Tag: funny

the special days of March, pt 1

As we have done in previous months, we will look at the special days and holidays of this month.  Since it’s March, I reckon we’ll focus on March’s holidays.  🙂  As usual, this is not a complete list — those can be found elsewhere.  But I guarantee you will not find another list like this one.  Not only do we list the best of the unusual and strange and obscure holidays, but we add our own unique commentary and analysis.

Let’s start with looking at the month-long celebrations and observances.

  • Music in Our Schools Month — I think students should be exposed to different types of music, like with Music Appreciation classes.  But make it fun.  Too many people know only the “Top 40” stuff on the radio.
  • National Frozen Food Month — This may sound like a bachelor’s food only, but there are now some nice frozen foods, like lasagna, which are really good.  Mmm… lasagna…
  • National Noodle Month — Speaking of lasagna…
  • National Nutrition Month — I’m not sure if this should be the same month as National Frozen Food Month.  Also, I figure this would be January, when everyone is starting a diet and trying to eat healthy.  By March, most of us have given up.  (Maybe they want renewed emphasis on nutrition…)
  • National Peanut Month — Peanuts are good by themselves, but add chocolate, and they’re even better.  Or you can have something with peanut butter and chocolate, like Reese’s, which are excellent.

The only weekly celebration worth mentioning is:

  • 2nd Week National Bubble Week — A good idea for bubbles is to blow them over cubicle walls at work and act like you don’t know what happened.  Another good office prank is to rip a bubbly fart, but you surely don’t want to get caught for that one!

Now let’s look at the individual day holidays and observances:

  • 1 National Pig Day — Since most people don’t keep pigs as pets, I reckon it’s best to celebrate them by eating sausage, bacon, and ham.  Mmm…
  • 2 Old Stuff Day — Uhh… what?!?  I reckon you should be thankful for antique cars and such things.  This day ought to make the Important Evil Genius happy, because he supposedly has a rather large collection of antiquated old relics that he plans to build a doomsday device with.
  • 3 I Want You to be Happy Day — I really do want you to be happy, every day.  That’s why I publish this great blog — to make everyone’s day a little more surreal.  🙂
  • 3 If Pets Had Thumbs Day — According to some scientists who believe in evolution, this would make animals a lot closer to humans.  But that’s silly. In fact, this whole day is silly.  What’s the point of it?
  • 3 National Anthem Day — If this is for the national anthem, there’s already a holiday or two where that is traditionally sung and/or played.  But perhaps this means we should each have our own anthem this day.  I’ve always thought it would be awesome if we each had our own theme song.  It could play when we get to work (although that might reveal your lateness to your co-workers) or when we walk into a meeting at work.  Of course, we’d want the option to turn it off, for when we needed to be in stealth mode.  But I think this could be really awesome.
  • 4 Holy Experiment Day — Uhh… what is this for?  I’ll figure out something.  How about on this day you try to live a completely holy life.  Although, if you’re a Christian, you should be trying to do that every day.
  • 5 Multiple Personality Day — Isn’t that normally considered a disorder?  If so, why are we celebrating it?  It can be confusing to have multiple personalities, so I recommend against it.  Besides, if you want to add or remove parts from your current personality, you can do so without adding the disorder.
  • 6 Dentist’s Day — I appreciate dentists, but I’m not going to celebrate this day.  They already make plenty of money, plus I don’t want to go to the dentist any more than I have to.
  • lasagna6 National Frozen Food Day — This would be a good day for lasagna.  Mmm…  Of course, there are other options, like Hot Pockets, and there are some frozen desserts that are pretty good.
  • 6 On this day in 1912, Oreo cookies went on sale for the first time.  Now we might take them for granted.  But imagine eating your first Oreo, then discovering how good it is with milk.
  • 8 Be Nasty Day — Why is this a holiday?  We shouldn’t ever be nasty.  There’s a place for joking amongst friends, but we shouldn’t ever be nasty.  (I could come up with better holidays than this…)
  • 9 Employee Appreciation Day — Employees should definitely be appreciated.  This would be a good day to give everyone the afternoon off, or to let them leave early, or to at least buy their lunch.  If this day is on a weekend, it should be observed on the following Monday.
  • 9 Panic Day — This is just stupid.  If there’s a reason to panic, then panic, but don’t schedule it!
  • 9 Daylight Saving Time Begins — We’ve discussed this before, and we decided it should be changed to better accommodate the average working person.  I really don’t like losing an hour of sleep, nor does that help productivity the following Monday.  There is a better way…
  • 10 Middle Name Pride Day — This is good if you have a good middle name, but some people may not.  Also, it’s a good time to learn why you were given the name you got.
  • 11 Johnny Appleseed Day — This is to honor a man who planted and sold a lot of apple trees some 200 years ago.  He lived a simple life, and he was a deeply religious person.  And, if you’re curious, that wasn’t his real name.  I didn’t know you could be famous for planting apple trees…  He has become a legend in some ways.  I need to figure out how to become a legend, other than planting trees.  Perhaps someday this blog will be legendary.  If my blog traffic continues to grow at its current pace, eventually the whole world will be reading it.  🙂

