6 May 26

The first Wednesday in May is always the Great American Grump Out, or National Grump-Out Day. It means "no grumpiness for 24 hours"! If you missed celebrating this time, you can certainly use tomorrow. Remember, no complaints or frowns! I brightened the day for several people today(including my dentist and dental hygienist) with my smiley faces tie.

17 August 23

I hope you are smiling! My calendar played a joke on me, making me miss the real celebration of National Smile Week last week. I like smiling enough to do it two weeks in a row. (National Smile Week was started as a campaign for dental health, but it has broadened happily into raising awareness of how important and fun smiling can be.)

5 May 22

 No grumpiness today! My tie is extra long to show as many smiley faces as possible. I'm celebrating the Great American Grump-Out, which technically happened yesterday, but it's good to be un-grumpy on other days too. The first Wednesday in May has been honored for at least a decade as a great day to "focus on humor, self awareness and positive behaviors to lighten up the seriousness and stresses of the world for 24 hours.” If I'm in a space where I need to be masked today, I'll wear my one with smiling lips!

14 April 21

Laugh! It's the best medicine, and you need a lot of it. Today is International Moment of Laughter Day. One early childhood memory is laughing with my sister while watching a TV advertisement for Serutan (a laxative), with the tagline "Serutan is 'natures' spelled backward," and we thought it was funny to say "Lotireg is Geritol spelled backwards." It's not very funny in the retelling, but it also turns out that we were not the only ones who invented that joke! Maybe my smiley faces tie will amuse you today.

17 July 19

This is World Emoji Day! 🎉🎶💯🔥😍⛄☮
It's celebrated on 17 July because that's what is displayed on the Calendar emoji by many systems (Apple, Google, etc.). On Facebook, the Calendar emoji displays with 14 May, the birthday of Mark Zuckerberg. 📅
See https://emojipedia.org/ for an easily searchable index to thousands of emoji (emojis). In 2015, Oxford Dictionaries named the Face with Tears of Joy emoji the Word of the Year.

3 April 19

Big smiles for Paul Robert Wallace Kleppinger on his second birthday!

28 November 17

Today's smiles are for the birthday of comedian/satirist Jon Stewart (in 1962) and the first radio performance of entertainer Groucho Marx (in 1932). In pirate history, today is notable for Blackbeard's 1717 attack on the French merchant vessel "La Concorde," which became his ship "Queen Anne's Revenge," and for the 1720 trial in Jamaica of Anne Bonny and Mary Read, who were found guilty of pirating and sentenced to death, but whose "discovered pregnancies" won them stays of execution.

24 April 17

I'm very happy to be recognizing Barbra Streisand's 75th birthday today! Her comedy movie (with Ryan O'Neal) "What's Up, Doc?" has been a family favorite for many years. I'm sure "Funny Girl" would enjoy my smiley face tie.

14 April 16

I hope you have not missed International Moment of Laughter Day! You are allowed more than one such moment, and it would also be OK to have some laughing moments on another day. In our family today is also Shuttle Surprise Day, honoring the amusing creation of a skillet-potatoes-cheese-and-onion dish on the day in 1981 when the first space shuttle (Columbia) returned to earth.

11 August 15

It's National Smile Week! How will you celebrate?

14 April 15

Hey, wait a minute! Today is International Moment of Laughter Day.

11 August 14

This is World Smile Week! :-)

7 October 13

Today is "World Smile Day," and I am privileged to be spending the morning with Mallie Jayden Elizabeth Kleppinger! She is two days short of 3 months old. And she is short right now, but growing rapidly.

14 April 13

Haha! Are you happy about celebrating International Moment of Laughter Day? In our family today is also Invention of Shuttle Surprise Day, honoring the creation of a skillet-potatoes-cheese-and-onion dish on the day in 1981 when the first space shuttle (Columbia) returned to earth.

14 August 12

It's National Smile Week, and you have several days left to celebrate!

03 March 11

March 3 is always "I Want You To Be Happy Day."

I've worn this tie rather often, but not since September, so it's time to make some people happy with smiley faces.

19 September 10

The first known use of the "smiley" emoticon :-) came in an electronic bulletin board message posted by Scott Fahlman on Sept. 19, 1982. The people at snopes.com note that others had used typographical characters to create "pictures" as early as 1967, but Fahlman still gets credit for the first use of the "head tilt" smiley.

8 May 10

Today is EKU's Spring Commencement and I am the very proud father of one of the top graduates! Jonathan selected my smiley-faces tie for this event.

14 April 10

This is (once again) International Moment of Laughter Day. My Facebook status says "Gene wonders about jobs for humor consultants: Would they look for want ads in the funny papers?" I also attached a link to the official IMLD site.

11 February 10

Today marks the birthday of comedians Leslie Nielsen (1926) and Sarah Palin (1964). Oh, Palin is also a part-time politician.