My Holiday

I have a love / hate relationship with holidays. Some holidays I looked forward to as a child and now that I have little mini-me's running around, I get to enjoy those holidays again. There are also a few holidays that I rather enjoy as an adult due to large quantity of alcoholic beverages that I am expected to drink on said holiday. With St. Patrick's Day quickly approaching, I am reminded of one of those types of holidays. Today's list will consist of my favorite holiday both as a child and as an adult. Conversely, there will be another list tomorrow of my least favorite holidays (I'm looking at you Valentine's Day).

6: Independence Day (Fourth of July for you non-patriots): This is one of those holidays where it is expected of me to consume a few alcoholic beverages. And anytime I can combine that with detonating small explosives, count me in! While I am not a huge fireworks kind of guy, the older I get the funner it is because I have kids that like them. This is a holiday that you can get together with a bunch of friends, drink a few beers, play some horseshoes (I'm coming to get you Allison), and make stuff explode. What more could a guy ask for.

5. Veteran's Day / Memorial Day (sorry, no jokes on this one): Because I am a veteran and a huge proponent of honoring those that have given their lives for this country, I love these two days. I felt I had to combine them since they kind of represent the same thing. I do find it odd however that Memorial Day is a federal holiday and Veteran's Day isn't. Oh well. We cannot do enough to honor those that have made the ultimate sacrifice for this country and I feel that not enough attention is given to these days. Sure we get one of them off of work but we don't celebrate them like we do others. I do and will forever honor these two days.

4. April Fools Day: While this isn't officially a holiday, it is definitely one of my favorite days of the year. I remember making my mom so paranoid when I was younger that she would be walking around with extreme anticipation trying to figure out what I would be doing to her. That alone made the day fun for me. Now I get to play jokes on my kids and what is more fun than playing tricks on little unsuspecting children? The greatest April Fools joke I ever had was me actually being the victim. My loving siblings started setting me up months in advance when I was about 10 years old. They told me the story of a hot dog factory where all of the workers got sick and vomited in the hot dogs. They kept talking about this for a while and then on April 1st, they made me a hot dog with chili on the inside. I took a bite and all of this stuff came out. They were saying I must have gotten one of the dogs with puke in it. Thanks guys, that was real freakin funny!

3. Christmas: As a child, Christmas meant presents under a tree and a big family get-together. There was a lot of innocence associated with Christmas as a child. Now that I have children of my own, I get to celebrate that innocence with them and hope they have similar fond memories of this day, even if they don't get everything they want. Now I celebrate it because of its meaning with Christ, not Wal-Mart.

2. St. Patrick's Day: There are a couple of reasons for me loving this holiday. The aforementioned obligation to drink alcohol is one of them. This is a day where I can drink my weight in Guinness and it's perfectly acceptable. You got to love that concept. It's also a day where I can pinch someone for not wearing green. That probably got me slapped a few times growing up which is why I don't do it a whole lot anymore. But I still love the concept. And finally, this holiday reminds me of my sister Erin. She absolutely loved this holiday. Surprise there, a red-headed, Irish, (semi) Catholic loving St. Patrick's Day. She passed a few years ago but I still think of her on this day and make sure to dedicate at least one of my many Guinesses to her.

1. Halloween: Could there be anything else? You get to dress up in some crazy costume, go to some stranger's house and ask for candy, receive candy, and it's perfectly OK. This is the most amazing concept for a holiday ever. When I was in Virginia, my brother and I had a tradition of setting up a table at the end of the driveway with a cooler at our side and handing out candy, while consuming a few adult beverages. Now I get to walk around with my boys and carry on the tradition of begging strangers for candy. Another reason is that during the month of October, a few cable networks feel it necessary to show plenty of older horror movies throughout the month. Awesome! Great holiday with lots of candy, you just can't beat it.