November Newsletter 2008

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November's Newsletter

 

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November

November is the eleventh month of the year in the Gregorian Calendar and one of four Gregorian months with the length of 30 days. November retained its name (from the Latin novem meaning "nine") when January and February were added to the Roman calendar.

The birthstone for November is either topaz, citrine, or aquamarine. The birthflower is the chrysanthemum.

November starts on the same day of the week as February in common years, and March every year.  

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Events in November

All Saints' Day (formerly All Hallows Day), a Christian holy day, is celebrated on November 1, the day after Halloween. In Sweden the All Saints' official holiday takes place on the first Saturday of November.

In Ireland, November 1 is regarded as the first day of Winter.
November 1 is called November Day (Lá Samhna) in Celtic tradition and is thus named in the Irish Calendar, where the month is called Mí na Samhna.

In the pagan wheel of the year, November begins at or near Samhain in the northern hemisphere and Beltaine in the southern hemisphere.

In the Roman Catholic calendar, November 2 is All Souls Day. It is known

in Mexico as el Día de los Muertos (Day of the Dead), and the whole month of November is especially dedicated to praying for the dead

Britain and New Zealand celebrate Guy Fawkes Night, the anniversary of the failed Gunpowder Plot, on November 5.

In Indonesia, November 10 is known as National Heroes Day

St. Martin's feast day (Martinmas) on November 11 was formerly considered the start of winter in some places in Europe

Remembrance Day is celebrated on November 11 in the Commonwealth of Nations and various European countries (including France and Belgium) to commemorate World War I and other wars. It is known as Veterans' Day is the United States.

In India, Children's Day is celebrated on November 14, the birthdate of first Indian Prime Minister Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru.

The Leonids meteor shower reaches its peak around November 17.

Discovery of Puerto Rico by Christopher Columbus on November 19, 1493.

Día de la Revolución, or Revolution Day, is celebrated in Mexico on November 20.

On 24th November each year, Lachit Divas is celebrated statewide in Assam, India, to commemorate the heroism of the great general Lachit Borphukan and the victory of the Assamese army over the Mughal army at the battle of Saraighat in 1671.

The United States and Puerto Rico observe Thanksgiving on the fourth Thursday in November.

For Western Christians, Advent usually begins on a Sunday during the last week of November.

Scotland celebrates St Andrews Day, its official national day, on 30 November. Since 2006 it has been an official bank holiday.

Month-long observances
November is Pancreatic Cancer Awareness Month, National Novel Writing Month, Alzheimer's Disease Awareness Month, and National Homeless Youth Awareness Month
It's quite common for some males in Australia (especially in the city of Melbourne), and New Zealand to sport a moustache during the month of November. The custom being known as Movember (Movember is a portmanteau of the words 'Moustache' and 'November'.), and being a fundraising event for men's health issues. One's fashionable appearance often comes second to the calling of Movember. A similar observance in the United States, called Noshavember, involves a full beard as opposed to a mustache.

Movable events
First Tuesday
In Australia, the Melbourne Cup horse race is held annually on the first Tuesday in November.
Tuesday After the First Monday
In the United States, elections are held on the Tuesday after the first Monday of November. They therefore fall between November 2 and November 8. In even numbered years, members of the House of Representatives are elected to two-year terms, and about one third of the U.S. Senate are elected to six-year terms. The President of the United States is elected in years divisible by four. Most U.S. states, counties, and municipalities have some part of their election cycle coincident with this date.
Third Wednesday
GIS Day is held the 3rd Wednesday of November during Geography Awareness Week.
Third Thursday
The Great American Smokeout sponsored by the American Cancer Society occurs on the third Thursday of November, one week before Thanksgiving. Smokers are encouraged to quit smoking for these 24 hours, in hopes that they will quit forever.
Fourth Thursday in the USA
Americans celebrate the Thanksgiving holiday on the fourth Thursday of November.
The day after Thanksgiving in the USA
A famous day for shopping known as "Black Friday."
Monday immediately following Thanksgiving Day in the USA
Cyber Monday  

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November represented in culture

A poem which is often told in schools in the United Kingdom is No by Thomas Hood[1], playing on how the name "November" can be extended to other phrases beginning with no. Hood's poem suggests that melancholy moods associated with this month.

