In creating the list of observances for the Pagan Daybook software, I came to appreciate that there were a lot of additional holidays, festivals and observances which would not prove suitable for use in Pagan Daybook. Some of them weren't pagan — a decided drawback — some weren't very well documented and some were outright fabrications. Actually, the finest ones were outright fabrications, and upon considering them, it seemed like a worthwhile exercise to fabricate a few more. Lies hunt best in packs.

Nothing on this page should be construed as being true — any resemblance between people, organizations or institutions depicted herein and individuals living or dead is purely coincidental — and we'll send the by now grossly overworked leather-winged demon of the night to chow down on anyone who seeks to question the authenticity of any of the following.

Warning: This page contains material which is not suitable for anyone who is easily offended by hangovers, liberals, blenders, virgins, not-quite-virgins, sluts, women's basketball, knights, dead poodles, leprechauns, witchcraft, godless commie bastards, lost decimal points, banned books... actually, it's a fairly long list. If you read any further, you're on your own.

On this day more raw eggs, baking soda and peanut butter sandwiches, cod-liver margaritas, Baco-Bit burgers, Galapagos turtles smothered in pig fat, Tylenolnog, Spanish onion parfaits, goat's milk and creosote, fried lark hearts and other traditional hangover remedies will be consumed than on any other single day of the year.

The month of January is named for the Roman god Janus, who is depicted with two faces — one looking backward into the old year, and one looking forward toward the new. This is the day of two-faced bastards everywhere.

The Oracle at Delphi Gift Shop and Multimedia Experience opened on this day in 1995. Retrofitted with a microprocessor-based interactive prognostication system, this leading-edge oracle can now offer predictions of the future with a statistical probability of 86.2 percent accuracy, plus or minus a basis mean error value of 0.5 percent during months with an R in them. The oracle accepts Visa, Mastercard, American Express and attractive virginal women between the ages of sixteen and 21.

The Oddfellow Lodge of Canada was formed on this day in Montreal in 1843. Nobody knows exactly what they do in there... perhaps for the best.

All blenders, mixers, food processors, julienne fry makers, carrot peelers, apple core removers and radish enhancers received during the Yule season should be returned to the shops from whence they were purchased by this day.

On this day many coastal villages in Cornwall celebrated the new year with an exhibition of pig tossing. The object was not to see who could toss a pig the furthest, but rather, to have one land on its head with sufficient force to actually turn it inside out. The Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals successfully had this practice banned in 1911, but legend has it that if you prowl the back allies of fishing villages in Cornwall on this night you'll still hear the grunts of the pig tossers, the wail of the pigs and the unmistakable sound of pig liver being extruded through two hairy nostrils.

The British East India Company sent its first ships to India on this day in 1601, to bring back the spices of the Orient. They travelled not so much to the sub-continent, as to the sub-condiment.

On this day it is traditional in parts of southern California to light a lava lamp, listen to the Grateful Dead and say "groovy" as often as possible.

William Caxton published the first edition of Geoffrey Chaucer's "Canterbury Tales" on this day in 1477. Chaucer had been dead for about three quarters of a century by the time his book finally hit the streets. Caxton remarked of the work, "I don't care what anyone says about it — I'm sure the copyright on this puppy ran out years ago."

On this day in Norse mythology, it is traditional to hold contests to find a warrior capable of saying "Yggdrasil" without spitting.

The East Utica Women's Basketball Team Dinner Dance.

Kevin the Bruce, the younger illegitimate half-brother of the Scots warrior-king Robert the Bruce, was excused from the battle of Bannockburn with a note from his doctor. After the defeat of the English, he found brief employment as Robert's food taster. In this case, "brief" meant two dinners and a bed-time haggis, the latter of which was found to contain enough arsenic to fell most of the highlands. The English, as it turned out, were not gracious losers.

On this day every year, so long as it is not a leap year, overdue books may be returned to the Westchester Public Library without paying a fine.

In a traditional verse:

Arthurian legend — the unauthorized edition — has it that on this day the knight Sir Tristan first bonked the Lady Iseult after getting her pissed on home-brewed ale. In celebration of her deflowering, young women in villages across Cornwall and southern Wales have on this day happily given up their virginity in exchange for a pint and a promise. In other words, it's a day like any other.

