JULY 22nd - Yep. I Ended with a Sheep Pun.

You ever wonder why it’s an insult to be called a sheep? They are quite useful creatures. They provide warm clothing. You can count them if you’re having trouble sleeping. Their young provide a nice alternative to beef when slaughtered and prepared correctly. Oh, don’t judge me. You’re telling Lamb Shawarma doesn’t sound absolutely delicious right now? Exactly. They are chalk full of religious symbolism--which I guess could be taken as a negative if you are not of the spiritual/religious inclination. I’m just saying, when you look at sheep objectively they seem to be pretty okay animals. Above board, if you will. So when that dude or girl in high school--you know, the one that constantly waged war against conventionality and conformity--and I mean genuinely did so, not like the dude who wore all black to fit in with the Goths, or the girl who suddenly became Emo when her best friend lent her a Dashboard Confessional album because they were just picking less popular forms of conformity--but when the actual floaters, the Randall “Pink” Floyd’s who could move throughout different groups as welcome and honored guests, who dressed completely different than everybody else but never looked like they were making a statement, who had weird interests that they weren’t ashamed of like engraving ancient hieroglyphics into metal drinking mugs, when those people called you a sheep, it stung a little. That’s because Mr. Against-the-Grain and Ms. Do-What-She-Wanna knew this little tidbit of random history. On July 22nd, 1918, lightning struck in Utah’s Wasatch National Forest and killed 504 sheep. 504. That’s worse than the Luxembourg Power Plant for the sheep civilization. Apparently, when a storm comes, sheep tend to herd closely together because they are scared their wool is going to blow off or something. Actually I’m not really sure why they do it, but when they did it 1918 one of those little followers was struck by lightning, and all dem sheep were huddled so close together that the electricity passed through the whole damn herd. Because you see, it’s good to lean on people in times of trouble if you need to, but if you see the lightning coming, sometimes it’s best to have the good sense to leave the herd and seek some damn shelter. Mr. and Ms. Unencumbered-by-Convention back in high school knew this. Basically, they were just letting you know if you can’t think for yourself, things can turn out ba-aaaad.

This day has been Marked.

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