(Photo by Scott Liddell) (Editor's note: We originally ran this piece in 2006, but we felt its message about the holiday was as relevant now as it was then. Please enjoy it and thank you.) In anticipation of this year's commotion, we had planned to focus our Thanksgiving edition of The Spark on ways to beat holiday stress. But as I sat down to write, I couldn't stop thinking about what's missing this holiday. This will be my 14th Thanksgiving without my mother, who died of cancer when I was 14 years old. The loss caught up with me this year, and I joined a local grief group. Today, I'm thankful for the strong strangers I met there: a homeless woman mourning the loss of her son while trying to remain together with her husband in a transitional home; a woman who lost her stepfather only three weeks before is finally beginning to grieve for the little brother she'd lost nearly a decade ago; a man who shyly admitted that he sprays his wife's perfume in the bedroom every so often after recently losing her. Most of us will experience holidays of missing at some point in our lives. While I thank my group for sharing their stories and their strength, I have some colleagues to thank as well. One editor cherishes her Yahoo! Messenger conversations with her husband in Iraq. They turn on their web cams so they can see each other. And their daughter leaves palmprints on the monitor after touching the image of her dad's face. Another editor is afraid he can't carve the turkey like his dad used to. But as he shares his father's Thanksgiving traditions with his young daughters, he is sure they will learn all the great things about Grandpa... Through our memories and the stories we share, our loved ones can live on, during the holidays and beyond them. Thank you for reading. Happy Thanksgiving. Suggested Sites... How to Remember a Loved One at the Holidays - listen to their favorite music. Light a candle. Plant a tree, or establish a scholarship. How to Cope With Grief During the Holidays - ways to cope with loss of a loved one the holiday season.

Directory categories: Bereavement, Grief Groups, Thanksgiving Graces and Blessings, Thanksgiving, Holiday Stress

Archived under: Bereavement, Death, Health, Holidays, Mental Health, Thanksgiving

