Disguising the real issue, etc.

August 19, 1902: Poet Ogden Nash was born. Here's a verse:

They take a paper and they read the headlines,
So they've heard of unemployment and they've heard of breadlines,
And they philanthropically cure them all
By getting up a costume charity ball.



August 20, 1980: The first solo ascent of Mt. Everest was made on this date.

"Keep you down, and have breakfast while the asinine hunters after the picturesque go braying up the hill." -- Willam Makepeace Thackeray.



August 21, 1878: The American Bar Association was formed.

"Lawyers are the only persons in whom ignorance of the law is not punished." -- Jeremy Bentham.

I'm sticking my neck out--it's a great game!

Anniversary of first publicly played basketball game, in 1892.

"Nothing here but basketball, a game which won't be fit for people until they set the basket umbilicus-high and return the giraffes to the zoo." -- Ogden Nash.

Birthday of the Month

Alexander Graham Bell, born March 3, 1847. Bell patented the telephone on March 7, 1876.

"O misery, misery, mumble and moan!
Someone invented the telephone,
And interrupted a nation's slumbers,
Ringing wrong but similar numbers."
-- Ogden Nash.