Sunday, April 29, 2012

Holidays & Days of Note: May 2012


May 1. Beltane (Wicca) By the way the Gaelic or "Irish" for May is Bealtaine / May Day (International) / - 4 Green Corn Dance (Zuni) welcoming back the Corn Maidens, who flee the land during the Winter./ International Workers Day. What May Day has become in many parts of the world, in Russia however they have taken to calling it Labor & Coming of Spring Day. / Giorno dei Lavoratori (Italy) / National Love Day (Czech Republic) Couples go to the memorial of the poet Karel Hynek Mácha in  Prague and kiss. / Lei Day (Hawaii) / Law day & Loyalty day (U.S.) / Day in 1776 that the Order of the Illuminati of Bavaria was formed by Adam Weishaupt (1748 - 1811) / According to Ronald Hutton in Trumpet of the Moon, it was this day in 1947 that Gardner (founder of modern Wicca) had the first of four May meetings with Aleister Crowley, where he bought a number of books, and was recommend by him to be made a 4th degree initiate of the O.T.O. / Samhain (Wicca) In the Southern Hemisphere. At least I think so.... some one correct me if I'm wrong!
May 2. Second day of Labor Day (Bulgaria, Slovenia, & Romania) / Teacher’s Day (Iran) / Parkash (Sikh) Birth anniversary of noted Sikh leader.
 May 3.  Rice Planting Festival (Shinto) / World Press Freedom Day / Holy Cross Day (Catholic)
May 4. International Firefighters’ Day.  / Remembrance of the Dead. (The Netherlands) that’s the Netherlands NOT the Nether World. / Youth Day & Literary Day (People’s Republic of China) / Day in the Roman Empire on which an all-female festival was held in honor of Bona Dea. / It was on this date that Manhattan island is sold in exchange for $24 in beads & buttons in 1626. That’s the story anyway, but who used dollars as a designation of cost back then? Anyway the bit they always fail to add about this tale is that the fellow who took the beads & buttons didn’t even live on the Island (must of been from Jersey) and was just there to fish, no doubt he was glad to take it from the suckers however.

May 5. Cinco de Mayo (Mexico) / Children’s Day (South Korea) / International Midwives Day / International No Pants Day / Tango no Sekku (Japan) which means "First Day of the Horse" but it really more often called "boy's day." / Free Comic Book Day (U.S., Canada, U.K.) At participating comic shops you can go in and get a free comic book as part of a multi nation promotion.

Find where you can get a free comic book


May 6. Visakha Puja (Buddhist) Another day said to be the birthday of Buddha  / National Nurses Day (U.S)/ Corregidor Day (Philippines) / Bulgaria - Radio and Television Day / Beverage Day (U.S.) / National Prayer Day / National Masturbation Day (U.S.) Either way a lot of people will be saying “oh god! Oh god!” today.
May 7. Radio Day (Russia)  
May 8. Coca-Cola Day, invented in May of 1886 in Atlanta, GA Coke is 126 years old as of today. / Parent’s Day (South Korea) / V-E Day. Germany surrenders in 1945.

May 9. Lemuria (Ancient Rome) First day of a 3-day holiday when it was thought that the spirits of the dead returned to their old homes. / Lunalia (Fairy Wicca) festival for the Lady of Light. / Orgasm Day (Esperantina, Brazil) Started by the mayor of that town about three  years ago when he read that only 28% of sexually active women have orgasms. / Joan of arc canonized 1920, say what? I thought they burned her at the stake and a lot longer before 1920 too? Ohhhhh! The other kind of canonizing.

May 10. Day for Matsu, Goddess of the Sea (Taiwan) / Akshaya Tritya(Hindu) / Astronomy Day (U.S.) / Birds’ and Trees’ Day (Hungary) / Celebration of the Clandestine Retreat of Ma’at and Ra (Ancient Egypt) / Mania (Ancient Rome) / Ploughing Ceremony (Thailand) / Tin Hau’s Day (China) / Tritopatores (Ancient Greece) / and Happy Birthday Homer Simpson! Originally in 1955, now around 1969 and marching forward year after year.

May 11 Tupperware Day, according to DuPont the bowl that goes "burp" is 66 years old today. / Pentecost (Christian) / It was on this day in 1659 that the Massachusetts Bay Colony banned the "pagan" holiday of Christmas.
May 12. International Nurses Day, commemorating the birthday of Florence Nightingale in 1820.


