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June 6, 2015

Today we celebrate:

UN Russian Language Day - One of the six official United Nations languages, this day commemorates the birthday of Aleksandr Pushkin, a Russian poet who is credited with being “the father of modern Russian literature.”

National Gardening Exercise Day – Today is a day to get some exercise in the garden. Weeding, planting, weeding, watering, weeding, hoeing, weeding, and finally...resting while you watch the weeds grow.  Get some fresh air and exercise those muscles at the same time.

National Applesauce Cake Day – This is a cake that has applesauce as a main ingredient. It is very moist, and shouldn't need any oil. Unless you have unusual food allergies like some of the people in my household do, this is a very good thing because apples are much healthier than oil to bake with.

National Yo-Yo Day – This is believed to possibly be Donald F. Duncan, Sr.'s birthday... maybe. I’m not real sure about that and it appears that no one else is either. Why is that important, you ask? Well, I'll tell you. Yo-yo's have been around for well over two thousand years. In ancient Greece they were made from wood, or clay. In more recent times (1928), Pedro Flores began making yo-yo's to sell in California. Well, in 1929, Donald F. Duncan, Sr. felt that this new fad was going to go places and bought the Flores Yo-yo Corp. and registered the name Yo-yo as a trademark and really took off with it.  We have all been yo-yoing ever since.

Drawing Day or Pencil Day – Celebrated on the first Saturday in June, this is a day to drop everything, except babies, pick up a pencil and draw a picture. That's the easy part. The hard part, for some, is that when you are finished with your picture, you need to share your art with others. This is a day to encourage the love of art and drawing and to share art amongst ourselves.

D-Day – On this day in 1944, Allied troops invaded Normandy, France. More than 5,000 ships and 13,000 aircraft were involved and at the end of the day, our troops had a foothold in Normandy but the cost was great. We lost more than 9,000 soldiers on that day.

Drive-in Movie Day – There was a time when the Drive-in was THE place to go on a date. You could find one in almost any town. Nowadays, you'd be hard pressed to find one in every state. I happen to have one in my town, but that just makes me lucky. On this day in 1933, Richard Hollingshead's drive-in opened in New Jersey. His advertisement stated that “The whole family is welcome, regardless of how noisy the children are.” The first film they showed was called Wife Beware. The drive-in idea just took off from there and before long, they were everywhere.

National Trails Day – On the first Saturday in June, the American Hiking Society organizes “the country’s largest celebration of trails”. There are thousands of events celebrating this day occurring all over the country. See this web site for information on how to find an event in your local area.

Belmont Stakes – This is a famous Thoroughbred horse race that is held every year at Belmont Park in Elmont, NY. It is a 1.5 mile race for 3 year old thoroughbreds. The the winner gets $1.5 million dollars which is pretty powerful incentive for the owners. I'm not too sure if the horses care. Maybe they are racing for an extra apple.

To celebrate today, speak Russian to your plants while you get your gardening exercise workout done before you go for a hike on a trail near you.  Then watch the Belmont Stakes while you draw pictures of the horses.  Next you can watch a documentary on D-Day while you make applesauce cake.  This evening, go to a drive-in movie where you can eat doughnuts and play with your yo-yo.

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