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The Milestone Mo-Tel today. Winners get one free night. Losers get two. (That's the second time we've used that joke today.) If the whole world loves a winner, we have a weekend full of love ahead of us. Let's get started! The most obvious winners will be declared Thursday when either Clint Robertson or Brandy Kuentzel wins the right to become Donald Trump's latest Apprentice for one year. (We hope that the loser isn't stuck for two years ...) One of the three remaining teams on "The Amazing Race" will win a million smackers on Sunday. (Perhaps eating that sheep's head may have been worth it.) It's almost guaranteed that none of these winners will make Barbara Walters' list of the year's "Most Fascinating People," (most fascinating to her, anyway ...) but we’ll find out for sure Thursday. (Our guess for #1 on her list? The cameraman who smears the Vaseline all over the lens that photographs her.) And on Friday, they'll be handing out the Nobel Prizes. The Nobels aren't like the Oscars; everyone already knows who won and the winners have actually accomplished something that matters, rather than playing loveable oddballs. Saturday we'll see some sports winners. In the afternoon, someone (Cam Newton? Andrew Luck? LaMichael James?) will win the Heisman Trophy as the nation's finest college football player, and in the evening, either Georges St-Pierre or Josh Koscheck will take the welterweight championship at UFC 124 in Montreal. We assume the combatants will not resort to wheeling around the ring in roller skates, but while it would be appropriate (given that Thursday marks the anniversary of their 1884 patent), we'd have to warn them that such a thing would be just plain dangerous.) Sunday also marks the 10th anniversary of the U.S. Supreme Court's ruling in Bush v. Gore, which ensured that George W. Bush became the nation's 43rd president. Whether that made the country a winner or a loser, we'll leave up to you. Falling into a similar category is Larry King's retirement from his CNN talk show on Friday. (As with President Bush, we won't say whether that's a plus or a minus.) Weary travelers were winners 85 years ago Sunday, when the Milestone Mo-Tel, the world's first motel (short for "motor hotel"), opened in San Luis Obispo, California. If we stretch the definition of "winner" to include those whose birthdays fall this weekend, then we're lousy with winners. For example, Thursday sees the birthdays of both Margaret Hamilton (1902) and Redd Foxx (1922). Hamilton is best known for her role as the Wicked Witch of the West in the 1939 classic, "The Wizard of Oz." Despite her indelible portrayal of one of the screen's great villains, Hamilton loved children and was a lifelong advocate for charities that benefitted kids and animals. Foxx was someone whose work, on the other hand, was decidedly not for kids. A veteran of the black vaudeville entertainment venues known as the "Chitlin' Circuit," Foxx recorded a series of "party records" in the 1950s that were both filthy and hilarious. He reached a mainstream fame in the '70s when he starred in "Sanford and Son," where his frequent feigned heart attacks were one of the show's running gags. In a supreme irony, he suffered an actual heart attack while rehearsing for another television show, but no one believed was it real until it was too late. Sunday would have been the 95th birthday of Frank Sinatra. The greatest popular singer of the 20th century, Sinatra was also an Oscar-winning actor, starred in numerous TV specials that consisted of nothing but him singing with his guests, and was the biggest attraction in Las Vegas when that title actually meant something. Monday, we celebrate the 192nd birthday of Mary Todd Lincoln, wife of Abraham Lincoln who was criticized in her time for her extravagant and spendthrift ways, and committed to a psychiatric hospital by her son Robert. While she was undoubtedly depressed, wouldn't any woman who’d lived through the death of three sons and the murder of her husband (while sitting next to him) feel the same? She was eventually declared competent and released, but her health was broken, and she died three years later. If birthday celebrants are winners, so too are those is show business who meet success, like performers and lovers of country music, who can celebrate the 83rd anniversary of the first broadcast of the Grand Ole Opry on Friday. The Opry has been a staple of radio and television in the decades since it debuted, highlighting the best in country, from Hank Williams and Minnie Pearl to Clint Black and Carrie Underwood. Someone who's appeared at the Opry (but has yet to be inducted into its member ranks) is Taylor Swift. Perhaps the Opry has been waiting for her to turn 21 - in which case, it need wait no longer! The Grammy-winning singer reaches her majority on Monday. Thursday will see the annual airing of the Rankin-Bass animated Christmas special, "The Year without a Santa Claus," which features memorable turns by Snow Miser and Heat Miser (who are also not members of the Opry). Friday is also the 55th anniversary of the "Mighty Mouse Playhouse's" television premiere. In TV's early days, broadcasters were desperate for material to air, so old movies and cartoons were natural fodder, and Paul Terry's "Mighty Mouse" cartoons were some of the oddest programs to come to the screen. Mini operatic melodramas, they featured the eponymous rodent singing his was through battles with the villainous Oil Can Harry. Mighty made a brief comeback in the 80s in a brilliant TV series produced by Ralph Bakshi, but he's been in retirement since self-appointed censor Donald Wildmon mistook the mouse's flower sniffing for drug use. (No, really.) Wildmon isn't the only well-intentioned, if-misguided, protector we mention, though, since Thursday is the anniversary of the founding of the John Birch Society, which has been protecting Americans from the Communists lurking under their beds for 52 years. Legitimate do-gooders have something to celebrate this weekend, too. Thursday is the U.N's annual International Anti-Corruption Day, dedicated to wiping out, well, corruption and promoting the rule of law, and Friday is both Human Rights Day and the beginning of Human Rights Week. We end by noting a delightful juxtaposition on Thursday. December 9, 1792, saw the first cremation in America, when statesman Henry Laurens died at his plantation in Charleston, South Carolina, and per his will, his body was burned. On the same date in 1886, Clarence Birdseye, inventor of frozen food was born. We're reminded of the choice Curly Howard was given in a Three Stooges short: to be burned at the stake or to have his head cut off. He opted for the former, on the reasoning that a hot stake's better than a cold chop. Good night! Suggested Sites... NBC: The Apprentice - Trump's hair; you're fired! CBS: The Amazing Race - who will be eliminated -- next? UFC 124 - they're at it yet again. The Very First Motel - the story of the Milestone. Sinatra.com - the Chairman of the Board.

