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You've got e-mail problems by Bill Husted
Learn how to use the "save as a draft" feature in your e-mail. Instead of sending a heated e-mail right away, always save it as a draft and let the e-mail cool for 30 minutes to an hour before serving. Just this one tip can prevent most e-mail problems. The cooling-off period gives you time to reconsider angry or stupid words typed in haste. There's nothing like the Internet for turning mild-mannered and polite folks into berserk beasts. In almost every case - e-mails sent in anger turn bad situations into total disasters. I've worked at places where people sitting a few feet apart routinely communicated by e-mail. A simple question or directive often required three or four e-mails sent back and forth. E-mail is easy and fast, a lazy way of handling things. But the old-fashioned telephone is often the best choice if you're trying to clear up a problem with a merchant or get an answer for work. I have friends who forward pages of bad jokes . I've also received the electronic equivalent of the old chain letter that promises riches if I send it on to 10 or so friends . And - like you - I have received e-mails that offend me. Maybe, like you, I'm usually too polite to complain. But e-mails like this chip away at friendships. Don't assume I crave bad jokes or want to suffer through e-mails with extreme political or religious ideas. The best idea is to avoid sending this stuff entirely. But if you just can't help yourself, ask the recipients first if they have the time and inclination for junk like this.
http://www.palmbeachpost.com/money/the-most-helpful-e-mail-tool-your-head-742505.html?printArticle=y

YouTube Play, which launched June 14, is a partnership between the video site and the Guggenheim. It invites users to submit their short creative videos at http://youtube.com/play. The top 20, chosen by a jury of professional artists, will be on view this fall at Guggenheim museums around the world. http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/06/14/AR2010061405222.html

Jimmy Dean, who died June 13 at his home in Henrico County, Va., at age 81, may be better known by some today as "the sausage king" of TV commercial fame than a hit-making country music star and one-time TV show host who helped bring country music into the mainstream in the 1960s. The Texas-born entertainer and businessman, who began his recording career in the 1950s, scored a No. 1 hit on both the country and pop singles charts in 1961 with his spoken-narrative song about a coal miner — "a giant of a man" — who saves fellow workers from "a would-be grave" after their mine collapses. "Big Bad John," which Dean said he wrote in an hour and a half on a flight from New York to Tennessee, earned a Grammy Award for best country and western recording. Dean was born Aug. 10, 1928, in Olton, Texas, and grew up in Plainview. He and his brother Don were raised on a farm by their mother after their father left when Dean was still a child. They were so poor, he once said, he wore shirts that his mother made out of sugar sacks. Poverty, Dean told the Times-Dispatch, "was the greatest motivating factor in my life." He began singing early on, and his mother taught him to play his first chord on the piano when he was 10. He later taught himself to play the harmonica, guitar and accordion. See obituary and picture at: http://www.latimes.com/news/obituaries/la-me-jimmy-dean-20100615,0,948588.story

The origin of football / soccer can be found in every corner of geography and history. The Chinese, Japanese, Italian, Ancient Greek, Persian, Viking, and many more played a ball game long before our era. The Chinese played "football" games date as far back as 3000 years ago. The Ancient Greeks and the Roman used football games to sharpen warriors for battle. In South and Central America a game called "Tlatchi" once flourished. But it was in England that soccer / football really begin to take shape. It all started in 1863 in England, when two football association (association football and rugby football) split off on their different course. Therefore, the first Football Association was founded in England. After the English Football Association, the next oldest are the Scottish FA (1873), the FA of Wales (1875) and the Irish FA (1880). Strictly speaking, at the time of the first international match, England had no other partner association against which to play. When Scotland played England in Glasgow on 30 November 1872, the Scottish FA did not even exist - it was not founded for another three months. The team England played that day was actually the oldest Scottish club team, Queen's Park. The international football community grew steadily, although it sometimes met with obstacles and setbacks. In 1912, 21 national associations were already affiliated to the Fédération Internationale de Football Association (FIFA). http://www.all-soccer-info.com/

Football was introduced to North America in Canada by the British Army garrison in Montreal, which played a series of games with McGill University. In 1874, USA's Harvard hosted Canada's McGill University to play the new game derived from Rugby football in a home and home series. For the many differences in rules between U.S. and Canadian teams, see: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparison_of_American_and_Canadian_football

A recently discovered comet is surprising skywatchers by becoming brighter than predictions had first suggested and can now be seen with the unaided eye during the next few weeks. Comet McNaught, officially catalogued as C/2009 R1, was discovered by Australian astronomer Robert McNaught last September using the using the 0.5-meter Uppsala Schmidt telescope and a CCD camera. It's the 51st comet that bears McNaught's name. Comet McNaught is expected to pass closest to the sun (perihelion) on July 2, at a distance of 37 million miles (60 million km). http://www.space.com/spacewatch/new-comet-mcnaught-visible-100608.html

Feedback to A.Word.A.Day
From: Joel Mabus Subject: words that sound plural
I offer up my favorite word that sounds plural, but is both plural and singular. It is the tiny, often bothersome, insect named thrips. Because thrips usually appear in large numbers, the plural usage often applies. (As in "Oh, no! I've got thrips in my greenhouse!) But many a gardener will insist on calling an individual a "thrip" (as in "How do I kill a thrip?") But the declension is, properly, one thrips, two thrips, or a whole mess of thrips.
From: Robert Payne Subject: Words that appear plural but aren't
In my travels (such as they are), the singular term most often mistaken for plural is "Homo sapiens", the Latin species name for modern humans. This tendency to mistake the term as plural is perhaps exemplified by Pete Shelley's 1981 song Homosapien ("And I'm homosapien like you/And we're homosapien too"). In Latin, "Homo sapiens" means "wise man"
From: John D. Laskowski Subject: Taxes and tropisms
As a biologist I've always loved examples of taxis and tropism. For all of you who are plagued with various insects that "crowd around" at your house in the fall (Marmorated Stink Bugs, Ladybird Beetles, and Box Elder Beetles) -- they all utilize thigmotaxis where they tend to "hug" each other. In plants a similar situation occurs with the tropism of many vines to "hug" a surface as they climb upward in their growth aspect. Surprisingly, some "hug" clockwise and others counterclockwise as they twine upward! Look for these in your enjoyment of nature's never-ending amazing displays of behavior.