Tom Waits performs a song titled November on his 1993 release The Black Rider.

Jay Chou released an album in November 2005 entitled November's Chopin.  

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Thanksgiving

Thanksgiving, or Thanksgiving Day, is a traditional North American holiday, which is a form of harvest festival. The date and whereabouts of the first Thanksgiving celebration is a topic of modest contention, though the earliest attested Thanksgiving celebration was on September 8, 1565 in what is now Saint Augustine, Florida. Despite scholarly research to the contrary, the traditional "first Thanksgiving" is venerated as having occurred at the site of Plymouth Plantation, in 1621.

Today, Thanksgiving is celebrated on the second Monday of October in Canada and on the fourth Thursday of November in the United States.

Grenada
In Grenada there is a national holiday of Thanksgiving Day on 25 October. It is unrelated to holidays in Canada and the United States even though it bears the same name and occurs around the same time. It marks the anniversary of the US-led invasion of the island in 1983 in response to the deposition and execution of Grenadan Prime Minister Maurice Bishop.  

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Black Friday

Black Friday is the Friday after Thanksgiving in the United States, where it is the beginning of the traditional Christmas shopping season. Since Thanksgiving falls on the fourth Thursday in November in the United States, Black Friday may be as early as the 23rd and as late as the 29th of November. Black Friday is not an official holiday, but many employers give the day off to workers, increasing the number of potential shoppers. Retailers often decorate for the Christmas season weeks beforehand. Many retailers open very early (typically 5 am or even earlier) and offer doorbuster deals and loss leaders to draw people to their stores. Although Black Friday, as the first shopping day after Thanksgiving, has served as the unofficial beginning of the Christmas season at least since the start of the modern Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade in 1924, the term "Black Friday" has been traced back only to the 1960s. The term "Black Friday" originated in Philadelphia in reference to the heavy traffic on that day. More recently, merchants and the media have used it instead to refer to the beginning of the period in which retailers are in the black (i.e., turning a profit).

The news media frequently refer to Black Friday as the busiest retail shopping day of the year, but this is not always accurate. While it has been one of the busiest days in terms of customer traffic, in terms of actual sales volume, from 1993 through 2001 Black Friday was usually the fifth to tenth busiest day. In 2002 and 2004, however, Black Friday ranked second place. The busiest retail shopping day of the year in the United States (in terms of both sales and customer traffic) usually has been the Saturday before Christmas. In 2003 and 2005, however, Black Friday actually did reach first place.

In many cities it is not uncommon to see shoppers lined up hours before stores with big sales open. Once inside, the stores shoppers often rush and grab, as many stores have only a few of the big draw items. Electronics and popular toys are often the most sought-after items and may be sharply discounted. Because of the shoulder-to-shoulder crowds, many choose to stay home and avoid the hectic shopping experience. The local media often will cover the event, mentioning how early the shoppers began lining up at various stores and providing video of the shoppers standing in line and later leaving with their purchased items. Traditionally Black Friday sales were intended for those shopping for Christmas gifts. For some particularly popular items, some people shop at these sales in order to get deep discounts on items they can then resell, typically online.

Origin of the name "Black Friday"

Stress from large crowds
The earliest uses of "Black Friday" come from or reference Philadelphia and refer to the heavy traffic on that day, an implicit comparison to the extremely stressful and chaotic experience of Black Tuesday (the 1929 stock-market crash). The earliest known reference to "Black Friday" (in this sense), found by Bonnie Taylor-Blake of the American Dialect Society, refers to Black Friday 1965 and makes the Philadelphia origin explicit:

JANUARY 1966 -- "Black Friday" is the name which the Philadelphia Police Department has given to the Friday following Thanksgiving Day. It is not a term of endearment to them. "Black Friday" officially opens the Christmas shopping season in center city, and it usually brings massive traffic jams and over-crowded sidewalks as the downtown stores are mobbed from opening to closing.

