Family Day is quickly becoming our favourite holiday here at All Fired Up in the Big Smoke. Free of the pressures of gift giving/receiving, religious connotations, easter egg hunting, tree planting and general all round labouring, Family Day is simply the third day of a long weekend in February, just past the half way mark of the winter season.

The Christmas spirit has long since past (although the overdue bills linger) but the days are growing noticeably longer, the nights shorter. If the winter has not yet killed us, we bask in the growing possibility of spring being right around the corner.. and up the street, then take a left and go two, no wait, three or four long city blocks until you reach a stop light. There, spring will be just around the corner.

With the annual trip down south into the warmth not until the kids’ spring break, by Family Day you realize that it is still more than a month away, give or take a week depending on your school board and you secretly start (once again) to curse your luck and your ancestors for possessing the grand stupidity in deciding to settle here. I mean, seriously. It was the olden days. Why didn’t they just keep going from wherever it is they came from, across the border, through the Midwest and spread out to the semi-tropical climes of Florida or the arid dry heat of the American southwest? Screw that. Why weren’t they even more adventurous and become pirates somewhere in the Caribbean? Anywhere in the Caribbean except for maybe Haiti.

Still, it could be worse. You could be living in Winnipeg or Regina. Or suffering under the unbearable spirit and constant drizzle of the Olympics in Vancouver.

But why did they give us an extra day in the middle of February again? Couldn’t they’ve jammed it into one of the summer months when there’s stuff you can actually do and enjoy? Downhill skiing is too expensive. Cross country skiing’s just stupid. The AGO still has the fucking King Tut exhibit. And no, I don’t care how bored I am, you cannot make me go see Precious.

I’ll tell you what. You take the kids and go see Precious or that real life football player story with Sandra Bullock while I just go into to work, book the day. We’ll try to tack it onto one of the other days off we have and make it a real long weekend. When it’s nice out. We can drive somewhere and it won’t cost us an arm and a leg. How’s that sound?

So happy, happy Family Day, everyone. From our family here at All Fired Up in the Big Smoke to yours. And don’t fret. We can all get back to work tomorrow.

— forced vacationally submitted by Cityslikr