title: Meme Misappropriation: It's Not My Birthday
category: memes
content: |

    <p>Misappropriated from <a
    href="http://bitterspice.blogspot.com/">bitterspice.</a>  Data
    thieved from <a href="http://www.wikipedia.org/">Wikipedia,</a>
    final arbiter of absolutely nothing on <tt>t3h intarw33bz.</tt>
    So take it with some amount of salt.  Warning: may contain
    italicized snark.</p>

    <p>Five Events:</p>

    <ul>
        <li>1492 - Ferdinand and Isabella sign the Alhambra decree aimed at expelling all Jews from Spain unless they convert to Roman Catholicism.  <em>Perhaps this is how my mother's grandparents ended up as sub-citizens in Turkey.</em></li>
        <li>1858 - Hymen Lipman patents a pencil with an attached eraser.  <em>Has an intellectual property lawyer jumped on this one yet?</em></li>
        <li>1870 - Texas is readmitted to the Union following Reconstruction.  <em>Would I have met my betrothed otherwise?</em></li>
        <li>1951 - Remington Rand delivers the first UNIVAC I computer to the United States Census Bureau.  <em>Thus ensuring that <a href="http://www.theregister.co.uk/">The Register</a> would always be able to find Comedy Gold when governments use computers.</em></li>
        <li>2006 - Marcos Pontes is the first Brazilian astronaut in space.  <em>I think you mispronounced IN SPAAAAACE.</em></li>
    </ul>

    <p>Five Births:</p>

    <ul>
        <li>1135 - Maimonides, Spanish rabbi and philosopher (d. 1204)  <em>Back when it was almost cool to be smart and Jewish.</em></li>
        <li>1914 - Sonny Boy Williamson I, American musician (d. 1948).  <em>Blues harp, yo.</em></li>
        <li>1950 - Robbie Coltrane, Scottish actor and comedian.  <em>Och!</em></li>
        <li>1967 - Megumi Hayashibara, Japanese voice actress and singer. <em>Is my inner child really a 15-year-old Japanese schoolgirl?</em></li>
        <li>1968 - C&eacute;line Dion, Canadian singer.  <em>When Canada is dead and gone / there'll be no more...</em></li>
    </ul>

    <p>Five Deaths, snark-free:</p>

    <ul>
        <li>1840 - Beau Brummell, English celebrity and dandy (b. 1778).</li>
        <li>1966 - Maxfield Parrish, American artist (b. 1870)</li>
        <li>1977 - Abdel Halim Hafez, Egyptian singer and actor (b. 1929).</li>
        <li>1986 - James Cagney, American actor (b. 1899)</li>
        <li>2002 - Elizabeth Bowes-Lyon, Queen Mother of the United Kingdom (b. 1900)</li>
    </ul>