Directory categories: Reality TV, College Football, Al gore, Hotels and Motels, Country Musicians

Archived under: 18th Century, 1900s, 1910s, 1920s, 1930s, 1950s, 1980s, 19th Century, Abraham Lincoln, Actors, Advertising, American History, Animation, Anniversaries, Athletes, Awards, Biographies, Birthdays, Black History, Buildings, California, Cartoons, Celebrations, Celebrities, Censorship, Children´s TV, Christmas, Coincidence, College Football, College Sports, Comedians, Communism, Communists, Country Music, Dead Celebrities, Death, Depression, Elections, Entertainment, Events, First Ladies, Food and Drink, Football, Frank Sinatra, George Bush, Government, Health, History, Holidays, Human Rights, Humor, In Character, Invention, Inventors, Issues and Causes, Journalism, Journalists, Law, Legal Cases, Media, Men, Movie History, Movies, Music, News, Nobel Prize, Nostalgia, Politics, Presidential Candidates, Presidents, Radio, Reality TV, Recreation and Travel, Reporters, Roadside Attractions, Singers, Sports, Supreme Court, TV, Talk Show Hosts, The Three Stooges, The Wizard of Oz, Tourist Attractions, Travel, U.S. Elections, UFC, United Nations, United States, Vaudeville, Villains, Vintage, Witches, Women, Wrestlers, Wrestling

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Kirk Douglas in 1956. The dimple in his chin is so deep it has its own gift shop. Don't they say that doing what you love keeps you young? If they don't, they ought to, as the lives of some of the celebrities we note this week stand as living proof of the connection between doing what you do and a long lifespan. We'll start with the "babies" of the group, Christopher Plummer and Dick Van Dyke, who turn 81 and 85 respectively on Friday. Plummer and Van Dyke have pretty much done it all in their time, from dramas to farces to musicals Plummer's classical theatre chops are a little more developed, but Van Dyke's sitcom of the 1960s is still recognized as one of the finest and most influential ever, so we'll call it a draw. Next on our list is spring chicken Eli Wallach, who turns 95 on Tuesday. Wallach began his acting career in the 1950s, with a series of performances out of the Method school of acting that so pervaded that decade. The "Method" (which has been over-hyped and misunderstood almost from the beginning) was a school of acting that emphasized personalized and naturalistic behavior on stage and screen, breaking away from the more florid or theatrical styles that had been the norm. Its foremost proponents were actors like Wallach, Marlon Brando, and James Dean, but a modified version of it is still seen in the performances of Robert De Niro, Dustin Hoffman, and Al Pacino. Getting back to our birthday boy, Wallach is still working, having acted in two movies this year, with (his health permitting) more on the way. The champ, though, is Kirk Douglas, who turns 96 on Thursday. Douglas hit the screen like a thunderbolt in the late 1940s, and for the next 50 years, turned in a series of dynamic and artful performances that have few rivals for energy and power. He's also been outspoken in his politics, breaking Hollywood's blacklist by employing writers who went unhired because of their politics. The stroke he suffered in 1996 has impaired his ability to speak, but he continues to work, and as recently as 2009 appeared in an autobiographical one-man show. Those aren’t the only events of note, of course. Why, Tuesday alone brings us the announcement of Sports Illustrated's Sportsman of the Year (it's New Orleans Saints quarterback Drew Brees), the lighting of the U.S. Capitol's Christmas tree (the White House gets its turn on Thursday, the day after President Obama appears on "MythBusters"), the Luxury Travel Expo in Las Vegas (for those of you who have so much extra money you can't help but spend it on travel), and National Cotton Candy Day. Wednesday is chock-a-block with events, too, particularly with birthdays of artists and humorists. In the former category, we have Diego Rivera (1886), the Mexican painter whose intricate and detailed murals were loaded with historical and political commentary. In the latter, we have two men whose work spans both categories and who were born on the same day in 1894. First, we have James Thurber, whose art defined the cartooning style of "The New Yorker," and whose short stories, including "The Catbird Seat" and "The Secret Life of Walter Mitty" remain as perceptive and witty as when they were written. 1894's other multi-talented contribution is Elzie Segar, the cartoonist who created Popeye the Sailor. Segar created a unique world of comic adventures and characters that has rarely been equaled. Since his death in 1938, numerous ghosts have tried to keep the wackiness of his comic strip alive, but none have succeeded in finding his balance of thrills and laughs. We close by remembering two tragedies, one markedly larger than the other. Wednesday is the 30th anniversary of the murder of John Lennon in front of New York's Dakota Apartments. Lennon was only 40 years old, and was just resuming his music career when he was struck down, forever robbing the world of his humor and songs. The larger commemoration, is the anniversary of the December 7, 1941, bombing of the Pearl Harbor naval base in Hawaii, an even which brought the United States into World War II. The sneak attack by the Japanese cost the U.S. more than a dozen ships and 2,042 lives. When President Franklin D. Roosevelt addressed Congress the next morning, he called it "a date which will live in infamy," and it remains a date whose memory still resonates today. Suggested Sites... Dick Van Dyke: Step in Time! - information about Van Dyke's "musical memoir." The Death of Method Acting - film critic David Thomson provides the post-mortem. Diego Rivera Web Museum - dedicated to the painter and muralist. Thurber House - the writer's boyhood home in Columbus, OH is now a museum. John Lennon.com - we still remember.

