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Superman: The Definitive History - Hardcover

A few days ago my lovely daughter AnnMarie handed me one of the most wonderful Fathers Day/Birthday gifts ever in the form of Superman: The Definitive History in hardcover. It wasn’t supposed to be a gift from anyone but myself to me, but it didn’t work out that way. I keep two wishlists for myself; one for family and friends to see what I would like and one private for me to remind me of…

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Superman: The Definitive History - Hardcover

A few days ago my lovely daughter AnnMarie handed me one of the most wonderful Fathers Day/Birthday gifts ever in the form of Superman: The Definitive History in hardcover.

It wasn’t supposed to be a gift from anyone but myself to me, but it didn’t work out that way.

I keep two wishlists for myself; one for family and friends to see what I would like and one private for me to remind me of something I’d like to get myself. I meant to put this item on my private list because of the price (it’s a large amount that I would not expect anyone else to spend on me) but I mistakenly put it on my public list in early June.

A few days after doing so, my Princess messaged me that she had ordered it for me as a combination Fathers Day/Birthday gift and I realized my error. I tried to talk her out of if, but she would have none of it. However, the publication date kept getting pushed back so it wasn’t ready anywhere near either of those events.

It was finally released on December 10th and shipped to her. She handed it to me last week when I stopped by.

What a monster this book is!

Its dimensions are 15 x 11 x 2.9 inches and, as you can see from the photo, it would make a great coffee table book. It has 486 color pages on glossy paper and weighs a tad over 15 pounds!

Here’s a portion of the book description; “Behold the most comprehensive book about Superman ever produced! From Krypton and Smallville to Metropolis and beyond, explore over eighty-five years of Superman’s history in radio, TV, film, animation, computer games, PSAs, advertising, merchandise and, of course, comics. This ultimate official book features a wealth of unpublished artwork, exclusive interviews, unique bonus inserts, and little-known facts detailing the long and extraordinary history of the world’s first, and greatest, costumed superhero.”

I met one of the authors, Edward Gross, 18 months ago at the 2023 Superman Celebration in Metropolis, Illinois and Cindy bought me his latest book (at the time), Voices From Krypton, which I thoroughly enjoyed! Now, teaming up with Robert Greenberger, author of The Essential Superman Encyclopedia (among others) they have produced this definitive history of The Man of Steel.

As of yet, I haven’t had the opportunity to even crack open this book yet. The holiday season is hectic and I want some quiet time to sit for a while and enjoy what I am sure will be an awesome book. But I’m sure that when I have finished I’ll be writing up a review for my other site, The Word of Jeff.

For now (though I have already done so in person), I give a “Super” thank you to my daughter for this magnificent gift!

Up, up and away!

Happy 99th Birthday To My Dad

Today would have been my dad’s 99th birthday, had he not passed away almost 25 years ago. Here’s something I wrote a little over a decade ago about my dad on the anniversary of his passing. I was running some errands this morning and a song I had not heard in a long time came up on my playlist while I was driving. It was “Everybody Loves Somebody” which was a chart-topping hit for Dean Martin in…

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Happy 99th Birthday To My Dad

Today would have been my dad’s 99th birthday, had he not passed away almost 25 years ago.

Here’s something I wrote a little over a decade ago about my dad on the anniversary of his passing.

I was running some errands this morning and a song I had not heard in a long time came up on my playlist while I was driving. It was “Everybody Loves Somebody” which was a chart-topping hit for Dean Martin in the latter part of 1964. It brought back a memory of watching my mom and dad dance to that song when it was played, and how happy they seemed. My dad was no Fred Astaire (and I, sadly, inherited his lack of dancing prowess) but I remember my mom looking so happy as they danced to that song when I was 9 years old.

That song coming up was actually a surprise because I don’t even remember adding it to my playlist, though surely I must have at some point in the past. I don’t really believe in this type of thing but maybe, just maybe, it coming up was dad saying “Hi” and dropping a pleasant memory for me on his birthday. If so, thanks dad.

I love you and miss you.

Worms in Canned Fish Products

It’s said that “One man’s trash is another man’s treasure.” How old, expired cans of fish helped researchers trace the progress of worms in various fish over the past 42 years. And did you even KNOW that worms were in your canned fish products? Yuck!

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Worms in Canned Fish Products

It’s said that “One man’s trash is another man’s treasure.”

How old, expired cans of fish helped researchers trace the progress of worms in various fish over the past 42 years.

And did you even KNOW that worms were in your canned fish products? Yuck!