The First Inbred Militia Unit for a Free Arkansas marched for the first time on this day in 1987 under the banner "Support the Right to Arm Bears."

On this day in 1965, thousands of tiny men in tacky plastic hats emerged from the sewers of Boston carrying pint glasses of green beer. They reportedly bludgeoned passing fat ladies and stopped traffic for over an hour, screaming at the tops of their lungs in Gaelic that Saint Patrick was a syphilitic Englishman with a fake accent. Just as suddenly as they appeared, the leprechauns vanished back into the subway and were never heard from again, save for the dozen or so who got jobs at the mayor's office.

On this day in 1622, Fuzzles, a black cat, was accused at the Temple Bar in London of consorting with unclean spirits. Fuzzles was defended by Sir Cedric Blunt, the pre-eminent barrister of his day, who obtained no fewer than five stays of execution for Fuzzles on grounds ranging from a lack of evidence of Fuzzles practicing the black arts to the frilly knickers being worn by the magistrate hearing the case. After over a year in court, Fuzzles was acquitted of witchcraft and jailed for her inability to pay her legal bills owning to Cedric Blunt. Being found to have no assets beyond a large and moldering collection of partially eaten dead mice, she was beheaded.

The Annual Eastham Conservative Picnic.

Pope Gregory I created the musical style which would come to be known as Gregorian Chants on this day in 602 by accidentally standing on the toes of several monks who were trying to clear their throats while simultaneously kneeing one in the ghoulies. He subsequently offered a full 74 minutes of the chants for the low, low price of just $19.95 plus $4.50 shipping — Nebraska residents please add sales tax. No CODs.

The first Sunday in April is traditionally reserved for the installation of ceiling fans purchased the previous August, but which their owners never got around to unpacking.

On this day in 1951 the law firm of Wombdecker, Fizzbatt, Krashenburne, Mezzleharp, Dreedle, Dreedle, Dreedle, Dreedle and Leech made legal history when they handled the first extraterrestrial real estate conveyance, arranging for one Jim-Bob Puckerwort of Little Rock, Arkansas to purchase the moon.

It is traditional that on this day, English sports cars which have been repaired throughout the winter months are pushed triumphantly from their garages and driven aimlessly about town for several hours.

On this day it is proper to describe people as gravitationally challenged, intellectually undercompensated, folically disadvantaged, underwashed, communicatively dysfunctional, sartorially repressed, economically handicapped, statistically encumbered, conversationally plebeian, politically displaced, victims of stellar dislocation, disenfranchised of extensive musculature, reality deprived or metabolically underachieving rather than fat, stupid, bald, filthy, illiterate, rude, badly dressed, broke, unlucky, boring, fascist, extraterrestrial, weak, liberal or dead.

On this day many towns and villages in the former Soviet Union hold flea markets to exchange busts of Karl Marx with cigarette lighters in their heads, antique rolls of CIA-made Vladimir Kryuchkov toilet paper, Josef Stalin spittoons, Leon Trotsky pin cushions, concrete block paperweights from Berlin, photographs of Mir with all its systems functioning and other memorabilia of the glory days of the evil empire.

On this day it is traditional to ship small, highly-strung, yappy rat-dogs to Botswana by Federal Express.

This is statistically the most likely day of the year to spot Elvis at a shopping mall. On average, over 1200 Elvis sightings are reported across North America on this day. This does not include the sightings of Elvis weighing less than 300 pounds, Elvis with a beard, sunglasses and Vulcan ears, Elvis playing poker with Emelia Earhart, Elvis beaming down to buy donuts at a 7-Eleven and Elvis actually being able to sing.

On this day it is traditional for the last of the English sports cars to have succumbed to major gear box failure, total lack of engine compression and the inavailability of major components. They are to be pushed back into their garages for eleven more months of repair.

On this day the extremely minor Roman festival in honour of the quasi-god Ralph was celebrated. Ostensibly the son of Apollo and a young woman who sold flowers on the Via Appia, Ralph was regarded as a deity without portfolio by most Romans. He was worshiped as the god of left-handed half-blind mule gelders, who couldn't be bothered to build a temple for him.

