Monday, May 16, 2011

Marie Antoinette, Poe, and Root Beer

I was thinking that May 16 was certainly a day for foolishness over the course of the past. Witness that on this date in 1770 14 year old Marie Antoinette married 15 year old Louis-Auguste, later King of France. Enough with the teen marriages? No, for on the same date in 1836, Edgar Allan Poe married his 13 year old cousin, Virginia. Enough insanity? On May 16, 1866, C. E. Hires invented root beer!

But as I was walking in the garden, this magnificent creature dropped from the tree into the newly-sprouted yarrow. This brings me back to the reality that it is a beautiful creation. So much for perusal of old almanacs. And I really do like root beer, especially when it is decanted over vanilla ice cream in a tall mug!












Antheraea polyphemus

4 comments:

Vee said...

Marrying young is a bad idea; root beer a great one. I'm with you on root beer floats.

Your pictures are beautiful - I'd say contest winning quality!

Secondary Roads said...

On reading the title of this post, I wondered how you could bring those three together. Well done.

The first thing I wanted when returning to the US after three years in central and south America was a frosty glass of root beer. It never tasted better.

Sharkbytes said...

Wow- I havn't seen one of those for quite a few years. Great sighting. I'm a moderate fan of root beer, not so much of floats.

vanilla said...

Vee, thank you. I got really lucky to have walked by the tree just as the moth dropped into the flora, and a perfect backdrop that was!

Chuck, thanks. The consensus seems to be: root beer, yes!

Shark, I was blessed to be the recipient of this display of nature. Thirty minutes later, she had flown away.