While the FM-switches and the green-light digits keep in touch with the world outside

[venta]

Well, I promised trivia from The Calendar, and here's the first bit. It's not relevant to anything but it interested me.

Schott's Calendar seems to provide a random burst of information each day, coupled with a note of something completely unconnected which happened on this day in another year. Today it offers me a list of 70s Christmas number ones, and tells me that the first international distress call (CQD) was established in 1904 on Jan 7th.

I'd never heard of CQD before, but found this page on Wikipedia about it. It suggests CQD stood for nothing, but was developed from the radio operators' habit of using CQ to mean "seek you" - so CQD was "Seek You, Danger". Nice to see that applications like ICQ are still sticking to century-old traditions.

My only gripe so far with this calendar is that it doesn't have the day of the week on it, thus leaving me permanently slightly unsure whether I've ripped off the correct number of days, and whether it really is the 7th of January today. The daily trivia is otherwise delightful - and there's something very debonaire about writing one's shopping list on the back of a page listing the horsemen of the Apocalypse.

Comments

[broadmeadow.livejournal.com]

1970: I Hear You Knocking - Dave Edmunds
1971: Ernie - Benny Hill
1972: Long Haired Lover From Liverpool - Little Jimmy Osmond
1973: Merry Xmas Everybody - Slade
1974: Lonely This Christmas - Mud
1975: Bohemian Rhapsody - Queen
1976: When A Child Is Born - Johnny Matthis
1977: Mull Of Kintyre - Wings
1978: Mary's Boy Child - Boney M
1979: Another Brick In The Wall - Pink Floyd

[venta.livejournal.com]

Er... yes.
You know how I just said I had a list of Christmas number ones for the 70s ? I'm not sure why you think I need a second one ;)

[broadmeadow.livejournal.com]

For the benefit of your readers who might have been interested. As I was.

[broadmeadow.livejournal.com]

Here's some more (are these on your calendar for tomorrow?)

1980: There's No One Quite Like Grandma - St Winnifred's School Choir
1981: Don't You Want Me? - Human League
1982: Save Your Love - Renee and Renato
1983: Only You - Flying Pickets
1984: Do They Know It's Christmas - Band Aid
1985: Merry Christmas Everyone - Shakin' Stevens
1986: Reet Petite - Jackie Wilson
1987: Always On My Mind - Pet Shop Boys
1988: Mistletoe and Wine - Cliff Richard
1989: Do They Know It's Christmas - Band Aid II
1990: Saviour's Day - Cliff Richard
1991: Bohemian Rhapsondy / These Are The Days Of Our Lives - Queen
1992: I Will Always Love You - Whitney Houston
1993: Mr Blobby - Mr Blobby
1994: Stay Another Day - East 17
1995: Earth Song - Michael Jackson
1996: 2 Become 1 - Spice Girls
1997: Too Much - Spice Girls
1998: Goodbye - Spice Girls
1999: I Have A Dream / Seasons In The Sun - Westlife

1990's pop. <Shudder>

[venta.livejournal.com]

(are these on your calendar for tomorrow?)

I don't know. I doubt it.
Looking ahead in calendars, however, is Just Very Wrong.

[http://users.livejournal.com/_corpse_/]

this calendar is that it doesn't have the day of the week on it, thus leaving me permanently slightly unsure whether I've ripped off the correct number of days

Then you need to upgrade to the C&T Calendar and you'll never suffer that problem again.

2006 January 1 Sunday is the target date for its universal adoption. I hope the rest of the universe knows.

[venta.livejournal.com]

... and then instead of being confused about what day it is, I can get confused about whether it's a Newton year or not. "There is no "rule" similar to the current leapyear rule." Pah. Could do better.

And regardless of the ISO Standard, I resolutely refuse to use middle-endian dates. It's silly.

[lanfykins.livejournal.com]

In what sense are the dates middle-endian?

