Piggy Pennants and Vexilloids - Angry Birds 2016

The Piggies in Angry Birds 2016 use the livery of purple and green.  The charged icons are a fork and knife. Angry Birds 2016 is one of the few successful video-game movies ever made.  Nintendo, Konami, and Electronic Arts are sitting on several touchstone cultural gold mines, yet they let these fertile fields of joy and abundance go wasted.  This is partly due to the rift between the fan-base and cultural non-gamer business-class board of directors.  Finally, a Video Game movie done right.

Piggies at the stadiu, notice flags.  In the grand Piggy stadium flags are along the tops.

The staff of power, King Piggy, with crown.  The staff is in his right hand.  The finial has the lopsided piggy nose snort.

Angry Birds Cross Walk Flag - 2016 Movie

Angry Birds 2016 is perhaps the first authentically well adapted movie video-game to movie in the history of cinema.  Usually video-game movies are horrid and the executives involved have no bearing to the game play, an follow it in name only, marketed to general audiences.  As has been the case with Super Mario Brothers; perhaps in 20 years in the year 2036 we will get a good Attack of the Snapple Snapchat 2036?  

Of vexillological consequence is the crosswalk flag.  It has an orange field with two horizontal yellow stripes.  It was obviously hand stitched as you can see when our hero sticks his tongue out at a passerby.





 

Island of Stability Flag Ship Cartoon

The island of stability was made popular by one of America's finest scientists, Glenn Seaborg, who got an element named after himself: Seaborgium, element 106. Glenn was also a crew member on the USS Scientific D. Rsc. team that discovered 10 new atoms on the periodic table. 

The cartoon above that shows the Ion Ships attempting to land on the "Island of Stability" are shown.  The mast flags give away the elements that are shown.  A Calcium-Ca Ion ship is closest to reaching the predicted island, likewise a Zinc-Zn ship is in second place.

The periodic table of atoms, or rather periodic table of elements, has reached a full definition and shape for every element has recieved an official name.



Cartoon Image Credit: Island of Stability: https://pls.llnl.gov/content/assets/images/research_and_development/nuclear_science/project_highlights/livermorium/e113_115/island3.jpg

Car Door Greek Flag from My Big Fat Greek Wedding 2002

In 2002 My Big Fat Greek Wedding made a comforting splash in America.  As with any ethnic group in the USA, many Greeks love to display their flag.  The design is fatefully similar to the US flag, having a canton on a field of stripes.  But the field of stripes are blue and white.  In the canton is a white cross. You can also see the US flag hanging properly near the front porch.

The heroine, Nia Vardalos, of the movie comes out of her shell and exposes some of the insecurities of growing up Greek in America.  America has base root love affair with Greece via the study of classics and college social societies.  And every classroom in America dedicates it's classroom time to the Ancient Greeks. The Ancient Irish, English, Scottish, Germans, French, Sub-Sahran Africans, and Native American civilizations hardly get a fraction of classroom time as compared to the Greeks.  Nonetheless Greek civilization is way cool, and remember to eat more Gyros.

Note Gyros are properly pronounced with a hard G as in Greek!  "Ghee-Row"  not "Jai-Row!"  Although "Jai-Row" rolls off the tongue easier.  Most Greeks don't seem to care, it's the non-Greek armchair experts who make an issue of Gyros, who probably don't even know the Greek, or Jreek, Alphabet.

Greece is at the cultural nexus of the Old Word mixed up with elements of Asian, African, and European culture.  Interestingly Greece has a small part of her national territory East of Asia and South of Africa.  Thus Greece is only European Nation that can see all sides of the Old World Rubric.  Greece can look Westward at the East, Eastward to Europe, South at Africa, and North to Africa. 

Like many Asian nations, the Greeks have their own private alphabet.  For example the hallmark of an Asian family group is to maintain a unique alphabet: Japanese, Korean, Chinese, Thai, Khmer, Sanskrit, Bengali, Nepalese, Mongolian, Arabic, Armenian, Georgian, Burmese, and Hebrew.  European nations have borrowed the Latin Alphabet or Cyrillic Alphabet.  There is no original English, German, Spanish, French, Romanian, or Scottish alphabet.  Imagine going to colleges in America and finding fraterneties and sororities with three letter Hangul, Katakana, Arabic, Hebrew, or Sanskrit letters?

In any case My Big Fat Greek-Uruguay Wedding 3- Greeks Down Under in America would be a classic culture clash fun filled original movie. Since Uriguay's flag is the Fraternal Twin of Greece: both flags have 9 horizontal stripes of counter point colours of blue and white; and cross points in the canton.

CBFA: Fall Meeting 2016

Yesterday the Chesapeake Bay Flag Association met at Sparrows Point, Maryland. 

Thin Blue Line Fallen Officer Flag & More

The most popular flag for fallen officers is the Thin Blue Line flag.  The stripe that underscores the canton is colored blue in honor of police officers.

The Thin Red Line flag honors fallen firemen who died in the line of duty.

The Thin Green flag honors fallen military persons who died protecting our freedoms here and abroad.

The Thin Orange Line flag is for fallen personnel in the rescue, life guarding, and coast guard duties who have fallen in the line of duty.  

The Thin Yellow Line flag is for fallen road, construction crew, and persons who gave their lives in service to transportation services in the line of duty, which includes school bus drivers.  

The Thin Violet Line flag is a memorial flag for persons who died or suffered great injury while in political office from the local to federal levels, due to political violence.

Flag for Earth's Second Moon - 2016 HO3

2016 HO3, or rather Ho Ho Ho 2016, is a new moon.  Not a new-black, nor a new-empty, nor a new-non reflective moon; but rather a newly discovered moon!  A natural object placed in the heavens that is in orbit around Earth.  We humans became aware of this moon during the year of the Monkey and month of Taurus.  We could call it Monkey-Bull or just Monkey-Boo HO Cubed, or Mo-Bo Ho Ho Ho.  Note that it is the letter 'oh' and not a zero.  I know, so confusing that o,0,O can so easily get mixed up, especially when you write em'.

Note this moon will be in orbit around our humble abode for the next few centuries.  Interestingly, there is no lower size limit on moons.  A rock the size of your hand, could be a moon.  Perhaps the moon of an asteroid?  Yet there are size limits on planets.  Thus you'll never hear astronomers speak of a Dwarf Moon, or failed moon.  Sorry only planets and stars can fail.  Moons are special because they come in any size.  Unless... they get really big and become stars.  Thus the biggest moons are Brown Dwarfs, which are failed stars.

The colours of the flag and astrological associations are black, yellow, and blue.  Coincidentally the Astrological symbol for 2016 HO3 is in the canton area.  It is a fusion of symbols form the Western-Symbol for Year of the Monkey and the sign of Taurus.

Earth's neighborhood just got a little bigger this year. It used to be just the two of us: the Earth and the Moon.  But Earth also has a Trojan Moon and now an outer Moonlet.  How wonderful!

So here is the revelation, it not only orbits the Earth but also our Moon.  Thus our Moon also has a satellite, or rather 2016 HO3 is a moon of a moon!  Sort of, it does not directly orbit the moon but in follows an orbit around our Earth-Moon system.  Thus it does qualify as a type of a moon of our Moon, believe it or perhaps not!