The term Black Friday began to get wider exposure around 1975, as shown by two newspaper articles from November 29, 1975, both datelined Philadelphia. The first reference is in an article entitled "Army vs. Navy: A Dimming Splendor," in The New York Times:

Philadelphia police and bus drivers call it "Black Friday" - that day each year between Thanksgiving Day and the Army-Navy game. It is the busiest shopping and traffic day of the year in the Bicentennial City as the Christmas list is checked off and the Eastern college football season nears conclusion.

The derivation is also clear in an Associated Press article entitled "Folks on Buying Spree Despite Down Economy," which ran in the Titusville Herald on the same day:

Store aisles were jammed. Escalators were nonstop people. It was the first day of the Christmas shopping season and despite the economy, folks here went on a buying spree. . . . . "That's why the bus drivers and cab drivers call today 'Black Friday,'" a sales manager at Gimbels said as she watched a traffic cop trying to control a crowd of jaywalkers. "They think in terms of headaches it gives them."

Cyber Monday

Main article:
The term Cyber Monday, a neologism invented by the National Retail Federation's Shop.org division, refers to the Monday immediately following Black Friday, which unofficially marks the beginning of the Christmas online shopping season.

In recent years, Cyber Monday has become a busy day for online retailers, with some sites offering low prices and other promotions on that day. Like Black Friday, Cyber Monday is often wrongly said to be the busiest shopping day of the year for online shoppers, although in reality several days later in the holiday shopping season are busier.

Earlier in the 2000s the day had more significance (though it was not named as such until 2005) as most people did not have broadband connections at home and presumably used the first day back at work from the long Thanksgiving weekend to take advantage of such connections in the office to do online shopping. In response, many retailers now encourage people to do their online shopping at home on Thanksgiving Day itself by offering their Black Friday sales online that day.  

[Rhiannon Daimon]

A few other important days in November

November 11th - Remembrance day
Remembrance Day – also known as Poppy Day, Armistice Day, or Veterans Day – is a day to commemorate the sacrifices of members of the armed forces and of civilians in times of war, specifically since the First World War. It is observed on 11 November to recall the end of World War I on that date in 1918.

Traditionally in Canada on the 11th hour of the 11day of the 11th month we have a moment of silence to remember the fallen soldiers of all of the Canadian wars. taking into special consideration the sacrifices of WWI as it is at this exact time in 1918 that WWI ended.

November 5th - Guy Fawkes day
Guy Fawkes Day is celebrated in England on the 5th of November every year. On this date in the year 1605 a large group of Roman Catholics, led by a man called Guy Fawkes, tried to blow up the House of Parliament. The men were angry because the king had treated them badly and they didn't like it. The plan they had was called the Gunpowder Plot.

The twelve conspirators rented a cellar underneath the Houses of Parliaments and put lots of barrels of gunpowder (we don't know how many barrels, some sources say twenty and the others say thirty-six) under the houses after breaking their way through the wall.

But they were discovered in the cellar and arrested. During the trial Guy Fawkes admitted everything and all the conspirators were found guilty and executed. Names of ten of the conspirators are: Robert 'Robin' Castesby Sir Everard Dugby,John Grant, Thomas Percy, Robert Keyes, Ambrose Rookwood, Thomas 'Tom' Wintour, Robert Wintour, John 'Jack' Wright, Christopher Wright, Thomas Bates, Francis Tresham and Guy 'Guido' Fawkes.

Guy Fawkes Poem
Remember, remember, the 5th of November
The Gunpowder Treason and plot ;
I know of no reason why Gunpowder Treason
Should ever be forgot.

Guy Fawkes, Guy Fawkes,
'Twas his intent.
To blow up the King and the Parliament.
Three score barrels of powder below.
Poor old England to overthrow.
By God's providence he was catch'd,
With a dark lantern and burning match

Holloa boys, Holloa boys, let the bells ring
Holloa boys, Holloa boys, God save the King!

Hip hip Hoorah !
Hip hip Hoorah !

A penny loaf to feed ol'Pope,
A farthing cheese to choke him.
A pint of beer to rinse it down,
A f*****t of sticks to burn him.
Burn him in a tub of tar,'
Burn him like a blazing star.
Burn his body from his head,
Then we'll say: ol'Pope is dead.