Directory categories: Acting, Classic Hollywood Movies, Hollywood Blacklist, Cartoonists, The Beatles

Archived under: 1910s, 1920s, 1940s, 1950s, 1980s, 19th Century, Actors, Aging, American History, Anniversaries, Artists, Arts, Assassinations, Assassins, Athletes, Authors, Awards, Barack Obama, Bereavement, Biographies, Birthdays, CIA, Canada, Candy, Cartoonists, Cartoons, Celebrations, Celebrities, Censorship, Christmas, Coincidence, Comic Strips, Crime, Criminals, Dead Celebrities, Death, Entertainment, Events, Fiction, Food and Drink, Football, Franklin D. Roosevelt, Government, History, Holidays, Hollywood, Humor, In Character, James Dean, John Lennon, Las Vegas, Magazines, Men, Mexico, Military, Movie History, Movies, Murder, Music, Music History, Musicians, NFL, New York, Nostalgia, Performing Arts, Popeye, Presidents, Sports, TV, The Beatles, The New Yorker, United States, WWII, War, Writers, Writing

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All right; so those weren't Oscar Wilde's last words - but they should have been We'll start the day by mentioning three of the wittiest men who ever lived. It's the birthday of both Jonathan Swift (b. 1667) and Mark Twain (b. 1835), and the anniversary of the death in 1900 of Oscar Wilde. Swift was the Irish cleric and satirist who wrote "A Modest Proposal" (which purportedly advocated that the cure for Irish economic woes was selling its children to be eaten) and "Gulliver's Travels" (which started out as a satire of European politics, but has evolved to become fodder for Jack Black to show once again how annoyingly unfunny he is). We've written about Twain in previous Sparks, but we’ll add once again that his "Adventures of Huckleberry Finn" is considered by many to be the "Great American Novel," and that his autobiography was published a couple of weeks ago. Oscar Fingal O'Flahertie Wills Wilde was one of Ireland and England's most celebrated wits, with an epigram for every occasion. He wrote plays, books, and poems, including one of the most perfect comedies ever, "The Importance of Being Earnest." In 1895, at the height of his fame, he was arrested and tried for his homosexuality, and eventually sentenced to two years of hard labor. A broken man by the time he was released in 1897, he left London, ending his days in a  shabby Parisian hotel. On a less gloomy Gallic note, we note that on this day in 1886, the Folies Bergère staged its first revue. The theatre was dedicated to music hall and vaudeville-type performances, and in its time has featured such stars as Charlie Chaplin, W.C. Fields, Elton John, Ella Fitzgerald, Frank Sinatra, and even Benny Hill. If you're looking for racier entertainment, we can point you to a double shot today, as CBS will air the annual "Victoria's Secret Fashion Show," and the 2011 Pirelli calendar will be released. The TV show, a parade of beautiful women walking the runway in their underwear is a beloved holiday tradition for men (and lingerie-loving women) everywhere, while the Pirelli calendar offers many of the same models, only sans the underwear, in artistic photos. (We'd offer more links to the calendar, but this is a family-friendly blog, after all.) We're so family-friendly, that we'll offer some programming to counter the fashion show. Tonight