January 6, 2014: That’s right, Bean Day. Of all the foods, why beans? Looks like the most likely reason is that today is the anniversary of Gregor Mendel’s death in 1884. He used bean and pea plants to study the inheritance of traits, which was a huge stepping stone in our understanding of genetics. It’s also National Weigh-In Day; the first Monday after New Year’s Day. Makes sense, considering the number of people who vow to lose weight in the new year, but don’t want to start until a Monday. So hopefully all of the cookies and candy are out of the house.

Administrative business! I see by my visitor statistics that Australia is my #2 source of visitors behind the USA, with the UK in a close third. I’ve bumped the time zone of Holiday Doodles from the east coast of the USA (UTC -5) to Greenwich Mean Time (UTC +0). (And hey, I had no idea we weren’t using GMT anymore, but had changed to UTC, only they’re not exactly the same. Oy, my head hurts just trying to think about it.) Bottom line, our friends down under will now get the doodles between 8 and 10 in the morning, instead of in the afternoon, our UK friends will get them around midnight, and the American west coast folks can get started celebrating early, around 6 in the evening the night before. Let’s see how this works, and please let me know any thoughts/feedback. 🙂