I found this meme on Far From Perfect‘s blog – a birthday meme! It’s perfect in it’s unexpected randomness because my birthday is 5 months from now. But I don’t think that matters, do you?

Sooo here’s how it works:

1. Go to Wikipedia and type in your birth date only -without the year.

December 24th – which according to Wikipedia, “is the 358th day of the year (359th in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. There are 7 days remaining until the end of the year.” One little week away from the next year! Wow! Anyway, moving on…

2. List 3 events that occurred that day:

There were a TON to choose from so I tried to keep to things either really cool or upbeat in nature, skipping things that involved slaughtering and war for instance.

* 563 – The Byzantine church Hagia Sophia in Constantinople is dedicated for the second time after being destroyed by earthquakes.

* 1777 – Kiritimati, also called Christmas Island, is discovered by James Cook.

* 1968 – Apollo Program: The crew of Apollo 8 enters into orbit around the Moon, becoming the first humans to do so. They performed 10 lunar orbits and broadcast live TV pictures that became the famous Christmas Eve Broadcast, one of the most watched programs in history.

3. List 2 important birthdays:

* 1973 – Stephenie Meyer, Author – now that is just freaking cool!

* 1880 – Johnny Gruelle, American cartoonist, children’s book writer and creator of Raggedy Ann (d. 1939)

4. List 1 death:

* 1863 – William Makepeace Thackeray, British writer (b. 1811)

5. List a holiday or observance:

*You obviously probably are aware that it’s Christmas Eve, so I posted the entire blurb on holidays and observances on that date from Wikipedia so you might learn something you didn’t know:

• Christmas Eve
• Calendar of saints: Feast of Saint Adela and Saint Irmina.
• It is the day when food is traditionally set out for Santa Claus and his reindeer in some parts of the world.
• In Portugal, Germany, Switzerland, Hungary, Finland, Denmark, Sweden, Iceland, Norway, Poland, the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Colombia, and the Dominican Republic, among others, this is the day that presents are exchanged and opened. In some of these countries, presents are delivered to children by Santa Claus, personified by an adult dressed up as Santa who comes knocking on the door.
• The Declaration of Christmas Peace takes place in the Old Great Square of Turku, Finland‘s official Christmas City, according to old traditions dating back to the Middle Ages.
• Grand High Climax, a major holiday in the Satanic religion, is celebrated at nightfall.