MISCELLANY:

Vinyl LP record albums play at 33-and-a-third revolutions per minute.

Groundhog Day occurs on Feb. 2, the 33rd day of the year, while there are 332 days left in the year, meaning that it is also the 333rd day, counting backwards from year's end.

The ROLLING ROCK BEER Co. uses what they call, "The 33 Mystery," as a gimmick. The number appears on all the bottles and means 3 things, which are revealed upon inquiry to the company. It refers to the repeal of prohibition (1933); there are 33 words in the paragraph on the bottles; and there are 33 letters in the list of ingredients.

Hershey Chocolate U.S.A. has the capacity to make approximately 33 million Hershey's Kisses per day, or more than 12 billion a year.

Among food additives, coloring agents in particular are rigidly controlled, with 33 of them considered safe by the FDA.

At Disneyland in Anaheim California, there is an exclusive "Club 33," upstairs next to the "Blue Bayou" restaurant. Anaheim's global latitude is 33°84'N.

A San Diego restuarant calling itself, "Parallel 33," serves specialties with origins along the earth's 33rd parallel.

Among the universally employed abbreviations used in telegraphy and in telephony, the number 33 is used for "fondest regards, " for example, when concluding a conversation.

In Spanish, the phrase, "Diga treinta y tres" ("Say 33"), is used in the same way as is "say cheese" in English.

Patients in Romania are typically asked to say "33" ("Treizeci si trei") by doctors listening to their lungs with a stethoscope.

Latvia's national instrument, the kolke - traditionally played by women and girls - is a triangular wooden box with up to 33 metal strings, which are plucked.

The Cyrillic (Russian) alphabet consists of 33 letters: 21 consonants, 10 vowels, and two letters without sound. The Georgian, Ukrainian, and Latvian alphabets all have 33 letters, as well. The first major attempt at forming an Albanian alphabet was made by Naum Veqilharxhi in 1824. He formed a 33-letter alphabet from Latin alphabets and called it Evetor.

The Italian language has 33 sounds.

There are 33 consonants in the Hindi (Devanagari) alphabet.

6/14/06: Russia plans to build the world's first floating nuclear plant, at a cost of $336 million.

Russia developed their "NK-33 Rocket" in the mid 1990s for prospective sale to the United States.

The U.S. Air Force’s first jet trainer aircraft was the "T-33 Shooting Star."

A rocket launcher normally has a 1,000-meter (3,300 ft) range.

The Constitution of the State of Texas (1869) declares: "The Senate shall consist of thirty-three Senators, and no more."

The National Labor Relations Board, five members (appointed by the U.S. President with the approval of the Senate for five-year terms), is assisted by 33 regional directors.

33 U.S. states, plus the District of Columbia, restrict low-income women’s access to abortion. 33 states and the District of Columbia have no laws requiring contraceptive coverage by insurance providers. 33 states require girls under 18 to obtain the consent of, or notify, at least one parent prior to undergoing an abortion.

33 states and the District of Columbia offer some coverage for tobacco dependence treatments, yet only one state offers coverage for all treatments.

Nearly 2,000 youths are incarcerated every day because community mental health services are unavailable; in 33 states, these are locked up in detention facilities to wait for treatment even while no charges have been filed against them.

A chicken in the background of the cartoon show "The Simpsons" has the number 33 as its wing.

A 1990 survey showed that 33% of viewers watch television for over 3 hours a day.

Baseball's "Longest Game" was between the Rochester Red Wings and the Pawtucket Red Sox in April, 1981. Lasting a record 33 innings, the game took more than eight hours over two different days to complete.

Gift guides suggest amethyst for the 33rd marriage year anniversary gift.

Wal-Mart offers a "Mystery shop" award for its employees entitled, the "Grocer 33 award."

Downloaded music reached 332.7 million in 2005, an increase of 148% over 2004.

John Lennon's song Imagine beat two Beatles numbers, taking top honors in a U.K. radio poll for favorite song. The Beatles had 33 entries in the top 500 songs, followed by the Rolling Stones with 17 and U2 with 15.

Waco Texas cult leader David Koresh died at age 33.

The "Heaven's Gate" cult left this world from almost exactly the 33°30'N latitude ("Rancho Sante Fe," north of San Diego.)

A group that calls itself "Unariuns" believed that 33 spaceships would land in Jamul, CA (near the 33rd parallel) in the year 2001, stacking up to form some sort of "interplanetary learning center." This "UFO" cult believes there is some "Interplanetary Federation" consisting of 32 planets, Earth someday to become the 33rd.

Roswell, New Mexico is at 33°37'N latitude.

