Abraham Lincoln was assassinated …

… on Good Friday, April 14, 1865, when President Abraham Lincoln was shot while attending a performance of Our American Cousin at Ford’s Theater with his wife and two guests.

Lincoln’s assassin, actor and Confederate sympathizer John Wilkes Booth, had also plotted with fellow conspirators to kill William H. Seward (then Secretary of State) and Vice President Andrew Johnson respectively. Although Booth succeeded in killing Lincoln, the larger plot failed. Seward was attacked, but recovered from his wounds, and Johnson’s would-be assassin fled Washington, D.C. upon losing his nerve

– Wikipedia

There are not so many things in this world that have the emotional impact as the flying machines of the golden age of aviation. The Waco is not Howard Hughes’ H-1 or Amelia Earhart’s Lockheed Electra but it, along with Boeing’s Stearman taught legions of pilots for WWII and while many Stearmans went into post-war service as crop dusters and had dramatically short lifespans, the Wacos went into private hands and were cared for and passed from one set of caring hands to the next.

Fuel prices, FAA regulations, and liability concerns have turned many of these airborne icons of history into Hangar Queens and museum pieces; silencing them forever. Most may not pass to another generation of guardians.

It really does feel like and ending.

The most common Google search that hits theSalmonFam.org blog is: stages of the common cold !

For those who have not read the post, it is a humorous look the common cold through the 5 stages of death. Here’s a link for your … umm … enjoyment.

Today would have been Dr. Randy Pausch’s 49th birthday. He died of pancreatic cancer but not before making one more indelible mark, “The Last Lecture“.

One of his many legacies is the Alice Project – a 3D animation environment that makes it easy for students to learn object oriented programming while creating animated movies.

As for “the Last Lecture”, here are a few of his memorable quotes …

remember, the brick walls are there for a reason.  The brick walls are not there to keep us out.  The brick walls are there to give us a chance to show how badly we want something.  Because the brick walls are there to stop the people who don’t want it badly enough.

The best way to teach somebody something is to have them think they’re learning something else.

It’s not about how to achieve your dreams.  It’s about how to lead your life.  If you lead your life the right way, the karma will take care of itself.  The dreams will come to you.

… a mixture of spirits and flavorings that whets the appetite, pleases the eye, and stimulates the mind. It is one of our conspicuous contributions to cultured living, up there with the Great American Songbook and the tuxedo.

By the 1990s, few establishments could produce a passable Martini or Manhattan.

Some of it is the ignorance of the folks behind the bar, who not only have a limited mastery of the ratios that make such cocktails refreshing but also fail to measure. It is a profession after all dominated by disabused actors and women comfortable in brief attire. But it is just as much the lack of audience.

The best cocktails were not the product of the 1950s when the Rat Pack set the standard, but the 1920s when piano bars and hot jazz ruled and people changed their clothes for the evening. Our most elegant cocktails were part of the great modern revolution in design and had the same sleek lines as that era’s airplanes and motorcars.

- The Weekly Standard – “The Cocktail Renaissance“

First, the disclaimer – I have nothing against actors for female bartenders. I do not disparage the beer drinker. I do take offense with someone behind the rail who can’t be bothered to learn how to do their job and worse still, makes the customer the guilty party for requesting the bartender actually perform their trade.

It does not take a degree in organic chemistry to make a proper cocktail. It takes three things – ingredients, equipment, and the ability to follow directions. It’s my guess that all three conspire against perfection. First, the ingredients. Cheap booze makes cheap drinks and in a market where volume sales is what that majority of customers demand, quality gets a nail it its coffin. The equipment is less of an issue other than the fact that it requires more work to keep six things clean than it does one … and the bottle open or corkscrew rarely get cleaned anyway so that makes it “zero”. Finally we arrive at “following instructions”. Doing things right takes time and why bother making one good drink if you can pawn off four bad ones in the same amount of time and get tipped for doing so.

The well formed cocktail has gone the way of fine crafted coachwork, the hand made chair, and braided rugs – all were built with pride and quality and the time involved resulted in something that would last.

A cocktail “must whet the appetite, not dull it.”
A cocktail “should stimulate the mind as well as the appetite.”
A cocktail “must be pleasing to the palate.”
A cocktail “must be pleasing to the eye.”
A cocktail “must have sufficient alcoholic flavor.”
A cocktail “must be well-iced.”

- David Embury,  Fine Art of Mixing Drinks

On a personal note, I’m a lightweight. If I can only have one drink in a sitting, I’d rather it be one worth drinking. While those around me pay $6-$10 for 3 drinks of C₂H₅OH + “filler”, I’d rather pay the same for one spectacular representation of a classic libation. If you are up for the challenge of learning a classic, check out Mike Hagan’s “5 Classic Cocktails Every Man Should Know“.