December 06, 2021

😕 I'm very confused.

Marron Hoodie with a coffee mug and the words Caffiend

I'M GONNA NEED SOME COFFEE TO MAKE SENSE OF TODAY.

Happy National Gazpacho Day! You may be asking yourself "why are we celebrating a chilled soup in December? Especially when that particular soup's star player is the tomato, which isn't remotely in season in December? And what does that have to do with the coffee-themed hoodie up top?"

All great questions! I'll answer them to the best of my ability below:

• I don't know why the random holiday powers-that-be chose December 6th for Gazpacho Day. It's not like the Andalusian region of Spain (where gazpacho originated) is particularly warm this time of year. 

• Despite all the talk about how imperative it is that only the freshest, ripest tomatoes be used for gazpacho due to the fact that we can't rely on heat cooking techniques to coax flavor out of them, this all smells like an attempt by Big Tomato to move more units during the off season.

• I just happen to think a jolt of caffeine might help us all wrap our confused heads around this nonsensically-timed holiday.

Coffee And Contemplation GIF

If we still are struggling to arrive at a tomato-based epiphany, we could just scrap the chilled soup angle, do a 180 as far as food temperature, and celebrate National Microwave Oven Day instead. 

*****

OK, birthday time! Let's slice some cake in honor of:

• The 13th Amendment of the US Constitution, which was ratified by Congress on this day in 1865! The 13th Amendment abolished slavery and forced servitude* and was the first of three Reconstruction Amendments adopted following the end of the Civil War.

*Except as punishment for a crime. Sorry, prisoners.

• Lyricist Ira Gershwin, born this day in 1896! Along with his composer brother George, Ira wrote some of the most popular English-language songs of the early 20th century, including 'Embraceable You,' 'I Got Rhythm,' 'Someone To Watch Over Me,' 'Let's Call The Whole Thing Off,' and many, many others.

• Jazz pianist and bandleader Dave Brubeck, born this day in 1920! Mr. Brubeck was a pioneer at the forefront of the cool jazz movement and favored unusual time signatures in his compositions, and his hit album Take Five is one of the best-selling jazz albums of all time.

• Everglades National Park, dedicated on this day in 1947! I've never been myself, but if I learned anything from the Showtime series Dexter, it's that alligators are a wonderful dead body disposal system. 

• King of the internet classified Craig Newmark, born this day in 1956! Mr. Newmark is the founder and creator of Craigslist, the motto of which should probably be "connecting you with weird and undesirable roommates since 1995."

• Director, producer, screenwriter, and comedian Judd Apatow, born this day in 1967! Mr. Apatow was the creative force behind the TV shows Freaks and Geeks and Undeclared and the films The 40 Year-Old VirginKnocked UpFunny People, and more. 

*****

This is normally the portion of the Monday email where I'd encourage you to scroll down to learn a bit about another Boredwalk fan, but unfortunately no one has volunteered to be featured in almost a month! If you want to be briefly quasi-famous with your own Q&A segment, reply to this and let me know and I'll send you some questions! If you're not sure what this looks like, you can check out past customer Q&A's over on our blog

We'll be back in your inbox on Wednesday morning with links to fun distractions! If you're in a shopping mood or still have people on your list to get gifts for, be sure to use the code YAY10 at checkout to save 10% on orders of $100 or more! Until next time...

Peace, love, and hopefully flavorful gazpacho,

Matt