30 Dec 2016

Here’s Why New Year’s Eve is Dumb (So Buy Our Stuff)

by Tim Simmons | posted in: Holidays That Are Dumb | 39

The real origins, the truth behind New Year’s resolutions, and Ryan Seacrest’s puberty. Here’s why New Year’s Eve is dumb.

New Year’s Eve and New Year’s Day. How exciting! It’s so classy because there’s champagne and that’s from France! Let’s light fireworks on fire! Let’s drink until we can’t feel feelings! Because, you know, it’s January! It’s January, which of course, is derived from the latin words ‘janus’ and ‘arius,’ meaning ‘jiggling bird.’ Just kidding. We gotcha. It means ‘Jesus, shut the door.’ Just kidding again.

This is the one holiday of the year where the eve of the holiday is more celebrated than the holiday itself. How humble are you, New Year’s Day? You do all the work, but New Year’s Eve gets to do all the drinking and embarrassing their friends. New Year’s Day is the Little Red Hen of holidays.

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Great Party, Bro

For real, we only need one reason to hate New Year’s Eve: Ryan Seacrest. The world doesn’t need one more reason to have Seacrest’s animatronic face distracting my network television. So you tried to clone Dick Clark, but at the last minute, a really average fly with a high-pitched voice snuck in the cloning machine. Not our problem, ABC. Just give him some bird seed and lock him in whatever closet you stuck the writers from My So-Called Life.

No, for real though, Ryan Seacrest is definitely a cyborg from the future helping countdown to our doom. Seacrest, didn’t we pay you like a billion dollars for last season of American Idol? You don’t need the money, dude. Still saving up for that leg extension? Did McHale steal your lunch money again?

And of course, he’ll be joined by Jenny McCarthy, who this year is going to announce that if you drink pasteurized milk, your eyes will bleed and fall out of their sockets. She doesn’t have science to back her up; we don’t know why, but we believe her!

Or you could turn the station to NBC and watch Carson Daly, who we’re pretty sure is the same fucking guy. Have you ever seen them both in the same room together? Just sayin’.

The Origin is Dumb

Iraq invented this holiday in 2000 BC. You know, a country we’ve had nothing but positive feelings toward. Although, their calendar year started on March 1st, so it was confusing; their countdown was all like, “Five million, ninety-seven-thousand, six-hundred, and TEN…Five million, ninety-seven-thousand, six-hundred, and NINE… “.

Then in 153 BC, Rome moved it to January 1st for the perfectly good reason of that it was Caesar and his wife’s anniversary and he forgot a gift. Just kidding, it was actually because Roman government officials start their jobs in January. So there you go, you’re basically celebrating SUPER DUPER Monday. Strike two, NYE.

Calendar, Invented

For a while, New Year’s was celebrated on December 25th, but then I guess Jesus got all pissy that his birthday was on a holiday. (“Everyone only gives me one gift,” he whined.) Since it was Jesus and all, we did him a solid and moved it. It bounced around for a while after that, like Johnny Depp’s career without Tim Burton.

Even in America, we kept that March 1st shit until the 1700’s. I mean, CAN YOU IMAGINE?!?!?! CELEBRATING NEW YEAR’S ON MARCH 1ST?!?!

Actually, it still is in some places. In fact, in Ethiopia, it’s September 11th. In Cambodia and Thailand, it’s April 13th/14th. In China, it moves around in January and February every year. And on and on. New Year’s has had more dates than Scarlett Johansson when she was rebounding from Ryan.

Because you see, it doesn’t fucking matter. It’s made up. All of this is made up. It’s one day among many, people. You’re celebrating nothing.

The Traditions are Dumb

Speaking of counting down from 10… Are we rehearsing for first day at kindergarten? In that case, we’d like to add the following New Year’s traditions: hopscotch, four square, and punching Billy in the stomach until he cries and runs home to mom. Nobody likes you, Billy. Happy New Year!

So what’s the tradition for this fucking holiday? Get drunk, then countdown from 10-1. If we make it to 1, then celebrate? … It’s the only holiday where we self administer our sobriety test. Thanks a lot, M.A.D.D.

Yep, counting down is arbitrary. The clock and calendar are a bunch of baloney invented by those people who are always on time so they can tell me “you’re late” every time I arrive somewhere. I’m not late. I arrived right when I intended.

Staggered Staggering

Plus, that footage you’re watching of New York City was taped. That’s right. In case you don’t know how time works, every time zone has their own New Year’s drunken countdown, like when we were kids, and we’d all start singing Row, Row, Row Your Boat… and you stagger it around the room line-by-line so everyone’s in a different place in the song… except you’re drunk, you have a lot more psychological baggage now, and Sandra definitely isn’t going to fuck you tonight, so don’t wait around for the kiss.

Where did that ball drop thing come from anyway? Is it supposed to be a puberty analogy? It feels like a puberty analogy.

Oh, we get it! THIS WILL BE THE YEAR that Seacrest’s balls finally drop!

