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"Live so that when your children think of fairness, caring, and integrity, they think of you."
[H. Jackson Brown, Jr.]

Quote of the Day, from brainyquote.com (2026/08/21)

Stanley Goble (21 August 1891 – 24 July 1948) was a senior commander in the Royal Australian Air Force (RAAF) who served three terms as Chief of the Air Staff. During World War I, Goble flew fighters on the Western Front with the British Royal Naval Air Service. He became an ace with ten victories, commanded No. 5 Squadron, and was awarded the Distinguished Service Order and the Distinguished Service Cross. In 1924, he and fellow RAAF pilot Ivor McIntyre became the first men to circumnavigate Australia by air, journeying 13,600 km (8,450 mi) in a single-engined floatplane. On an exchange posting to Britain in the 1930s, Goble led No. 2 (Bomber) Group RAF. As Chief of the Air Staff at the onset of World War II, he clashed with the Australian Government over the implementation of the Empire Air Training Scheme. He stepped down as leader of the RAAF, and spent the rest of the war in Ottawa as air liaison officer to Canada. Goble died in 1948, two years after retiring from the military. (Full article...)

Xá Lợi Pagoda, raided by South Vietnamese special forces

1717 – Austro-Turkish War: Austrian troops under Prince Eugene of Savoy captured the strategically important city of Belgrade from the Ottoman Empire.
1808 – Peninsular War: British and Portuguese forces put an end to the first French invasion of Portugal at the Battle of Vimeiro.
1942 – World War II: The Imperial Japanese Army lost the Battle of the Tenaru, the first of its three major land offensives during the Guadalcanal campaign.
1963 – South Vietnamese special forces loyal to Ngô Đình Nhu, the brother of President Ngô Đình Diệm, raided and vandalised Buddhist pagodas (one pictured) across the country, arresting thousands and leaving hundreds dead.
2015 – Passengers on a Thalys train from Amsterdam to Paris confronted and subdued an attacker who attempted a mass shooting.

Age of Earth: ~ 4.568 billion years
World Population: 7.3 billion (July 2015)
Continents: 7 (Asia, Africa, North America, South America, Antarctica, Europe, and Australia)
Mean Radius: 6371.0 km
Axial Tilt: 23,44°

Image Source: Wikipedia - License: Public Domain (thanks to NASA)

Our solar system consists of
1 star (Sun) and 8 planets (Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus and Neptune).

1 AU (astronomical unit) is roughly the distance between Earth and the Sun (about 150 million kilometres).
The space probe Voyager 1 was launched by the NASA in 1977 and is meanwhile (autumn 2015) about 133 AU away from Earth.

Image Source: Wikipedia - License: CC BY-SA 3.0