Monday, January 05, 2009

I Didn't Even Know I Missed A Great Holiday!

Yesterday, I found this webpage put together by the National Confectioner's Association (NCA). I'd never heard of the NCA, but they have quite a few holidays that I like a lot, one or two I'm ambivalent about, and two others for which I could care less (National English Toffee Day and National Candy Corn Day). The one that is most interesting to me was (bear in mind, I didn't find the list until the fourth of January), of course, celebrated on the third of January: National Chocolate Covered Cherry Day.

I love chocolate covered cherries. I could eat one after every meal and not get tired of them for years. Oh well, there is always next year. I decided to scan the list and see what other days would pop out at me. National Chocolate-Covered Cashews Day, National Taffy Day, and National White Chocolate Day were the first

The main thing that struck me as unusual was the fact that there are so many chocolate days. Don't get me wrong, I enjoy chocolate (especially white chocolate), but these people eat drink and breathe sugar; they are the National Confectioner's Association! I can think of a lot more candies than the few they have on their list. Consider: they have no day for Smarties! Smarties are a national classic! How can there be twenty-six various days throughout the year designated as some type of "chocolate day-of-observance" and someone forgot all the great things my dad introduced me to as a kid? Famous "iconic" candies -- like Smarties? or Sweet Tarts? Nerds? Bit-O-Honey? butterscotch candy? mints? candy bars? pop rocks? pixie sticks? jawbreakers? sour balls? fire balls? hot tamales? peppermint candy? There isn't even a national ice cream day!

As I started thinking of all the different candies and other yummy junk foods loaded with sugar that were not on the list, I decided to try to figure out just how a day gets designated. It would be pretty neat to start instituting different "candy days" throughout all twelve months of the year. I can think of a few friends' birthdays that I'd like to associate various national candy days with, but for starters, I would especially like to see "National Smarties Day" instituted on my birthday, "National Bit-O-Honey Day" on my dad's birthday, and "National Hot Tamales Day" on my mom's birthday.

As I dug around the website, lo and behold, the NCA even has a web page explaining how to add more holidays! The bad news is, designating holidays is completely out of their control (and mine). National Days must be designated by a sitting President or a convened session of the U.S. Senate. So unless there are any Senators with large candy-makers in their states, I'm thinking we're "stuck" with only the few that have already been designated.

While I'd like to add a few more, I'm really not complaining about all these "extra" holidays I've discovered. I can hardly wait for the third week of March: "American Chocolate Week" sounds just as wonderful as Spring Break, except I don't have to sit thru college again to enjoy the holiday!

I wonder how we should decorate?

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