A Cleveland Twist On “Make Your Own National Holiday Day"

Almost daily, we find ourselves rolling our eyes about the wacky holidays people make up for trivial purposes. From “Fruitcake Toss Day” to “Work Like A Dog Day” to “Sock Day,” there seems to be a national holiday for everything. There’s even a “Make Up Your Own National Holiday Day,” which is recognized annually on March 26. In honor of a sarcastic, tongue-in-cheek holiday we can get behind, we’ve dreamed up some ways every Clevelander should celebrate.

Drew Carey Day — May 23
This Cleveland-born comedian is best known his self-titled sitcom The Drew Carey Show. But from his hosting the improv show Whose Line Is It Anyway? and game show The Price is Right to his competing in the celebrity World Poker Tour, it’s clear Carey loves games. Celebrate his birthday with a trip to Ohio City’s Tabletop Board Game Cafe for lunch and a round of Monopoly or to Lakewood’s 16-Bit Bar and Arcade for happy hour and a game of Donkey Kong. Finish off the night with a comedy show at Hilarities, The Cleveland Improv or The Funny Stop in Cuyahoga Falls.   

“Cleaveland” Spelling Day — September 16
Spelling errors and Cleveland go way back. The city was initially spelled “Cleaveland” after its founder, but the “A” was dropped along the way. While Cleveland Magazine busted the newspaper masthead theory in December, the myth of Clevelanders as liberal spellers persists. Celebrate the art of spelling by trying to find a typo at one of Cleveland’s great independent bookstores, such as the expansive Loganberry Books in Shaker Heights or Tremont’s Visible Voice. Then, cheer on the corporate participants at The Literacy Cooperative’s CLE-BEE spelling bee, which raises awareness for low literacy rates in the Greater Cleveland community.

Langston Hughes Day — February 1
This innovative poet and leader of the Harlem Renaissance has yet to be honored with a day in his name, but he’s more than deserving. Though he didn’t live in Cleveland for long, Hughes honed his writing skills in the attic of his family home in Fairfax and wrote for the school newspaper at Central High School. Celebrate Hughes’ birthday by attending a show at the Karamu House Theater, the oldest African American producing theater in the nation, where Hughes premiered his earliest plays.