March 14, 2022
While you are still struggling over that lost hour of sleep this weekend and you've wished we'd stop this silliness, QB will inform you that it will, literally, take an act of Congress to make Day Light Savings Time permanent. That's right! States can opt out of DLS and remain on Standard Time (see Arizona and Hawaii) but to permanently remain on DLS our elected officials in Washington have to give it the okey-dokey. In 2021, Georgia's legislature passed a permanent DLS law that was signed by Gov. Brian Kemp. But until Congress changes the law, nothing will change with Georgia's time. For our Pennsylvania readers, your state's House has passed a law, but your Senate hasn't done anything with it.
👉 Today we look at more of the incredible cities and temples carved out of solid rock, and we begin with the Ellora Caves. Built between 600-1,000 AD, the Ellora Caves consist of 34 monasteries and temples which were sanctuaries devoted to Buddhism, Hinduism and Jainism and highlight tolerance and co-existence of different religions in India.
There are over 100 caves at the site, all excavated from the basalt cliffs. Cave 16, known as the Kailasa temple, is a particularly notable cave temple in India as a result of its size, architecture and having been entirely carved out of a single rock.
The structure is a freestanding, multi-level temple complex covering an area twice the size of the Parthenon in Athens. It is estimated that the artists removed three million cubic feet of stone, weighing approximately 200,000 tons, to excavate the temple.
Eleven out of the twelve Buddhist caves consist of monasteries with prayer halls: large, multi-storeyed buildings carved into the mountain face, including living quarters, sleeping quarters, kitchens, and other rooms.
Next, carved into the side of a Turkish mountain are what look to be the entrances to countless temples, but are in fact the ornate facade of ancient Lycian tombs.
The Lycians believed that their dead were carried to the afterlife by magic winged creatures and thus they placed their honored dead in geographically high places such as the cliffside. Dating back to the 4th century, many of the numerous entryways are adorned with tall Classical columns and intricate reliefs. The older tombs are often no more than unremarked holes dug into the rock.
Despite the external grandeur, the interior of the tombs are spare chambers cut into the rock with a simple monolith inside to display the body and the rooms, are otherwise empty from hundreds of years worth of looting.
More on Wednesday.
👉 To remind us all that baseball used to be a game, Charlie Brown and the Peanuts gang are ready to take to the field for another season:
 |
| May I remind you that Charlie Brown wears the colors of the Pittsburgh Pirates. Maybe that's why his team struggles so much. |
👉 Monday’s pun comes from our “Ooh You’re Gold” collection:
👉 If you live in Georgia you need no explanation of this “Gold” comment:
👉 These are some of the best riddles I have seen (Our Canadian correspondent sent these). The answers are at the bottom. Riddle 5 is amazing. The answers to all five the riddles are below. Don’t cheat!
1. A murderer is condemned to death. He has to choose between three rooms. The first is full of raging fires, the second is full of assassins with loaded guns, and the third is full of lions that haven’t eaten in 3 years. Which room is safest for him?
2. A woman shoots her husband. Then she holds him under water for over 5 minutes. Finally, she hangs him. But 5 minutes later they both go out together and enjoy a wonderful dinner together. How can this be?
3. What is black when you buy it, red when you use it, and gray when you throw it away?
4. Can you name three consecutive days without using the words Wednesday, Friday, or Sunday?
5. This is an unusual paragraph. I’m curious as to just how quickly you can find out what is so unusual about it. It looks so ordinary and plain that you would think nothing was wrong with it. In fact, nothing is wrong with it! It is highly unusual though. Study it and think about it, but you still may not find anything odd. But if you work at it a bit, you might find out. Try to do so without any coaching!
Answers:
1. The third room. Lions that haven’t eaten in three years are dead. That one was easy, right?
2. The woman was a photographer. She shot a picture of her husband, developed it, and hung it up to dry (shot; held under water; and hung).
3. Charcoal, as it is used in barbecuing.
4. Sure you can name three consecutive days: yesterday, today, and tomorrow!
5. The letter “e” which is the most common letter used in the English language, does not appear even once in the paragraph.
How did you do?
🛐 Almost everyone knows “Jesus Loves the Little Children,” but few of us have sung the three verses that go along with that chorus. Nor do many people realize this was originally a Civil War ballad.
George Frederick Root was born into a large family in Sheffield, Massachusetts, in 1820, and showed signs of musical genius. By age thirteen, he boasted that he could play thirteen different instruments. As a young adult, he taught music in Boston and New York, and he also composed music and served as church organist.
In 1855, he offered a song called “Rosalie, the Prairie Flower” to his publisher for the hefty sum of one hundred dollars. Root’s publisher, not thinking it worth that much, offered Root a royalty plan instead. In time, Root grossed thousands of dollars from “Rosalie,” which helped establish him financially.
The outbreak of the Civil War deeply affected Root, and he immediately began using his gifts to advance the Union war effort, writing a host of patriotic songs to rally the moral of the North. As a serious, classical composer, he was embarrassed at the simple martial music coming from his pen, so he signed them with the name Wurzel, the German word for “root.” Among his most popular pieces was a ballad entitled “Tramp! Tramp! Tramp!”
In the prison cell I sit,
Thinking, mother, dear of you,
And our bright and happy home so far may,
And the tears, they fill my eyes,
’Spite of all that I can do,
Tho ’ I try to cheer my comrades and be gay.
Chorus:
Tramp! Tramp! Tramp!
The boys are marching,
Cheer up, comrades, they will come,
And beneath the starry flag
We shall breathe the air again
Of the free land in our own beloved home.
After the Civil War, the melody remained popular, but the words were dated. A minister named Clare Herbert Woolston, a lyricist whom Root occasionally used, wrote new verses and a chorus. And that’s how a Civil War ballad about a soldier in prison became one of the most popular children’s choruses in history.
Here is the complete version of “Jesus Loves the Little Children,” performed by the Gary Chapman family.
-30-
No comments:
Post a Comment