ON THIS DAY
December 31, 2016
IT’S DAY 366 OF 2016
BRITAIN sent 366 athletes to the Rio Olympics, compared with China’s 416, but won 27 gold medals, one more than China. GYMNAST Justine Allingham from Hampshire has completed a challenge to do 366 handstands, one for every day of 2016, each in front of English landmarks, including in Trafalgar Square, to raise money for The Fire Fighters Charity. THE most flags tattooed on the body is 366, a record set in 2009 by Guinness Rishi, from India (he named himself after the Book Of Records). His wife Bimla set a 1991 world record for the shortest will: ‘All to son.’
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COCA-COLA ZERO was launched in 2006, gaining the nickname ‘Bloke Coke’ in Britain as it was aimed at young men watching their figure who thought Diet Coke ‘too feminine’. LICKING a stamp gives you 5.9 calories, Royal Mail claimed in 2001 when it launched the selfadhesive, zero-calorie stamp.
HAPPY BIRTHDAY
PSY, 39. The singer-songwriter/record producer is known as the ‘Korean Robbie Williams’. In 2012, the video for his hit Gangnam Style, named after the district of Seoul he was born in, became the first to garner more than one billion views on YOUTUBE. Ed Balls did the song’s dance routine on Strictly Come Dancing and Boris Johnson said he and David Cameron danced it at Chequers. ALEX SALMOND, 62. The former First Minister made headlines in 1988 when he was banned from the House of Commons for a week after becoming the first MP in history to interrupt a Chancellor’s Budget speech — heckling Nigel Lawson over the poll tax. DIANE VON FURSTENBERG, 70. The Belgian-American fashion designer is best known for her wrap dress, created in 1974 and frequently worn by the Duchess of Cambridge (right). Born Diane Halfin, she married and divorced German Prince Egon of Furstenberg and had relationships with actors Richard Gere, Warren Beatty and Ryan O’Neal.
BORN ON THIS DAY
JULE STYNE (1905-1994). The Oscar-winning, London-born American songwriter composed the music for shows including Gypsy, Gentlemen Prefer Blondes and Funny Girl and songs Diamonds Are A Girl’s Best Friend and Three Coins In The Fountain. As a boy, he was taken to the London Hippodrome to see vaudeville star Harry Lauder and was so excited, he jumped on stage to sing a song, causing a sensation.
ELIZABETH ARDEN (1878-1966). The American cosmetics pioneer — real name Florence Nightingale Graham — said: ‘To be beautiful is the birthright of every woman.’ She was the first to sell travel-size beauty products and to incorporate a founder’s name into a product name.
ON DECEMBER 31...
IN 1923, the chimes of Big Ben were broadcast for the first time on BBC Radio. IN 1946, U.S. president Harry S. Truman officially declared World War II was over, even though fighting had ended a year earlier in both Europe and Japan. IN 1999, Russian president Boris yeltsin announced on TV he was resigning, handing power to prime minister Vladimir Putin.
QUOTE FOR TODAY
When I was young I thought that money was the most important thing in life; now that I am old I know that it is. Oscar Wilde, playwright, poet and novelist (1854-1900)
JOKE OF THE DAY
WHAT do you call a nun with a washing machine on her head? Sister Matic.