t-day, more

[Mullins, Bill]

 Barry has pushed "turkey day" back to 1887.

"FOREIGN AFFAIRS Letters From The Front"
By George C. Wilson, _National Journal_
Friday, Feb. 1, 2002
[excerpt from an anonymous email from a Naval aviator off the USS Theodore
Roosevelt]
"For Thanksgiving, the ship dressed up the wardroom, dimmed down the lights,
and put out a nice T-day spread and, for a brief moment, it was almost like
being home."

beer days
[later in the same article]
"Speaking of beer, somewhere in the Navy regulations it's written down that
for every 45 consecutive days that you spend at sea without a port call, you
rate two beers. Two weeks ago, they broke out 10,000 beers for the crew to
tear into, for this deployment's first of many "beer days." "

college of cardinals
_Almanac of American Politics_, Michael Barone with Richard E. Cohen and
Grant Ujifusa; National Journal Group, 2002.
New York: Twenty-Fifth District, Rep. James T. Walsh
"Walsh has a seat on the Appropriations Committee, and has now been chairman
of three subcommittees--part of the ''college of cardinals,'' in House
lingo."

_Charlie Wilson's War: The Extraordinary Story of the Largest Covert
Operation in History_, by George Crile; Atlantic Monthly Press Books, 2003.
p. 77.
"He'd first broken from the pack and become a part of the legend of his
party in 1976, when he'd defied his own Texas delegation and maneuverd his
way onto the all-powerful Appropriations Committee.  That move had made
Wilson a player -- one of fifty House members with a vote on how the
government's $500 billion annual budget would be spent. "

"Earmarking, a Way to Send Millions of Dollars Home", Tim Weiner
 Jul 13, 1994;  The New York Times pg. D18/4
"To earmark a program, a member must have the ear of one of the 13 chairmen
of the House Appropriations subcommittees.  The chairmen, nicknamed "the
college of cardinals" by their colleagues, have the power to distribute
billions of dollars a year to favored programs."


forty acres
_Backyard Brawl : Inside the Blood Feud Between Texas and Texas A & M_
by W. K. Stratton; Crown Publishers, 2002.  p. 88
"In fact, some Longhorn alumni complained during the 1990s that they were
losing out on game seats to high-tech immigrants from out of state with deep
pockets who wanted to be part of the UT football scene, never mind that
they'd never set foot in a classroom on the Forty Acres, as the Texas campus
is known."