NASA’s Curiosity rover caught a glimpse of purple rocks embedded in the planet Mars. The rocks, near the foot of the Red Planet’s 18,000 ft Mount Sharp, likely contain an iron-oxide mineral called hematite, also found in other Mars rocks.
for your info: NASA's Curiosity Rover Spots Purple Rocks on Mars | Space
Antares, a reddish-hued star, is the brightest star in the constellation Scorpio. It is a red supergiant star, on its way to a supernova, which, when it occurs in an estimated few hundred thousand years, will be as bright as the full moon, as viewed from Earth. It is named Antares meaning “rival of Mars”, owing to their similar appearances.
Ed Subitzky wrote and illustrated the story “Saturday Night on Antares (the Planet with Twelve Different Sexes” for the National Lampoon in the 70s, a parody of the hookups of the time?
“I’m in Marsport without Hilda!” is one of Asimov’s rare short stories where sex is a major theme. It deals with the (ultimately frustrated) attempt by a government spy type guy to have a hookup with a hot young lady, on one of his rare trips to Marsport without his wife, Hilda.
Hilda Solis was a Congresswoman from California, the US Secretary of Labor from 2009-2013, and is currently a Member of the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors.
Solis is a daughter of immigrant parents (from Mexico and Nicaragua) who met in citizenship class.
On January 1, 1892, the immigration station on Ellis Island in New York Harbor opened, and would, over the course of its existence, process twelve million immigrants to the US. Long considered part of New York, a 1998 US Supreme Court decision found that most of the island is in New Jersey.
The Arthur Ellis Awards are the annual awards by the Crime Writers of Canada for crime writing, both fiction and non-fiction. It is named for the pseudonym of Canada’s former hangmen, “Arthur Ellis”.
Merv Griffin decided to create a Hangman-style game after recalling long car trips as a child, on which he and his sister would play Hangman. After he discussed the idea with Merv Griffin Enterprises’ staff, they thought that the idea would work as a game show if it had a “hook”. He decided to add a roulette-style wheel because he was drawn to wheels when he saw them in casinos. The resulting game, Wheel of Fortune, is the longest-running syndicated game show in the United States, and has sixty international adaptations.
Jeopardy!, originally titled What’s the Question?, premiered on NBC on March 30, 1964, hosted by Art Fleming. Its creator, Merv Griffin, wrote the 30-second piece of music heard during the show’s Final Jeopardy! Round, and which later became the iconic melody of the theme for the syndicated version of the show hosted by Alex Trebek.
Sir Alexander** Fleming** was a Scottish biologist, pharmacologist and botanist. His best-known discovery was the world’s first antibiotic substance benzylpenicillin (Penicillin G) from the mold Penicillium notatum in 1928. He shared the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine in 1945 for this discovery. In 1999, he was named in Time magazine’s list of the 100 Most Important People of the 20th century.
Albert Hofmann was a Swiss scientist known best for being the first person to synthesize, ingest, and learn of the psychedelic effects of lysergic acid diethylamide (LSD). Hofmann was also the first person to isolate, synthesize, and name the principal psychedelic mushroom compounds psilocybin and psilocin.In 2007, he shared first place, alongside Tim Berners-Lee, in a list of the 100 greatest living geniuses, published by The Telegraph newspaper
Prince Albert of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha and his future wife, Queen Victoria of Great Britain, were first cousins. They were born in the same year, 1819, and their mothers were both assisted by the same midwife.
Victoria would likely not have been born if her cousin, Prince Charlotte of Wales, had not died in childbirth in 1817. As a result of the need to provide an heir, William, Duke of Gloucester, and Edward, Duke of Kent, both put away their long-time mistresses and married suitable German princesses, for England’s sake.
Victoria and Albert had nine children. Their eldest grandchild was Wilhelm, later Kaiser Wilhelm, the last Emperor of Germany, who loomed large in WWI.
I and Albert, a 1972 musical by composer Charles Strouse, and lyricist Lee Adams, debuted in the West End at the Piccadilly Theatre on November 6, 1972, under the direction of John Schlesinger, but proved a flop, running only for three months, 120 performances. British actress Polly James performed the role of Victoria opposite Sven-Bertil Taube as her husband Prince Albert. Lewis Fiander and Aubrey Woods had featured roles. Sarah Brightman made her stage debut in 1973 in this musical, as Vicky, the queen’s eldest daughter, and a street waif, at age 13. Also in the cast was Simon Gipps-Kent as a young Prince Edward (“Bertie”), a role he would later reprise for television in Edward the Seventh.
Victoria “Vicki” Vale is a fictional character who appears in comic books published by DC Comics.She first appeared in Batman #49 (1948) in a 12-page story entitled, “Scoop of the Century!” written by Bill Finger with art by Bob Kane and Lew Schwartz. She continues to appear in the Batman universe.
The Vale of Mowbray is a flat, fertile area in Yorkshire. The Coast-to-Coast Trail crosses it. Hikers on the trail appreciate it as a flat, relaxing stretch after some strenuous walks in the early going on the trail.
McLaren Vale is a wine grape growing and wine making area in South Australia, just outside of Adelaide. It is best known for producing dry red wines, particularly of the shiraz variety.
In the movie “Now, Voyager”, drab Charlotte Vale (Bette Davis) is an unattractive, overweight, repressed spinster whose life is brutally dominated by her dictatorial mother (Gladys Cooper), an aristocratic Boston dowager whose verbal and emotional abuse of her daughter has contributed to the woman’s complete lack of self-confidence.
(original post ninja’d)
King George III’s consort, Queen Charlotte, was rather drab and plain, but her devotion to her husband, and his to her, was undoubted. Together, they had fifteen children.