Today in a compressed universe

A dull day here in the suburbs, but it wasn't always so. Oh, no no no no:

Feast day of Macarius the Great. A hyena once brought him her cub, which was blind—he spat on it and the creature regained its sight. The mom returned shortly thereafter with a bloody sheepskin; after a severe tongue-lashing, Macarius accepted the gift, on the condition that the grateful hyena not do anything mean ever again, and slept on the skin until the very day he died. I feel that this story is sending us all mixed messages.

Speaking of which:

1977: Today the song "You Make Me Feel Like Dancing" by Leo Sayer topped the charts and stayed there for a week.

Actually, that's not a mixed message, that's one of the four or five top signs of the apocalypse.

1951: Charo is apparently born. Her real name is "María del Rosario Pilar Martínez Molina Baeza Rasten," and sister, if she was born in 1951, I'll eat a dead bird.

Speaking of which:

Also on January 15, 1951, a dead cedar waxwing was found at Massillon by Ralph Dexter of Kent State. Contents of its stomach: fruit of rose bush, and 1 fruit pit.

2003: In Albuquerque, New Mexico, Lou Rawls is arrested on one count of battery against his girlfriend. She’ll never find, as long as she lives, some one who cares for her, tender like he does.

Today in the Voodoo Bungalow: The round-headed kid tells me “Bat guano was once used as an ingredient in cosmetics.”