Pi Day 2021

This is the perfect year to celebrate the circumference of PIE.

 I normally don't post political stuff on THIS blog - I do it on the other one - but if Joe Biden wants to go down in history in the Top Ten Greatest Presidents of ALL TIME, he'd better fight to make March 14 an official national holiday.

It's The Most Saturnalian Time Of the Year 2020

Welcome back to another year of the Roman celebration of the Winter Solstice!

I need to hire someone to do a better graphic design for the Saturnalia season.

Say what you want about the failings of Roman politics,
they knew how to throw a shindig!

Happy holidays to you all, ya pagans!

National Black Cat Day 2020

Say hello to Mal the Crazy Kat (or Krazy Cat, one of the two) the Pan-Furr of the house!

You'll notice he's fixated on the snack that's about to drop into his belly!

(My online friends call their Black Cats "Pan-Furrs" because they're more fur than usual panthers, well you'll understand it when you see it)

International CAT Day 2020

I have been reminded on Twitter that today is International Cat Day.

So with that, I give you ALL THE CATS!

Happy Easter and Some Writing Announcements

Just saying, this Easter Sunday, that I want to announce a few things.

1) Mystery And Horror LLC publishing has accepted another humorous short from me for their upcoming Strangely Funny III, their popular ongoing humor/horror anthology series. Still waiting on word for when the release date will be - hopefully soon in April - but meanwhile here's the cover for the upcoming print:

2) I've been invited back to the Barnes & Noble Local Authors Event in Wesley Chapel, FL this year. This event will be on Saturday afternoon during May 21st from 2:00 to 4:00 PM. There hasn't been final confirmation and paperwork yet, but I should get something soon.

3) Finishing up a pair of stories for the FWA. The story I hoped to submit to the "Hide and Seek" anthology - a science fiction idea I've had for a decade called "Problem Solver" that needed to be finished - is turning out too long. It's twice the length of the word count, so there's no way I can whittle it down. So I've started a second story about finding the Book With the Blue Cover in the Library Infinite (What's the classical Greek for "Infinite"? Same word, just pronounced a bit different?) which I have to keep below 1500 words.

One Problem With Being a Librarian During The Winter Festivities

...is that when I offer people a wonderful "Io Saturnalia!" almost none of them get what it is I'm saying.

Sigh.

Okay, here's the Wiki entry on Saturnalia:

...A number of scholars view this festival as the origin of later Christmas celebrations, or at least as contributing to them. Others point out that the Christian feast of Christmas on December 25 does not coincide with the date range of the Saturnalia, and that Christmas in any regard has not always been celebrated on December 25. The Catholic Encyclopedia states that church's view on the matter by saying that while midwinter pagan feasts such as Saturnalia may have helped influence the eventual choice to fix the date of Christmas, this does not mean that Christian Christmas traditions find their origin or inspiration there: "though the abundance of analogous midwinter festivals may indefinitely have helped the choice of the December date, the same instinct which set Natalis Invicti at the winter solstice will have sufficed, apart from deliberate adaptation or curious calculation, to set the Christian feast there too."

Just remember these three things:
1) Say "Io Saturnalia" a lot;
2) Find out which Roman Pagans are still around to answer back;
3) Celebrate.