Today is the remembrance of Irwin Dagobert, one of the early technicians to work on the design and implementation of the Hubble space telescope, for his observation on the remarkable progress of technology, in that the mirror dimensions of the telescope could be ascertained with nothing more than a five-dollar solar calculator from K-Mart.

On this day in 1983, ultra-low-cost, no-frills international carrier BuzzardAir made its inaugural flight from New York to London. Among its cost-saving measures were festival seating, Jehovah's Witnesses for cabin crews and an old lady at the back of the plane cooking hot dogs on a gas barbecue instead of a meal service. Its motto was "if pigs could fly they'd choose another airline."

On this day in 1912, continental drift was outlawed by an act of congress. Drifting continents were given a grace period of thirty days to cease all movement, after which time any continents still found to be drifting were to face severe legal and economic penalties. In excess of nine billion dollars have thus far been charged against various continents — the identity of the continents in question cannot be revealed while litigation is pending.

On this day in 1987, Agatha "Moonswallower" MacLarynx, a witch, turned Charles, Prince of Wales and future King of England, into a toad. She has thus far refused to turn him back.

On this day in 305, the Spanish synod at Elvira decreed that all christian clergy would be celibate.

On this day in 1867, the Dominion of Canada was created with the perpetually inebriated John "Anteater" MacDonald as its first prime minister. In an anecdotal legend from that time, one of MacDonald's aids recalls the prime minister discussing the choice of a national animal with several members of his cabinet. "The Americans," it was observed, "have as their national animal the eagle, because they see themselves as being fierce. The British have as their national animal the lion, because they see themselves as being brave." John MacDonald considered this for a few moments, and through a haze of whiskey fumes, said, "in that case, gentlemen, the choice is clear. The national animal for Canada shall be the beaver. Judging by the government we have this day given shape, the people of Canada had best get used to the idea of being screwed."

This day commemorates the fabled ninth-century alchemist Wetzlethrobinbanger the Last, who discovered the secret of turning lead into gold and then forgot it in his back pocket when he sent his pants out to be cleaned.

The nones of July were the traditional Roman festival of poodle bludgeoning. On this day all the poodles in Rome were herded into the Forum, where the city's children would set upon them with clubs amidst squeals of laughter and delight. That is, the children produced squeals of laughter and delight. The poodles just stood around looking irritated.

The Index Librorum Prohibitorum, the list of prohibited books, was first published by the Vatican on this day in 1502. Described as "the only papal bull ever to come with its own toreador," it was abolished in 1966 after it was discovered that every book added to it became an instant best-seller.

On this day in 1925, the noted physicist Robert "Green Cheese" Millikan discovered cosmic rays and subsequently spent the rest of his life with his head wrapped in aluminum foil to keep them out of his brain.

On this day in 1694, the Bank of England was incorporated and opened its doors for business. Fifteen minutes later all its employees put NEXT TELLER PLEASE signs at their windows and went for coffee.

Actually, it remains unclear as to whether this will become an annual event, as none of last year's participants have proven inclined to dig themselves up to participate again.

On or about this day in 1018, the border between Scotland and England was defined by the Scots king Malcolm II in a decisive battle against the English. The Scottish defenders, having exhausted all their spears, arrows and reasonably large rocks, pelted the English with their packed lunches, consisting for the most part of bridies and haggis on moldy bread. The English retreated under this onslaught — not, as history records, because of excessive losses, but rather because they decided that they didn't want to take over a country where people voluntarily ate anything which smelled that bad.

Schrodinger's Cat is a famous example in quantum physics illustrating probability. Erwin Schrodinger locks his cat in a sealed box, along with a fragile glass capsule containing poison gas. Eventually, the cat is certain to break the gas capsule and die. However, because the box is opaque, it is impossible to say precisely when this will happen, or at any given time whether it has taken place or not. The probability of Schrodinger's Cat being dead increases with time, but it is only possible to express the probability of its being dead as a function of time, not in an absolute sense. The example of Schrodinger's Cat also serves to illustrate that attempting to ascertain the state of the cat would affect the experiment, as opening the box or knocking on it to see if the cat moved might in fact cause it to break the gas capsule and kill itself.

