Sometimes I get so preoccupied with gardening that I completely miss important events. For example, yesterday was "Square Root Day" and I totally failed to celebrate it. If mathematics humiliates you into a quivering bowl of liquefied offal like it does me, then I will explain: yesterday was 3/3/09. 3x3=9. Square root of 9 is 3. Awesome. The last Square Root Day was on 2/2/04,and was totally overshadowed by Groundhog Day. Don't worry, the next one is on 4/4/2016 so you don't have to fret about party planning for a while. And considering that the Mayan calendar runs out on 12/21/12, I would wait to see if the world really ends before you start baking that square root cake.

If you'll recall, last year the Chinese celebrated the opening ceremonies of the Olympics on 8/8/08, which was sure to induce peace and prosperity into the world. Then the Olympics ended and the world stopped looking at China and they stopped working on their infrastructure and the bottom of the recyclables market fell out. Here's to 9/9/09!

I have a friend who recently started celebrating Sexagesima, because the Pope cancelled it and so no one was celebrating it anymore. Sexagesima is the second Sunday before Ash Wednesday, about 60 days before Easter. It should not be confused with Quinquagesima or Septuagesima, which are totally different Sundays. What do you do on Sexagesima? According to the official site (on Facebook): "We celebrate by sharing great food, ridiculous quantities of great wine, and one really terrible bottle." I'm sorry we missed it this year, as it sounded totally profound, though I'm pretty sure he just celebrates it because it's a religious holiday that has the word "sex" in it. All the power to him! Anyway, less significance has been ascribed to less momentous occasions. I, for one, am always looking for something to celebrate.

Like this work day. I'm going to celebrate it by dropping the kids off at the sitter and busting my butt on that rooftop in Coronado. That's right: today is "Coronado Rooftop Aluminum Cover Day" (or "CRACD") and it's celebrated on the first Wednesday of every March by building an aluminum patio cover on a rooftop in Coronado, California and then going home and "crac"ing open and polishing off four lukewarm domestic beers (symbolizing the four installed columns) while watching Lost. See you there.


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