Humor Post #50 from the world’s Crankiest Curmudgeon’s Middle School Blog (and probably the awesomest YA blog too) –

I’ve been watching the calendar lately. It’s almost spring break time and I keep gazing at that thing trying to make the days go faster. But it doesn’t work; it never does. Seems like there’s always going to be 24 hours in a day. (But in the future that might change, if people listen to me. More about that in a later column.) But all that staring got me to thinking. How did our days get their names?

“That’s an interesting question,” I said to myself. “Good for you, Crankenfuss!” (See, I like to give myself an occasional pat on the back. Cheers me up, you know.) So I went to my trusted friend Wikipedia and some other sources and found out something very uncool. The names of our days are stupid out of date. (I’m trying to be nice here, for a change.) Oh sure, the names were fine, like one or two thousand years ago, but isn’t it time we modernized them just a wee bit? How out of date are they? Let me show you seven reasons they should be canned, deep-sixed, whacked, you name it, whatever makes them go away.

Let’s start with Sunday, our official first day. Anyone out there know how it got its name? “Uh, from the Sun?” you answer. That’s right, it goes back to when people worshiped the Sun. And if you don’t believe me, consider where Monday got its name. It’s not from money or monarch or monsoons or mongoose or monkey or Monopoly or monster, all of which certainly have their good points. (Ooh, Monkey Day, where we all get to act like monkeys. Or Monopoly Day where we all get to stay home from school to play games.) Nope, you give up? Well, you probably already figured it out. It’s short for Moon Day, back from when people worshiped the Moon.

It gets better, people. Tuesday started out as Tiw’s Day. “Who’s Tiw?” you ask. “Some cool rapper?” No, it’s even more surprising. He was a one-handed warrior god from Norse mythology or something people believed in up in Sweden and Finland, places where they actually eat reindeer steaks. Why would we go along with people who eat poor Rudolf? And Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday come from other gods and goddesses from those way-up-north ancient religions: Woden, Thor (that thunderbolt dude), and Frige (or Frigga or something like that), the goddess of love. I guess that’s why Friday night is such a heavy date night.

And Saturday, my favorite day of the week comes from Saturn’s Day. Saturn comes from Roman mythology and he was the son of the Earth and the Sky and his wife was named Ops. I guess when he was wanting her to feel good, he’d call her Special Ops. (Okay, you can stop your moaning.) Anyway, they were the parents of Jupiter, Neptune, and Pluto.

So I think you’re probably ahead of me in all this. “Why in the heck are our days still named for dudes who are, to say the least, yesterday’s news? If they were singers, they’d be doing gigs in rest homes.” You’re right and let me compliment you for that rest home joke. That was good!

Now I haven’t gotten around to thinking up better names for our days, but just let ol’ Crankenfuss put on his thinking helmet — it helps prevent concussions from thunderously awesome thoughts — and he might get back to you. But in the meantime get out the word about how dumb our days’ names are.

Unless, of course, you think we should bring back animal sacrifices and naked Olympics. (Yes, they were!! I promise you!)

From your Dude with the ‘Tude,
Your Star Elite with his Genius Complete,
Dr. Crankenfuss