Allow me to be the first to wish you a happy National Punctuation Day. The seventh annual National Punctuation Day, to be precise.
NPD is the brainchild of one Jeff Rubin, an author and expert in shameless self promotion. He even managed to get the holiday recognized as official in Chase’s Calendar of Events. If you go there, you will also see that October is Self Promotion Month.
Given all the activities offered on the holiday’s website, you could be a faithful observer of this occasion for weeks.
For example, you could:
- give yourself a refresher on the correct uses of 13 types of punctuation;
- enter a Punctuation Haiku contest;
- make Norma Martinez-Rubin (a.k.a. Mrs. Punctuation)’s famous Semicolon Meat Loaf, the official meatloaf of National Punctuation Day, or make one in the punctuation shape of your choice;
- sit in on Punctuation Playtime at a participating school, and enjoy punctuation relay tag, a Wynken, Blynken and Nod punctuation contest or a punctuation rap performed by facilitators and students;
- purchase T-shirts, latte mugs, greeting cards and punctuation posters from the official NPD website; and
- as the Rubin suggests, take a leisurely stroll, paying close attention to store signs with incorrectly punctuated words. Stop in those stores to correct the owners. If the owners are not there, leave notes.
Or you could observe the holiday by reading some the blog posts I’ve written on punctuation.
Forgive me; I’m just gearing up for Self Promotion Month.
Word Nymph 
