I read recently that January is apparantly National Hot Tea Month. I’m assuming the “National” here must refer to America – I’ve certainly never heard of it! Mind you, being British I have no need for a tea month. A nice cup of tea, according to we Brits, is the answer to everything, therefore every month is tea month!
January is also supposedly National Soup Month. Again, I can only assume the nation in question is America. I think this is one I could get on board with though. What could be better to counteract the awfulness of January than some nice hot soup? (I know it’s an utter cliché, but I think January is my least favourite month of the year, closely followed by November.)
World soup month is the way forward, I feel. Admittedly it’s not exactly soup weather in Australia and New Zealand, but there’s always Gazpacho and… other cold soups. I’m sure there must be some.
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Homemade soup!
Since tonight, for me, is quiz night (the first one of the year!) here are some random facts about January for you:
- The birthstone for January is garnet.
- 8 January is the birth date of Elvis Presley, Dame Shirley Bassey (a Welsh singer) and David Bowie.
- The United Kingdom claimed sovereignty over the Falkland Islands on 1 January 1833.
- January is named after the Roman God Janus, God of beginnings and transitions
- Traditionally, the Roman calendar consisted of 10 months totalling 304 days, with winter as a “monthless” period. January and February were only added in around 713 BC, which explains the seeming weirdness of October, November and December – which mean eight, nine and ten respectively, despite, in fact, being the tenth, eleventh and twelfth months!
- The London Underground, the world’s oldest underground railway, opened in 10 January 1863. That means the oldest section, which went from Paddington Station to Farringdon Street via King’s Cross and is now incorporated into the Circle, Hammersmith & City and Metropolitan lines, will be celebrating 150 years this year!
Confuzzledom 
Soup sounds good. might have some tomorrow 🙂
I’m having soup for tonight’s tea 😀
A month of soup would be a challenge, but a tasty one!
Yes, I wonder if I could even think of enough different soups for an entire month?
I didn’t know that the original Roman calendar had 10 months, with January and February added later. I honestly did always wonder about the naming of October, November and December! Nice to have that clarified – and I didn’t even have to Google it myself! Thanks for the interesting info!
That’s what Wikipedia says anyway 😉
I agree. Every single day is a tea day. No need for a tea month. A cup of tea solves everything – at least makes everything a little better. I also had soup yesterday – some veggy-polenta soup, which was delicious. Soup is my number one detox food – so I might be on it a little more often than just one months, as I probably need to detox once in a while over the year ahead 😉
January is competing with November on being the worst months in the whole year. Agree. Yay for February!! (= days get at least a little bit longer, the month is short, means more salary for less worked days, the month before winter is over …. )
xx
Mm, your soup sounds good! I have loads of polenta in the cupboard that I used for a recipe at Christmas. Now I need to figure out what to do with the rest!
Yes, every day is a tea day 😀
Can’t decide if it was celebration or vanity that DB released his new album on his birthday.
And I wouldn’t have given it a thought without your fact, because I didn’t know it was his birthday until now 🙂
A bit of both I suspect 😉
I’ve always wondered why Oct/Sept/Dec were 10/11/12! And as for soup month – I am ON BOARD! (In fact, I have already had two lots of soup so far this week, and even though one of them caused an a disaster I’m still in soup mode!) Tea month though – forget it! It’s freezing here and all about either coffee and peanut butter toast or hot chocolate and biscuits!
Soup is definitely the way forward!
I rarely drink coffee at home – we only use real coffee and it’s too much effort to make just for one cup. Haha.