Debbie Harris
Aside from New Year’s Day (which is also National Hangover Day) and Martin Luther King Jr.’s birthday, there aren’t very many holidays to celebrate in January. In fact, January seems to be hangover month-the major holidays are over and post holiday blues can set in. Still, I think you may be able to celebrate some of the holidays that I found on holidayinsights.com
Monthly celebrations for January include National Oatmeal Month, National Soup Month, and Hot Tea Month, all great things for keeping warm during winter. January is also National Blood Donor Month, so shout out to all the blood donors. Thank you for bleeding to help others. I tried for a while to be a regular donor, but see my piece in the February 2014 Foolish Times “Blood Donation for the Squeamish.” January is also National Bath Safety Month, National Braille Literacy Month, and National Hobby Month. So, keep yourself and your rubber duckie safe in the tub and for a hobby, learn Braille.
As for individual days to celebrate in the first month of the year:
January 2: International Stop Spam Day. Holidayinsights.com points out that this is not the meat that comes in a can; it’s the email type. It includes the joke: “There is an email going around offering processed pork, gelatin, and salt in a can. Don’t open it; it’s spam.”
January 3: The Festival of Sleep Day. How is that celebrated? Group napping?
January 4: National Spaghetti Day and Trivia Day. Part of the trivia preparation is knowing that January 4 is National Spaghetti Day.
January 6: Bean Day. This is the day we celebrate a green vegetable and/or pintos and their cousins. But wait, there’s more. The day is also for celebrating the character Mr. Bean, created by British actor Rowan Atkinson. They cover all the bean bases. January 6 is also Epiphany in the Christian calendar, but it’s not included on holidayinsights. Apparently they don’t care beans about it.
January 13: National Rubber Duckie day.
This fits in well with bath safety month. Put
a life jacket on your rubber duckie and listen to Kermit sing the rubber duckie song as you bathe.
January 16: Appreciate a Dragon Day. I guess
you can sing “Puff the Magic Dragon,” but this day is also National Nothing Day, celebrating doing nothing, so I guess that gets us off the hook with the dragons.
January 18: Thesaurus Day, which I find wonderful, magnificent, fabulous, stupendous, wondrous, outstanding, marvelous, sensational, phenomenal, and maybe even groovy.
January 20: Penguin Awareness Day. I guess it’s needed because as a general rule, I’m not very aware of penguins.
Keeping the animal theme!
January 21: Squirrel Appreciation Day. The website didn’t convince me that there are actually things about squirrels that we need to appreciate. A puffy tail, maybe? The squirrels in Sherwood Park in Salinas are tearing up the landscape. Should I appreciate their ability to do that?
collecting empty beer cans. Who doesn’t like a good belly laugh? But how do we get the entire globe laughing-international forced mandate? I’m told that laughter is contagious. Wouldn’t it be great if we could generate a pandemic of laughter?
January 24: Beer Can Appreciation Day. What should we appreciate about beer cans? That they allow the brew to be dispensed in individual servings, so beer drinkers don’t have to go to the town beer barrel and use a dipping gourd to drink their beer? The site says that some people collect beer cans as a hobby- empty ones. Hmm, hobby or in need of a 12 step group?
January 28: National Kazoo Day. Now there’s an instrument I can play. I wonder if there are any celebrations with kazoo parades with marching kazoo bands.
January 29: Bubble Wrap Appreciation Day. I can appreciate bubble wrap. It keeps shipped products safe and allows for hours of bubble popping stress relief, whether by fingers or feet. If you have any bubble wrap, today’s the day to share
it.
Let’s brighten up a dreary month celebrating these holidays-with a kazoo, a rubber duckie, some bubble wrap, some belly laughs, and maybe a penguin. Whatever you do, I hope your January is great and your year is off to a wonderful start.
Safe & Happy