In fact, Schrodinger didn't actually devise this example to illustrate quantum probability, which he considered so simple as to require no further explanation. Some time before setting up this demonstration, he had accepted a cat from a friend who had been found to be allergic to it. Schrodinger hated the cat, which was huge and ill-kept, and wished to be rid of it. Ultimately, he decided that killing the cat under the guise of a scientific demonstration would trouble his friend less than simply cracking it across its head with a baseball bat and burying it in the yard.

In some traditions this is considered to be the hottest day of the year. It is regarded as unlucky to sit next to a fat, sweaty bastard with hair growing in his ears and a beer gut the size of a small emerging African nation on this day.

Today is the festival of the Roman goddess Prenuptua, the patron deity of legally binding, prosecutable, air-tight, iron-clad marriage agreements. The goddess was traditionally honoured by a parade through the Roman circus consisting of the city's divorce lawyers, matrimonial councilors, midnight moving companies and private detectives. The temple of Prenuptua bore the motto "Life's a bitch and so am I."

On this day in 1877, members of the Pony Express Riders Local 216 went on strike for improved wages, job security, incremental pensions, health benefits and a saddle allowance. The picket line is still walked today by several great-great grandchildren of the original workers, who feel that "a breakthrough at the bargaining table is imminent."

On this day Clythandra, the Celtic divinity of pewter key chains, jeweled letter openers, hand-made irregular copper bracelets and pottery lampshades, is honoured in craft shops around the world.

On this day in 1988, over 400 residents of Gulf Breeze, Florida, attempted to send a message to extraterrestrial life in outer space by simultaneously pointing their VCR remote controls at the sky and pressing PLAY.

This day in 1566 marked the publication in Venice of Notizie Scritte, the first newspaper. Of the 412 copies printed, 116 were delivered to the wrong address, 27 were left out in the rain, 41 had pages missing and 196 were only bought for the crossword puzzle and then rolled up and used to spank someone's dog.

On this night in some rural communities it is traditional to gather up all the pink plastic lawn flamingos in town and put them to death with a wood chipping machine. The remains are recycled into milk bottles.

On this day in 1995 the British government announced that it was officially downgrading the national panic over Mad Cow Disease to Slightly Annoyed Cow Disease. It further announced that its research proved that the likelihood of contracting the disease were one in four and a half million — coincidentally, roughly the same as the odds of winning the British national lottery.

On the first weekend of September, uncounted millions of city dwellers attempt drive to cottage country for one last weekend of beer chugging, burger burning and wife swapping. Few actually arrive, but this festival is enlivened by the brightly attired vendors who walk between the cars in traffic jams on the major highways offering to sell the drivers Valium, handguns and suicide capsules.

On this day in 1877, Lady Gladys Overhammer-Sweatwallow rode naked through the streets of Coventry in honour of her supposed distant ancestor, Lady Godiva. Tipping the scales at just over four hundred pounds, Lady Gladys attracted a considerable wealth of airborne vegetables during her short peregrination, which ended when the spine of her horse cracked simultaneously in seven places, necessitating that the animal be put down.

The Mayflower sailed from Plymouth, England, on this day in 1620. Contrary to popular legend, its passengers were not pilgrims wishing to live free in the new world, but rather, a collection of fundies and flower-sellers the British government figured it could get rid of by offering them a cruise.

It is traditional on this day for those who brew beer to gather together, to exchange glasses of their finest creations and maps illustrating where the police cars are likely to be hiding on the way home.

On this day it is traditional for the rite of the starting of the chain saws to be enacted in rural areas. The rite consists of the search for the sacred spark plug, the most revered mixing of gasoline and oil, the repeated pulling of the honoured starting rope, the holy tightening of the chain, the august removal of mice from under the engine housing, the sublime reading of the owner's manual as a last resort, the song of praise sung for the successful starting of the saw as darkness falls and the familiar cries of "get me to a hospital, Martha... I think I've cut my goddamned arm clean off!".

On this day in 1835, the British Parliament passed an act outlawing bear baiting. After this time, it was necessary to lure bears by showing them naughty pictures of other bears, discussing the exciting investment potentials of mutual funds with them or slapping them briskly across the nose and running like hell.

St. Trelaxia was a minor sixth-century martyr who was sentenced to die of boredom by listening to endless civics lectures as a result of his refusing to license his dog.