also brings the annual airing of the stop-motion animated classic, "Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer" and NBC's special "Christmas in Rockefeller Center," which will feature appearances by Susan Boyle, Mariah Carey, Sheryl Crow, Jackie Evancho, Josh Groban, Annie Lennox, Kylie Minogue, and Jessica Simpson The extravaganza will climax with the lighting of the Center's tree (this year, it's a 74-foot Norway spruce from Mahopac, New York). The weather forecast for New York on Tuesday evening calls for rain and a low of 53°F, not exactly winter weather, so we guess it's appropriate that the U.N.'s Climate Change Conference is being held this week in sunny Cancun, Mexico (Tuesday's forecast high: 82°F). Speaking of "hot," Tuesday is the 28th anniversary of the release of Michael Jackson's "Thriller," which became the biggest-selling album of all time, in addition to inspiring prisoners around the globe to replicate Jacko's signature moves. As unique as Michael Jackson in their own ways were Winston Churchill and Irma S. Rombauer. Churchill was the Nobel Prize-winning author, historian, orator, and two-time British Prime Minister who led his country through World War II (and was promptly bounced out of office afterward as thanks) and whose 136th birthday occurs today. Rombauer was the St. Louis teacher and housewife whose cooking classes were so popular that, on this day in 1931, she self-published her book of recipes under the title "The Joy of Cooking." The book has never been out of print, and although it has undergone numerous revisions and alterations in the decades since, it remains one of America's favorite cookbooks. Finally, we remind you that today is Computer Security Day, so take a moment to check your security settings and virus updates, won't you? We want to see you back safely next time. Suggested Sites... After Reading: Prison, Publication, and Personal Letters - letters to and from Oscar Wilde after his release from prison. Folies Bergere Stages First Revue - a show featuring "scantily clad chorus girls" was "a tremendous success." Boy, times sure have changed ... CBS: Victoria's Secret Fashion Show - ... yep, they sure have. Wikipedia: Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer Special - is it Hermie the Elf, or Herbie? About.com: Computer Safety Tips - stay virtually safe.

Directory categories: Authors, Playwrights, Paris, Rockefeller Center, Cookbooks

Archived under: 17th Century, 1930s, 19th Century, Actors, American History, Animation, Anniversaries, Authors, Beauty, Birthdays, Books, Bras, Breasts, Buildings, Calendars, Celebrations, Celebrities, Charlie Chaplin, Christmas, Clothing and Accessories, Coincidence, Computers, Cooking, Dead Celebrities, Death, Eating, Entertainment, Environment, Events, Fiction, Food and Drink, France, Frank Sinatra, Gay History, History, Holidays, Humor, In Character, Legal Cases, Lingerie, Literature, London, Mark Twain, Men, Michael Jackson, Models, Movies, Music, Musicians, New York, Oscar Wilde, Performing Arts, Photography, Quotes, Recipes, Safety, Scandals, Science, Sex and Sexuality, Singers, TV, Theatres, Thriller, Tourist Attractions, Trees, U.K. History, United Kingdom, United Nations, Vaudeville, WWII, Weather, Winter, Women, Writers, Writing

