it's 9:30am. i'm completely alone in the office. and i have come to a conclusion.

august should be a national holiday.

the executive director of my job never takes a day off. literally. she's here the friday after thanksgiving and christmas eve day too (i heard a rumor that she's jewish, but i have yet to confirm that. she didn't give me the secret i-am-jew-too handshake when we met. for the non-jewish readers, i'm just kidding; no secret handshake exists ... that i know of). she even works on national holidays, albeit, from home.

and still, she takes off the entire month of august.

congress isn't in session. the media is dead. the government is essentially shut down. retail has a revenue drop. most bankers and lawyers take off.

the president of the united states takes off the month of august.

(okay. maybe that's not a good example. he's taken off more vacation time than any other president in recent history -- or ever?)

nevertheless.

extending daylight-savings time was a good first move. but let's get serious here.

august sucks. it's hot. it's boring. it's the last month that pools are open in the north (a phenomenon that is new to this miami native). it wasn't even a month at all until some ego-maniac augustus named it after himself.

granted, if i had been a roman emperor, you can bet that christmas would fall in debemcer.

why should we lock ourselves up in offices and classrooms pretending to do work/homework when really, most of us aren't doing anything because the movers and shakers of this country are off? well, i don't know that "most" of us aren't doing anything; i just know that i haven't done any real work since last thursday.

conclusion:
i propose that august be taken off by the entire country in order to travel, enjoy the last weeks of summer, and rest up for the vigorous months ahead.

evidence:
august 2nd is "national pretty is as pretty does day"

august 18th is "bad poetry day"

august 22th is "national punctuation day"

august 26th is "cherry popsicle day" and "toilet paper day"

august 29th is "lemon juice day"

august 31st is "love ligitigating lawyers day"

... commmmmmon. this is the best we can do? don't get me wrong: no need to get rid of august all together. but why the hell am i working on the zoroastrian new year (august 20th)?

i mean, g-d said we could rest on the seventh day each week. what's the harm in resting the 8th month of each year too?