The Russian word Tsar (also sometimes spelled Czar) is the Russian translation for Caesar.

Ivan III was the first Czar of Russia*.  He was searching for a way to unite the factious princedoms of Russia, and decided that embracing the Catholic Church was the way to do it.

So he took a bride from Rome, and also took the old Roman title for himself, Caesar.

*Technically, Ivan IV (the terrible) was the first ruler to “officially” use the title Tsar, but III used it unofficially.  Also, the point of the post is that the two words are related, so the firsties debate is really secondary.

scoff·law/ˈskôfˌlô/

The Wife^® and I are re-watching the The Matrix trilogy… I suppose because we were in the mood to be vastly disappointed or something.

Anyway, I just looked up Trinity on IMDB and it turns out she was in a show called Matrix in 1993. This show was about a hitman, and had 100% less Lawrence Fishhead and his odd behind-the-back arm folds.

A bezoar is a mass found trapped in the gastrointestinal system (usually the stomach), though it can occur in other locations.

There are several varieties of bezoar, some of which have inorganic constituents and others organic.

Source: My Strange Addiction, TLC

**The girl eats chalk… 3-4 pieces a day… Doctor said that people eat their own hair and produce the object on the right… vomit.

Bezoar: Wiki

For the bacon-obsessed, a camp in Michigan has the cure.

I’m convinced that Facebook is one of the worst online applications ever*.  It’s buggy.  It’s hard to navigate.  It just all around sucks.  But alas, it’s the largest online community out there, so you can’t just ignore it (if you’re in the marketing game, that is).

To make a bulleted list in Facebook’s proprietary FBML language, use <blockquote> rather than <ul>

<blockquote>
<li>Item 1</li>
<li>Item 2</li>
<li>Item 3</li>
</blockquote>

*To be clear, as much as Facebook sucks, it’s not as bad as IBM’s Websphere.

Judge Wesley E. Brown, 103 years young, is the oldest federal judge still hearing cases.

Born June 22, 1907, he got his law degree in 1933, did private practice from 1933 to 1944, entered the US Navy in 1944, becoming a Lieutenant and serving until 1946, and then returned to private practice until 1958.  He was a Referee in Bankruptcy for the United States District Court for the District of Kansas from 1958 to 1962, and then was appointed to the Kansas court.  He served as chief judge from 1971 to 1977, and became the senior judge in 1979.  He still hears cases to this day.

That is an impressive resume!

Apparently, sunscreen removes the invisible ink that Valleyfair! uses for your re-admission to the park.

We went last week.  I ran out to the car to put on sandals (so my socks wouldn’t get wet when we went on the water rides) and reapply sunscreen.  I got my arm stamped like I always do.  When I came back to the gate, she looked at my arm and couldn’t find the stamp.  She asked if I had put on sunscreen and told me that washes it off.  That information would have been good to know BEFORE I reapplied it!!!

Lucky for me, I still had my half of my ticket, so she let me back in.  It would have been big trouble if she hadn’t!

twyndyllyng

1. (obsolete) A twinling; twin.

twinling

1. A small or young twin, especially a twin lamb

via twyndyllyng – Wiktionary.

Janus Words are words that have two different meanings that are opposite of each other.

From Grammar Girl:

Such words are named after the Roman god Janus who has two faces that look in opposite directions. Other Janus words are “cleave” (which can mean to cling to or to separate), “screen” (which can mean to review or display or to hide or shield from view), and “trim” (which can mean to remove things or add things).