C is for Conspiracy

C is for Conspiracy

Conspiracy - a secret plan or agreement between two or more people to commit an illegal or subversive act Conspiracy theories abound. I actually mentioned one on Monday, that aliens crash-landed in Roswell and the US military covered it up. Some folks think Princess Diana was killed by MI6 at the orders of a member of the Royal Family. Others are convinced NASA faked the moon landings. More recently, the 9/11 attacks sparked all sorts of conspiracies, from the US government had prior warning of the attacks but did not do enough to stop them to the government being active in the destruction of the towers, that the airliners couldn't have brought them down alone, and the US air force was deliberately stood down or sent on exercises. And then there are some conspiracies that actually turned out to be true. First on the list, of course, is Watergate, when Republican officials spied on the Democratic National Headquarters from the Watergate Hotel in 1972. While conspiracy theories suggested...
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B is for Bananas

B is for Bananas

First, some banana trivia. The banana "tree" is not really a tree, but a giant herb.  The banana is the fruit of this herb. The cluster of bananas sold in supermarkets is a "hand" of bananas, while the individual bananas on the hand are called fingers. It is believed by many experts that bananas were the first fruit cultivated by humans. Worldwide, bananas are the fourth largest fruit crop. Alexander the Great first came across bananas in India in 327 B.C. Bananas were introduced to the United States at the 1876 Philadelphia Centennial Celebration, where they were sold wrapped in foil for 10 cents each. The average American consumes 28 pounds of bananas per year. India is the #1 banana producer in the world. In Uganda, bananas are such a big part of the diet that the same word, matooke, is used for both "food" and "banana." The pejorative term "banana republic" was coined by American writer O. Henry.  He used it in reference to Honduras, but the term...
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A is for Aliens

A is for Aliens

It's A to Z April!! Such a fun event. The plan is that each day in April, aside from Sundays, is dedicated to a letter in the alphabet. Last year I had a great time, so here we go again. My plan is to stay pretty much with my usual style posts, book reviews, Thursday's Tales, but adding the alphabet twist. Of course, some posts will probably be off-topic, but that's okay, right. And a special thanks to Arlee Bird of Tossing It Out for starting this challenge. A is for Aliens You know the kind, the glowing green humanoid aliens that arrive in space ships, abduct people and carry them off to experiment on. And in America, one of the major toursits stops for alien and UFO seekers has to be Roswell, New Mexico. In the summer of 1947, an object crashed near Roswell. Some believe it was a spacecraft containing extraterrestrial life,  but the Armed Forces maintain what was recovered was debris from...
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