This post is getting really long, so I’ll continue the list tomorrow.  (There will be a link above this post to the next one.)

celebrity voices for car navigation systems

This isn’t a new thing, but it’s the first I’ve heard of it.  One company is now offering celebrity voices as an add-on to your in-car navigation system.  The first ones chosen were Mr. T, Burt Reynolds, and Dennis Hopper.  They didn’t get a great review in this article, so perhaps the company didn’t do enough with them.  I could think of some really cool uses for their voices, but, as “real life” tends to interfere with what would be cool, some people would get offended and want to sue, so they probably have to limit what can be done.  Maybe they should offer some different rudeness settings, from “Bring It!” to “Please be gentle because I’m a wuss”.  Then again, my idea of settings to be politically correct wouldn’t be politically correct.  *sigh*

This second article explains why having your navigation system joke with you and use unusual accents is bad.  This is obviously overreacting, as long as the celebrity voices are optional.  People can use them if they can handle it.  If it doesn’t work for them, use the standard boring voice.  I tell ya, some people are just looking to get offended, even on others’ behalf.  *sigh*

In the latter article on being offended, someone said:

Even though we all realize that a car’s navigation system is a computer, our brain still responds to anything speaking to us as if it were a person.

Really?!?  Are you sure?  I think that’s stupid.  Because my wife’s vehicle has a navigation system in it, and I never confuse it with a person.  Nor do I treat it as a person.  Actually, I usually either ignore it or turn it all the way down, because I’m a man and don’t need directions!  🙂  But if it sounded like Mr. T, I would listen to it for the humor effect.

I don’t know who these people are that confuse a computer with a real person.  If this actually happens, there shouldn’t even be verbal directions, because they might think someone is in the car with them, and so they might panic and run off the road.  I know, that sounds silly, but so does their premise of confusing the voices.  And if you’re going to account for the possibility of human stupidity, then there’s a LOT of scenarios to consider.

Here comes X-Guy to save the company!

There’s this company called Acxiom that has created a new mascot for marketing purposes.  They are calling him X-Guy.  (It used to be X-Man, but that was probably too close to lawsuit territory.)  Anyway, on the company homepage, there’s a flash video where he appears to rescue a marketer who is sitting at his computer in a cubicle.  If you’re thinking that sounds lame, you would be right, but that’s what makes it amusing.

While I normally applaud the use of humor by corporations and other professional groups, I’m thinking this particular methodology probably isn’t the best marketing strategy for a company that is in the information technology (IT) sector.  This is a company with $1.4 billion in annual revenue, yet this is how they are promoting their “X” brand.  They even issued a press release to announce their new website design.  (I don’t know why…)  Regardless of whether it’s a good strategy or not, they did it, so check it out and have a laugh.

Here’s the link : Acxiom homepage.

In the interest of full disclosure, I do not work for this company.  But I am somewhat familiar with it, for various reasons.

What should this man have done?

The other night I was at a local restaurant, and there was a couple sitting next to us.  The guy was a big man — not all muscular, just big — and he was wearing a floral shirt.  (No, it wasn’t the infamous Mango-Man, though it sounds like him and he lives in these here parts.)  Anyway, the waitress said she really liked his flowered shirt.  I felt somewhat embarrassed for him, but then I wondered how he should respond.  He simply said, “Thank you.”  But I wonder what he really wanted to say…

What should he have said and/or done?