The Daily Drift

The Daily Drift

Today's horoscope says:
If you're feeling pressure to pony up for extravagant gifts, your economical side is likely to rebel.
Sure, lovely things are lovely to give, but practicality is your stock and trade.
And if you apply your surprising creative side to it, you can find something practical and perfect that'll really please.
Who doesn't like a pair of fuzzy slippers, a wonderful book or a certificate for a homemade meal made with love?

Some of our readers today have been in:

Montreal, Quebec, Canada

Paris, Ile-De-France, France

Surabaya, Jawa Timur, Indonesia

Dublin, Dublin, Ireland

Kuala Lumpur, Wilayah Persekutuan, Malaysia

Sittard, Limburg, Netherlands

Sydney, New South Wales, Australia

Watford, England, United Kingdom

Ho Chi Minh City, Ho Chi Minh, Vietnam

Santader, Cantabria, Spain

Perth, Western Australia, Australia

Ottawa, Ontario, Canada

Gelsenkirchen, Nordrehien-Westfalen, Germany

Bangkok, Krung Thep, Thailand

Annecy, Rhone-Alpes, France

Melbourne, Victoria, Australia

Bremen, Bremen, Germany

Petaling Jaya, Selangor, Malaysia

Wellington, Wellington, New Zealand

as well as Bulgaria, Israel, Finland, Austria, Norway, Georgia, Mexico, Peru, Kuwait, Serbia, Bangladesh, Latvia, Greece, Scotland, Hong Kong, Denmark, Wales, Iran, Singapore, Poland, Taiwan, Sweden, Afghanistan, Belgium, Tibet, Croatia, Pakistan, Romania, Paraguay, Sudan, Vietnam, Argentina, Cambodia, Egypt, France, Estonia, Puerto Rico, Brazil, New Zealand, United Arab Emirates, Slovenia, China, Iraq, Ecuador, Nigeria, Colombia, Chile, Honduras, Paupa New Guinea, Moldova, Venezuela, Germany, Mexico, Saudi Arabia, Ireland, New Zealand, Czech Republic and in cities across the United States such as Warner Robins, Twin Falls, Los Angeles, Spring Grove and more.

Today is:

Today is Thursday, December 23, the 357th day of 2010.

There are 8 days left in the year.

Today In History December 23

Today's unusual holiday or celebration is: 

Festivus. 

Don't forget to visit our sister blog!

The North Pole Pub

Yukon Cornelius walks into a North Pole pub and clears his voice to the crowd of elven drinkers. He says, "I hear you elves are a bunch of hard drinkers. I'll give 500 gold to anybody in here who can drink 10 pints of extra stout back-to-back."
The room is quiet, and no one takes up Yukon's offer. One elf even leaves.

Thirty minutes later the same elf who left shows back up and taps the prospector on the back. "Is your bet still good?" asks the elf.

Yukon says yes and asks the pub keep to line up 10 pints of extra stout. Immediately the elf tears into all 10 of the pint glasses, drinking them all back-to-back.

The other pub patrons cheer as Yukon sits in amazement. He gives the elf the 500 gold and says, "If you don't mind me asking, where did you go for that 30 minutes you were gone?"

The elf replies, "Oh... I had to go to the pub down the street to see if I could do it first."

Pre-'Seinfeld' Festivus origin

Surprising pre-'Seinfeld' origins of Festivus

The alternative winter holiday was actually first celebrated decades before it appeared on TV.  

Dates to 1966 

Also: 

• A guide to the holiday
• Prisoner's Festivus plea
• Asia cheers, West glum

Christmas In Sweden

Sweden's bizarre tradition of watching Donald Duck cartoons on Christmas Eve.

Every year on Dec. 24 at 3 p.m., half of Sweden sits down in front of the television for a family viewing of the 1958 Walt Disney Presents Christmas special, "From All of Us to All of You." Or as it is known in Sverige, Kalle Anka och hans vänner önskar God Jul: "Donald Duck and his friends wish you a Merry Christmas."
Kalle Anka, for short, has been airing without commercial interruption at the same time on Sweden's main public-television channel, TV1, on Christmas Eve (when Swedes traditionally celebrate the holiday) since 1959. The show consists of Jiminy Cricket presenting about a dozen Disney cartoons from the '30s, '40s, '50s, and '60s, only a couple of which have anything to do with Christmas.

And this:

The show's cultural significance cannot be understated. You do not tape or DVR Kalle Ankafor later viewing. You do not eat or prepare dinner while watching Kalle Anka. Age does not matter—every member of the family is expected to sit quietly together and watch a program that generations of Swedes have been watching for 50 years. Most families plan their entire Christmas around Kalle Anka.

I Me Mine

The Beatles

Four Hands One Guitar

Neat.

Active Duty US Army Ranger Named #3 Pastry Chef in the World

Master Sergeant Mark Morgan of the U.S. Army Rangers is, according to the World Association of Chefs, among the three best pastry chefs in the world. He won this affirmation in Luxembourg at a competition held every four years:

“I’m not as good as I used to be – it’s been 10 years,” the Bronze Star recipient said, referring to the past decade that he served in the 75th Ranger Regiment. He deployed twice to Iraq and four times to Afghanistan in support of Operations Enduring and Iraqi Freedom.[...]
His peanut butter ganache earned him third place among 55 pastry chefs. Morgan also prepared four desserts, which together, were called “Pumpkin and Spice”. They included a spiced pumpkin custard; walnut cake inside a coconut blossom; red currant compote; and a cinnamon beignet on poached pumpkin petals, a trio of cranberry, and honey, yogurt and pumpkin sorbet with a pumpkin-thyme essence.

Full Story

No-holds-barred exit for senator

Fiery exit for outgoing senator

Arlen Specter takes a swipe at the tea party before rapping two Supreme Court justices he supported. 

'Cannibalism' 

Also: 

• Arlen Specter's career
• Obama rebound fleeting?
• Dems laud Jon Stewart

Town Learns Lesson

In New Jersey: Bridgewater spends $17K to defend $5 fee it charged resident.

A Somerset County town spent more than $17,000 defending a $5 fee it charged a resident for a compact disc of a council meeting.
Tom Coulter filed a complaint with the New Jersey Government Record Council in October 2008, saying he should pay the actual cost of the CD to get the recording.
The state council this year sided with Coulter and found he should have paid about 96 cents.
Bridgewater paid more than $14,000 in legal fees defending the case. It had to pay $3,500 to Coulter for his legal fees and give him a $4.04 refund.

Shown here is a random Bridgewater sign. It could be anywhere. Bridgewater is a common name for towns.

iPhone Found In Prisoner

In Kenya, the little "i" stands for intestines: Cellphone found in man’s gut.

A Kenyan death row inmate has had an operation to remove a cellphone from his large intestine, a prison warder said on Wednesday.
Medical teams at a hospital in Naivasha, north-west of the capital Nairobi, on Tuesday night extracted a cellphone wrapped in a plastic bag from the gut of the prisoner after the device showed up on an X-ray.
“There was a mobile phone in the body and it's worrying the lengths this inmates can go to smuggle things into prison,” prison chief Patrick Mwenda told reporters.
Mwenda did not specify how the inmate, identified as Bernard Kosgey, had introduced the cellphone into his intestine but said doctors established it had been wedged there for a month.