SS Eastland Disaster

Today is the 100th anniversary of the disaster. At the time, the Lithuanian newspaper, "Draugas," "speculated that there were few Lithuanian casualties, because 'Lithuanians always run late' and many did not make it to the ship on time."

Neither Mr. Irene nor I learned about this incident until recently.

Uncertain

 
Kaunas, Lithuania, 1943. One of the Facebook groups I follow is "Lietuva senose fotografijose"—"Lithuania in old photographs." The group recently published this photo. We were tickled to see it because we think the woman in the plaid skirt may be my Mom. The women are walking on "Laisvės Alėja," or "Liberty Boulevard."

Thanks to "Lietuva senose fotografijose" for giving me permission to post the photo here.

"The Dancing Diplomat"

John Boehner's account of his visit to Lithuania.

More here.

(Today, US tanks arrived in the Baltics, as promised.)

This isn't a new idea.

It's World Wide Knit in Public Day. Hey: we've been doing that for years.

Santa Polka

LTnews.net writes on its Facebook page: "Bob Dylan must have been inspired by his Lithuanian -Jewish roots when he wrote this holiday polka; Merry Christmas !!"

Are you okay with rock music?

Because there may be rock music during your surgery.

R2D2 ...

... yarnbombing.

(Via thinkgeek)

Watch the Lithuanian Empire grow and shrink …

… on this time-lapse map of Europe's last 1,000 years.

I used to teach "Western Civilizations," so I love stuff like this.

(Thanks to a Facebook friend for pointing out the map.)