h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

my daughter in singapore is now 7 hours ahead of me instead of 6, it's all very confusalating

I know what you mean, Pierce; "confusalating" indeed! My second grandniece was born across the date line. I don't know which day to use for her birthday.
Bel, I think Narnia is an excellent choice of books. Loved them at eight and fourty years later still reread them from time to time.
(Speaking of Halloween costumes, a bunch of us had our younger students in a costume recital. It was a hoot, and started with a parade for them around the auditorium. They dressed for their pieces. "Rainy Day" had a rain slicker. "Detective Agency" a trench coat and dark glasses.)

Sounds funny. I don't mind costumes as long as I am not supposed to come in disguise.

If you want confused dates for birthdays, how about this:

George Harrison, the Beatle, always celebrated his birthday on February 25th, as this was what was on his birth certificate. It wasn't until about 10 years before his death that he discovered that he was actually born on the 24th, shortly before midnight. However, by the time the midwife got round to filling in the relevant forms, she checked her watch, saw it was 12.15am on the 25th, and that is what was entered as his birthdate!

could have been worse. he could have been born on the 29 february

So George Harrison was born on 24th in the UK but definitely 25th in Oz time. That exact moment would have been late morning on 25th over here. A baby born in the UK many hours before a baby born in Australia would be younger according to birth records.

it's all relative. i was born in neither UK nor OZ, but i feel old anyway

What's it got to do with your relatives?

At least one of them would have been there at the time, I assume.

One way to make yourself feel old is to think of what was happening in the world the same number of years before you were born as you are now.

I'm 50 and was born in 1960. 50 years before I was born was 1910. The British Empire was in its prime. Encyclopaedia Britannica was putting the finishing touches on the greatest work of reference to be ever produced, the Titanic was in the shipyards being fitted and people were saying that there could never be another major war in the World.

I feel old enough without subtracting another 48 years, thank you, Gnomon.

jazz was born back then - and i'm still enjoying it

1894 was probably a good year, but that does make me feel ancient.

There was (barely) cinema. Recorded music was on records that had only one side, or on wax cylinders.

'Typewriter' was a job description.

Not only did people not consider going to the moon, they wondered if man would ever fly.

And people in the US were still afraid of Communists.

Mine would be 1898. Marie and Pierre Curie were busy in their laboratory about then. Coincidentially, the biggest events in the year of my birth (according to a video tape I was given once for my birthday, with newsreels from that year) were the opening of Sellafield and the launch of nuclear submarines.

stalin died the year i was born, maybe i am his reincarnation

be afraid, be very afraid

Gnomon's method calls for me to think about 1956.

Elvis Presley entered the US charts.
The Southern Manifesto, in favour of racial segregation, was written and signed by 101 American politicians.
The UK still had the death penalty, and a motion to end it failed.
The computer hard drive was invented.
And there was some trouble in Suez.
The Montgomery Bus Boycott ended with victory for the Civil Rights Movement.

That's a very US-centric list. I'm afraid I took it all from Wikipedia.

TRiG.

The first thing that sprung into my mind for 1956 was http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hungarian_Revolution_of_1956 .

Mine would be 1948. The two things that spring to mind are the foundation of the NHS and of the state of Israel. Gandhi was assassinated, the Grundgesetz of the German Federal Republic was drafted, and the UN Declaration of Human Rights was introduced.

None of this makes me feel especially old, because I don't feel like I have any connection with it. But when I think there were people voting in the last UK election who weren't even born when Thatcher as PM...Wow.

For me, it's 1930. Evelyn Waugh, Virginia Woolf and other people of that calibre were putting out new books. Talking pictures were still a novelty to some extent. Italy had gone Fascist, but I think that might have been the extent of the contamination. There was a depression but it hadn't yet hit rock-bottom. Not bad, really, until I think how little time there would be before everything fell in a heap.

We did this recently, didn't we?

Mine's in 1917. The Americans have arrived fashionably late to the First World War, and the Bolshevik Revolution's about to take place.