Pluto, Pluto, wherefore art thou, Pluto?

The eight planets of our solar system, this week at least, in no particular order, are:

1. Jupiter, (n.), the planet fifth in order from the sun, having an equatorial diameter of 88,729 mi. (142,796 km), a mean distance from the sun of 483.6 million mi. (778.3 million km), a period of revolution of 11.86 years, and at least 14 moons. It is the largest planet.

2. Mercury, (n.), the planet nearest the sun, having a diameter of 3031 mi. (4878 km), a mean distance from the sun of 36 million mi. (57.9 million km), and a period of revolution of 87.96 days, and having no satellites: the smallest planet in the solar system.

3. Neptune, (n.), the planet eighth in order from the sun, having an equatorial diameter of 30,200 mi. (48,600 km), a mean distance from the sun of 2794.4 million mi. (4497.1 million km), a period of revolution of 164.81 years, and two moons.

4. Saturn, (n.), the planet sixth in order from the sun, having an equatorial diameter of 74,600 mi. (120,000 km), a mean distance from the sun of 886.7 million mi. (1427 million km), a period of revolution of 29.46 years, and 21 known moons. It is the second largest planet.

5. Uranus, (n.), the planet seventh in order from the sun, having an equatorial diameter of 32,600 miles (56,460 km), a mean distance from the sun of 1,784 million miles (2,871 million km), a period of revolution of 84.07 years, and 15 moons.

6. Venus, (n.), the planet second in order from the sun, having an equatorial diameter of 7521 miles (12,104 km), a mean distance from the sun of 67.2 million miles (108.2 million km), a period of revolution of 224.68 days, and no moons. It is the most brilliant planet.

7. Mars, (n.), the planet fourth in order from the sun, having a diameter of 4222 miles (6794 km), a mean distance from the sun of 141.6 million miles (227.9 million km), a period of revolution of 686.95 days, and two moons.

8. Earth, (n.), our home, the third planet from the sun.

What happened to poor old Pluto shouldn’t happen to a dog (7:55).

The budding meteorologists were obviously Too Busy Looking Out The Window at clouds to pay Attention the day capitalization was Covered In Grammar Class.

The following showed up in my e-mail this morning and I felt transported back Into The Eighteenth Century:

The National Weather Service in peachtree city has issued a Flood watch for portions of north central Georgia, Northeast Georgia and northwest Georgia. From Wednesday morning through Thursday afternoon Showers and a few thunderstorms with moderate to heavy rainfall are expected too move into northwest Georgia early Wednesday morning in association with a strong upper-level system. Moderate to heavy rain will then spread across the remainder of north Georgia during the day Wednesday. Rainfall totals will average 2 to 3 inches across north Georgia, With Locally Higher amounts possible.

The soil across north Georgia is saturated from recent rainfall. The additional expected rainfall will result in considerable runoff into area rivers, Creeks, And Streams. Several creeks, Especially In Northwest Georgia, Are Already At bankfull or in minor flood. Many of these same creeks and streams, As Well As additional ones, Will Likely Reach or exceed flood stage Wednesday through early Thursday.

Precautionary/preparedness actions, A flood watch means there is a potential for flooding based on current forecast. You should monitor later forecasts and be alert for possible flood warnings. Those living in areas prone to flooding should be prepared to take action should flooding develop.

Ye All have been Duly Warned. I remain

Yr obdt svt,
rhymeswithplague

I can't help it; I was raised in Texas.

One hundred seventy-five years ago today, this place became hallowed ground:

(Copyrighted photo by Daniel Schwen)

You can read all about it -- probably more than you care to -- here.

And if you do, you will know who this woman is:

E-mail of the month and perhaps of the year

I tried very hard not to forward the following e-mail, but because it helped my perspective and made me feel much better I thought perhaps it would do as much for you. It’s tough, but we all need to do our part.


BUDGET CUTTING REQUIRES REAL SACRIFICE

The President recently ordered his cabinet to cut the $3.5 trillion federal budget by a whopping one hundred million dollars.

I was so impressed by this sacrifice that I decided to do the same thing with my personal budget. I spend about $4,000 a month on housing, groceries, medicine, utility bills, clothing, entertainment, and so forth, and now it’s time to get out my own budget cutting axe, go line by line through my expenses, and get to work.

