I did my usual Sunday shopping yesterday, heading out to the shopping “club” to get vittles for the week and fill up my gas tank. I’d finished my shopping and was pushing my cart out of the store when I passed a fat old tired-looking guy who, to be charitable, I would describe as “simple” looking (to be honest, my initial thought was that looked rather feeble-minded), but he seemed to have a fairly pleasant demeanor about him. As he happened to be looking in my direction, I gave him a smile and a nod, and he smiled a dopey little smile back at me that only reaffirmed my opinion that this guy was most definitely not the sharpest tool in the shed. Just your basic dumb schlub out on a Sunday morning.

It was right about then it dawned on me that I was looking at a mirror.

I literally exclaimed something or other out loud at this realization. “Oh my God” or “Holy shit” or “Jesus Christ” or just plain “Fuck” – something like that – I don’t remember the exact words. All I know is that genuine surprise quickly changed to anger which then changed to sadness. In fact, I filled with an intense feeling of sorrow for most of the day yesterday. Sadness at what I’ve become. Sadness at what I haven’t become. Sadness at what I will never become because, well, time’s pretty much up – at least for this go-around. Better luck next time, if there is one.

Hey, at least I don’t have to go to work today. I thought the wife was off, too, but she apparently forgot to put in to be off, and so she’s stuck working. I’m on-call this week, though. Well, not technically “on-call” because that would mean that I’d get paid something like $4.35 an hour for 16 “off” hours a day plus the 48 hours of the weekend (which would be a nice little bonus), plus get recall pay should I actually get called in. So instead I am “on support” which means, basically, nothing. Except in the case of a holiday, when I need to keep the phone handy, answer e-mails, and keep an eye on the server to make sure it’s running. For this, I earn the gratitude of all NY State residents. And a comp day to use later. With the vast tundra of non-holiday months ahead (no “red” holidays until the end of May, fer chrissakes). I earn another day for Preznit’s Day, but it’s not one we typically take off and no offices are closed.

For this reason, I think it’s time we added some official federal holidays to the calendar. First off, the day after the Super Bowl clearly needs to be a holiday. Those who care about the game (or the commercials) are hungover and unproductive talking constantly all day long about the game (or the commercials – or both), and those who don’t care about the game (or the commercials) really don’t wanna have to hear about the game (and the commercials) all day long. So, perfect excuse for a Monday holiday. Now, we know that Republicans despise the idea of working people getting a day off with pay (hell, they aren’t to crazy about having to pay people even if they are working. So, here’s how we sell it.

Ronald Reagan was born on February 6th, so I say we designate the Monday after Super Sunday as “Reagan Day.” That’s right – a holiday for the Gipper. :pup: I mean if the greatest American of all time doesn’t deserve a national holiday, I don’t know who does.

Then we’re on to March. This one’s easy: St. Patrick’s Day. Yep, a good way to stick it to all those secular atheists out there by adding a religious holiday for a change (you know, unlike Christmas). The only question here is whether the holiday should be on the 17th or the 18th. On the one hand, it was always really the day after SPD when I most needed a day off. But on the other, it sucks to have to miss out on those early morning drink specials (there was a bar in Oswego that used to have penny beers from 7-8 AM, nickel beers from 8-9, dime beers from 9-10, and then, well, I’m actually a little fuzzy on what came next).

Now what? April. Earth Day is in April, but you might have a hard time slipping that one past the Climate Change deniers and Glenn Beck devotees (side note – I caught “A Face in the Crowd” for the first time in a while this weekend, and if Glenn Beck aint the reincarnation of Lonesome Rhodes, I don’t know who is).

Easter would seem like a no-brainer here, if you could just count on the damn thing being in April. But the Catholics (or whoever came up with this crazy scheduling scheme) have it in March some years for some stupid reason that nobody understands (I read they supposed explanation once, and all it did was give me a headache; personally I think it’s all bullshit. Oh, yeah, and “40 days after Lent” is not and acceptable answer). So either we tell the Catholics (or whoever’s in charge of this) to either pick a fucking Sunday in April and stick with it, or we have to pick another date (which would be a shame, ‘cuz with Easter you get a perfect excuse for at least a 4-day weekend: Good Friday, and then the day after Easter – Marvelous Monday or whatever you want to call it. Throw in Maundy Thursday, Holy Monday/Tuesday/Wednesday and you’ve got a built-in vacation week).

Hey, you know what? If every asshole employer out there can claim to have had a religious revelation and deny their employees birth control, then the least we should get out of it is a week off of work.

So let’s leave Easter on the table (and I’m all for adding in all those Jewish Holidays that I know nothing about; I can drink wine, eat matza and then recline in celebration of freedom – as long as I don’t have to go to work), but we’ll need to choose another day that’s always in April.

Did you know that the first Friday of April is National Walk to Work Day? How ironic (and uniquely American) would it be to celebrate walking to work day by staying home (or better yet, driving someplace for the weekend)? I think we have a winner there, folks. We can get it sponsored by AAA or Exxon/Mobil or something. Thomas Jefferson was born on April 13th, so that’s a possibility, too.

May. May has Memorial Day of course, but that’s not until the end so we need something earlier. May Day seems obvious – sales pitch: let’s take that day back from the commies! And what with the changing demographics in this country, I think any politician who proposes a national holiday for Cinco de Mayo is gonna get a boost in the polls.

I know that vacation season starts to kick in after Memorial Day, but there’s a real dearth of holidays in June (D-Day comes to mind) and August (hey, if Americans can’t celebrate the use of atomic weapons to fry a couple hundred thousand mostly civilian people, what can we celebrate? And imagine the sales you’d have at your local Nissan and Honda dealers).

Oh, and if we can’t get at least one day of for Oktoberfest, then, damnit, America is just not the great melting pot she claims to be.

Today may be MLK day, but right now it looks more like “snow day” ( very under-appreciated movie, by the way). It’s warmish right now, but that’s not supposed to last for long and there’s a real cold stretch of weather ahead this week.

Glad I’m off.