Alfred was the ninth-century English king who declared that the same law must apply to all people, whether they be rich or poor, high born or common. On this day lawyers around the world get together, have a drink to Alfred and laugh their asses off.

This is traditionally the day upon which to give thanks to whichever deity you pray to for the limitless bounty of life and the equally limitless credit card limit that's gotten you into debt for it. Take a moment to consider that all people are equal in the eyes of Visa, unless they have a monthly outstanding balance over 1000 dollars, in which case they're swamp scum.

On this day in 1307 — a Friday — the order of the Knights Templar was forceably disbanded by the French government, its assets seized and many of its members imprisoned. This is, in fact, the origin of the superstition that Friday the thirteenth represents bad luck. Many of the fugitive Templar knights fled to Scotland, where they began dressing conservatively, carrying oddly shaped black bags, wearing huge, garish silver rings, delivering secret handshakes to everyone they met and affixing "I am a member of a secret society" bumper stickers to the rumps of their horses. They eventually founded the brotherhood of Freemasons.

The Nobel prize-winning physicist Harold Clayton Urey claims to have discovered heavy water on this day in 1931, although, like, anyone who's had to drag one of those mother ten-gallon water jugs up three flights of stairs to the cooler will tell you it's been heavy all along, Dude.

On this day it is traditional for any sports cars not yet broken down to be garaged for the winter.

On this night it is traditional for brightly-costumed children in urban areas to knock on the doors of their neighbours and exclaim "trick or treat or I'll hose the place down with this AK-47."

On this day in 1605, Guy "Guido" Fawkes successfully detonated a crude gunpowder bomb in the English Parliament, killing 23 members of parliament. He narrowly missed killing King James I, who was out back having a crafty smoke. Fawkes was apprehended in a cellar of Parliament with a checklist of instructions for the act of terrorism, which lamentably had omitted the final entry, to wit, "run away." Not wishing to seem to have been nearly killed by such an obvious half-wit, James ordered that all evidence of the explosion be quickly removed, and that life-size wooden dummies of the murdered parliamentarians be crafted to replace them. The ruse worked, and seven of the dummies were subsequently re-elected.

On this day in 1901 the Rolling Stones played their first gig.

On this day in 1967, thousands of hamsters were put to death in Newcastle because of widespread and dire boredom.

On this day it's traditional to take a big, smelly, drooly dog to the most expensive restaurant you can find and threaten to sue its proprietor for species discrimination if you and the dog are not given the best table in the house.

The remaining members of the Portland Marxist-Leninist Movement meet each year on this day in the back booth of a local MacDonald's to plan the upcoming workers' revolution.

On this day it is traditional to buy a drink for someone wearing a trench coat and dark glasses, a crew cut, a shoulder holster for a SAM missile, laser guided black Oxford shoes, Kevlar underwear, glued-on fingerprints, a Latex mask, ear transistors, cyanide capsules in at least three separate hollowed-out teeth, a throwing knife secreted in a partially removed leg bone and a toupee that changes colours when the room gets dark. Tell the people who spend their lives in secret that you're grateful for their work.

The serial murderer Fred the Ripper was caught in London on this day in 1891. Wishing to enjoy the same notoriety as his namesake Jack the Ripper, Fred was confounded by his propensity for fainting at the sight of blood. None the less, he left the London docklands area littered with corpses by sneaking up behind little old ladies and popping air-filled paper bags in their ears to see which ones had weak hearts. He was eventually apprehended with the assistance of a 91-year old civil servant who had been deaf from birth, and as such survived his assault.

On this day it is traditional to gorge to the brink of explosion, drink like a templar, perform innumerable noxious bodily functions amidst crowds of loved ones, tell lewd stories, sing bawdy songs and generally behave like an ill-bred lower life form. Slainthe.

On this day about two thousand years ago, three old men of no fixed address were caught by a Roman centurion while attempting to engage in perversions with a sheep in a barn near Bethlehem. Thinking quickly, they crafted a magnificent tale of being themselves kings, and having been drawn from distant lands by a particularly bright star to witness the birth of a child from a virgin mother. This having taken place shortly after the end of the Roman Saturnalia, the annual festival of foolishness and mirth, the local Roman magistrate let the three old men off with a warning.