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Subj: HOLIDAYS DEC 11 - JAN 7
 
 
 

Here are the holidays for the next few weeks.  Enjoy!  There are a bunch.

HOLIDAYS OF DECEMBER 11 - JANUARY 7
SUN DEC 11:Old St. Andrew's Day
    Upper Volta National Holiday
MON DEC 12:Kenya Independence Day
    Fiesta of our Lady of Guadalupe (Mexico)
    St. Spyridan (Greece)
TUE DEC 13:St. Lucia's Day
           Malta Independence Day
           Tandem Day
     Soot Sweeping Day (Japan)
THR DEC 15:Bill of Rights Day
    Statute Day (Netherlands Antilles)
FRI DEC 16:National Day of Bahrain
    Victory Day (Bangladesh)
    Day of the Covenant (Namibia)
    Constitution Day (Nepal)
    Underdog Day
    Day of the Vow (South Africa)
SAT DEC 17:Wright Brothers Day
    Bhutan National Day
    Bolivar Day (Venezuela)
SUN DEC 18:National Day of Niger
MON DEC 19:St. Ignacius
WED DEC 21:Forefathers Day
    Roman New Year
    St. Thomas (Holland)
THR DEC 22:Electric Power Workers Day (USSR)
    Toji (Japan)
FRI DEC 23:St. Naum's Day
SAT DEC 24:Christmas Eve
    Kit Carson Day
    Adam and Eve Day (Hungary)
SUN DEC 25:CHRISTMAS!!!!!!
    Anniversary of the Death of Emperor Taisho (Japan)
    Family Day (Angola)
    Birthday of Quaid-es-Azam (Pakistan)
    Taiwan Constitution Day
MON DEC 26:Boxing Day
    St. Stephen
    Day of Good Will (South Africa)
TUE DEC 27:Zimbabwe Public Holiday
WED DEC 28:Nepal National Day
       All Fool's Day (mexico)
    Holy Innocent's Day
    Whipping of the Innocents Day (Hungary)
THR DEC 29:Costa Rica Public Holiday
FRI DEC 30:Rizal Day (Philipines)
SAT DEC 31:Grand Last Day (Japan)
    New Years Eve
    Ano Viejo (Ecuador)
    Allendale Tar Barrels (UK)
    St. Sylvesters Day
    Feed Yourself Day (Benin)
    Foreign Troops Evacuation Day (lebanon)
    Hogmanay Day (Scotland)
SUN JAN 1:New Years Day
   My Birthday (thank you very much!)
   Cuba Independence Day
   Haiti Independence Day
   Bank Holiday (Somalia)
   Sudan Independence Day
   Western Samoa Independence Day
   St. Basil's Day
MON JAN 2:Ancestor's Day (Haiti)
   Beginning of Work (Japan)
   Bertchtold's Day (Switzerland)
TUE JAN 3:Genshi Sai (Japan)
   Upper Volta Revolution Day
WED JAN 4:Feast of St. Titus
   Trivia Day
THR FRI 5:Night of Destiny (Arab Countries)
   New Years Party (Japan)
FRI JAN 6:La Befana
   Three Kings Day
   Epiphany
   Blessing of the Sponge Divers at Tapon Springs, Florida
   Army Day (Iraq)
   Chico's Birthday
SAT JAN 7:St. Distaff's Day
   Grandmothers Day (Bulgaria)
   Liberia's Pioneer Day
*********************************************************************
THIS WEEK'S TRIVIA QUESTION:
 What should you feed your adult pet moth?
LAST WEEK'S TRIVIA:
 When George Washington ran for the Virginia House of Burgesses in 1758,
what did he see to that all voters receive?
 ANS:Beer, rum, and cider
*********************************************************************
On the twelfth day of Christmas my true love gave to me:
12 frenzied chemists
11 polish meatball
10 commandments
9 dreadful squirrells
8 Maids a-cleaning
7 vaxes crashing
6 geese saute'-ing
5 guillotines
4 falling planes
3 stolen squids
2 hurdle falls
and a cartridge for an uzi
*******************************************************************
----It is that time of year to let Science see if there is really a Santa Claus?

