Celebration Day

WordPress asks us to “invent a holiday, and explain how and why everyone should celebrate”…

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International Tinday is a celebration of the wonder that is Tinman’s blog, the wonder being how he gets away with writing the stuff he does. It is a fun-filled day guaranteed to quicken hearts, mimicking what Tinman’s pacemaker is doing to his.

It is celebrated on April 29th, partly because that is the anniversary of the day on which the blog first appeared, and partly because it is nowhere near Christmas, so there is no risk of getting just one present to cover the two events.

The fun begins the evening before, when families gather around while their father reads “The Night Before Tinday”.

In the story the father has just settled his brain for a long winter’s nap (surely the words “long” and “nap” are contradictory?) when there arises such a clatter, of fingers on a keyboard, and down the internet comes Tinman. Traditionalists will be disappointed to hear that since he has given up beer he no longer has a little round belly that shakes, when he laughs, like a bowlful of jelly, but his dimples are probably still merry, whatever that means.

The evening ends with someone saying the traditional sentence “this time tomorrow it’ll be all over”.

On Tinday itself gifts are exchanged, mainly large tins of shortbread biscuits or large tins of Cadburys Roses, including the sweets with the ghastly pink goo in the centre. Some people think it’s amusing to give Tin-openers, though I have to say I don’t find that at all funny. Men are given socks.

Then there is the traditional Tinday dinner, consisting of tinned foods. Tins of Spam are frowned upon, because that casts aspersions on his blog, but tins of peaches are served because Tinman is a real peach, tins of baked beans because he is great gas, and tins of prunes because he is full of, well, let’s leave it at that.

In Australia they drink a lot of tinnies. Sorry, that has nothing to do with Tinday, I just thought I’d point it out.

After dinner families gather around the computer to listen the traditional Tinday messages from the Pope, the Queen and, for some reason, Wolverine from the X-Men. These are given via comments on Tinman’s blog (to which he usually doesn’t respond, so it’s not just you). The families then turn on the TV and watch the Great Escape, the Sound of Music or ET (apparently there is some EU law that these are the only films allowed on such days). The BBC will show an especially depressing episode of EastEnders, in which one of the cast will beat one of the others with a tin dustbin lid.

The night ends with another traditional sentence, “well, that’s it over for another year”.

Shameless attempts have been made to commercialise the day, as has happened with Christmas, marketing “Happy Tinday” Cards, Tinday crackers, and even Tinday novelty jumpers (it has a picture of Tinman‘s face on it, and if you press his nose he tells you to stop doing it).

These attempts have so far been unsuccessful, but I fully intend to keep trying.