ON THIS DAY
December 10, 2016
IT’S DAY 345...
J.K. ROWLING’S last Harry Potter book, The Deathly Hallows, sold more than 345,000 copies per hour after its release on July 21, 2007 — earning it the world record for the fastest-selling book. ONE of British street artist Banksy’s most famous works sold for £345,000 at a Miami auction in 2014. Kissing Coppers showed two policemen embracing and was stripped from the wall of a Brighton pub (it was replaced by a copy covered in plastic). THOMAS BLOOD, an Anglo-Irish army officer, tried to steal the Crown Jewels 345 years ago, having got into the Tower of London dressed as a priest. He got hold of the crown, orb and sceptre, but was captured. He was pardoned by Charles II.
THERE ARE 21 DAYS LEFT
WOMEN lie an average of 21 times a week, but men tell 42 porkies a week, according to a poll. ‘Nothing’s wrong, I’m fine,’ is the most common lie told by both sexes. VENEzuELA’S capital Caracas is the world’s ‘most murderous city’, with a death every 21 minutes. The city’s murder rate is 120 per 100,000 residents (by comparison, it is 4.7 per 100,000 in the u.S., the most murderous Western developed nation). GIRAFFES’ tongues are 21 in long to help them pull leaves from branches and their hearts weigh 25lb (big enough to pump blood to their brains).
HAPPY BIRTHDAY
CLIVE ANDERSON, 64. The barrister-turned-comedian and chat show host once asked Jeffrey Archer: ‘Is there no beginning to your talents?’ ‘The old jokes are always the best,’ said Archer, to which Anderson retorted: ‘Yes, I’ve read your books!’ His most uncomfortable on-screen moment came when the Bee Gees walked off his 1996 chatshow after his sniping jokes. SIR KENNETH BRANAGH, 56. The actor, writer and director is the only man to have been nominated for five Oscars in different categories: Best Live Action Short Film, Best Director, Best Actor, Best Writing and Best Supporting Actor. Sadly, he won none of them.
BORN ON THIS DAY
MARY NORTON (1903-1992). The English children’s author is most famous for her Borrowers books, featuring tiny people who live beneath the floorboards. She also wrote the stories that the 1971 Disney film Bedknobs And Broomsticks was based on. MICHAEL CLARKE DuNCAN (1957-2012). The American actor (right) was nominated for an Oscar for his role as John Coffey, a gentle giant on death row in the film The Green Mile. The 6ft 5in star had worked as a bodyguard for Will Smith and Jamie Foxx, but gave up his day job in 1997 when the rapper The Notorious B.I.G. was murdered on the first day Duncan was in charge of protecting him.
ON DECEMBER 10 . . .
IN 1845, the Scottish civil engineer Robert Thompson patented pneumatic tyres. IN 2003, Salisbury mother Angela Cannings had her conviction for murdering her two baby sons quashed by the Court of Appeal, discrediting the evidence of expert witness Professor Sir Roy Meadow, who had claimed that one cot death was a tragedy, two was suspicious and three was murder.
QUOTE FOR TODAY
FOOLS are in a terrible, overwhelming majority all the wide world over. Norwegian playwright Hendrik Ibsen (1828-1906)
JOKE OF THE DAY
WHY does Santa have three gardens? So he can hoe, hoe, hoe.