Witnessing Three Total Solar Eclipses in My Lifetime

Saturday, March 7, 1970 I was 14 years old and playing trombone in my junior high school’s orchestra/stage band. That day our school was competing in the state school band contest held in Miami and afterward having lunch at a Swedish buffet restaurant named Sweden House Smorgasbord. We got off the bus in the restaurant parking lot and watched the first total solar eclipse seen in North America in…

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Witnessing Three Total Solar Eclipses in My Lifetime

Saturday, March 7, 1970 I was 14 years old and playing trombone in my junior high school’s orchestra/stage band. That day our school was competing in the state school band contest held in Miami and afterward having lunch at a Swedish buffet restaurant named Sweden House Smorgasbord. We got off the bus in the restaurant parking lot and watched the first total solar eclipse seen in North America in our lifetime. Some of us had film we looked through and some had built pinhole projectors out of cardboard boxes.

Not sure why this newspaper headline only mentions the next one as being in 2024, since there was one in 1979 and one in 2017. But it was pretty neat to see this year’s eclipse being predicted 54 years ago!

I missed getting to see the next total solar eclipse that touched American soil in 1979, but did get to see the following one in 2017.

By the way, here’s a list of all the total solar eclipses that have occurred over the United States since such occurrences were officially recorded.

Now, barring dismal weather or my untimely discorporation, I’ll get to see the third North American total solar eclipse in my lifetime next Monday, April 8, 2024. Cindy and I have planned for two years to be where we’re at now (Canyon Lake, Texas) so we could be in the path of totality.

Which is good, because the odds aren’t in my favor that I’ll be around for the next one a little over 20 years from now on August 23, 2044.

But who knows…?

Happy Birthday Superman!

February 29th, a date that only appears every four years (due to a “Leap Year” used in the Gregorian Calendar to align months in sync with annual events such as equinoxes and solstices), is officially designated as the birthdate of Superman by DC Comics. If you’re not familiar with the mythos of Superman, that date may leave you scratching your head. I’ve covered this before, but thought I would…

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Happy Birthday Superman!

February 29th, a date that only appears every four years (due to a “Leap Year” used in the Gregorian Calendar to align months in sync with annual events such as equinoxes and solstices), is officially designated as the birthdate of Superman by DC Comics.

If you’re not familiar with the mythos of Superman, that date may leave you scratching your head. I’ve covered this before, but thought I would do so again.

Superman officially appeared for the first time in Action Comics #1, cover dated June 1938 but released on the newsstands in April 1938. And he has always been portrayed as being 29 years old, as if preserved in amber since his debut. If we used that date as his “birthday” then Superman would be turning 115 years old this April.

But in the late 1960’s – early 1970’s (before his owners starting resetting his origin every few years) the powers that be at DC Comics came up with a rather strange way to explain why, 30 years after his debut, Superman still appeared to be a young man. Let’s place his birthdate on a date that only falls every four years, February 29th, so that he only “ages” a year every four years. Yeah, that’s the ticket!

And you know, for kids who were reading in the 1960’s that seemed like a VERY logical thing. Of course it completely ignores the fact that you still age during those four years, but to a kid who isn’t given to critical thinking (and most weren’t/aren’t), that explanation makes sense.

Today, Superman is still portrayed as being a young man, though one that is married and has a son. That has been accomplished by, as I mentioned above, resetting his origin every few years or splitting the older Superman versions into separate worlds or separate dimensions, etc.

But officially, February 29th is STILL Superman’s birthday, recognized as such around the world.

So Happy Birthday to the world’s greatest superhero, Superman!

P.S. Here’s one of my very favorite Superman books, collecting the “Whatever Happened to The Man of Tomorrow” storyline by Alan Moore that officially marks the end of the Silver Age Superman era, along with a couple of other classic Superman stories.

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If You Were a Pizza...

If you were a pizza, what kind of pizza would you be?

I don’t ask this as an existential question or a thought experiment, though it may lead to such for you as you consider.

I ask because last night I had one of the strangest dreams I’ve had in quite a while, and it got me to wondering about the question above.

During my dream, everyone I interacted with was a “pizza person” and by that I don’t mean they liked pizza. I mean they WERE PIZZA.

Pizza bodies with little arms and legs sticking out from the edges of the rounded crust, and faces on the pizza topping.

It was weird.

I saw pepperoni, sausage, veggie, supreme and all other varieties of pizza people. I talked to them, and they to me. Other than their appearance, everything else was quite normal.

I don’t think I was a pizza, but to be honest I don’t remember completely.

Did I say it was weird?

Anyway, after I awakened from my Italian Alice in Wonderland dream, I got to wondering, “If I were a pizza, what kind of pizza would I be?”

