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A holiday is a day or other period of time set aside for festivals or recreation. Public holidays are set by public authorities and vary by state or region. Religious holidays are set by religious organisations for their members and are often also observed as public holidays in religious majority countries. Some religious holidays, such as Christmas, have become secularised by part or all of those who observe them. In addition to secularisation, many holidays have become commercialised due to the growth of industry.
Holidays can be thematic, celebrating or commemorating particular groups, events, or ideas, or non-thematic, days of rest that do not have any particular meaning. In Commonwealth English, the term can refer to any period of rest from work, such as vacations or school holidays. In American English, the holidays typically refers to the period from Thanksgiving to New Year's (late November to January 1), which contains many important holidays in American culture. (Full article...)
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Burning Man is an eight-day-long festival organized by Black Rock City, LLC, under the guidance of founder Larry Harvey. The festival is held annually and ends on the American Labor Day holiday in September. The festival takes place on the playa of the Black Rock Desert in Nevada, 90 miles (150 km) north-northeast of Reno. Though the specific location on the playa changes from year to year, the location has been quite constant in recent years. The temporary city is an experiment in community, radical self-expression, and radical self-reliance. The event takes its name from the ritual of burning a large wooden sculpture of a man on the sixth day.
The annual event now known as Burning Man began on the summer solstice in 1986 when Larry Harvey, Jerry James, and a few friends met on Baker Beach in San Francisco and burned an eight foot (2.4 m) tall wooden man as well as a smaller wooden dog. The inspiration for burning these effigy figures has been explained by Harvey as "a spontaneous act of radical self-expression."
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In Irish mythology, a leprechaun is a type of male faerie said to inhabit the island of Ireland. They are a class of "faerie folk" associated in Irish mythology and folklore, as with all faeries, with the Tuatha Dé Danann and other quasi-historical races said to have inhabited Ireland before the arrival of the Celts. Leprechauns and other creatures of Irish mythology are often associated with "faerie forts" or "faerie rings" — often the sites of ancient earthworks or drumlins. They are said to be very rich, having many treasure crocks buried during war-time. According to legend, if anyone keeps an eye fixed upon one, he cannot escape, but the moment the eye is withdrawn he vanishes.
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“ | A severed foot is the ultimate stocking stuffer. | ” |
— Mitch Hedberg |
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Holidays - Anniversaries - Civic holidays - Federal holidays - Hallmark holidays - Heroes' Day - National holidays - Observances - Holidays by Country - Victory Days
Lists: Christmas carols - Christmas dishes - Hindu festivals - Holidays by country - Objects dropped on New Year's Eve - Winter festivals
Religious festivals: Buddhist festivals - Christian festivals - Islamic festivals - Neopagan holidays - Hindu festivals - Jain festivals - Jewish holidays - Roman festivals
Secular holidays: April Fools' - Armed Forces Day - Boss's Day - Children's Day - Cinco de Mayo - Commonwealth Day - Earth Day - Father's Day - Grandparents' Day - Halloween - HumanLight - Labor Day - May Day - Mother's Day - Naadam - Pi Day - Presidents' Day - Spring break - Teachers' Day - Thanksgiving - Yom Yerushalayim
Winter holidays: Chinese New Year - Christmas - Dōngzhì - Eid ul-Adha - Festivus - Groundhog Day - Hanukkah - Kwanzaa - New Year's Eve - Shab-e Chelle - Sol Invictus - Twelfth Night - Valentine's - Winter Solstice - Yule
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