2003-01-02 meaning 2nd January 2003 progresses neatly from the macro to the micro minutae (or do I mean dayae?).

[lanfykins.livejournal.com]

Hmm. Your calendar has no day of the week on it. Mine has no space to write stuff. Maybe if we somehow synthesised the two...

[venta.livejournal.com]

You should swap calendars with triskellian, you know (http://www.livejournal.com/users/triskellian/118835.html).

[triskellian]

Y'know, I almost bought the origami calendar, but was put off, as with pretty much all other desk calendars, by the fact that it only tells you what today's date is. I didn't particularly want a calendar with space for writing stuff in it, it's just a side effect of a calendar that tells me what all the dates this month are.

Anyway, given that I've already started writing stuff in it, and from the sounds of it, so has lanfykins, I'm pretty sure the suggestion's a bad one, cos I don't want to find myself accidentally going to Cam events, and I doubt she wants to accidentally go to my work meetings ;-)

Anyway - hands off my Emily! She's sweet and I'm not letting anyone take her!

[lathany.livejournal.com]

there's something very debonaire about writing one's shopping list on the back of a page listing the horsemen of the Apocalypse.

Are there four or has Pratchett had a hand in it?

[venta.livejournal.com]

Just the four :)

[zotz]

Death, Taxes, Boredom and Flatulence, or the more traditional ones?

[sushidog.livejournal.com]

If your calender has no days of the week, you should keep the torn-off pages and re-use it next year!

[venta.livejournal.com]

I could, but it conflicts with my current recycling scheme of choice, which is writing people notes/shopping lists/messages to myself on the back of the pages!

[venta.livejournal.com]

In fact, I've just noticed that the box doesn't specify which year the calendar is for - so presumably your supposition that it's year-agnostic is correct.

Today in Survival History

[wimble.livejournal.com]

The first sucessful crossing of the English Channel by air occurred on this day in 1785. An American, John Jeffries, and a Frenchman, Jean Pierre Blanchard, crossed from Dover, England to Calias, France in a gas balloon. Their flight came only 14 months after the first manned hot air ballon flight had taken place and only a few days after two men had died attempting the Channel crossing. Minutes before reaching the French coast, Jeffries and Blanchard were force to throw almost everything they had out of the balloon as it began to crash toward the earth. Jeffries went so far as to throw his pants overboard to avoid crashing.

(Guess which calendar I got for Christmas)

Maybe there ought to be an LJ community where you can read the page for every desk calendar! That way you'd always have something interesting to read, and wouldn't have to start work until about 3pm!

(Pity about the copyright issues!)

Re: Today in Survival History

[lanfykins.livejournal.com]

Setting up said community suddenly becomes tempting.

Re: Today in Survival History

[venta.livejournal.com]

Sssh! No!
If everybody can read Schott's calendar on line, then that's the mainstay of my day's conversation gone.

Re: Today in Survival History

[onebyone.livejournal.com]

Or one RSS feed per calendar. Guess who installed Thunderbird yesterday?

[snow-leopard.livejournal.com]

If its any help I can offer you a free tells-you-what-day-it-is-but-not-that-interesting calendar to use in conjunction with your very-interesting-but-rather-less-useful calendar.

Thanks :)

[venta.livejournal.com]

Actually, I've just remembered that my watch tells me both the date (7th) and the day (Friday), so some sort of simple visual number matching between watch and calendar will probably do the trick.

Your challenge is to find an interesting piece of trivia and write it on your calendar each day :) Ar invite your colleagues to draw cartoons on it in crayon. Whole minutes of amusement!

I know it's taken me seven hours, but...

[lanfykins.livejournal.com]

Isn't 'debonaire' traditionally spelt without the second 'e'?

Re: I know it's taken me seven hours, but...

[venta.livejournal.com]

I believe either is acceptable (or so dictionary.com says). I looked it up because I had to check how many 'n's it had in it.