Tonight is the big Academy Awards. First off, they are calling it “the Oscars.” Its not “the Oscars”, its the 79th Academy Awards and the Academy Award is the Oscar. The website of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences says:
“Officially named the Academy Award® of Merit, the statuette is better known by its nickname, Oscar, the origins of which aren’t clear. A popular story has been that Academy librarian and eventual executive director Margaret Herrick thought it resembled her Uncle Oscar and said so, and that the Academy staff began referring to it as Oscar. In any case, by the sixth Awards presentation in 1934, Hollywood columnist Sidney Skolsky used the name in his column in reference to Katharine Hepburn’s first Best Actress win. The Academy itself didn’t use the nickname officially until 1939.”
Now, they’ve gone so far and called the event “The Oscars.”
Not sure why I get worked up about it since I rarely watch. I see alot of movies on cable but don’t go to too many at the theatres. Think I’m getting old because I just can’t bring myself to pay $7.50 to see a movie. Pretty soon I’ll be saying, “back in my day…” But I do wonder how many people out there are like me who don’t think that the Academy Awards is that big of a deal and more often than not miss the show.
On This Date in Weather History On February 25, 1934 six tornadoes touched down in Alabama, Georgia and Mississippi leaving 19 dead. On the same date in 1987, Alpine Arizona received 87 inches of snow.
This weekend we had both types of weather historically noted. Tornadoes in the South and snow in the Rocky’s and significant snow in the Northern Plains. But, you see, when pitchers and catchers report to Spring Training, that is when we start to see severe weather showing up. We have a system that looks pretty similar to this past weekend’s storm system poised to pounce on the US. It will be interesting to see how it shakes out for us; whether or not we get any severe storms or if we just get cold rain like this past system. Odds are it will not be too rambunctious but its worth watching. And its probably a good idea to go over your severe weather a tornado safety procedures with your family. You shouldn’t wait around until a storm is on top of you to try and figure out what to do. If you don’t know, feel free to email me.
On This Date In History On this date in 1964, Louisville’s own Muhammed Ali stunned not just the boxing world, but the entire sports world when he defeated the seemingly invincible heavy champion of the world, Sonny Liston. The 22-year-old Ali was an 8-1 underdog and had brashly predicted he would stop Liston in the eighth round. But Liston, who had twice handily beaten former heavyweight champion Floyd Patterson, claimed he had a shore shoulder and did not answer the bell for the seventh round. Ali had won the gold medal at the gold medal at the 1960 Rome Summer Olympics at the age of 18. He later went on to win the title again in similar unsuspecting fashion when he defeated another seemingly indestructable champion, George Foreman, in the Rumble in the Jungle. But the boxing legend of Muhammed Ali was set with his victory over Sonny Liston on this date in 1964 in Miami Beach, Fl.
rsymon@hearst.com
Symon Sez 
Leave a comment