PRPG:
Weird January Holidays

Happy National Nothing Day!

January 12, 2018

The holidays aren’t over yet…they’re just getting started. Here are some quirky “celebrations” coming up this month.

Weird January Holidays

January 12: National Pharmacist Day

First responders, emergency workers, and military personnel are heroes, sure, but pharmacists perform low-key heroics every day. This is the day to acknowledge and even personally thank your pharmacist for always having your very necessary medicines ready to go, accurately filled with the proper dosage, and making sure you won’t have any harmful interactions.

January 14: Dress Up Your Pet Day

Here’s the deal with sweaters and coats for dogs and cats: Unless they’re a hairless breed, or they need one of those compression-type shirts to calm them down during fireworks, they don’t need clothes. They’re animals, which seem to be perfectly fine to go naked, and also, they have fur to keep them warm. But still, Americans think their pets look cute in clothes (because they do) to the tune of several billion dollars in annual sales. This is the day to proudly dress your animals up in their little outfits—just don’t expect them to enjoy it.

January 16: National Nothing Day

So many holidays celebrate something, be it a religious observance (Easter), historical occurrence (Independence Day), or an emotion (Valentine’s day). In 1973, a newspaper columnist named Harold Pullman Coffin created this day to celebrate and recognize…absolutely nothing.

January 21: Squirrel Appreciation Day

Despite how they make a lot of noise, steal all the food out of your bird feeder, and eat most any edible food growing on trees in your yard, squirrels are pretty cute. It must be that gigantic, bushy trail and their chubby little cheeks that sets them apart from the rats. A North Carolina animal rehabilitator named Christy Hargrove established this holiday in 2001 for us all to stop and notice the squirreliest of all animals.

January 25: Opposite Day

Did you ever play this increasingly annoying game when you were a kid? Generally, some kid would say something nice, or offer to share a toy…and then take it all back by saying “Just kidding, it’s Opposite Day!” That means everything means its opposite—“I like you” is “I hate you,” etc. (It of course gets confusing if somebody says “It’s Opposite Day,” because then does that mean it isn’t Opposite Day?) Kids still play this game all the time, but now there’s a set-in-stone day for it, apparently.