Bag of Randomness for Monday, July 22, 2019

  • Here’s a fun bit of presidential trivia – President Richard Nixon’s “I’m not a crook” speech took place at Disney World, specifically at the Contemporary Resort hotel.
  • I’m sure most folks are aware as vice-president, Nixon attended the grand opening of Disneyland, but I bet most overlook the fact that Ronald Reagan was one of the opening ceremonies celebrities, he was even the one who introduced Walt Disney at the event. Another odd bit of trivia, at one point, Reagan was forced to scale the wall of Frontierland to make one of his scheduled appearances.
  • Here’s one more Nixon and Disneyland connection.  When Nixon was vice-president, his brother owned a series of restaurants named “Nixon’s” (Source1, Source2).  One location was on the corner of Harbor Blvd. and Katella Ave in Anneham, immediately next to Disneyland. And just because I’m fascinated with Howard Hughes I’ll add this, he once loaned Nixon’s brother, Donald, $205,000 in 1956 to save the failing restaurants. I read his main competitor was Bob’s Big Boy. According to my research, only one Bob’s Big Boy still exists. But I may be confusing it for Big Boy.  I think there may have even been a Kip’s Big Boy for a while. The only one I can recall ever seeing was on Camp Bowie Blvd in Fort Worth, across from King’s Liquor, where we stopped to buy Dad’s and Grandma’s Seagram’s 7.  We lived in Palo Pinto, a dry county.
  • The 2020 Corvette Uses GPS and Hydraulics to Automatically Lift the Car Over Speed Bumps
  • Here’s the story behind the pic at the top of this post in case you are interested.
  • Somebody in British Columbia is gonna get fired – Cat filter mistakenly applied during police news conference on double murder
  • Google To Build A Second $600m Data Centre In North Texas
  • The future of warfare – A US Navy ship used a new drone-defense system to take down an Iranian drone
    • Marines aboard the USS Boxer used a new system called a MRZR LMADIS — a Light Marine Air Defense Integrated System. The system is comprised of two vehicles — one a “command node,” and the other a “sensor node.” The vehicles are outfitted with radar sensors, cameras, and radio frequency detectors and jammers. Once the crew is able to detect a threat, they use the jammer to disrupt the signals from the drone.
  • I’m a fan of all three of these women and all their characters, so these gave me a great laugh when I ran across them on the Dallas subreddit. They are all great in their own way and all are nailed one form or another. I don’t remember the Kristen Wiig Denton role.
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Bag of Randomness for Friday, July 19, 2019

  • I notice odd little stuff. We ate at McDonald’s recently and noticed the plastic drink lid has changed, and I’m pretty certain this is the first lid change in decades. A little research led me to LidWorks, the company which manufactures their lids. Browsing their website was more interesting than I would have thought, as they make different lids for paper and foam cups, hot and cold drinks, reclosable drink lids, domed lids (think ICEEs and Slupries), branded lids, and detail the concept to market process. Apparently, the new trend in the plastic lid business is strawless lid solutions, Starbucks appears to be the trendsetter. All of this info is probably making me sound like Jay Pritchett rambling about closets.
  • Yesterday’s Jeopardy ended in a tie. I’ve only seen a tie one other time. In case you are wondering, if there is a tie after Final Jeopardy, Trebek will inform the contestants the subject of the next “answer” and the first one with the correct response wins. This tie was well set up. The champion had exactly twice as much money as one of the contestants. The champion answered Final Jeopardy incorrectly but wagered zero dollars. And as you probably guessed, the other contestant wagered everything and doubled his amount to tie the champion with his correct response.
  • Mattel Is Bringing Back the Original Vintage He-Man Figures
  • Hasbro has decided to combine the Transformers and Ghostbusters universe, here’s Optimus Prime clad in Ecto-1 coloring.
  • Toys ‘R’ Us returns with ‘STEAM’ workshops and smaller stores
  • I’m looking forward to this:
  • And in another bit of Eighties nostalgia:

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Bag of Randomness for Wednesday, July 17, 2019

  • I’d like to wish a very happy birthday to my friend, Brent.
  • Amazon must be working their delivery driver pretty hard, they dropped a package off at my doorstep at 10:28 PM last night. I know it wasn’t a neighbor dropping off a package which was delivered to the wrong address because the delivery was confirmed by their app with a photo of it at my front door. Also, the dog barked like crazy and I looked out the window.
  • Ross and Margo Perot have been members at Highland Park Presbyterian Church since 1957 when they first moved to Dallas. Because the church was going through major renovations, so nearby Highland Park United Methodist Church held the service. I love it when a church from another denomination helps out a fellow church. I don’t know how that stuff works out, or if there were any rental fees or costs involved, but I don’t want to know, just leave me with the illusion that grace was extended.
  • I’ve mentioned several times that WifeGeeding’s friend was the nanny for the Perot grandchildren and when she got engaged they threw her an engagement party at one of their houses and I actually had a brief one-on-one conversation with the man. She spoke so fondly of that family and Mr. Perot, who insisted she simply refer to him as “Ross”. She recently posted a picture of him at her wedding and the time she was playfully choking him after a boating adventure. What a special moment that must have been to have someone like him attend your wedding. This is also the only picture I’ve seen of the man in shorts.
  • If memory serves me right, she and her husband had plans to move to Houston. Mr. Perot nonchalantly asked what her plans were and she mentioned how she’d like to work at a particular hospital. He said something to the effect that that hospital was one of his largest customers and he’s made donations to it for decades and he could pick up the phone right then and either schedule an interview or give her such a glowing recommendation she’d have to be hired. She thanked him for the offer but wanted to get the job on her own merit.
  • Perhaps the most comprehensive study of men and women’s pockets you’ll ever see.
  • It’s astonishing that NASA’s Voyager probes are still working after four decades, though barely.
  • I was surprised not to see Buzz Aldrin here and there with the 50th anniversary of the Apollo 11 launch. He was invited to a special ceremony at the Kennedy Space Center but decline (it was nice to see Micheal Collins make it). Buzz was always the more outspoken of the three men on that rocket and still makes public appearances. But, I did read last month he was suing his children and longtime manager.
  • When Neil Armstrong exited the lunar module to step foot on the moon, his heart rate was at 75 beats per minute.
  • I absolutely love this photo Michael Collins snapped. It’s technology and nature all wrapped up in one. At that very moment, Collins recorded everything that ever was and is of Earth with the exception of him. Also at that moment, no other human was farther from the planet or from any living thing, and there he was, in total isolation.
  • “I’d trade it all for a little more.” – C.M. Burns
  • What’s in this?: Oreos – All 10 ingredients in these miniature sugar bombs, explained (yep, even soy lecithin)
  • I’d like to wish WifeGeeding a very happy birthday.
  • It’s pretty darn cool what the Smithsonian Air and Space Museum is doing to celebrate Apollo 11’s 50th anniversary,  projecting a life-sized, animated image of a Saturn V rocket on the launchpad onto the face of the Washington Monument for three days. I hope my old college roommate who lives in the area got to see this.

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