Well, after Wednesday’s revelation that there was a National Gutter Day (no, we weren’t making it up, it marks the end of Ipswich Borough Council’s National Maintenance Week!) we wondered what other “National Days” were lurking in the diaries and calendars of the world’s PR agencies.
It didn’t take long before we realised that you could find a commemorative day for just about anything if you look hard enough, but there were a few stand-out examples which made us wonder whether the world generally had too much time on its hands.
So, in the great Singles365.com tradition of top fives, here are our Top Five Ridiculous National Days…
National Shed Week
There seems to be very little to say about his other than it does exactly what it says on the tin. The week centres on a shed designing and building competition between members of the shed-building community, or Sheddies as they like to be called, who come up with some quite exceptional examples of garden buildings. In fact the more we read into this, the more we’re starting to like the idea – what does that say about us?!
National Watermelon Day
Sponsored by Britain’s biggest supermarket chain and the West-End musical Dirty Dancing (for no ther reason, apparently, than the fatc that it features the line “I carried a watermelon”), the second National Watermelon Day was held on August 4th this year with the aim of raising awareness of the extensive health benefits of watermelon, “a healthy “superfood” which scientists claim can help fight cancer”. Who knew?
National Beanpole Week
Organised by the Small Woods Association and held between April 25th and May 3rd this year, National Beanpole Week encourages gardeners to use hazel beanpoles sourced from Britain’s coppiced woodlands, rather than imported bamboo canes. A noble environmental cause, no doubt, but not what we would call a national issue.
National Ammo Day
From the people who also gave us National Doughnut Day and National Cheeescake Day (yes, the USA). The aim, if you’ll excuse the pun, appears to be to strip shops’ shelves of ammunition to keep it out of the hands of criminals. To quote their website, “If each gun owner buys 100 rounds of ammunition, that’s 7.5 BILLION rounds in the hands of law-abiding citizens“, which rather optimistically assumes that all gun owners are 100% law-adibing.
National Maintenance Week
Culminating in National Gutter Day (as we all now know!), this is just begging to be ridiculed. Apart from the fact that a national day appears to be confined to the most remote part of the country, coupled with the most uninspiring title we’ve ever heard, the whole event also undermines its own cause. Surely the whole point of maintenance is that it’s an ongoing thing and not a once-a-year event?! We have been trawling the internet all morning to make sure it wasn’t a joke!!!