The author, Bruce L. Cathie, in his first book, Harmonic 33 (published in 1968, now out of print), claims to have mapped out the Earth's magnetic grid, explaining that the "harmonic" of that grid is "33," adding that the "UFOs" he had observed always traveled along that "harmonic." He also correlates atomic bomb detonations with the 33rd North latitude and grid points and details some of the related global effects of these events.

A June 16, 1997 report on a television tabloid show profiled a nun who sees visions of the Virgin Mary. Allegedly, some aspect of her brain functions registers "333...(hz?)" when in trance. This was in Conroy, GA, mere miles from Atlanta. (See, "GEOGRAPHY")

March, 2006: A Teotihuacan pyramid has been discovered in the Iztapalapa hillside, known as Hill of the Star. Local people began re-enacting the Passion of Christ there in 1833, to give thanks for divine protection during a cholera epidemic - a ritual which now draws as many as a million spectators every year.

MoveOn.org Political Action is entirely funded by its 3.3 million members.

New York’s Grand Central Terminal covers 49 acres of land, 33 miles of track, and 44 platforms.

The Port Authority Trans-Hudson (PATH) rapid transit railroad linking Manhattan, New York with New Jersey, with a fleet having an average age of 33 years, is the oldest operating heavy rail line in the United States. 33rd Street (Herald Square) marks the northern-most and final stop on the line.

Charles Lindberg’s 1927 New York to Paris flight lasted 33 hours and 30 minutes.

In India, research for the year 2001 showed that for every 1,000 male babies born, there were just 933 girls born.

India's famous three-and-a-half-year-old marathon running boy, Budhia Singh, has run distances up to 33 miles.

3.27.06: Survivors of the world's worst industrial disaster in the Indian city of Bhopal have marched all the way to parliament in the capital, Delhi. About 40 survivors of the December 1984 disaster made the 800km (500-mile) journey in 33 days.

Glasgow Airport now has 33 gates, bringing its capacity up to seven million passengers per year.

The capital of Isfahan Province, the third-largest city of Iran, features the Siose Pol (Bridges of 33 Arches) at 300m or more in length, built in 1602.

Venerable Palden Gyatso was imprisoned by the Chinese for 33 years for speaking out for political and religious freedom in Tibet after the communist invasion.

Country code 33 is the code for France.

The Republic of China has 33 regions.

Mexico has 33 states.

Canada's population is 33 million.

33 million Americans are foreign-born, as of March, 2006.

California has 33 state prisons.

Oregon was 33rd state admitted to the Union.

Mokumanamana Island, the most sacred of the Hawaiian islands to the ancient Polynesians, hosts 33 remaining stone "shrines."

The BBC World Service news website offers news in 33 languages.

English solitaire boards have 33 holes.

Britains eat 33 million turkeys, annually.

Queen Elizabeth's first Corgy dog was given to her in 1933.h

The U.K. hosts a total of 333 "institutions of higher and further education."

The first 100+ million POWERBALL jackpot's number was "33".

A1 paper is 33 inches long (and 23.5 inches wide).

Arthur Stace, otherwise known as "Mr Eternity", for 33 years wrote with chalk on pavements in and near Sydney, Australia, the single word: "Eternity". It is estimated that he did this over 500,000 times.

Michelangelo was 33 years old when he started his work on the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel.

"Every 33 minutes someone will die in an alcohol related traffic accident." - Farmer's Insurance ad, 7/31/01

Americans 65 and older are most at risk for suicide: 33 of every 100,000 of them commit suicide every year, translating to 4,655 suicides in 1998 alone.

HIV/AIDS pandemic is ravaging countries in sub-Saharan Africa, drastically reducing life expectancy in some parts to less than 33 years, a new UN report said.

From to a friend of mine (09/25/00): "According to Apache belief, from the time of the Harmonic Convergence (1987) until 2020, we'll be in the chaos of the world, like a red ray leaving and a purple ray trying to get a foothold...There will be such imbalance that everyday will be a juggling act - a challenge to remain in harmony and not be thrown off by the chaos of these two powerful energies, war and peace. This is a 33-year cycle."

The 2003 human-caused Aspen Fire burned 84,750 acres in the Santa Catalina Mountains (near Tuscon, Arizona) and consumed 333 structures.

The LRAD, a relatively new weapon utilizing a high energy acoustic beam to disable and disorientate an opponent or crowd, consists of a sound projecting unit measuring 33 inches across.

Security company Symantec's figures indicate that there were 33 serious computer virus outbreaks in 2004. In 2005, there were only six such incidents.

The most complicated watch in the world was formerly a Patek Philippe called the "Graves Watch", which had 24 complications (functions), took three years to complete, and was delivered to Henry Graves Jr. in 1933. It was bested by Patek Philippe's "Caliber 89", which commemorates the company's 150th anniversary, and boasts 33 complications.