Chess Quotes  Chess, like other arts, must be practiced to be appreciated. – Alexander Alekhine (1892-1946) (source:  Brooklyn Daily Eagle 1929)   I failed to make the chess team because of my height. – Woody Allen (born 1935)   Chess is as elaborate a waste of human intelligence as you could find anywhere outside an advertising agency. – Raymond Chandler (1888-1959) (source:  The Long Goodbye, 1953)   Not all artists may be chess players, but all chess players are artists. – Marcel Duchamp (1887-1968)   Life is a kind of chess, with struggle, competition, good and ill events. – Benjamin Franklin (1706-1790)  http://www.chessmaniac.com/chess-quotes/

March Food Calendar from Institute of Agriculture and Natural Resources at University of Nebraska Lincoln (UNL)  http://food.unl.edu/march-food-calendar

Until 1963 the Post Office Department preferred that state and territorial names be written out in full to avoid confusion, but accepted the popular public practice of abbreviation.  The Department published lists of preferred state abbreviations in the 1831 Table of Post Offices in the United States and in the United States Official Postal Guide, first published in 1874.  Most of the preferred abbreviations in 1874 remained the same for nearly the next 90 years.  On July 1, 1963, the Post Office Department implemented the five-digit ZIP Code, which was placed after the state name in the last line of an address.  To provide room for the new code in the address line, the Department published an initial list of state abbreviations in the June 27, 1963, issue of the Postal Bulletin.  Many of these initial abbreviations consisted of four letters.  Four months later, in October 1963, the Department published the now-familiar list of two letter state abbreviations in Publication 59, Abbreviations for Use with ZIP Code.  To date, only one change has been made to the abbreviations issued in October 1963.  In November 1969, at the request of the Canadian postal administration, the abbreviation for Nebraska, originally NB, was changed to NE, to avoid confusion with New Brunswick in Canada.  https://about.usps.com/who-we-are/postal-history/state-abbreviations.pdf

State trivia questions   How many states have four letters in their names?  How many states have thirteen letters in their names?  How many state names begin with the letter M?  How many state names begin with the letter N?   Answers are forthcoming.

suffix - ory  1.  of or pertaining to, serving for; adjective suffix appended to various words, often nouns but also verbs, to make an adjective form.  Often added to words of Latin origin, but used with other words also:  sense and sensory, statute and statutory.

2.  that which pertains to, or serves for; noun suffix appended to various words: 

ambulatory, dormitory, factory  https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/-ory

negatory (adjective)   "expressing negation," 1570s, from Middle French negatoire or directly from Medieval Latin negatorius "negative," from Latin negatus, past participle of negare "deny, say no, to refuse".  In the sense "no" it is U.S. Air Force slang from the early 1950s.  http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?term=negatory

Ekphrasis  “Description” in Greek.  An ekphrastic poem is a vivid description of a scene or, more commonly, a work of art.  Through the imaginative act of narrating and reflecting on the “action” of a painting or sculpture, the poet may amplify and expand its meaning.  A notable example is “Ode on a Grecian Urn,” in which the poet John Keats speculates on the identity of the lovers who appear to dance and play music, simultaneously frozen in time and in perpetual motion.  http://www.poetryfoundation.org/learning/glossary-term/ekphrasis  See also http://writingaboutart.org/pages/ekphrasis.html and http://csmt.uchicago.edu/glossary2004/ekphrasis.htm

A friction ridge is a raised portion of the epidermis on the digits (fingers and toes), the palm of the hand or the sole of the foot, consisting of one or more connected ridge units of friction ridge skin.  These epidermal ridges serve to amplify vibrations triggered, for example, when fingertips brush across an uneven surface, better transmitting the signals to sensory nerves involved in fine texture perception.  These ridges may also assist in gripping rough surfaces and may improve surface contact in wet conditions.  Other forms of biometric identification utilizing a physical attribute that is nearly unique to humans include iris recognition, the tongue and DNA profiling, also known as genetic fingerprinting.  Read much more and see graphics at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fingerprint

A.Word.A.Day with Anu Garg

lutestring  (LOOT-string)  noun  A glossy silk fabric.  This fabric has nothing to do with a lute string.  The word is a corruption of French lustrine, from Italian lustrino, from Latin lustrare (to make bright).  Ultimately from the Indo-European root leuk- (light), which also gave us lunar, lunatic, light, lightning, lucid, illuminate, illustrate, translucent, lux, lynx, pellucid, lucubrate, limn, levin, and lea.  Earliest documented use:  1661.

frontispiece  (FRUN-ti-spees)  noun  1.  An illustration facing or preceding the title page of a book.  2.  A facade, especially an ornamental facade, of a building.  3.  An ornamental pediment over a door or window.  The word was formed by corruption of French frontispice by association with the word ‘piece’.  It’s from Latin frontispicium (facade), from front- (front) + specere (to look).  Ultimately from the Indo-European root spek- (to observe), which also gave us spy, spice, species, suspect, expect, spectrum, despise, despicable, bishop, telescope, specious, speciesism, soupcon, prospicient, perspicuous, speculum, omphaloskepsis, and conspectus.  Earliest documented use:  1598.

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From:  Fred Reinagel  Subject:  lutestring   Interesting coincidence?  The Chinese lute (pipa) was historically strung with silk strings.  There is some evidence that silk strings were also used on European lutes and viols in medieval and early Renaissance eras.

From:  Ron Betchley  Subject:  frontispiece  While on a visit to Cuba, I was surprised to find a Masonic Temple in the city of Cienfuegos.  I wanted to share this information with fellow cruisers telling them how I recognized the logo, sign, sculpture thing above the doors.  But what to call it?  Opened my AWAD this morning and there it was, “frontispiece”.  Thanks again.

While music is in many respects a mathematical thing, ultimately it is an emotional art.  One of the most solemn and evocative pieces of American music is the Adagio for Strings by Samuel Barber.  The piece was originally the slow movement of a string quartet before it was orchestrated at the request of Arturo Toscanini. It is often called upon to serve in times of great emotional stress and it was heard during the funeral services for President Franklin Roosevelt and John F. Kennedy.  http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=93612081  

The New Deal was a series of domestic programs enacted in the United States between 1933 and 1938, and a few that came later.  They included both laws passed by Congress as well as presidential executive orders during the first term (1933–1937) of President Franklin D. Roosevelt.  The programs were in response to the Great Depression, and focused on what historians refer to as the "3 Rs," Relief, Recovery, and Reform:  relief for the unemployed and poor, recovery of the economy to normal levels, and reform of the financial system to prevent a repeat depression.  Many New Deal programs remain active, with some still operating under the original names, including the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC), the Federal Crop Insurance Corporation (FCIC), the Federal Housing Administration (FHA), and the Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA).  The largest programs still in existence today are the Social Security System and the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC).  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Deal

http://librariansmuse.blogspot.com  Issue 1438  March 9, 2016   On this date in 1910, Samuel Barber, American pianist and composer, was born. He was awarded the Pulitzer Prize for Music twice:  for his opera Vanessa (1956–57) and for the Concerto for Piano and Orchestra (1962).  On this date in 1933,  President Franklin D. Roosevelt submitted  the Emergency Banking Act to Congress, the first of his New Deal policies.