The plant life in the oceans make up about 85 percent of all the greenery on the Earth.
The Dead Sea is nine times saltier than the ocean.
* * * * *
The Dark Blue Sea
by Lord Byron
There is a pleasure in the pathless woods,
There is a rapture on the lonely shore,
There is society where none intrudes,
By the deep sea, and music in its roar:
I love not man the less, but nature more,
From these our interviews, in which I steal
From all I may be, or have been before,
To mingle with the universe, and feel
What I can ne’er express, yet cannot all conceal.-
Roll on, thou deep and dark blue ocean-roll!
Ten thousand fleets sweep over thee in vain;
Man marks the earth with ruin-his control
Stops with the shore;-upon the watery plain
The wrecks are all thy deed, nor doth remain
A shadow of man’s ravage, save his own,
When for a moment, like a drop of rain,
He sinks into thy depths with bubbling groan,
Without a grave, unknell’d, uncoffin’d, and unknown.
His steps are not upon thy paths-thy fields
Are not a spoil for him-thou dost arise
And shake him from thee; the vile strength he wields
For earth’s destruction thou dost all despise,
Spurning him from thy bosom to the skies,
And send’st him, shivering in thy playful spray,
And howling, to his gods, where haply lies
His petty hope in some near port or bay,
And dashest him again to earth: there let him lay.
The armaments which thunderstrike the walls
Of rock-built cities, bidding nations quake,
And monarchs tremble in their capitals,
The oak leviathans, whose huge ribs make
Their clay creator the vain title take
Of lord of thee, and arbiter of war;
These are thy toys, and, as the snowy flake,
They melt into thy yeast of waves, which mar
Alike the armada’s pride, or spoils of Trafalgar.
Thy shores are empires, changed in all save thee-
Assyria, Greece, Rome, Carthage, what are they?
Thy waters washed them power while they were free,
And many a tyrant since: their shores obey
The stranger, slave or savage; their decay
Has dried up realms to deserts:-not so thou,
Unchangeable, save to thy wild waves’ play-
Time writes no wrinkle on thine azure brow-
Such as creation’s dawn beheld, thou rollest now.
Thou glorious mirror, where the Almighty’s form
Glasses itself in tempests; in all time
Calm or convulsed-in breeze, or gale, or storm,
Icing the pole, or in the torrid clime
Dark-heaving; boundless, endless and sublime-
The image of eternity-the throne
Of the invisible; even from out thy slime
The monsters of the deep are made; each zone
Obeys thee; thou goest forth, dread, fathomless, alone.
And I have loved thee, ocean! And my joy
Of youthful sports was on thy breast to be
Borne, like thy bubbles, onward: from a boy
I wanton’d with thy breakers-they to me
Were a delight; and if the freshening sea
Made them a terror-’twas a pleasing fear,
For I was as it were a child of thee,
And trusted to thy billows far and near,
And laid my hand upon thy mane – as I do here.
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How many of the following questions can you answer?
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- George Washington’s Thanksgiving Day Proclamation
- 1st National Proclamation of Thanksgiving
- A Charlie Brown Thanksgiving
- Abraham Lincoln’s Declaration of Thanksgiving
- Thanksgiving – select quotes
- An Old-Fashioned Thanksgiving
- A Thanksgiving Poem
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The earliest known pizza dates from about 200 BC. For centuries, Greeks and Italians used flat, round bread with toppings on it. But it was the Italians who added tomatoes and cheese to make the pizza as we know it.
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Cats average 16 hours of sleep a day, more than any other mammal.
A cat uses its whiskers to determine if a space is too small to squeeze through. The whiskers act as feelers or antennae, helping the animal to judge the precise width of any passage.
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.
Okay, guys, time for another pop quiz.
Can you name the following father and son? On September 14, 1990, they became the only father and son to hit back-to-back home runs in a Major League Baseball game.
Pressure’s on….
Chocolate contains phenylethylamine (PEA), a natural substance that is reputed to stimulate the same reaction in the body as falling in love.
The Aztec people are believed to be the inventors of chocolate. They made chocolate from the beans of the cacao plant. In 1519 the Aztec people of Mexico shared their creation with Spanish warrior who carried chocolate back to Europe.
One plain milk chocolate candy bar has more protein than a banana.
Hershey’s Kisses have been around since 1907.
In Hershey , Pennsylvania , the streetlights along ” Chocolate Avenue ” are in the shape of Hershey Kisses.
Chocolate manufacturers currently use 40 percent of the world’s almonds and 20 percent of the world’s peanuts.
