Welcome to the month of April. Did you know that April is: Autism Awareness Month … Lawn & Garden Month … Confederate History Month … Garlic Month … Grilled Cheese Month … National Humor Month … Soft Pretzel Month … Pecan Month and BLT Sandwich Month?

A lot of fascinating things happened in April including:  In 1775 The American Revolution began … In 1865 James Wilkes Booth shot and killed President Abe Lincoln … In 1872 General Electric Corporation was formed …  In 1901 the state of New York became the first state requiring cars to have license plates … In 1902 JC Penney opened its first store in Wyoming …  In 1912 the Titanic hit an ice burg and sunk killing 1,514 people … In 1923 Yankee Stadium opened … In 1947 Jackie Robinson became the first African-American to play in a Major League Baseball game … In 1953 TV Guide made its debut … In 1955 Ray Kroc opened his first franchised MacDonald’s restaurant … In 1964 Ford introduced the Mustang … In April 1970 President Nixon signed legislation banning cigarette commercials on television & radio …  In April 1973 the first cell phone call was made … In April 1976 Apple Computers was formed by Steve Jobs & Steve Wozniak … In 2010 BP Oil’s Deep Water Horizon rig exploded in the Gulf of Mexico … and in 2011 “Games of Thrones” made its debut on HBO !!

On April 16^th, NASA will blast off a spacecraft known as the Transiting Exoplanet Survey Station (TESS) fueled by a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket. The satellite will orbit between the Earth and the Moon for the next two years collecting data and scanning the space sky for alien worlds. TESS will help identify exoplanets orbiting the stars just outside our solar system. Scientists are saying there could be as many as 500 earth-size planets within 300 light-years of here that could possibly sustain life.

According to a 2017 study published in the journal “Pediatrics”, firearm injuries are the third leading cause of death among children age 1 through 17 in the USA. In a study from the “American Home Journal” among the world’s wealth nations, the United States accounts for 91 % of all firearm deaths of children under 15 years of age. Between the years 2000 and 2016 at least 26,000 children and teenagers under the age of 18 were killed by guns … 59% of the childhood gun fatalities are homicides … 24% were suicides … 15% unintentional shootings and 2% of undetermined intent. I’m all for the Second Amendment and I am a card carrying member of the NRA but damn-it we need to do something about killing kids!

On February 24, 2018 two pilots on two different airplanes say they saw a UFO in the skies over Arizona. Both planes were cruising approximately 30,000 feet and the unidentified aircraft raced across the sky above them. Pilots from a Phoenix Air Learjet and American Airlines flight #1095 saw an object flying the opposite way and both reported to the Albuquerque Center air traffic control. The tower said they had no scheduled aircraft in the area. The FAA is looking into the matter.