October

OCTOBER FUN HOLIDAYS

Fall has arrived, and soon there will be "frost on the punkin" as the poem by James Whitcomb Riley so eloquently tells us, but that doesn't mean it's time to mourn for the summer. It's time to embrace the holidays of fall; time for fun and frivolity, and maybe a little bit of freakishness as well. With October comes a month filled with festivals and holidays sure to please everyone. Why settle for the everyday holidays that everyone knows? Celebrate something new this year!

Halloween is the best-known and most widely celebrated October holiday, but why not try Mad Hatter Day on Oct.6 (Oct. 10 in U.K)? 1 A day when everything crazy is sane, and everything sane is mad, just like the tea party in Alice in Wonderland. Perhaps that's not your cup of tea? Then maybe Lief Erickson Day on Oct. 9 2 is more to your Viking liking. Celebrate the Nordic seafarer and contributions of the Scandinavian settlers who came to the Americas after him with a bit of fish stew, or maybe just some Swedish Fish candies. Another more traditional and sacred celebration is the Hindu and Nepalese Diwali,3 (28th) or "Festival of Light", to celebrate the good and evil in everyone.

If health interests you, there are plenty of monthly observances to choose from in October. For all the women, it's the month to Go Pink for Breast Cancer, and for men, Prostate Cancer Awareness Month. Health topics for everyone include Health Literacy, World Blindness Awareness, Lupus Awareness, Liver Awareness, and National Dental Hygiene Month (U.S.) to name only a few. Perhaps you want to lend a hand and support one of these causes or another health-related issue, or just do something for yourself and get a checkup if it's been a while. Screening saves lives, maybe your own.

On the literary front there are some page-turning observances as well. October boasts Children's Magazine, National Reading Group, and Self-Promotion Month. There's Mystery Series Week (Oct. 5-11) to keep you on the edge of your seat, and Teen Read Week (Oct. 12-19). You could read a classic to get in the spirit of the month. Phileas Fogg set off on his amazing journey in Jules Verne's Around the World in 80 Days on October 2, 1872. You can learn a new word on the 16th to celebrate Dictionary Day. And don't forget, October is the month before NaNoWriMo4, so it's time to get geared up for that too, if you're planning on going for it this year.

There's a lot more to October than just Halloween on the 31st. It's a pretty substantial holiday in it's own right, but there are some peripheral holidays that bear mentioning. You can try a card or coin trick for International Magic Week (Oct. 25-31), or get a little creepy with some more morbid observances including: Create a Great Funeral Day (30th); Haunted Refrigerator Day (30th); Frankenstein Friday(31st) and Samhain (31st),5 the Celtic "equivalent" to Halloween. And Dia de Los Muertos or Day of the Dead is observed on Nov. 1 and 2, but deserves mention because of its obvious similarities to Halloween.6

Finally, there are the silly, but nonetheless real, holidays and observances to make you smile or that are just plain weird. Personal favorites include: International Moment of Frustration Scream Day (12th), everyone needs one of those; National Grouch Day (15th), ditto; National Sarcastic Awareness Month--that sounds pleasant: Raptor Month (have you hugged a bird of prey today?); Spinach Lover's Month, and Squirrel Awareness Week (Oct. 5-11)7. And if you were looking for Oktoberfest, the German beer festival? Sorry, you missed most of it...it actually begins in September, but ends the first weekend in October.

There's something for everyone in October. Enjoy your favorite holiday, or make up one of your own. Above all, have fun no matter how you celebrate October, silly or not. For more fun ideas and holidays in October, and the major sources for this article, please visit the references below.

Special thanks to: http://www.brownielocks.com/october.html

Footnotes
1  http://www.cs.cmu.edu/~ari/madHatter.html
2  which incidentally, is my B-day as well
3  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diwali
4  http://www.nanowrimo.org/
5  http://www.chalicecentre.net/samhain.htm
6  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Day_of_the_Dead
7  http://www.scarysquirrel.org/special/nsaw/index.html