I decided to cut my spending at exactly the same ratio the President did, a whole 1/35,000th of my total budget. After doing the math, it looks like instead of spending $4,000 a month, I’m going to have to move that number downward by eleven cents!

Yes, I know that’s a lot. Somehow I must get by with only $3,999.89, but that is what sacrifice is all about.

The President has requested that we get some of our own “skin in the game” with everyone else. So we’ll just have to do without some things that, quite frankly, are luxuries those eleven cents normally buy us.

From now on, I will be putting a little less lemon in my iced tea!

I hope this helps brighten your day and gives you a little better understanding of just how serious our President really is.
....................................................................

My swimming horse needs a paraffin ski lamp.

That’s what reader Yorkshire Pudding, late of Sheffield, Yorkshire, England, and currently teaching school in Thailand, thinks the title of my last post (aByde SnOik huvEo tpot voXuw) might mean in Latvian.

Pat, a reader in Arkansas, said it reminded her a bit of the code used in Dr. Hudson’s Secret Journal by Lloyd C. Douglas.

Both guesses are imaginative and, as luck would have it, both are 100% wrong.

It can now be revealed -- cue the trumpets for ruffles and flourishes, please -- that aByde SnOik huvEo tpot voXuw is the closest you can come to duplicating the beautiful dips and swirls of the lowercase letters of the Greek alphabet using only your computer’s regular QWERTY keyboard.

Here’s proof:

Didn’t I tell you it would be obvious?

In other news, CCCP refers to the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR), as an English-letter imitation of the Cyrillic Russian initialism СССР [SSSR], which stands for Союз Советских Социалистических Республик [Soyuz Sovyetskikh Sotsialisticheskikh Respublik].

The very sharp-eyed and retentive among you (I do not say anal) will now be able to determine correctly that Soyuz, the name Russians have given to many of their spacecraft, means Union.

No matter how thin you slice it, though, it’s all Greek to me.

I believe that is what is called a mixed metaphor.

Should auld acquaintance be forgot that not be enough trivia for you for one day, keep reading.

Duncan Renaldo was the actor who played the Cisco Kid many moons ago in several western movies and an American television series called, oddly enough, The Cisco Kid. Duncan Renaldo was only his stage name. His real name was (wait for it) Renaldo Duncan. The part of Pancho was played by Leo Carillo, who was seven-eighths carillon.

On a closing note (pardon the pun), if you can listen to all nine minutes and four seconds of this carillon recital without your eyes rolling back in your head, both you and your swimming horse will definitely need a paraffin ski lamp.

Oh, Cisco! Oh, Pancho!

aByde SnOik huvEo tpot voXuw

Anybody care to hazard a guess what this post’s title is all about?

Hint: It is not a coded message from my follower bARE-eYED-sUN, nor is it a meaningless collection of orthographical flotsam and jetsam. It is quite uncharitable of you even to suggest it.

When I tell you (in my next post), it will seem so obvious.

P.S. - This, my 700th post, is fairly representative, I think. All of my previous posts are at least as lucid, relevant, and enlightening as this one, not to mention entertaining as all get out.

Where did everybody go?

I’m disappointed that no one chose to play my little game. Me, I thought it was fascinating. Here are the actual names of the 29 towns:

1. Ball Ground*
2. Blue Ridge*
3. Cave Spring*
4. Locust Grove*
5. Sunny Side
6. College Park*
7. Dock Junction
8. Druid Hills*
9. Five Forks
10. Flowery Branch*
11. Lookout Mountain*
12. Mineral Bluff*
13. Powder Springs*
14. Pine Mountain*
15. Rocky Face*
16. Radium Springs
17. Sandy Springs*
18. Sea Island
19. Social Circle
20. Stone Mountain*
21. Sugar Hill*
22. Sugar Valley
23. Tallulah Falls*
24. The Rock
25. Tunnel Hill*
26. Twin Lakes*
27. Ty Ty
28. Villa Rica*
29. Young Harris*

And if you visit every last one of them, there’s still Fairplay and Hopeful* and Constitution and Hephzibah and Beulah and Talking Rock* and Between* and Washington and Jefferson and Monticello and Climax* and Needmore and even Stillmore left to visit.

I have placed an asterisk next to places I have visited.