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Quite possibly the worst photo ever taken of the Mona Lisa (Taken by the author in 2009.) A new week presents new opportunities, new challenges, and new events to note. Let's begin, shall we? Monday: Last week we mentioned that Wednesday was anniversary of Leonardo da Vinci commission to paint the portrait that became known as the Mona Lisa. Well, today is the anniversary of the museum that is the painting's home. In 1793, the French government opened the Louvre to the public as a museum. Built as a fortress in the 12th century and gradually converted into a palace, following the French Revolution, it eventually became the most-visited art museum in the world (approximately 8.5 million visitors a year), with a collection of nearly 400,000 items - ranging from ancient Egyptian antiquities to 19th-century masterpieces– of which only 35,000 are on display at any one time. Our birthday of note today is that of Edmond Halley, born in 1656. Halley (pronounced "Holly," not "Hal-ee," or "Hailey") was the English astronomer who realized that not only were the various celestial objects that had visited the earth since 466 BCE actually only one comet, but also that the comet was in such an orbit that it would return like clockwork every 76 years. In 1705, Halley predicted that the comet would return in 1758 – which it did. Unfortunately, Halley never actually saw his prediction confirmed, as he died in 1742. Speaking of deaths, we note the 1965 passing of newspaper columnist Dorothy Kilgallen. Kilgallen was nationally known for her "Voice of Broadway" column in New York's "Journal-American" as well as her weekly appearances on the "What's My Line?" game show. Always political, she became obsessed with the assassination of President John F. Kennedy, doing extensive interviews and investigations, and coming to the conclusion that there had been a massive cover-up of the murder. She claimed to have evidence that would blow the lid off the case, but was found dead in her apartment under very mysterious circumstances. Apparently healthy only hours before, she was found sitting in bed in a bedroom she never used, fully made-up and dressed, with a book she had finished weeks earlier by her side, and her reading glasses nowhere nearby. Her husband claimed she had come home at midnight, but eyewitnesses had seen her out on the town as late as 2 a.m. All her research on the assassination had mysteriously vanished. The official verdict said that her death was due to either a heart attack or a drug overdose, but we have our suspicions. In happier news, Conan O'Brien will make his TBS debut tonight, with his new talk show, the eponymously-titled "Conan." We should probably make the nearly-obligatory joke about the barbarian of the same name, but haven't those been done to death? Suggested Sites... Le Louvre - home of the Mona Lisa, the Venus de Milo, the Nike of Samothrace -- and a McDonald's. Stealing Mona Lisa - whodunnit? Halley's Comet Through History - hope you're around in 2061. Dorothy Kilgallen: Mysterious Death? - certainly seems that way to us. Wikipedia: The War for Late Night - Jay? Dave? Conan? Kimmel? Fallon? Does anyone come out well here?

Directory categories: Pars Museums, Astronomy, Comets, Gossip Columnists, Talk Shows

Archived under: 17th Century, 18th Century, 1960s, American History, Anniversaries, Archaeology, Art Museums, Arts, Assassinations, Astronomy, Biographies, Birthdays, Buildings, Celebrities, Comets, Conan OBrien, Conspiracies, Cover Ups, Dead Celebrities, Death, England, Entertainment, Europe, European History, France, Gossip, Halley's Comet, History, In Character, Journalism, Journalists, Louvre, Media, Men, Murder, Mysteries, Nostalgia, Reporters, Rumors, Science, Scientists, Secrets, Space, TV, Talk Show Hosts, Tourist Attractions, United Kingdom, Urban Legends, Women, Writers

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