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The ClubHouse: Archives: 02 02 02 20 02

Ocean_Islands

Friday, February 01, 2002 - 11:10 am Click here to edit this post
Don't understand? Does this make it any clearer: 02/02/02 20:02.

A rare event on Saturday night, at 8:02 pm (military time)! See below:

It's the same backward and forward

By The Associated Press

Look closely at the calendar Saturday. Then do it backward.

In either direction, it's still 2-02-02.

You're in the middle of a palindrome — a string of numbers, words or sentences that read the same backward or forward.

A palindrome year such as 2002 usually happens every 110 years, and Saturday's palindrome day is another rarity. Then Saturday night brings a palindrome in military time: 20:02, or 8:02 p.m.

That's reason enough for a palindrome party, says Mark Saltveit, editor of The Palindromist magazine.

To make the event more special, invite others who were around in 1991; having two palindrome years so close together is a thousand-year happening.

Saltveit suggested a palindromic party menu:
Ham — ah!

Salad, alas.

No lemons, no melon.

Naive Evian.

Yo, bro! Free beer for boy!

After Y2K and the heavy events of 2001, people are looking for something a little silly to occupy their minds," Saltveit said from Portland, Ore., coincidentally returning a reporter's call at 1:31 p.m.

"Palindromes are as good as anything and better than most to take your mind off your troubles," he said.

Palindromes were originated by Sotades the Obscene, whose vulgar verses about a ruler of ancient Greece led to the poet's painful execution.

Officialdom apparently hasn't caught palindromania. There is no evidence of formal palindromania in the corridors of power — no pronouncements from White House or the United Nations, no congressional declarations or parliamentary citations.

Even in the southwest Missouri palindromic community of Ava, City Clerk Marilyn Alms hadn't pondered palindromes until a reporter called.

"I think our population is about 3,003, maybe that helps," she said.

Ava was named after a place in the Bible — "It's mentioned in II Kings, and II is a palindrome," Alms said — and it's Missouri's largest town with a palindromic name (the others are Otto and Reger).

Some palindromes make fine icebreakers: "Madam, I'm Adam."

Some are clever tributes, such as the late Leigh Mercer's tribute to Theodore Roosevelt: "A man, a plan, a canal: Panama!"

Other palindromes deliver tongue-twisting political sarcasm. Witness Saltveit's: "O naughty me, tut! It's Bush — substitute, myth, guano."

Palindromic tweaking is nonpartisan: "Flog sad loser Al. Gore, zero, glares, old as golf."

Some enthusiasts are into palindromic words and others specialize in numbers; it's permissible to play with spaces and punctuation. One of the most noted palindromists, Peter Hilton, possessed dual specialties. Hilton was an Allied genius who during World War II sorted numbers and letters that helped smash Nazi codes.

After working all night breaking codes in 1943, Hilton burst forth with this palindrome: "Doc, note. I dissent. A fast never prevents a fatness. I diet on cod."

For all the brainpower behind snappy palindromes, they aren't universally appreciated, as Sotades the Obscene found out the hard way in the third century B.C.

He mocked the marriage of King Ptolemy II to the king's sister, verses that were raunchy when read backward. For his witty word exercises, Sotades was ordered encased in a lead box and tossed into the Mediterranean.

"I suppose the king had no sense of humor," Saltveit said, "and for his art, Sotades suffered a fate something like concrete overshoes in an old Mafia movie."

Amen, icy cinema.

This might be a fun exercise for Groundhog Day.

Grooch

Friday, February 01, 2002 - 11:21 am Click here to edit this post
Thanks, OI. This was fun and we should have a party for it.

P.S. Is the title name correct?

Moondance

Friday, February 01, 2002 - 11:31 am Click here to edit this post
Very Cool!:)

Egbok

Friday, February 01, 2002 - 11:41 am Click here to edit this post
Very interesting stuff OI. Thanks for sharing.

Ocean_Islands

Friday, February 01, 2002 - 09:07 pm Click here to edit this post
I forgot an 0 and a 2:

02 02 20 02 20 02

02/02/2002 20:02

Ketchuplover

Sunday, February 03, 2002 - 07:22 pm Click here to edit this post
This thread is 2 cool :)

Admin

Friday, February 08, 2002 - 01:11 pm Click here to edit this post
Of course OI is the author of this strange thread! Very interesting.

In the paper money collecting world, they call a bill with a serial number that reads the same forwards or backwards a RADAR bill....they are much more collectible.

No, I don't collect bills...just something someone once told me. Just call me Cliff!

Moondance

Friday, February 08, 2002 - 01:12 pm Click here to edit this post
HI Cliff!

Admin

Tuesday, February 19, 2002 - 01:24 pm Click here to edit this post
From what I can tell, OI was wrong...the date did not read the same forwards and backwards (unless he just got the seconds wrong? 02/02/02 20:20:20 ...but apparently the same kinda thing is happening tomorrow.....

As the clock ticks over from 8:01PM on Wednesday, February 20th, 2002, time
will (for sixty seconds only) read in perfect symmetry. To be more precise:
20:02, 20/02, 2002. It is an event, which has only ever happened once
before,
and is something which will never be repeated. The last occasion that time
read in such a symmetrical pattern was long before the days of the digital
watch (or the 24-hour clock): 10:01AM, on January 10,1001.

And because the clock only goes up to 23.59, it is something that will never
happen again

Julieboo

Tuesday, February 19, 2002 - 01:42 pm Click here to edit this post
I'm glad someone else said something, because it did not read backwards the same... on the other hand, 02/02/02 20:20:20 does work,(but you need the seconds)

Ocean_Islands

Tuesday, February 19, 2002 - 07:49 pm Click here to edit this post
Sorry -- didn't write the above article, and my intention was not for it to read the same backwards as forwards! I just thought it was a cool time of day.

Americans put the month first, for unknown reasons so it would be 20:02 02/20, 2002.

Kitty

Wednesday, February 20, 2002 - 08:58 am Click here to edit this post
won't it happen again in: 21:12 21/12, 2112