jeudi 31 décembre 2009
New Year's is my least favorite holiday. Want to know why?

Reason #1: Exhausting
What worse way to cap off a long year, and especially the holiday season, than by taking your sick, festivitied-out body, stuffing it into some little get-up and uncomfortable shoes, dragging it out into the cold winter weather complete with icy sidewalks, plying it with alcohol and staying out into the wee hours of the morning, just to scream and yell "Happy New Year!" at some random moment of the evening?

Here's my idea of how to celebrate the end of a year-
1) Sleep in.
2) Wake up, eat a croissant and drink a cappuccino, watch some mindless tv show
3) Go for a massage
4) Come back, take a nap
5) Wake up, take a hot bath and drink some tea while reading some trashy novel
6) Order a pizza, open a bottle of champagne, submit to your husband's requests to watch Gladiator or The Last Samuri, zonk out on the couch around 10:30 pm, wake up around 12:30 am, mumble "Happy New Year", stumble to bed, zonk out in bed.

I mean really, doesn't that sound much better?

Reason #2: Pointless
Really, what is the point of celebrating when each hour another time zone does the same thing? (And don't even get me started on time zones.)

Reason #3: Random
Who ever decided that each new year started between 11:59:59 December 31st and 12:00:00 January 1st in the first place?
Why not on the day of the winter solstice, which would make a bit more sense?

I love numbers. But not arbitrary ones such as what year it is. I like my numbers to have absolute, pure, and certain values.
It may be year 2009 here, but other calendars have entirely different years (though not used much anymore) and it is year 2009 from what? If 2009 is completely random, then so is 2010, and the moment that it is considered to pass from one to the other is totally random too.

Reason #4: Everything I dislike
Here are the things I really dislike: Staying up late. Loud music. Big crowds. Lots of people I don't know.
Here is what defines New Year's: Staying up late. Loud music. Big crowds. Lots of people I don't know.

Reason #5: Inexact
If I am going to go through all this trouble (Staying up late. Loud music. Big crowds. Lots of people I don't know.) then I want to be darn sure that the moment that everyone is counting down to, then screaming Happy New Year IS EXACTLY THE MOMENT that the New Year begins. I guess it is the Engineer in me. No, I don't want to be 3 seconds off. I want to know the exact moment that 2010 starts. And if it is the exact moment, then it should be the same moment all over the world, not depending on what time zone you are in.

I can't know the exact moment? Well, then I might as well go to bed and not obsess over it.

Here is my list of holidays, from favorite to least favorite:
1) Thanksgiving and 4th of July, tied for first. Too bad neither of these are celebrated in France.
3) Christmas
4) Easter
5) May Day
6) Halloween
7) Bastille Day
8) All those other holidays (ie Thank goodness I have off from work!)
President's Day, Columbus Day, VE Day, Armistice, All Saint's Day, etc.
9) Arbor Day
10) New Year's

Yes, even Arbor Day ranks higher on my list than New Year's.
Get my point?

Tonight I am taking my anti-social, obsessive-compulsive, exhausted self and going to bed early, spending New Year's day at my in-laws for another 8-hour eating session.

That being said, Happy New Year Everyone!

9 commentaires:

Jennie a dit…

Haha I totally agree!!!! This holiday is so incredibly stupid and pointless. I hate it! But at least it's another day off work and it's not a religious holiday.

We're not doing anything tonight. We're staying home and watching TV and going to bed.

screamish a dit…

ha! yes, how i hate compulsory fun.

no, actually i do normally like New Year's, but it's been a while since i had a good one and im getting bad at pretending to be having a good time since I had to stop getting blootered on whisky...i think all those good times i thought i was having were just too much booze phenomena...I'm obviously getting older

my best new years were with my parents...i've never been able to recreate it

good luck with the 8 hour eating fest!!

Anonyme a dit…

Hysterical, you poor old Grinch! I sympathize with your hatred for NY's eve. So have a good, but quiet, one and here's to better things in 2010.

Brandi a dit…

Who says you have to go out or stay up til mid-night? Any why can't you get a massage, take a bath, eat pizza and so on. I don't think I have ever gone out on NY's eve...

Toulonnaise for a while a dit…

I sooooo agree!!

Starman a dit…

Why would the French celebrate the 4th of July? They have the le quatorze juillet. New Year's is fun. Bonne Année!

Uncle David a dit…

We traditionally follow pretty closely your initial steps 1-6, and it works well for us. Happy new year from a fan of your blog!

Anonyme a dit…

How's this for a numbers person? On January 2nd it was a palindromic date.
It was 01022010. And they say it won't happen again for a long time. I'm not going to try to figure out when!
Mom
P.S. We stayed up to watch the fireworks on Pikes Peak!

Anonyme a dit…

Actually, the next palindromic date would be 11022011 followed by 02022020.

We never make that big a deal of New Year's. It serves as an excuse to get together with friends to play games and chat for half the night. The random moment comes and goes, but it was more about the friends than the moment.

Happy New Year.

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