The Best Holiday Of The Year...

...is only just over one month away. It may come in the middle of the winter, at the nastiest time of the year, it may be absolutely meaningless (except maybe for the money it brings to places like Punxsutawney, PA) but it is an all American extravaganza like none other and all about a rodent. How could you not like Groundhog Day! No obligatory or expected: Groundhog Day tree, no tinsel or lights or garland, no spending on presents, no lines in the stores, no pushing, shoving, no mannerless nasty bastard shoppers looking for that special something at the last minute and trying to knock you over to grab out of your hand the last one that you just picked up, no grumpy salespeople who don't give a shit that your wife wants the red ones instead of the black nylons gloves, no Groundhog Day Eve shopping, heck no Groundhog Day Eve anything, no church going (unless maybe it falls on a Sunday), no dressing up, no having to wake up everyone and get their asses in gear early enough to make it to grandma's house on time, no putting presents under the tree on Groundhog Day's Eve, no staying up til just after midnight to give the yearly Ho-Ho-Ho (even though the kids are both adults now), no giving out and opening presents before morning coffee, no cleaning up the wrappers putting away the gifts and maybe saving some of the boxes for next year, not a friggin thing! Nothing to do but sit back, maybe with a with a hot cuppa' Joe, and watch some guy dressed to the hilts in a monkey suit, top hat included, hold up a furball and predict without any true reliability whether or not the winter will last another 6 weeks and of course, it will last that much longer whether or not the little buck-toothed booger is afraid of his own shadow or not. Even watching that is not obligatory but it is fun.

 That it is not a real holiday and only a somewhat unofficial one may also have something to do with it being my favorite holiday. Thanksgiving comes in as a not so close second and would have been first except it usually requires cooking or helping in the kitchen and then acting nice with relatives and other guests when they show up to eat us out of house and home and maybe even leave a little (or a lot of) something behind in the way of an aroma I would rather not smell. There is absolutely nothing that anyone needs do to enjoy Groundhog day though and that makes it the best holiday by far.  

All the best,
Glenn B