Official News BOG, April 2004

The Residents' Official News BOG was a news blog maintained by Big Brother of The Cryptic Corporation beginning in August 2003 (originally titled The Residents' Official News Blog and Website Wrapper), following the company's purchase of the residents.com domain name from fan site RZWeb (now defunct).
Around March 2004, this blog became known as the Official News BOG. In this form, the blog became The Cryptics' (and thus, The Residents') main outlet for communication with their fans until the website's redesign in 2008.
This page collects posts made to this news blog in April 2004, as archived on archive.org, as archived on archive.org, transcribed to this wiki by a Mysterious Spanish Lady.
==Blog entries==
===Happy New Year===
:
:Ancient cultures, including those as varied as the Romans and the Hindus, celebrated New Year's Day on April 1. It closely followed the Vernal Equinox in the same way the the celebration of Brumalia closely followed Winter Solstice.
:In 1582, Pope Gregory XIII ordered a new calendar (the Gregorian Calendar) to replace the then currently in use Julian Calendar. The new calendar called for New Year's Day to be celebrated Jan. 1. This happened because the Julian calendar’s inaccuracies had cause recorded time to fall more than 10 days behind the actual solar calendar and the Pope was trying to get everything back on track.
:In France, however, many people either refused to accept the new date, or did not learn about it - communication not being so good in 1582 - and continued to celebrate New Year's Day on April 1. Other people began to make fun of these traditionalists, sending them on "fool's errands" or trying to trick them into believing something false.
:The French came to call April 1, Poisson d'Avril, or April Fish. French children would sometime tape a picture of a fish on the back of their schoolmates, crying “Poisson d'Avril” when the prank is discovered.
:These French traditionalists weren’t the only ones to reject the idea of changing the beginning of the year to January 1. For 200 years the English held dear to April 1st being the first day of the new year, finally officially accepting the Gregorian Calendar in 1752. All those years, English and French calendars were 10 days apart in recorded time.
:But before the French point fingers at the English, there is a nice list of other countries to say Poisson d’Avril to first.
:While most Catholic countries went Gregorian in 1582, Germany and the Netherlands held onto April 1st until 1698. Russia only accepted it after the revolution of 1918 and Greece waited until 1923.
:Currently many Orthodox churches still follow the Julian calendar, which now lags 13 days behind the Gregorian.
:And what is really cool is that you don't know if I just made all of this up!!
:
:St Stupid
:For those of you who don't live in San Francisco, here are some photo's from the 2003 St. Stupid's Day Parade which is sponsored by the First Church of the Last Laugh every April 1st. Recognize anyone?
:St Stupid's Day
Posted: Thu - April 1, 2004 at 05:35 AM"Happy New Year" post, from a privately held website archive supplied to The Mysterious Spanish Ladies by a fan
===Available Today Only===
:
:Not really. Sorry.
:April Fool
:MP3 Sample from Bride of the 12 Days of Brumalia
:[mp3 file: Bride_Sample.mp3]
Posted: Thu - April 1, 2004 at 05:35 AM"Available Only Today" post, from a privately held website archive supplied to The Mysterious Spanish Ladies by a fan
===Fixation or cruci-fixion===
:
:13 Filipinos crucified (by choice) today.
:
:UK gets into the Hollywood spirit.
Posted: Fri - April 9, 2004 at 10:43 AMApril 9th post, from a privately held website archive supplied to The Mysterious Spanish Ladies by a fan
===Feast of Eostre===
:[broken image: Easterdogsweb.jpg]
:The word “Easter” comes from the Teutonic goddess of spring, Eostre. So Easter is the holiday of spring, hope, and new life. From prehistoric times, people everywhere have rejoiced to welcome spring. The awakening of the earth after its long winter sleep has been observed with feasting, singing, dancing and worship.
:Easter is tied to the New Year celebration on April first. The beginning of spring and rebirth.
:The Christians, in their usual zeal to steal preexisting holidays, saw relevance in a connection between the rebirth of nature and the resurrection of Jesus. Historically, this was usually celebrated around the Jewish feast of Passover, on the 14th of Nisan, the Jewish month that is about the same time as April. In 325, the church decided to fix the date as the first Sunday after the first full moon after the Vernal Equinox. This causes Easter to float around for when it is observed.
:Universally, Easter is a rite of spring, a time to celebrate new life, to spread seed and rejoice in the sunshine. What better animal as a mascot than the rabbit?
:In Hungary, it is a time to push people into water. In England men lift girls in decorated chairs for good luck. In Germany, kids build nests in their yards and the Easter bunny brings them eggs in the night. Some European children go door to door asking for eggs.
:Some believe that painted eggs buried in the ground at Easter make the grapevines grow quickly. Some believed that the yolk of an egg laid at Easter time, if kept for a hundred years, will turn into a diamond.
:If there is a myth to poke holes in about Easter, it would be the Easter Lilly. This flower was first brought to America by Louis Houghton in 1919 from the Ryukyu island of Japan and it wasn't even a springtime flower. Flower breeders had to create a version that would bloom around Easter. Ahh, marketing.
:I suggest that you forget the marketing, including the Mel Gibson variety, and go look at the wild flowers in bloom. Wow!
Posted: Sat - April 10, 2004 at 06:19 AMApril 10th post, from a privately held website archive supplied to The Mysterious Spanish Ladies by a fan
=== New compilation ===
:The Residents have agreed to be a part of a new compilation of old songs, ENGLAND'S DREAMING.
:The Residents have survived the ravages of time by evolving. This compilation reopens the old New Wave and Punk wounds and somehow The Residents are clearly no more comfortable here than they have been anywhere else. None the less, Jon Savage, noted Brit journalist, has compiled this intriguing CD that includes the pre-eyeball group doing "Beyond the Valley of a Day in the Life." Other bands represented include Iggy and the Stooges, Patti Smith, Ramones, Siouxie and the Banshees, Throbbing Gristle, Cabaret Voltaire, Public Image Ltd, and plenty more.
:Due for release in the fall of 2004.
Posted: Fri - April 16, 2004 at 09:25 AM
=== Solstice comes but twice a year ===
:[broken image: 12-days-coverweb.jpg]
:Residents.com and Ralph America announce the CD release of music from THE 12 DAYS OF BRUMALIA.
:Relive the Magic
:Terrible that it only takes 6 months to turn nostalgic, huh.
:Why do you want this since you could down-load it for free at Christmas... (did I say Christmas...I mean Brumalia.) A good place to start is here ------> not MP3'recordings. Remixed and super sounding real recordings. Oh, gosh. "remixed" NOT "REMIXED"... just back to the original recordings and brought forward again. Sounds exactly the same to non-discriminating ears, totally different to the more sensitive.
:You are wondering if it has other material on it. The Residents say, no. I noted it is about a minute longer for some reason.
:Available at Ralph America around the end of May in time for Summer Solstice. Brumalia in June? Why not.
Posted: Tue - April 27, 2004 at 10:52 AM
==See also==
*BOG
==Resources==
* April 1st post (1) (PDF file, 110 KB)
* April 1st post (2) (PDF file, 76 KB)
* April 9th post (PDF file, 75 KB)
* April 10th post (PDF file, 81 KB)
==External links and references==
*The Residents' Official News BOG, archived May 19th 2004 by archive.org
Category:BOG
Category:Blogs
Category:Reference texts
Category:Residents.com