[thechat] On July 20th, 1969, humans first set foot on the Moon.

[rudy]

> April 5, 1968 -  snip
>
> There's lots more, but this is getting too damn depressing...

i know what you mean -- the chicago convention, bobby, kent state...

even though they occurred in a foreign country, it hurt me (as did tien an
men square, decades later)

the strongest memories come from the deepest emotions, and tragedy is pretty
strong

when jfk was killed, my grade 10 typing teacher came back into class from
the principal's office crying -- in those days, grown men just did not cry

please do not ask how it happened that i was in a <em>typing</em> class (in
those days a subject normally taken only by <strong>girls</strong>) nor why
it was being taught by a man (he was also the junior football coach)

anyhow, i also have some happy memories, but the problem is, they're
personal events that happened to me, or to me and few other people

we need something joyous and glorious and exhilarating and just plain GOOD
to happen to the entire world the way some of those other events did

... but that'd be silly, wouldn't it?   [*]

i'm sure there are equally memorable happy world events in our lifetimes,
but none spring as easily to mind, eh?


rudy


[*]   totally unrelated to the above deep thinking, but that's the punchline
of a really great joke -- madhu, on the rudymeter scale of 5, it's a 5


a dog walks into a telegraph office in old west, says to operator, "send a
telegram please"

"what should it say?" asks operator

"woof, woof," says the dog, "woof woof woof"

"well," says the operator, "for the minimum charge, you still got words left
over, you could add another 'woof woof'"

"but," says the dog, "that'd be silly, wouldn't it?"