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| Mortimer Mort |
"What was that sound?" you ask? That was my Steam Team wailing in collective anguish.
Alas, while I was rejoicing in the arrival of my darling Clementine, members of my Steam Team have been mourning Wilde Imagination's announcement that there are no plans (at this time) to continue the Imperium Park line.
I guess we shall have to get creative ourselves.
According to the Imperium Park website:
Theodora and Phineas live with their Uncle, Professor Kingsley Avery Knightsblood. A brilliant scientist, Professor Knightsblood took in his niece and nephew after their parents were killed in a skirmish with a Beastealiax patrol when the children were six and eight. Both Theodora and Phineas adore their uncle.
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| Albus Dumbledore |
Personally, I think that Mortimer Mort from Wilde Imagination's Evangeline Ghastly line will make a fabulous Professor Kingsley Avery Knightsblood.
I don't know who Albus Dumbledore will be yet, but I'm sure we can figure something out.
Clementine and I got to help Momma decorate the house tonight with some of those new-fangled electric Christmas lights.
Christmas lights originated with the use of candles to decorate the Christmas tree in upper-class homes in 18th-century Germany. However, candles caused a lot of fires.
In the United Kingdom, the Savoy owner Richard D'Oyly Carte equipped the principal fairies with miniature lighting for the opening night of Gilbert and Sullivan's opera Iolanthe on Nov. 25, 1882. (The term "fairy lights" for electric Christmas lights has been used ever since in England.)
The first known electrically-illuminated Christmas tree was by Edward H. Johnson, an associate of inventor Thomas Edison. He had 80 red, white and blue electric incandescent light bulbs the size of walnuts especially made for him which he displayed on his Christmas tree on Dec. 22, 1882 at his New York City home.
By 1900, businesses started stringing up Christmas lights behind their windows. Christmas lights were too expensive for the average person so electric Christmas lights did not become the majority replacement for candles until 1930.
In the United States, it became popular to outline private homes with Christmas lights in the 1960s. By the late 20th century the custom had also been adopted in other countries, especially Japan.
Battle of Prairie Grove, Ark.
This week 150 years ago in the Civil War, Confederate and Union forces continued their fight for supremacy in Arkansas. Confederates led by Maj. Gen. Thomas Hindman moved to put his sizeable force between two Union divisions in hopes of smashing them. But rival Union commanders fought back against the Confederates, who set up defensive lines along a ridge at Prairie Grove. Attacks and counterattacks followed and at one point it looked as if the rebels would triumph. But then sunset brought a halt to the fighting with neither side a winner. Nonetheless, Hindman was forced to withdraw from the region, leaving the Union in control of a large swath of Arkansas. Elsewhere, newspaper reports spread word that Confederate leaders were rejoicing over the discovery a large cache of salt in the earth that can be used for any number of purposes, including preserving food. "The rebels are said to be rejoicing over the discovery of (the) immense bed of rock salt at Obelisk, Ala.," the Daily Illinois state Journal reported on Dec. 2, 1862.
