What’s Up October?
When did you first realize that October is the tenth month despite the fact that the prefix “octo” means eight? Probably at the same time you realized you still have the old Roman calendar hanging up beside your rotary phone.
It wasn’t until Pope Gregor the [insert Roman numeral here] thought that the year was too short and randomly added two months to the calendar, much to the ire of Costco, who had already planned to put out their Christmas display.
The populous was pissed because many had already booked their summer vacations. At the protest, one guy yelled out, “While you’re at it, why don’t you just add some random days to the months so we don’t know which ones are longer!”
Well, he got his wish.
Pumpkin growers however were elated. Two more months? That would mean their pumpkins could get even bigger and they decided to have a competition to see who could grow the largest misshaped gourd. The winner of the first annual “Big Ugly Gourd” festival was Miss Helenus Arlenus of Pompeii. Surprisingly, a photo of that year’s winner was unearthed in 2024:
-Leon
Leon Stevens is a multi-genre author, composer, guitarist, songwriter, and an artist, with a Bachelor of Music and Education. He published his first book of poetry, Lines by Leon: Poems, Prose, and Pictures in January 2020, followed by a book of original classical guitar compositions, Journeys, and a short story collection of science fiction/post-apocalyptic tales called The Knot at the End of the Rope and Other Short Stories. His newest publications are the novella trilogy, The View from Here, which is a continuation of one of his short stories, a new collection of poetry titled, A Wonder of Words, and his latest sci-fi mystery, Euphrates Vanished.
My new book page: http://books.linesbyleon.com/
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