The War to End All Wars. Though in 20 years time the Second World War would begin and the 78 million casualties would more than double the amount of World War One.

 

The total number of casualties in World War I, both military and civilian, was about 38 million: 16 million deaths and 22 million wounded (7 million were permanently disabled, and 15 million were seriously injured).

 

Of the 60 million European soldiers who were mobilized from 1914 – 1918, the official number of deaths was 9,721,937 with 21,228,813 wounded personnel; that is over half the military population. The Entente Powers (also known as the Allies -- United Kingdom, France, the Russian Empire, Belgium, Serbia, Canada, Australia, Italy, Japan, Greece, Romania and the United States) lost 5.7 million soldiers and the Central Powers (Germany, Austria-Hungary, Turkey, Bulgaria) about 4 million. Civilian deaths officially totaled 6,821,248, though many estimates double that number.

 

Germany lost 15.1% of its active male population, Austria–Hungary lost 17.1%, and France lost 10.5%. About 750,000 German civilians died from starvation brought on by the British blockade during the war. In 1914 alone, the typhus epidemic killed 200,000 in Serbia and a few years later more than 3 million more would die in Russia. By 1918, famine had killed approximately 100,000 people in Lebanon. In addition, the biggest influenza pandemic of the century, the Spanish flu, spread around the world killing at least 50 million to as many as 100 million people. Though the war was not the cause of the flu, it certainly hastened the pandemic (the first cases were found at the army base, Fort Riley, Kansas). With massive troop movements, close quarters and poor sanitary conditions, some researchers speculate that the soldiers' immune systems were weakened by malnourishment as well as the stress of combat and attacks from chemical weapons, increasing their vulnerability to the flu, widening the spread of the disease.

 

Battles of Arras, Somme, Verdun, Soissons, Ypres, Liege, Lorraine, Belleau Wood, Antwerp, St. Quentin, Fromelles, Artois, Bazentin Ridge, Gallipoli, Ctesiphon, Dujaila, Asiago, Caporetto, Mount Ortigara, Piave, Vittorio Veneto, Galicia, Komarów, Kraśnik, Gumbinnen, Łódź, Przemyśl, Rawa, Tannenberg, Vistula River, Kajmakcalan, Kosovo, Bucharest, Cer, Kolubara, Mărăşeşti, Turtucaia, Neuve Chapelle, Cambrai, Saint-Mihiel, Passchendaele, Mont Sorrel, Messines, Marne, Le Cateau, Loos, Guillemont, Fromelles, Charleroi, Gaza, Romani, Hanna, Kut, Champagne, Broodseinde, Amiens, Aisne, Kisaki, Erzincan, Manzikert, Sardarapat, Sarikamish...

 

In many parts of the world people take a two-minute moment of silence at 11:00 a.m.

This morning I was reminded by my second grader son that today is a holiday with an actual message and purpose-- it’s Global Handwashing Day. Simply, it’s a day to educate and motivate people around the world to wash their hands with soap on a regular basis. The campaign is dedicated to raising awareness of the fact that handwashing with soap is a key element in preventing disease.

 

Last year Global Handwashing Day was initiated as part of the annual World Water Week. According to the official site, the focus for Global Handwashing Day, like last year, is on school children. And with the inevitable flu season just around the corner, handwashing with soap is the single most effective and inexpensive way to prevent flu, diarrhea and acute respiratory infections like pneumonia, which is the number one cause of death among children under five years old. Diarrhea and pneumonia together account for almost 3.5 million child deaths annually. Regular handwashing with soap before eating and after using the toilet is projected to save more lives than any single vaccine or medical intervention, cutting deaths from diarrhea by almost half and deaths from acute respiratory infections by one-quarter.

 

And needless to say there are a bevy of kids songs just about handwashing, and these songs are destined to get stuck in the old noggin for several days to come. Unfortunately, washing your hands with soap and hot water will not prevent what Dr. Oliver Sack calls amusia; the disorder in which impaired musical processing prevents the ear from recognizing musical tones or rhythms, beautiful music may very well sound like the clattering of a toddler in the kitchen with a couple of large ladles and a floor full of pots and pans. Some of these songs I have cued up may just have that effect on the adult brain. Then again, if you’re lucky you’ll just be subject to earworms; the maddening condition where musical fragments repeat incessantly.

 

Anyway, here are some musical odds and ends about handwashing from the likes of Handwashing with Soapy, a Beatles parody, a weirdly paranoid Henry the Hand spreading fear and cleanliness, and of course, a selection from the most successful musical act in the world-- the Wiggles.

October 8 is Walrus Day. What is Walrus Day and why does it matter to you? Well, it only matters if you enjoy things that you like. Do you fit that type? Are you the sort of person who enjoys things that you like? Then Walrus Day is for you, friend!

