We'll start the day by mentioning three of the wittiest men who ever lived.
It's the birthday of both Jonathan Swift (b. 1667) and Samuel Clemens, aka Mark Twain (b. 1835), and the anniversary of the death in 1900 of Oscar Wilde.
Swift was the Irish cleric and satirist who wrote A Modest Proposal (which purportedly advocated that the cure for Irish
economic woes was selling its children to be eaten) and Gulliver's Travels (which started out as a satire of European politics, but has
evolved to become fodder
for Jack
Black to show once again how annoyingly unfunny he is).
We've written about Twain in previous Sparks, but we’ll add once again that his Adventures of Huckleberry Finn is considered by many to be the "Great
American Novel," and that his autobiography
was published a couple of weeks ago.
Oscar Fingal O'Flahertie Wills Wilde was
one of Ireland and England's most celebrated wits, with an epigram
for every occasion. He wrote plays, books, and poems, including one of the most perfect comedies ever, The
Importance of Being Earnest. In 1895, at the height of his fame, he
was arrested and tried
for his homosexuality, and eventually sentenced to two years of hard labor. A
broken man by the time he was released in 1897, he left London, ending his days
in a shabby Parisian hotel, where his supposed last words give us our title today.
On a less gloomy Gallic
note, we note that on this day in 1886, the Folies
Bergère staged its first revue. The theatre was dedicated to music hall
and vaudeville-type
performances, and in its time has featured such stars as Charlie Chaplin, W.C. Fields, Elton John, Ella Fitzgerald, Frank Sinatra, and even Benny Hill.
For those looking for racier entertainment, we can point them to a
double shot today, as CBS
will air the annual Victoria's
Secret Fashion Show, and the 2011 Pirelli calendar will be released.
The TV show, a parade of beautiful women walking the runway in their underwear
is a beloved holiday tradition for men (and lingerie-loving women) everywhere,
while the Pirelli calendar offers many of the same models, only sans the underwear, in artistic
photos. (We'd offer more links to the calendar, but this is a
family-friendly blog, after all.)
We're so family-friendly, that we'll offer some programming to counter the
fashion show. Tonight also brings the annual airing of the stop-motion animated classic, Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer and NBC's
special Christmas in Rockefeller Center, which will feature appearances by Susan Boyle, Mariah Carey, Sheryl Crow, Jackie Evancho, Josh Groban, Annie
Lennox, Kylie
Minogue, and Jessica Simpson.The extravaganza will climax with the lighting of the Center's tree
(this year, it's a 74-foot Norway spruce from Mahopac,
New York).
The weather forecast for New York on Tuesday evening calls for rain and a low of 53°F, not exactly
winter weather, so we guess it's appropriate that the U.N.'s
Climate Change Conference is being held this week in sunny Cancun, Mexico (Tuesday's forecast high: 82°F).
Speaking of "hot," Tuesday is the 28th anniversary
of the release of Michael Jackson's Thriller,
which became the biggest-selling album of all time, in addition to inspiring prisoners
around the globe to replicate Jacko's signature moves.
As unique as Michael Jackson in their own ways were Winston Churchill and Irma
S. Rombauer. Churchill was the Nobel Prize-winning author, historian,
orator,
and two-time British Prime Minister who led his country through World War II (and was promptly bounced out of office afterward as thanks) and whose 136th birthday occurs today.
Rombauer was the St. Louis teacher and housewife whose cooking classes were so popular that, on
this day in 1931, she self-published her book of recipes under the title The Joy of Cooking. The book has never gone out of print, and although it
has undergone numerous revisions and alterations in the decades since, it remains one of America's favorite cookbooks.
Finally, we remind you that today is Computer
Security Day, so take a moment to check your security settings and https://www.webroot.com/us/en/resources/tips-articles/computer-security-threats-computer-viruses, won't you? We want to see you back safely next time.
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