Argumentative Essay: The Roman Calendar

Hysterically Historical

January IAnchor

January 1
Roman Catholic Feast of the Circumcision. [Leviticus 12:3 commands that the son be circumcised on his eighth day and January 1 is 8 days after December 25. Thus, this “feast day” commemorates a priest removing the holy foreskin (so we know He’s Jewish.) Any anti-Semites out there? You’re picking on Jesus Christ’s cousins.]
January 1, 364 BC
The Roman calendar is reorganized to begin in January instead of March. [Ever after, “Octo”ber is the tenth month, not the eighth. Go figure (every year, figure which month this is.)]
January 1, 404
Rome has its last gladiator competition. [Saint Telemachus/Almachus/Tilemahos rushes into the stadium to stop the bloodsport. Whether killed by gladiator(s)

[While this appears astonishing, the fact is that he’s already on a life sentence for 1 murder when he arranges 3 more people be murdered. He worked hard to get this and the state really didn’t have the right to refuse what he’d labored to have.]
January 17, 2008
British Airways Flight 38 lands on crashing. [152 passengers; 47 injured; 0 dead (good reflexes, pilots!) It’s 1st 777 written off. Apparently, its Roll-Royce engines have a problem with the fuel-oil-heat-exchange developing crystals in the fuel to clog the tubes, if you get the thrust of my explanation because the jet plane did not. Belly slap, skid, everyone slide out ~900’ short of the runway (whoever put this grass here, thank you.) All 16 crew get the safety medal.]
January 17, 2010
Moslems vs. Christians in Jos, Nigerian riots. [Jos’s Anglican Archbishop Benjamin A. Kwashi notes that religion is a cover for the real causes: inter-tribal fighting, politics, social discontent, economics, and indigenous Christians vs. “settler” Moslems (i.e., you’re working and I’m not.) 992 dead, mostly women and children; too many injured to bother counting (much less noting.) Damage is irrelevant because most of the participants own very little to begin with (but the wealthy have machine guns, so we leave them alone.) See May 20, 2014 for more