March, the National Month for Many Things

A month can be claimed by numerous groups and causes in order to support their cause, particular hobby or even a specific food. March has a number of strange and worthy causes associated with it. I find a way to combine as many as possible.

On the medical front, March is National Foot Health Month, National Kidney Month and National Nutrition Month. To fulfill all of these you'll mainly just want to avoid diabetes. Diabetics have the most problems with foot health and they get major kidney problems because of their condition. If you eat nutritious food and avoid as many simple sugars as you can, you can pay homage to all three medically oriented March holidays.

Foodwise, March is National Noodle Month, National Frozen Food Month and National Peanut Month.

My suggested menu item to make for March that incorporates all three of these would be a shrimp pad thai. It includes rice noodles (National Noodle Month), frozen shrimp (Frozen Food Month) and peanut butter. Check it out here or you can just go ahead and buy a frozen pad thai dinner to celebrate March.

It's also Irish American Heritage Month, Poetry Month, Women's History Month and Red Cross Month. That means that March is the time to write an epic poem about a courageous Irish-American woman who volunteered for the Red Cross. It's also National Craft Month and Music in Our Schools Month, so perhaps we should set the poem to music as we display a handmade diorama of her adventures in a local school.

If you think the month-long themes are strange, you should really check out a daily calendar. March 5^th is multiple personalities day and March 28^th is something on a stick day.

I am still attempting to wrap my mind around "If Pets Had Thumbs Day" on March 3^rd. I think someone may have just made that one up. To be honest I am not quite sure how to celebrate it. March 3^rd is also National Anthem Day, Peach Blossom Day and "I Want You To Be Happy Day." Again, I think someone made the last one up. I'm thinking of renaming it Be a Martyr Day. The only thing I can think of to celebrate all of these at once is pretty awful: Tie artificial thumbs onto your cat while singing the national anthem and wearing a peach blossom in your hair. When your cat protests (and it will) you say "I just want you to be happy!" and remove the artificial thumbs.

Check out this list of all of March's weird and wacky days.