Here is your open thread for March 27, 2020.
Mariah Carey turns 50 today. She’s got pipes, but my favorite stuff of hers is the giddy, bubbly pop, like this one:
On March 27, 1309, the Avignon Pope Clement V excommunicated Venice — the whole city. If that seems harsh, he followed it up by later calling for a crusade against Venice. Clement died five years later and as his body was lying in state, the church was struck by lightning and burned to the ground. (Whether that really happened is disputed, but that was the story going around at the time, so it’s not disputed that this is what people widely believed ought to have happened.)
On March 27, 1915, Mary Mallon — better known as “Typhoid Mary” — was placed under quarantine for the second time. Mallon had worked as a cook for several families around New York. She was perfectly healthy herself but, unbeknownst to her or to those families, she carried the disease and was eventually identified as the source of multiple outbreaks and fatalities. She was kept in isolation from 1915 until her death in 1938.
March 27, 1964, was Good Friday. It was also the day that a magnitude-9.2 earthquake hit Alaska, killing 125 people.
Wilhelm Röntgen was born 175 years ago today. Röntgen discovered X-rays and laid the path for all the ways they’re used in modern medicine. He was also a mensch — refusing to file patents for his discoveries and inventions due to his belief they should belong to all for the common good. (He also donated his Nobel Prize money to scientific research.)
Patty Hill was born 152 years ago today. She wrote “Happy Birthday to You,” a song that I hope you’ve had sung to you, more than once, by people you love. It’s also a song that, today, is helping people keep safe as they wash their hands. So.
Sarah Vaughan was born 96 years ago today. Here she is singing Gershwin.
Julian Glover turns 85 today and Michael York turns 78. If I’m watching a mystery show and Julian Glover shows up, I’ll be like, he did it — he’s always the guy who did it. But then if Michael York shows up, I’ll be like, hold on … maybe …
Austin Pendleton turns 80 today. (When he shows up in this mystery, we know he didn’t do it, but that he probably knows something and has been too afraid to tell detectives what that is.)
Actor Stephen Dillane turns 63 today. I was halfway through the John Adams miniseries before I realized that Thomas Jefferson was Stannis Baratheon.
Randall Cunningham and Quentin Tarantino both turn 57 today. I’ve enjoyed many of Tarantino’s films, but has Quentin Tarantino ever high-hurdled a defensive lineman, punted a ball 91 yards, or thrown a touchdown 60 yards through the air into the wind in Buffalo? No, he never has. Advantage Randall Cunningham.
Nathan Fillion turns 49 today. Fergie turns 45. Buster Posey turns 33 (which is older in catcher-years).
Finally, today is the feast day of St. John of Egypt: “He withdrew to the top of a cliff near Lycopolis, Egypt, where he could avoid all human contact. There he carved three small cells out of rock; one for sleeping, one for work and the last for praying. Then he walled them up with himself inside, leaving only a small window. He communicated through the window to people who brought him food and water twice a week. Crowds would gather on those two days to hear him preach.”
I was all set to recommend him as a patron saint for social distancing, but then I got to that bit about the crowds gathering twice a week outside his cell.
Keep your distance, but talk amongst yourselves.
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