Ides of March, Yet Again. I blame British Theater

Caesar: Who is it in the press that calls on me?
I hear a tongue, shriller than all the music,
Cry 'Caesar!' Speak! Caesar is turned to hear!

Soothsayer: Beware the Ides of March.

Caesar: What? You again?

Soothsayer: It's March the 15th on the calendar, Caesar.
Bloody right I'm here.

Caesar: But you warn me every year!
And every year I parade into the Senate,
Unarmed like a newish plebe, standing
Amid friends now sworn to dire purpose
Against me

Soothsayer: And yet, I do warn you
Even still that the day is not yet done

Cassius: How many ages hence
Shall this our lofty scene be acted over
In states unborn and accents yet unknown!

Soothsayer: Oh, many ages foolish lean hungry guy
Because this other fellow who
Shakes his spear upon the stage
Wrote us up a treat in this play of his
In which we do this over and over
Mostly in bad English
What the hell IS iambic pentameter anyway

Brutus: I do fear this future of yours

Soothsayer: Hey, I see the future I don't write it
If I could do anything to stop the foolishness
I'd have warned everyone about 
Trump's vicious ties to Russia decades
afore he slouched down that escalator

Caesar: What's this about Trump?

Soothsayer: He lies and bullies his way into
the Presidency in the Common Era year
of 2016 and worse
schemes painfully to regain the office
the following 2024 with more
destructive ambitions than any
you yourselves hold in your hearts
all of you

(long pause among the characters)

Caesar: Know what? Brutus, go ahead
with your steely knives, I ain't
even bothered anymore.

(Conspirators stab Caesar)

Caesar: Thank the Gods! I die free of Trump!

(dies)

Soothsayer: Lucky bastard.

It's the Ides of March. Do YOU Know Where Your Astrologer Is?

It's Stabby Time!

Caesar (to the Soothsayer): The Ides of March are come.
Soothsayer: Ay, Caesar, but not gone.
-- Julius Caesar Act III, some bloke goes by Willie Shakespeare

So what exactly IS an "Ides" on the calendar, anyway? 

Well, back in the ancient days while the Romans worked on getting us the roads, aqueducts, wine, maritime laws, and vomitoriums (it's NOT a place to upchuck, but their word describing the exit ramps from their sports stadiums), they did it all working with a calendar that followed the lunar cycle. That is, the fullness of the moon in a 28-day cycle of a dark face, a half-full, full, and waning to dark again.

The new moon (or dark) signaled the Calends (or Kalends) of the month (hence the name calendar for our monthly schedules). The Calends were when people paid off their debts, similar to today when people pay off mortgages, utilities, cable, that blackmailer who's got all the juicy video on you, etc. The Nones were at the seventh day where the moon would be half-full, and then the Ides were the full moon (total brightness) which would be on the 15th day, before everything waning back down to the next Calends.

Knowing these days helped the Romans keep up with their religious holidays, on which days to appease certain gods/goddesses, and keep track of their agrarian schedules (farming back then meant food and prosperity).

There was, however, a slight problem.

While the moon is an easy method of keeping to a strict schedule - where the lunar cycle is roughly 29 days, to where a flexible 28 days with an occasional leap day added could work - it didn't reflect the seasonal patterns of where the Earth is cycling around the Sun. Working on a farm requires knowing the best times to plant your seeds, fertilize the ground, grow the things that grow best in cold climes and then grow things best in warmer climes. Because the cold months and warm months depended more on where the Earth was in relation to the Sun, the Romans quickly kept losing track of when the winter months were and when to start growing things in springtime.

Various attempts at reforms took place during the days of the Roman Republic, but it wasn't until Julius Caesar showed up, becoming the High Priest of Rome (the Pontifex Maximus) as well as military dictator winning the civil wars against Pompey and other Senate rivals. He had the astrologers and scientists map out an unbalanced but longer calendar year more aligned to the solar (or tropical) patterns, and added three emergency months in 46 BCE to get things aligned in time for 45 BCE.

And what was the thanks he got?!?!

Bloody Optimates.

Ides of March 2022

It's March 15th. You know what THAT means!

TOGA! TOGA! TOGA!

 Wait. Wrong toga party.

Well, okay, now you know how to show up for the party...

Dammit, all that blood just ruins the bedsheets.

Ides of March 2021

March 15 can mean ONLY THING ON THE GREGORIAN CALENDAR!

Celebrating a guy who got the month of July named after himself!

Let's go to the tape!!!! 

Yeah, the day could have gone better for Julius.

Ides of March 2020: Good Things Coming Out of Italy (w/ Updates)

With all the craziness this year for the Ides of March, I didn't want to rehash the whole Roman Civil War thing or any other historical/Monty Pythonesque madness.

Instead, one of the things cropping up on social media is how Italy has been coping with the pandemic that has hit their nation real hard the past month. With most everything shut down, and people ordered to stay at their homes, what the neighborhoods and cities have done has been heartwarming. Just watch and listen:

Humanity at our best.

We love you, Italy. Stay healthy, and virtual hugs to your loved ones in need.

Update: Did I get this one?

Oh here's another!

I swear, it has something to do with having 2,000 years worth of balconies to your living spaces.

I want to know if the other countries have something similar. I know there's little news getting out from some of the hardest-hit like Iran, and stuff out of China I would question because of their censorship rules, but how are all the other nations coping?

Ides of March 2019: Tired Of This

You know there's so much crazy shit happening in the world right now, who gives a rat's ass about the Romans right now. Take your Fasces and shove em up your... what's the Latin word for 'buttocks' again? Clunes? Okay, we're going with Clunes.

Beware The Ides of March Madness Florida Primary Or Whatever

Man, this day sure is packed.

We're sitting on the anniversary of Julius Caesar finding out that Roman togas have enough pocket room to hold long knives.

You know, if they had cell phones back in 44 BC, they could have video-captured the death and uploaded it to YouTube for Twitter comments before Marc Antony could say a damn thing about it.

I mean, after all, the Romans brought us the sanitation, the medicine, education, wine, public order, irrigation, roads, the fresh-water system, and public health, they could have brought us telephone technology 2000 years before we really did get that tech, and we'd be that much closer to hoverboards and warp drives am I right?

Anyway, THIS March 15th is huge because there's a series of primaries in five key states, of which Florida is one. The even bigger story in that is how Florida is a Winner-Take-All state, meaning whoever wins the overall - and if they win decisively - gets a huge boost in the delegate count.

According to the polling, that's Trump.

We're screwed.

At least there's college men's basketball to distract us in Florida as Dunk City AKA Florida Gulf Coast holds a play-in game against another 16 seed for the right to upset North Carolina in the 2016 East Region. Here's hoping.

I'll blog later today about all this.

In the immortal words of the Soothsayer, Day Ain't Over Yet.

Anniversary: The Ides of March

This is a busy month of events, I tell you what:

Note to self: if I ever win the Presidency, NEVER EVER PUT MY BRO BRUTUS ON THE SECRET SERVICE STAFF.  Especially nowadays.