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2009: Day 183

London calling! 102 years ago (1897) Guglielmo Marconi obtains a patent for radio in London.

On this date in 1927 Gene Ray, founder of the Time Cube website, was born. Have yourself an extra helping of crazy today.

Former Phillipine dictatress and, later, Presidential candidate, Imelda Marcos turns 80 today, so if you have an impulse to buy a pair of shoes consider it an hommage.

Wendy's founder Dave Thomas would have turned 77 today.

Mystery in the Pacific. On this date in 1937 the final radio signals from Amelia Earhart and Fred Noonan were picked up from their attempted equatorial 'round the world flight attempt. The same day, actress Polly Dean Holliday was born in Jasper, Alabama. Whether or not you know who she is likely depends upon whether or not the catch phrase "Kiss my grits" rings a bell.

Actor, writer, comedian, producer and director Larry David celebrates his 62nd birthday today. As just the revenues from Seinfeld have netted him an estimated $250 million, I suspect it's a reasonably happy birthday.

Musician Mark Hart (Supertramp and Crowded House) turns 56 today.

The first Wal-Mart store opened its doors in Rogers, Arkansas on this date in 1962. An empire born!

It's two milestones on this date for former Mexican President Vincente Fox Quesada. In 1942 he was born, and in 2000 he was elected President.

Actress Yancy Victoria Butler - probably best remembered as either the crime-fighting android from Mann & Machine or the main character in the tv adaptation of Witchblade - turns 39 today. (She was one of the people appearing at this past weekend's Wizard World Philly, though I generally steered clear of the celebrity autograph row.) I never watched more than a minute or two of Witchblade, and all I seem to recall of Mann & Machine is a segment where she got into a hot pepper-eating contest with a friend of her human partner. Memory has blurred it all to the degree that she's become almost interchangeable with Emily Deschanel's titular Bones character, which is at least a disservice to Deschanel.

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