================================================================================
                           IS THERE A SANTA CLAUS?
================================================================================

1)  No known species of reindeer can fly.  BUT there are 300,000 species of
living organisms yet to be classified, and while most of these are insects
and germs, this does not COMPLETELY rule out flying reindeer which only
Santa has ever seen.

2)  There are 2 billion children (persons under 18) in the world.  BUT since
Santa doesn't (appear) to handle the Muslim, Hindu, Jewish and Buddhist
children, that reduces the workload to 15% of the total - 378 million
according to Population Reference Bureau.  At an average (census)rate of 3.5
children per household, that's 91.8 million homes.  One presumes there's at
least one good child in each.

3)  Santa has 31 hours of Christmas to work with, thanks to the different
time zones and the rotation of the earth, assuming he travels east to
west(which seems logical).  This works out to 822.6 visits per second. This
is to say that for each Christian household with good children, Santa
has 1/1000th of a second to park, hop out of the sleigh, jump down the
chimney, fill the stockings, distribute the remaining presents under the
tree, eat whatever snacks have been left, get back up the chimney, get back
into the sleigh and move on to the next house.  Assuming that each of these
91.8 million stops are evenly distributed around the earth (which, of course,
we know to be false but for the purposes of our calculations we will accept),
we are now talking about .78 miles per household, a total trip of 75-1/2
million miles, not counting stops to do what most of us must do at least once
every 31 hours, plus feeding and etc.  This means that Santa's sleigh is
moving at 650 miles per second, 3,000 times the speed of sound.  For purposes
of comparison, the fastest man-made vehicle on earth, the Ulysses space probe,
moves at a poky 27.4 miles per second - a conventional reindeer can run, tops,
15 miles per hour.

4)  The payload on the sleigh adds another interesting element. Assuming
that each child gets nothing more than a medium-sized lego set (2 pounds),
the sleigh is carrying 321,300 tons, not counting Santa, who is invariably
described as overweight.  On land, conventional reindeer can pull no more
than 300 pounds.  Even granting that "flying reindeer" (see point #1) could
pull TEN TIMES the normal anoint, we cannot do the job with eight, or even
nine.  We need 214,200 reindeer.  This increases the payload - not even
counting the weight of the sleigh - to 353,430 tons. Again, for comparison -
this is four times the weight of the Queen Elizabeth.

5)  353,000 tons traveling at 650 miles per second creates enormous air
resistance - this will heat the reindeer up in the same fashion as
spacecrafts re-entering the earth's atmosphere.  The lead pair of reindeer
will absorb 14.3 QUINTILLION joules of energy.  Per second.  Each.  In short,
they will burst into flame almost instantaneously, exposing the reindeer
behind them, and create deafening sonic booms in their wake.The entire
reindeer team will be vaporized within 4.26 thousandths of a second.  Santa,
meanwhile, will be subjected to centrifugal forces 17,500.06 times greater
than gravity.  A 250-pound Santa (which seems ludicrously slim)would be
pinned to the back of his sleigh by 4,315,015 pounds of force.

In conclusion - If Santa ever DID deliver presents on Christmas Eve, he's
dead now.
==========================================================================
In the spirit of Christmas, I am willing to forward any of the following lists
to anybody who doesn't have it, if you just drop me a note:
1) Politically Correct Red Riding Hood
2) 50 things to do on a final
3) Animaniacs
4) History of the world according to student bloopers
5) Bumperstickers on the information superhighway
6) Nerd test
7) Examples of unclear writing
8) First aid for non-medically minded persons
9) More Disorder in the court
10)Ready for a test?
11)101 ways to freak out a roommate
12)English reforms
13)Why? questions
14)Excuses for school
15)25 ways to deal with stress
16)50 fun things to do in an elevator

I wish you a merry christmas and a happy new year

     Brent