20 October 2017

paradiddle

[par-uh-did-l]

noun

1. an exercise or sequence performed typically on the snare drum, marked by four basic beats with alternation of the right hand and left hand on successive strong beats, and begun and ended slowly with a dramatic increase in tempo in the middle.

Origin of paradiddle

1925-1930; staccato syllables partly imitative; cf. diddle2; perhaps with para-1facetiously representing the alternation

Dictionary.com

Anagram

dad lip read
air paddled

Today’s quote

To permit ignorance is to empower it.
Origin
Dan Brown

On this day

20 October 1949 – Norman Joseph Woodland and Bernard Silver apply for a patent on their new design for capturing product information: the bar code. Woodland and Silver had been considering this since overhearing a supermarket executive asking the Dean of Engineering at Drexel Institute how to solve the problem of capturing product information automatically at the checkout. While sitting on the beach, Woodland drew out dots and dashes based on Morse code. He then dragged his fingers through the sand to convert them into lines: thin lines for the dots and thick lines for the dashes, thus inventing a two dimensional, linear Morse code which he and Silver then adapted optical sound film technology with. The patent for bar codes was issued on 7 October 1952, almost three years after they applied for it.

20 October 1977 – Plane crash in Mississippi kills 3 members of rock band, Lynyrd Skynyrd (Ronnie Van Zant, Steve Gaines, Cassie Gaines, along with their Assistant Road Manager (Dean Kilpatrick), the pilot (Walter McCreary and co-pilot (William Gray).

20 October 2011 – death of Muammar Gaddafi, former leader of Libya. He had been shot to death by rebel fighters following the overthrow of his government. Born 7 June 1942.