I think I’d be my favorite; Alfredo sauce, Feta Cheese and Black Olives.

Or, my second-favorite; Red sauce, Black Olives and Mushrooms.

Might depend on the mood I was in.

And I won’t even get into the various crust types, lol.

How about you? If you were a pizza, what kind of pizza would you be?

Jeffrey M. Wetherington, Sr.

Deployed to DR-4559-LA & DR-4570-LA as Assistant External Affairs Officer l External Affairs

Mobile: (202) 341-3077

[email protected]

Federal Emergency Management Agency

fema.gov

#Dreams #Pizza

The Queen’s Gambit

I spent this past Saturday binge-watching “The Queen’s Gambit” on Netflix. Initially I had not planned on watching it, but several friends on Facebook were singing its praises and a couple of my co-workers were also recommending it, so I figured I’d give it a look. I should say up front that I am a […]

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The Queen’s Gambit

I spent this past Saturday binge-watching “The Queen’s Gambit” on Netflix. Initially I had not planned on watching it, but several friends on Facebook were singing its praises and a couple of my co-workers were also recommending it, so I figured I’d give it a look.

I should say up front that I am a fan of the game of chess. When I was 8 or 9 a young man and his sister who were refugees from Cuba…

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The Queen’s Gambit

I spent this past Saturday binge-watching “The Queen’s Gambit” on Netflix. Initially I had not planned on watching it, but several friends on Facebook were singing its praises and a couple of my co-workers were also recommending it, so I figured I’d give it a look.

I should say up front that I am a fan of the game of chess. When I was 8 or 9 a young man and his sister who were refugees from Cuba moved in with their parents across the street from us in Hialeah. Their parents did not speak much English, but Mario and his younger sister Marilyn were fluent in the language. Marilyn would babysit my younger brother and I sometimes and Mario taught me how to play chess. I loved the game, especially since it involved skill and strategy, as opposed to games of chance. But there weren’t many other kids in elementary school who knew how to play and it wasn’t until I got to junior high school that I was able to play different people.

One of my favorite gifts of all time came from my younger brother (that’s the case with a lot of my favorite gifts) who brought me back a chess board and pieces carved out of lava rock from his honeymoon in Mexico. My most recent games have been with my ten-year old middle granddaughter Abby a few months ago who, unlike her granddad, had an elementary school which offered an after-school chess club before COVID-19 shut things down.

Still, it’s difficult to imagine a seven-episode television series on the subject of chess being much of a draw, even to fans of the game. But, of course, the series deals with more than the game and is centered around the rollercoaster life of a young chess prodigy as she moves from discovering the game at the age of nine to the end of the series when she is twenty-two and competing in the Soviet Union in 1968.

So I started watching it without knowing what it was all about and, honestly, almost gave up after the first couple of episodes. However, I continued on and by the time it was over I was glad I did. It is an admirable look at overcoming situations you didn’t create and situations you did create, as well as the value of teamwork when it is not your default choice.

A big thumbs up for “The Queen’s Gambit” on Netflix.

Did You Know…How We Got WD-40?

Well, I noticed the other day that I haven’t done one of these kind of posts in almost 5 years and it’s time to remedy that. These days, almost every professional and home tool kit contains a can of WD-40, which is used for a variety of lubrication purposes in the home, on cars, on […]

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Did You Know...How We Got WD-40?

Did You Know…How We Got WD-40?

Well, I noticed the other day that I haven’t done one of these kind of posts in almost 5 years and it’s time to remedy that.

These days, almost every professional and home tool kit contains a can of WD-40, which is used for a variety of lubrication purposes in the home, on cars, on boats, really on just about anything metal.

But do you know how it came to be?

Back in 1953, a fledgling company…

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#Rocket Chemical Company #Water Displacement #WD-40

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Did You Know...How We Got WD-40?

Well, I noticed the other day that I haven’t done one of these kind of posts in almost 5 years and it’s time to remedy that.

These days, almost every professional and home tool kit contains a can of WD-40, which is used for a variety of lubrication purposes in the home, on cars, on boats, really on just about anything metal.

But do you know how it came to be?

Back in 1953, a fledgling company named Rocket Chemical Company of San Diego with only 3 employees was attempting to develop a product that would prevent rust and corrosion on missile parts for the aerospace industry by displacing water on surfaces before it could cause oxidation to begin. Scientist Norm Larsen was experimenting with formulas to achieve that result, but kept failing to find one that would work.

Finally, on his 40th try, he got it right and WD (Water Displacement) – 40 was born.

Now you know.

#Rocket Chemical Company #Water Displacement #WD-40

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