American and Russian space flights have always included chocolate.
Per capita, the Irish eat more chocolate than Americans, Swedes, Danes, French, and Italians.
Americans consumed over 3.1 billion pounds of chocolate in 2001, which is almost half of the total world’s production.
Hawaii is the only US state that grows cacao beans to produce chocolate.
Click on image
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Coffee is the most popular beverage worldwide with over 400 billion cups consumed each year.
Beethoven who was a coffee lover, was so particular about his coffee that he always counted 60 beans each cup when he prepared his brew.
Hawaii is the only US state that grows coffee.
Balzac is said to have drank more than fifty cups of coffee a day. Maybe that is why Baudelaire referred to him as the author of “energy and will.”
Coffee, as a world commodity, is second only to oil.
The average cup of coffee contains more than 1000 different chemical components, none of which is tasted in isolation but only as part of the overall flavor.
Coffee trees are evergreen and grow to heights above 15 feet but are normally pruned to around 8 feet in order to facilitate harvesting.
By 1850, the manual coffee grinder found its way to most upper middle class kitchens of the U.S.
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Grover Cleveland was the only U.S president to marry in the White House.
The “S” in Harry S. Truman was not just the initial of his middle name, but “S” was his middle name. His parents could not agree on a middle name, so they made it “S” which was the first initial of both of Harry’s grandfathers.
John F. Kennedy’s grave in Arlington National Cemetery in Arlington, Virginia is the most-visited presidential grave.
There have been four US Presidents who never held any other elective office: U. S. Grant, William H. Taft, Herbert Hoover, and Dwight D. Eisenhower.
Two US presidents were survived by their fathers: John F. Kennedy and Warren Harding.
Franklin D. Roosevelt was the only US president elected four times.
Franklin D. Roosevelt was the first U.S. President to select a woman to serve in his cabinet.
Four US presidents served an entire term without a vice president: John Tyler, Millard Fillmore, Andrew Johnson, and Chester Arthur.
Woodrow Wilson was the only US president to earn a doctorate.
James Buchanan was the only US president never to be married.
The only American president to graduate from the U.S. Naval Academy was Jimmy Carter, who graduated in the class of 1946.
Abraham Lincoln, who invented a hydraulic device for lifting ships over shoals, was the only U.S. president ever granted a patent.
George Washington is the only man whose birthday is a legal holiday in every state of the United States.
Richard Nixon was the 1st US president to visit China in February, 1972.
Gerald Ford was the only US president not to have been elected to either the presidency or the vice presidency.
Presidents of the United States have had the following denominational affiliations: Episcopalian (11); Presbyterian (8); Baptist (4); Methodist (4); Unitarian (4); No formal affiliation (3), Disciples of Christ (2); Dutch Reformed (2); Quaker (2); Catholic (1); Congregationalist (1) and United Church of Christ (1).
Andrew Jackson, 7th U.S. president, dueled with Charles Dickinson after he insulted Jackson ’s marriage. Jackson let his opponent fire first, giving himself time to take aim. Jackson took a bullet in the chest and, without flinching, calmly killed his man.
Throughout its history, the White House has been known as the “President’s Palace,” the “President’s House,” and the “Executive Mansion.” President Theodore Roosevelt officially gave the White House its current name in 1901.
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Coca Cola was originally billed as an “esteemed brain tonic and intellectual beverage” when it first appeared on the market in 1886.
Coffee is the most popular beverage worldwide with over 400 billion cups consumed each year.
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There are 31,557,600 seconds in a year.
The average American will eat 35,000 cookies in their lifetime.
Coffee is the most popular beverage worldwide with over 400 billion cups consumed each year.
Americans consumed 76 billion pounds of red meat and poultry in the year 2000, up 21% from a decade earlier.
Americans consume 29 billion, or 58 percent, of the 50 billion aspirin tablets which are taken worldwide each year.
Golfers use an estimated $800 million worth of golf balls annually.
There are more than 900,000 known species of insects in the world.
Annually, approximately 46 millions Cokes, five million pounds of french fries, and seven million hamburgers are consumed at Walt Disney World Resort.
The Mills Brothers have recorded more songs than any other artist(s): about 2,250.
Over 40 percent of the women in the U.S. were in the Girl Scouts organization. Two-thirds of the women listed in “Who’s Who of Women” were Girl Scouts.
In any given week, an average of 2.3 million Americans are on paid vacation.
By the time a child finishes elementary school he/she will have witnessed 8,000 murders and 100,000 acts of violence on television.
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