Bio • Email • Archive
 

Why August is the worst month

august.jpgNo holidays, lousy sports (except for the Olympics every four years), everything turns brown, grilled foods get tiresome, nobody you need to talk to is around - no doubt about it, August is a basket case. David Plotz laid it out some years back in Slate (that's another thing - lots of re-purposed columns):

August is the Mississippi of the calendar. It's beastly hot and muggy. It has a dismal history. Nothing good ever happens in it. And the United States would be better off without it. August is when the atomic bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, when Anne Frank was arrested, when the first income tax was collected, when Elvis Presley and Marilyn Monroe died. Wings and Jefferson Airplane were formed in August. The Sonny and Cher Comedy Hour debuted in August. (No August, no Sonny and Cher!) August is the time when thugs and dictators think they can get away with it. World War I started in August 1914. The Nazis and Soviets signed their nonaggression pact in August 1939. Iraq invaded Kuwait Aug. 2, 1990. August is a popular month for coups and violent crime. Why August? Perhaps the villains assume we'll be too distracted by vacations or humidity to notice.

More by Mark Lacter:
Thursday morning headlines
Why August is the worst month
Look, Tim Geithner is sitting in the next row!
The Stockton police chief who lasted 8 months and gets a 204K pension
California's Facebook windfall looks a lot smaller than expected
Still no movement from the Fed
If California were a country...
Wednesday morning headlines
L.A. lags in list of best cities to grow old
Carl Icahn gives up on MGM
Recent Life stories:
My back pages
Why August is the worst month
New, simpler route for the next CicLAvia
Ten cents a dance
Snapshot of how Americans spend their time

New at LA Observed
Follow us on Twitter

On the Media Page
Go to Media
On the Politics Page
Go to Politics

LA Biz Observed
Arts and culture

Sign up for daily email from LA Observed

Enter your email address:

Delivered by FeedBurner


Advertisement
LA Observed on Twitter and Facebook