•    Musings and History

    Quote of the day:
    “It hurts to love someone and not be loved in return, but the hurt is much worse when you love someone and do not have the courage to tell them how you feel.”
                                                      Charles Swindoll

    Back in 2007 an illegal immigrant named Alejandro Umana wanted to make an impression to the notorious Mexican street gang MS-13. He chose to walk into a restaurant in Greensboro, NC and gunned down two brothers for no other reason than to make an impression. After that he threatened many of the witnesses to try and stop them from cooperating with the investigation, he tried to extort money from a local drug lord for MS-13. Later on his trial was completed and he was sentenced to death. Yes indeed, we really want those illegal Latino immigrants living with us. 

    A while back up in Gaston County, North Carolina 28 year old Howard Pouser drifted to the opposite side of the road and slammed head on into an ’89 Oldsmobile. He went far enough over that he struck the passenger side of the Olds which was the heaviest. Recent high school graduate 17 year old Laura Fortenberry was riding in the passenger seat and was killed instantly. Here is the bad part. Howard had been convicted of three other DWI’s in addition to several other crimes. The law enforcement officials sent Howard to the hospital for a minor injury and he was released afterward. Howard went home, crawled into bed and went to sleep, for crying out loud. The cops came and woke him up and got a blood sample for DWI reasons. He was arrested and his bond is $2 million. How could this jackass be still be on the streets? He had better take a good look at the sun because it may be the last he will see of it for years to come.

                      This Date in History   July 29

    1588 A few years earlier Queen Elizabeth I of England had sent her most able sea captain in Sir Francis Drake out to harass Spain, England’s worst enemy at the time. Drake did not disappoint. He caught the Spanish fleet at anchor in Cadiz, Spain and sent in ships that were on fire into the fleet and bombarded them with long range artillery. This attack delayed by one year King Phillip of Spain’s attempt at the control of the English Channel and therefore controlling England’s commerce. Drake’s attack also alerted England to Spain’s intentions. Queen Elizabeth had sent monetary aid and supplies to some of the Dutch colonies that were rebelling against Spain’s attempt to occupy those lands. Eventually, King Phillip of Spain got his fleet together to the tune of 130 ships containing 8,000 guns manned by 2,000 sailors and 20,000 infantry. This fleet was known as the “Great Armada” but later it was known as the Spanish Armada. The fleet left Spain headed for the English Channel in a line of ships eight miles long. The delay had allowed the English fleet almost a year to prepare and when the Spanish Armada arrived in the English Channel the English were ready. The English ships were not a fast as the Spanish ships but they were a lot more rugged, especially in rough seas, and had cannon with a lot longer range. As you might suspect, the English ships stood off out of range of the Spanish ships and bombarded the hell out them. Then the worst possible thing happened for the Spanish Armada. A typical English Channel storm arrived unexpectedly and the mighty Spanish Armada was forced to seek shelter in a small bay near Calais, France where they anchored down to ride out the storm. The English fleet, Sir Charles Howard and Sir Francis Drake commanding, waited until the storm abated and on this date they sealed off the mouth of the bay the Spanish Fleet had occupied and again bombarded the hell out of them and sent in, you guessed it, fire ships meant to set fire to the Armada. After that it was every Spanish ship for himself and the ships left that bay the best way they could. Most of the ships did escape from the bay but they were not in formation and disorganized, the English were waiting and picked them off one by one. Not only that the wind shifted and the Spanish Fleet had no chance to sail back to Spain and many of them crashed on the shores of Scotland and Ireland with the English fleet in hot pursuit. The English fleet turned back at the north end of Scotland. Finally, the survivors of the “Great Armada” arrived back in Spain less than half strength. This is one of the most important military events in history in stopping Spain from invading England.

    1981 On this date the heir apparent to the English throne Prince Charles, the oldest son of Queen Elizabeth II, and Diana Spencer are married in St. Paul’s Cathedral in London (been there). Nearly one billion, I said one billion, people watched that wedding from 74 countries on TV. Since Diana was of a royal descent she automatically became Princess Diana. There were 2,650 guests at the wedding. The “happy” couple was blessed with a son about a year later when Prince William was born and in 1984 Prince Harry was born. It was soon thereafter that a rift appeared between the two and the English press got scent of it. They announced formal separation in 1992 but in reality they had been apart longer than that. They continued to carry out their royal duties until August of 1996 when a divorce was granted. The only thing Diana had to give up was the title of “Her Royal Highness” and Charles gained his mistress of many years, Camilla Bowles. We all know what happened to Princess Di but Prince Charles chose to marry Camilla. How he could ever arrive at this decision is beyond me. When I was in London in ’04 I went on a bus tour of that great city. Our tour guide was aflame but he was a funny guy. He said that on one occasion Prince Charles was driving into Buckingham Palace with a couple of his friends and ran over one of Queen Elizabeth’s prize Corgi dogs. He got out and found that the Corgi had been crushed top to bottom. His friends persuade him just to bury the dog and pretend that he did not know what happened to it. So he started digging a hole and hit something metallic and it is a brass lamp. Charles began rubbing and a Genie popped out. The Genie offered Charles one wish and he asked if the Genie can bring the dog back to life. The Genie says, “Hand me the dog” and he looks the dog over and says “I can’t do anything with this, the dog is crushed from one end to the other, but you still have a wish. So Charles said, “Can you make Camilla any prettier?” There was a long pause and the Genie says “Let me see the dog again.” By the way, our tour of London included a visit to St. Paul’s. What a stunning sight it is. Many, many of England’s greatest heroes are buried in the cemetery including Lord Wellington and Lord Nelson. The dome of St. Peters was designed by the famous architect Sir Christopher Wren in the late 1600’s. The dome has structural members that meet at the top and there is nothing underneath. Sir Wren designed a chain that was attached to all the members at the bottom which prevented them from spreading apart. As far as I know, that chain is still there. Wren was a pretty smart guy.

    1945 On this date the battleship USS Indianapolis is enroute from Tinian to the Philippines after delivering the final part of the Hiroshima bomb. A Japanese submarine spots the Indy and put two torpedoes in the side of this great ship. The shots are fatal and the Indy goes down fairly quickly but most of the crew of 800 escaped into the sea. But there are not enough life rafts to get everybody aboard so they rotate hanging on the sides and sitting inside. There were 134 survivors to this tragedy. The sharks fed on those hanging on the side.

                      Thanks for listening     I can hardly wait until tomorrow