Happy late Mother’s Day. I hope your Mother’s Day was fruitful and not totally derailed by having your last final project due on that day. Love them or hate them, holidays happen when they happen, to my dismay. This year though, I’ve been gathering all of my grievances on every holiday and I’m not holding back.
Groundhog Day
I have no qualms with the optics of groundhog day. Celebrating any groundhog at any time ever is pretty cool. I think the whole shadow is pretty metal too, and I don’t even mind that that leads to weather predictions. My thing is, how the hell do you differentiate between six more weeks of spring and not six more weeks of winter? There is a canyon between those two things. What if it is spring for the first five weeks and then there’s a winter snow storm during the last week? Is it still an early spring? Is it an early spring if it starts just under six weeks since Groundhog day, like, a day early? Does anyone even care at that point?
I think we should really get more out there with the whole letting animals predict between two incredibly different options. I think we should let lobsters predict when the next recession will be. Will it be in four years or in three days? No in between.
I looked it up and apparently Punxsutawney Phil has a lifetime 39% success rate. Why are we trusting this dude every year? Meanwhile, my boy Poughkeepsie Paxton the lobster has a 41% lifetime success rate of picking recession dates, which is still worse than if you just bet against him, but he’s still more accurate than Phil’s dumb ass.
St. Patrick’s Day
St. Patrick’s day is basically just leprechaun awareness day. I spend 98% of the year not thinking about leprechauns at all, and then for one week it’s all I can think about, and then I go back to non-leprechaun thoughts.
I think It’s pretty cruel to make a holiday about finding clovers right after the grass has been marred by snow for months on end. Whose idea was that? I would move St. Patrick’s day to mid May when the ground isn’t so gross. I also think it’s kind of weird that snakes have essentially no significance in the semiotics of St. Patrick’s day, despite snakes being a huge part of St. Patrick’s shtick. Bring back snake theming!
Any B.S. Fake Holiday
While I’m a fan of new federal holidays as much as the next guy (Election Day, where you at?), the democratization of holiday-making in the internet days has produced some truly maddening results. I learned today that December 4th is National Dice Day, a fact validated by multiple websites for no apparent reason. Why are dice worthy of any sort of celebration? How does one even celebrate such an occasion? They are almost always the side piece to any game, except Craps and Yahtzee, and one of those is a completely garbage game, so you might as well just call it National Yahtzee day.
Don’t get me wrong. I like using dice, I think they are great. But you cannot tell me that a single solitary soul looks forward to National Dice Day each and every year. No one is mourning the end of National Dice Day, bemoaning the fact that there are 364 days until the next National Dice Day. I’m willing to compromise though. I could accept a National Dice Hour, on one particular day of the year, and this policy goes for National Thesaurus Day, National Meatball Day and National Biodiesel Day as well.
New Year’s Day
I actually really like New Years because of how it relates to Christmas. I think it makes people get rid of their Christmas tree. When the year has literally changed since you’ve put a tree in your house, the tree must be disposed of. New Year’s is like the Anti-Arbor day. I think Arbor Day should counter by lowering the year number down by one every year, so we’re just stuck on the same year forever.
Earth Day
This is probably my least controversial take. Turn Earth Day into Earth Week. I am surprised by Earth Day every year. Earth Day has really just become for me “Feel Bad About the Earth and Then Don’t Do Anything About It” Day. In Earth Week, the first six days, I’ll procrastinate helping the Earth and feel bad about it. Then the remaining day I’ll be actionable. Like having something due in a week and then not doing anything about it until the last day. Oh shit, can I get an extension on Earth Week?
Anyways, I hope this article made you rethink everything. Time is always fleeting, and whether you want to spend thinking about leprechauns, or cherishing your precious dice, it will not matter when we all become dust.