Wednesday, January 3, 2018

Happy 2018, National Straw Day, Travels and President Thomas S Monson

I decided in the last few days of 2017 that I'd start blogging again and try to be more consistent about it.  Since I'm still not going to be able to finish up This Crazy Trip any time soon, I thought I'd write about something else.  So, what to write about?  Traveling in general?  Local places that I could travel to in a day?  Pottery and techniques for being creative within our studio?  Religion?  Things I've learned?  Bullet Journals, which I use daily?  I didn't know.

So, then I came across the National Day Calendar and after writing down some of the things for the first six months of the year, I found that every single day from January through June 30th has a "National" something or other Day attached to it.  The rest of the year probably does as well, I didn't look yet.

So, since this is January 3rd, we've already missed:

January 1st - New Year's Day, of course.  It's also National Hangover Day, National Bloody Mary Day, and National Thank God Its Monday Day.  Ummm, OK.  Not sure about that one, but the others are fairly self-explanatory for New Year's Day.

January 2nd - was National Buffet Day - I guess people are sick of holiday cooking?  It's also National Cream Puff Day; National Personal Trainer Awareness Day, of course, and National Science Fiction Day, which seemed more fun.

And today is National Chocolate Covered Cherry Day, which I would be happy to participate in if I wasn't on a diet; National Fruitcake Toss Day, which makes sense since not too many people actually EAT the fruitcakes that show up on Christmas and this seems a good day to toss them; and National Drinking Straw Day!  National Drinking Straw Day?  That's a funny day.  (Thanks to www.NationalDayCalendar.com for the use of their photo.)  #DrinkingStrawDay is paying homage to the day someone named Marvin C. Stone took out a patent on this date in 1888 for a paper drinking straw.  The website also mentions the Sumerians using straws around 3000 BCE.  I seemed to remember reading about the Egyptians using straws made of reeds around that time, too, so it seemed logical that the Sumerians had them, however, the one they had was apparently a gold tube with blue inlay!

Our grandsons like to use a straw with everything they drink, so I bought some stainless steel ones last year to use instead of continuously using plastic ones.  I'd like to think that I'm doing a little more to help save our planet's resources.

And congratulations to Marvin C. Stone who 130 years ago, took out a patent for a paper straw.  And congratulations to the Sumerians who created a gold tube straw thousands of years prior! :)



The other thing that happened this morning was that we found out that our Prophet, Thomas S. Monson passed away last night at the age of 90.  What a wonderful man he was!  I learned about cheerful service from him.  I loved his stories and how he could recite a poem from memory.  I loved that he cared so much about doing the Lord's work and how he loved the people he served.  He missed his wife terribly and I'm sure they are having a grand reunion.  Thank you, President Monson, for your life of service.  We will miss you.  

That's it for today!  See you tomorrow!
Judi