Wednesday, January 08, 2020

Paul Richardson: It's just another day

Christmas has come and gone and 2020 is on our doorstep. “It’s just another day….” as my Mother and Paul McCartney would say.

I recall one year that my Mother called me up extending the normal Happy Birthday salutations and then asked what I was doing. “I’m working, why do you ask,” I replied. She stated that it was a special day and she thought I might have special plans, even something along the lines of a motorcycle ride. 

My reply was that it was just another day. Now this is a concept which she had always held to in regards to her own birthday. 

Obviously, she had a different standard when it came to my birthday. If we were to look at things mathematically with a world population of about 6 billion (at that time) and 365 days in a year, a simple average yielded 16 million plus sharing the same birthday.








So here we are getting ready to roll over to a new number on a time tracking system that has huge tolerance values in its general specifications. The annual measurement of time is just a couple of degrees removed from taking a soft chalk-like rock and scratching a mark on the cave wall each day at sunset. 

This archaic time tracking system requires a 5-month period for everyone to adjust to a new number. In an age where we have atomic clocks that automatically adjust to the correct minute each day and adapt to daylight savings or standard time don’t you think we could do something about this crazy annual time system that requires a full day adjustment as a corrective measure every 4 years? One little check writing snafu and we’re all in for a pickle!

Well, I think this is a dandy way to end the year and get ready to start the new one. No lofty expectations, just a nonsensical rambling about the relevance of another day, followed by more dribble about astronomically based time systems. Don’t take yourself too seriously this coming year. Have some fun every once in awhile. If you haven’t ever heard the Paul McCartney song “Another Day”, look it up. Some advice for the upcoming New Year, “Borrow money from a pessimist, They never expect it back”.

While everyone else is writing about lofty goals, making resolutions and sounding very cosmopolitan, I’m wandering around going, “Oh look a squirrel." 

Me and the voices in my head would like to say, “Thanks for reading our column. We really believe that you should get a life, but are appreciative of the fact that in the absence of better things to do, good sense or just plain boredom you have not only read our writings, but have told us so. Thank you.” 2020 may be here but, “It’s just another day…”.
(Paul Richardson's column, The Horse I Rode In On, is published weekly in the Neosho Daily News, Seneca News-Dispatch, Aurora Advertiser and on the Turner Report.)

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