail fraud, & income tax evasions. Charges he was eventually convicted og. Kerner served six months on a three year sentence. His crimes went back to 1962 when as a governor he colluded with race track owners.
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Dan Walker was governor of Illinois from 1973-1977. Unlike Kerner, Walkers convictions came from crimes committed after his time as governor. As CEO of a savings and loan siphoned bank money for his own use, Walker was indicted, convicted and served 17 months of a seven year sentence.
George Ryan was governor of Illinois from 1999-2003 and was the Il Secretary of State prior to that, As Secretary of State he presided over a huge bribes for licenses scheme. This scheme was exposed after a truck killed 6 children in the same family and it was revealed that the trucker had paid bribes for his license. Ryan was sentenced to 6 1/2 years of prison and was released in 2013.
Rod Blagojevich was governor of Illinois form 2002 - 2009 when he was impeached by the Illinois General Assembly. When Blagojevich (Blago) rand in 2002 his mantra was no more business as usual. This was in the wake of the Ryan scandals. The problem is Blago missed his own memo, and went back to business as usual, and business was booming. Blago was caught on tape trying to sell the senate seat of President Elect Obama, and was charged with conspiracy to commit fraud and solicitation of bribery. He was convicted and sentenced to 14 years and was in prison from 2012 to 2020 when hw was pardoned by Donald Trump.
While it's true that our last 3 governors have not gone to jail. We could use the growth mindset, and say they have not gone to jail yet. Why do so many of the governors of my state go to jail. It may just be a matter of linguistical expectations. What do governors and convicts have in common. They both serve terms. So in a way their first career sets up their second.
While I made up this holiday, I unfortunately did not make up the history.
That's it for me . Feel free to add a comment before moving on with your day.
To go to the home of the A to Z challenge click here, to see the 2024 master list of participating blogs click here. Enjoy the 2024 A to Z challenge, and Happy Holidays!
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