August 2024: CAESAR
Image by Nick M.W. (FFP)
Augustus had no chill.
The eighth month of the Gregorian calendar is a wrap. Did you know that August was named for the first Roman emperor, Augustus Caesar, in 8 BCE. He seemed like an asshole. That’s based on a couple of quotes I read off his Wikipedia page and a brief but general assessment of his mood, as it was depicted on that website. Understandable.
I write a lot about time and mention it often on Saturday Night Special, but I usually write about how quickly time is passing in the moment. I haven’t mentioned how much time has passed. For example, eight years before the common era, or before Jesus Christ was born, they named the eighth month of the year after the first Roman Emperor, who had died six years prior. Our modern calendar, the Gregorian calendar, wasn’t accepted until 1582, one thousand five hundred and ninety years after they first dropped August on us, like a hit summer single. It was that “Not Like Us” of the early Roman Empire. Give them and their partners from antiquity, the Greeks, credit for slapping us with the enduring “dog days of summer” phrase. Their love for astronomy really paid dividends for civilization.
In our modern era, August is still referred to as the “dog days…” because most of us smell like a dog’s ass after sweating all damn day and all damn night. Facts. This August was no different. None of us out here where I live came out of the month with less than humid swamp ass. Out here it’s a dry heat. Godspeed you poor folks in places where you can see humidity. Your swamp ass is more like bayou butt. That’s a significantly worse situation. It’s not even close.
There is no reprieve from the heat for most of us in the Southwestern US until around Halloween, so expect a couple more of these blogs to bemoan my sweaty groin.
Twilight Season
The MLB season is entering its final month. A lot of folks don’t like baseball because the games are long and “boring”. Of course, those folks are uncultured swine. That was harsh. Just kidding. Nevertheless, the baseball season is described as a marathon because they play 162 games from April to September, which means that teams are playing every day of the week during that five-month stretch, give or take. I’m a baseball fan, more specifically a Dodgers fan, and I dig watching their games, so much so that I still pay for cable because that’s how I can get the team’s exclusive network (same with the Lakers).
“You cable TV cuck!”
Yes. Yes, I am. And I’m going to miss baseball season when it comes to its inevitable end in September. One thing I will not do this year that I’ve been doing the last few is give my playoff breakdown for the Dodgers. It hasn’t ended well for them since I started doing that, so clearly it’s my fault they haven’t even been back to the World Series since they won it in 2020.
Genesis
As I write this, college football games are being played. The NFL is right around the corner. The NBA is not far off the horizon, and we’ll be hitting holidays are more tolerable weather (at least until folks get hit by winter). This is a good time of year. If you don’t have to worry about your own survival, if you’re blessed enough to write a blog no one reads or read a blog no one else likes, throw your hands up and give praise to whatever it is you worship. If that is nothing, it’s still good to be grateful because seasons change with a quickness, and you can be caught unaware.
