Tuesdays Don't Exist

Did you ever wonder why Tuesday is so strange? For a long time now, we've been subject to the most awful regime, based on some outdated notion of time being divided into days in groups of seven, which they call "the week". NB: they never say which week.

The day after Monday is called Tuesday, in English-speaking places, but not in other places. In Germany it is called Dienstag, but it's the same day. Tuesday Blues Day, the ravers used to call it, because their artificially boosted weekend seratonin levels had, 48 hours later, drained away to nothing, leaving their mood as flat as the surface of a late work by Piet Mondrian. If only they had known that Tuesday didn't exist, that would have cheered them up, to be feeling that bad, on a day that doesn't exist.

Sunday, generally seen as the last day of the "cycle" of seven, is the busiest day of the week, the day when finally there is enough time to be able to sleep, eat, watch TV, read newspapers, visit friends/relatives, browse a market and catch an exhibition. After Sunday has exhausted everyone, on Monday they return to their jobs where they are able to rest and recouperate for a few days while the "cycle" repeats once more. It is rough, really, this awful treadmill, and especially so when you realise that our so-called seven day week is actually only six days long. We are being cheated.

In fact, Tuesday is Thursday. The real second day of the week was critically mislaid by the first Russian to drink space in 1961, but this was hushed up during the Cold War in case everyone got scared and someone pushed the button. The two super-powers copied Thursday and put it in place of Tuesday, in a panic, fearing world disorder. If only they had known. It was the main reason that Kennedy was shot, was the cause of the Chernobyl, and it was why Mandela was released, none of which momentous events happened on a Tuesday.

Artists and children have noticed the change, as the rest of us are being hoodwinked. It is no coincidence that People Are Strange (Densmore-Krieger-Manzarek-Morrison) has that stop-start mood of morbid panic. It was originally written: Tuesdays Are Strange - Jim had to be persuaded by the Doors to change the lyric. His untimely death was no coincidence, either - he was about to blow the lid off the whole scam. The closest anyone got to telling the truth about Tuesday is Mick Jagger - and who would believe him, prancing around foppishly, squawking about a girl named Ruby?

Happy Thursday, everyone.