Auld Lame Song

Then of course, we all get together and sing that song. You know the one. The song that no one knows the fucking words to. May all acquaintances be forgot??? May old aqua science be for God??? Oh, fuck it. I’ll just move my lips and pretend like I’m singing, like everyone else.

Did you know that song is actually about the Holocaust? No it’s not, but we made you think about it for a second, didn’t I? Cuz you have no idea!

Okay, okay. Here’s what you do. Let’s come up with some new lyrics to sing, and sing them every year instead, and no one will be the wiser. How about these snazzy new lyrics:

Should all of New Year’s be forgot

And Uber take me home

For I’ve drunk all the spiked egg nog

And now the room’s a blur

Past Your Bedtime

So what are we left with? That tradition of just going outside and making a shitload of noise at midnight. There is literally a device we just call a ‘noisemaker’. Why do we scream when we’re excited? What’s that about? I guess either to annoy your neighbor or maybe let him know that it’s January??

“HEY BILL! IT’S JANUARY! DO YOU WANT ME TO LET YOU KNOW WHEN IT’S FEBRUARY?! … OKAY, … I’LL BE INSIDE MASTERBATING!” (Damn you, Sandra.)

The other 364 days of the year, we would scold our children for making noise past 9 o’clock…

Since you agree with me, and need a non-awkward way to tell your neighbor to be quiet, I’ve created for you this free track!

Sick of listening to those pesky loud neighbors on New Year’s Eve? Download my free recording below. Then simply play it when things get out of control, and go peacefully back to sleep! It’s guaranteed to get you in the New Year’s Eve spirit each and every year!

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Then there’s perhaps the most important New Year’s tradition of them all. The big kahuna. The New Year’s Resolution.

New Year’s Irresolution

ADMIT IT. LAST YEAR, YOU KINDA SUCKED. You didn’t do that [fill-in-the-blank shit] you wanted to do. That philosophy book is dog-eared 12 pages in. You didn’t lose that 10 pounds. Your Pinterest projects are piling up. You never even took that ab equipment out of the box, did you?

Face it, we all view New Year’s as a chance for a fresh start. And that’s why we THINK New Year’s resolutions are so great. There’s only one problem. They’re not.

A paltry 8% of people make good on their New Year’s resolutions. That’s roughly the same percentage of women who have been unwillingly groped by Donald Trump. A quarter of us fail at our New Year’s resolution in the first week. That’s faster than it takes Ryan Lochte to backpedal on international scandals.

Every day is a fresh start. Quit waiting for January 1st to lie to yourself.

The Decorations are Dumb

What decorations does this dumb holiday have? Wearing eyeglasses with the year spelled out on your face? Stop wearing those, you look like an idiot. You know how we know? Transfer them to any other occasion. Photobomb Sheila’s wedding photos? Not cool, cousin Joey.

NYE doesn’t have a color. How’d that get fucked up? I mean, St. Patrick’s is green, because that’s what color Irish beer is. Valentine’s Day is red, because that’s the color of genitalia. Basically every holiday has their shit together. Congrats NYE, it’s just you and Labor Day.

We suggest purple. No one’s got purple yet! Let’s all start wearing purple on New Year’s Eve! From now on, you have to wear purple on New Year’s Eve, or else you get pinched! Purple, purple, purple, purple!

Multicolored Splooge

Confetti cannons really should be the most baffling of all decorations. Three seconds of pleasure and one hour of cleanup and apologizing – sounds like a teenager’s sexlife.

And of course there is fireworks on New Year’s, because as we all know, fireworks are symbols for bombs, and you know, bombs and New Year’s and you know, fireworks, and, uh… actually, we didn’t really work out an end for that joke before writing it down.

What else could you do for fun on New Year’s? Hmmm… Ooo, let’s tell everyone that New Year’s was originally celebrated because of the evil Newyearbeous, The Greek god of unkept promises, and that you have to make noise to scare him away.

Now Buy Our Stuff

We’ve arrived at the most important part – the part where you buy our stuff! We think you’re gonna buy all of it, and soon you won’t be able to get into the New Year’s Eve spirit without it!

New Year’s Eve is Dumb Stickers

Here are some stickers we KNOW you’re gonna buy. Every NYE comes with stuff you tell yourself you’re gonna do. Consider these stickers a reminder that you need to do/change that thing. Gosh, you’re so bad at this. Do it now! Seriously, stop reading this. Put your fucking phone down and go do it!

Order your stickers now and they will arrive in time for you to realize you’re TOTALLY GOING TO FAIL at your New Year’s resolutions!

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“You Still Suck” Shirts

Finally, once you realize that you’ve failed at your New Year’s Resolution, you can buy this shirt to remind yourself. You didn’t fix that thing, and therefore you still suck. It has a convenient mirror image design so it’s easy to read when you’re looking at yourself in the mirror and wondering, “Do I still suck?” Yes, you do.