Gotta love president's day. No gifts to be bought, cards to be sent, just a few mattress or bedding sales and for the folks I work with, a glorious three-day weekend.

hearkening back to grade school in Illinois, we used to get Casmir Pulaski day off. Politicians may argue that it was their way of paying tribute to their polish heritage however I always sort of cynically saw it as a lackluster way of balancing Martin Luther King's birthday time off. Ahem, um, of course...who wouldn't want to honor a polish war veteran but the grade schoolers of Chicagoland?

President's day is sort of the same thing. Just a rather remarkably odd monday we get as a "bonus" holiday. It was one of the things that I was excited about when I saw the benefits pages at Ecoville. However it is equally frustrating that we have this day off and yet I seem to always have to use my floating holiday or a vacation day if I want to take time off for easter or christmas eve.

I remember odd things about president's Washington and Lincoln which might be more a reflection on my schooling and may make people in District 25 want to reconsider giving us so many school holidays. Mostly I remember Washington and a story about chopping down a cherry tree and his quip "I cannot tell a lie, I did it with my little hatchet" and while I remember a bit more about lincoln, mostly from visits to his home and tomb in Springfield, I mostly remember having black construction paper and making stovepipe hats for a play that we put on for our parents.

And so George and Abe - Happy Birthday...and thanks for the day off.