May 13. . Mother's Day (International) though many countries have it on different day, this is the date of the original and the most widely used, you can also think of it as Christmas Eve for restaurants as they get the most business of the year this day / Frog Jumping Day (Calaveras Country Cal,) From the story by Mark Twain, but god help you if PETA finds you feeding your frog buckshot these days! / Leprechaun Day (U.S.) Like St. Paddies Day wasn’t enough?  Or is this day for the protestant Leprechauns?
May 14. Carabao Festival (Spain)

May 15. It was during the ides of May that the Vestal virgins preformed rites to bless and entice the water for the coming Summer. / Teacher’s  Day (South Korea) / National Chocolate Chip Day (U.S.) / Mercuralia (Ancient Rome) Held in honor of Mercury / Peace Officers Memorial Day (U.S.) / Dia del Maestro "Teacher’s Day" (Mexico) / Feast of Ochossi, Orisha of Animals (Santeria) / Happy Birthday Mickey Mouse! 1928.

May 16. International Pickle Day / Wear Purple for Peace Day / Teacher’s Day (Malaysia) / - 19 Strawberry Ceremony (Iroquois) / Middlesex Day. (Britain) To quote from the old cartoon of two children, a boy and girl, talking "I forget are you the opposite sex or am I?" As for which is the middle sex I will not dare a guess.
May 17. International Day Against Homophobia or IDAHO. / Ascension of Christ (Christianity) You know keeping track these movable feasts, of which there are more than a few in May, is a pain in the neck, give me a nice holiday ready to settle down, like Coca Cola Day on the 8th, none of the math and you get an ice cold Coke!

May 18. Festival of Pan (Ancient Greece) / Festival of Faunus (Ancient Rome) / the Roman name for Pan. / Remembrance day for Moses de Leon (Kabbalah) hmmm a day for Pan and a Kabalistic mystic, now we know what  Madonna is going to be doing today. / Senior Citizens Day (U.S.) and a day for senior citizens too! This really is a day for the Material girl today isn't it.
May 19. Armed Forces Day (U.S.) / Pilgrimage to Treguier (France) / Feast Day of Brigid (Celtic) During which sacred wells and springs were adorned with flowers.

May 20. Pardon of the Singers (Britain) / Feast of Aphrodite and Eros (Ancient Greek) From sundown till sundown tomorrow.

May 21. Victoria Day (Canada)


May 22. Immigrant Day (Canada) / Heroes Day (Sri Lanka) Save the Sri Lankan cheerleader, save the world. / First Reported modern sighting of the Lock Ness Monster (1933,) Whom some say is not a real living creature but is instead a shape shifting phantom that was released due to the activities of Aleister Crowley at his Scottish home of Boleskine on the shores of Lock Ness. / First reported sighting of Mister Roger’s Neighborhood 1967. Not even the wildest conspiracy buffs say Crowley had anything to do with that.



May 23. Feast Day of Hermes Trismagistus (Hermes the thrice blessed) patron of alchemists. / Waisak Day (Indonesia) Day when the birth, death & enlightenment of Buddha is celebrated in Indonesia. / Declaration of the Báb (Bahá’í Faith ) Starts at sundown yesterday, / Citizens for Retiring  the Penny. / Defenestration of Prague (Prague, Poland) Defenestration is an almost forgotten word that means "the act of throwing something or someone out of a window," this day in Prague commemorates the day in 1618 when some royal officials were thrown out a window in a castle by some noblemen, but survived the fall by landing in a cart full of manure. /  Penny Day (U.S.) However some disagree.

Their 2 cents... get rid of the penny

May 24. National Escargot Day (U.S.)

May 25. Trust in the Force Day (somewhere probably) In 1977 the film Star Wars is released, as there are now more people in England saying they are Jedi than there are people saying they are Jewish, Buddhist or Sikh I guess that makes this a religious holiday. / Africa Day (Liberia, Zambia, Zimbabwe.) / Towel Day, which I’m told is "celebrated" worldwide as well as, I assume, at the Restaurant at the End of Time. / Happy Birthday Goofy! 1932.

May 26 The National Day of Healing, formerly known as National Sorry Day (Australia)
May 27 Pentecost (Christian) / Día de la Madre (Bolivia) / Mors Dag (Sweden) both of which mean Mother's Day. / Children's Day (Nigeria) / Shavuot (Jewish) Feast of First Fruits.

May 28. Memorial Day (U.S.)  / National Hamburger Day (U.S.)
May 29. Ascension of Baha’u’llah (Baha'i) / Oak Apple Day (Fairy Wicca)

May 30. Sacred Heart of Jesus (Catholic) / The day in 1431 that Joan of Arc was burned at the stake, not shot out of a canon like they seem to have thought earlier in the month back in 1920
May 31. National Macaroon Day (U.S.) / International No Tobacco Day. Eat a macaroon instead, see we’re just trying to help.

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