My birthday surprises

My birthday was last Friday and of course I meant to get something typed up but never did get around to it..  so better late than never, right?

I have a few pictures to show you but first I want to talk a little bit about my birthday: March 15. Most people know this as the Ides of March. Growing up in Ohio, however, I know that traditionally this is also Buzzard Day: the day the buzzards return to Hinckley Township in Medina County, Ohio. I think you can imagine, I've gotten a few jokes about being born on this day :P It's also the day H.P. Lovecraft died, but there are quite a few famous birthday twins I have:

Sean Biggerstaff, or as we Harry Potter fans know him, Oliver Wood

Mark McGrath of the band Sugar Ray

my personal favorite of all my birthday twins: 

Naoko Takeuchi, the creator of Sailor Moon

and of course I can't leave out the single person I get teased about the most:

Dee Snider of Twisted Sister

(in addition to my Snyder relatives, I have Sniders, and Schneiders on my mom's side of the family.. so that ever increases the odds Dee and I may be related :P ....and I just read this little tidbit from Wikipedia: his mother was from a Catholic family of Swiss descent and as you know, I'm also part Swiss. Dee is truly the male version of me?)

That was enough to make my head spin, so ignoring my birthday twins.. in addition to Buzzard Day, there apparently are a few more things March 15 is known for:

 Apparently it's World Contact Day, who knew?

 In Japan, it is Hōnen Matsuri or Harvest Festival. From Wikipedia: "The festival's main features are Shinto priests playing musical instruments, a parade of ceremonially garbed participants, all-you-can-drink sake, and a 280 kg (620 pound), 2.5 meter (96 inch)-long wooden phallus. The wooden phallus is carried from a shrine called Shinmei Sha (in even-numbered years) on a large hill or from Kumano-sha Shrine (in odd-numbered years), to a shrine called Tagata Jinja."

In short, I was born on weiner day.

It's reflections like these which make me wonder if the Roman's knew something we don't...

Anyway, this post has gotten long enough so I will post my birthday surprises in another post :P 

If you want to know more, you can read all about my special day here on Wikipedia. Or if you want to read about another date, just replace March with the month you're interested in, followed by an underscore _ and the date you're interested in. You can also look by year, although just looking at the date I was born was enough to make my head spin.. I don't want to look at the year. 

Thanks for reading!