Walrus Day is a holiday I invented when I was a kid. I took my favorite animal, favorite number, and favorite month, combining them and voila! (That’s French for ‘that’s how that muthuhfuggin’ happened’.)

Below you’ll find a Walrus Day FAQ. You can read it with your eyes which will magically make thoughts form in your brain! Big fun!

Q: When is Walrus Day?

A: Walrus Day is always celebrated on October 8, regardless of what day of the week it falls on, or whether you’re Jewish, Chinese, or Yusef Lateef. Mark your calendars!

Q: How does one celebrate Walrus Day?

A: Walrus Day is perhaps the easiest holiday on the calendar to celebrate well. The goal is to treat yourself: buy yourself a gift. Want cake for breakfast? Do it. Want to call in sick to work and go to the beach and frolic? This is the day.* Wanna make sweet, sweet love to Beyoncé? I say, if you can, go for it! This is your day, your chance, your excuse to pepper your day with whatever perks and joys you dare. Get creative! Unless you hate getting creative, in which case, Walrus Day is your perfect excuse to stay uncreative the whole day! Very simply: Pamper and splurge as much as possible. Diets be damned!

Here we are again, celebrating yet another odd and perhaps, on the surface, ridiculous holiday that most people don't even know exists. September 22 is Elephant Appreciation Day. I know it sounds like an internet hoax but it's a real holiday, more or less.

Back in 1996, September 22 was declared Elephant Appreciation Day by Mission Media, a graphics and publishing firm who got the day included in Chase's Calendar of Events, making the holiday, I guess, official. Mission Media says elephants deserve a day of their own because they are the largest land mammal of our era and are undeservedly threatened with extinction. Sounds good to me, I’m just a bit surprised they didn’t pick a more endangered species like the Alabama Cave Shrimp, the Camiguin Forest Mouse or the Ethiopian Banana Frog. How about the Asian Small-clawed Otter Appreciation Day?

 

So of course one of the first questions posed to me when I mentioned this over breakfast, “how do you celebrate Elephant Appreciation Day?” Take a trip to the zoo, look at the elephants? Drink Carlsberg Elephant malt liquor? Plan ahead and take an African safari on Elephant Appreciation Day? What can children do to celebrate? For the most part, I haven’t a clue.

 

But for the kids, I suggest baking a cake in the shape of an elephant, or if you parents are short on time make a peanut butter and jelly sandwich cut out to look like an elephant. Maybe have the kids draw or paint elephant pictures and look up interesting elephant facts. Did you know, for example, elephants can live for up to 70 years? They walk about 4 mph but can run for short distances up to about 30 mph. Elephants are able to swim for long distances. They spend about 16 hours a day eating, consuming almost 500 pounds of food per day. Elephant's eyes are small and their eyesight is poor but they have the largest brains in the animal kingdom. One more thing, adult African elephants, the ones with the big ears, weigh about 15,400 pounds, whereas the Adult Indian elephants, small ears, weigh a mere 11,000 pounds.

Avast me mateys! By the powers this day be, a good day to pour ye self a tall, deep grog, get loaded to the gunwales, raise the Jolly Roger and scare the livn’ bejesus out of them landlubbin’ scurvy dogs, argh! Aye! On the account, today is International Talk Like a Pirate Day, no son of a biscuit eater goin’ to put up with them lily-livered scallywags, or them sprogs! Aye, I might toss a wee bit wi' a wannion on them scurvy asses, toss em into Davy Jones' Locker. Tell the tale me heartys! Slight no black spot on me troubled soul! Us gentlemen o' fortune need more than doubloons and booty before sailin’ into Fiddlers Green ... aye the sweet trade! Ahoy, ye need a furner to sail thar, wenchs ands the gates of Hades starboard to grabs at ye gods own swaggy golden pieces o’ eight! Yo ho ho ho!

 

Shiver me timbers, I think I was momentarily possessed by the ghost of some long dead privateer, or more likely a B-movie screen writer from the 1930’s!

 

Every September 19th is International Talk Like a Pirate Day. The day was created back in 1995 by John Baur, AKA ol' Chumbucket and Mark Summers, AKA Cap'n Slappy as an inside joke. But the holiday didn’t achieve any real media attention until 2002 when Miami Herald syndicated columnist and Pulitzer Prize winning writer of "distinguished commentary," Dave Barry, wrote about it. Today there are somewhere in the neighborhood of 1,500 “Talk Like a Pirate” videos on YouTube, and millions of websites dedicated in one way or another to Talk Like a Pirate Day. According to Summers, he chose this particular date because it would be easy for him to remember; it’s his ex-wife's birthday. Aargh! I hoist a tankard to ya and spit in yer eye, ye ol’ stinkin’ blaggards!