What's old is new.....
During filming of The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly in 1965, Eli Wallach, who played Tuco, drank what he thought was a soft drink from a soda pop bottle, but it turned out to be acid that some doofus had poured into it to store it. He had to go to hospital. The saga of these cans won't end well.

I was looking for that article of some years ago which identified the inspiration for that boulder scene, this being an issue of Disney's old Uncle Scrooge comics, which were childhood favorites of both George Lucas and Steven Spielberg, but it cannot be found.

That should be 1,500 and not 1,1500. Miss C.

I made a set of red velvet cupcakes with cream cheese frosting Friday for an office gathering
Office gathering, Miss C? Was this you and the cats?

Just the thing to keep your radium glass dust-free!

Pretty impressive, Miss C. I'm somewhat of a tornado fancier and I was not familiar with this one. It is hard to believe that an F-5 storm could occur in Germany, but evidently it did. But so far as it being "the most powerful recorded tornado in history" (as opposed to 'the most powerful tornado in recorded history') goes, I think that title belongs to the Tri-State Tornado of 1925, which had an effective wind velocity in excess of 350 mph, as well as a damage path 219 miles long. This tornado, as you may recall, is somewhere in here under the title 'The Forgotten Storm'.

From the Sherlock Holmes short story, The Five Orange Pips:
“‘Ku Klux Klan. A name derived from the fanciful resemblance to the sound produced by cocking a rifle. This terrible secret society was formed by some ex-Confederate soldiers in the Southern states after the Civil War, and it rapidly formed local branches in different parts of the country, notably in Tennessee, Louisiana, the Carolinas, Georgia, and Florida. Its power was used for political purposes, principally for the terrorising of the negro voters and the murdering and driving from the country of those who were opposed to its views. Its outrages were usually preceded by a warning sent to the marked man in some fantastic but generally recognized shape—a sprig of oak-leaves in some parts, melon seeds or orange pips in others. On receiving this the victim might either openly abjure his former ways, or might fly from the country. If he braved the matter out, death would unfailingly come upon him, and usually in some strange and unforeseen manner. So perfect was the organization of the society, and so systematic its methods, that there is hardly a case upon record where any man succeeded in braving it with impunity, or in which any of its outrages were traced home to the perpetrators. For some years the organisation flourished in spite of the efforts of the United States government and of the better classes of the community in the South. Eventually, in the year 1869, the movement rather suddenly collapsed, although there have been sporadic outbreaks of the same sort since that date.’

The article neglects to mention King Eglon of Moab in biblical times (see Judges 3:24, KJV), who was also assassinated while on the seat. This is one of two mentions of bowel movements to be found in the Bible. See also Deuteronomy 23: 12-13 (KJV).

H.P. Lovecraft wrote a story named 'The Dunwich Horror', but it was about something else.

I see an emerging market for such devices, sent by their owners to purchase goods embarrassing to some to be seen purchasing (you know the kind, such as https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bR8arJMOu7A). I would have to worry about carjacking, though.

Pantagruel was the son of Gargantua, as seen in this link:
https://archive.org/details/in.ernet.dli.2015.126311/page/n1/mode/2up
Rabelais wrote very coarse humor, which was popular at the time, and their adventures ran along the lines of identifying the perfect bum-wipe (today that would be toilet paper), with disgustingly detailed descriptions of all what they investigated by empirical means. Spoiler Alert: the winner was a well-downed goose pulled by the neck between the legs.
Rabelais died in 1553, so Breton evidently carried on the character with his own work.

Their 1925 catalog carried Thompson Submachine Guns, which could be purchased by mail and delivered to your door. One could also buy dynamite of varying nitroglycerin content, but it had to be shipped by itself.

One of the great horror comics of the 1950's, by EC Publications, featured a story, 'My Brother's Keeper', about a pair of conjoined twins, one good and one evil. The evil one committed all kinds of crimes, secure in the knowledge that he would never be punished for them, due to his innocent twin brother. The good one finally gave the evil one an ultimatum, which was laughed at, upon which the good one whipped out a straight razor and cut his own throat. The last panel showed the good one lying dead with the evil one next to him crying and trying to staunch the bleeding wound. And, in true EC fashion, you don't learn that they are conjoined until the last panel.

Fortunes were made in Galveston, thanks to Prohibition. It's all in that book of Gary Cartwright's. That's how the Maceo crime family got their start, and a cousin of theirs is still a Big Man in Galveston today, this being Tilman Fertitta. He's a restaurant and hotel magnate who has sworn to bring casino gambling back to Galveston. Good luck with that.