Bloomsday

June 16th is the day commemorated by James Joyce in his masterpiece Ulysses, and in odd pockets around the world, every year, on this date, there are excerpts read, interpretations discussed, drinks drunk, and offal eaten. in Toronto, it was a gorgeous morning at the Beaches--the Bloomsday Festival committee over here set up a wonderful series of locations, good actors, and they even loaned hats to ill-prepared audience members (like me).

why did Joyce choose June 16th for his character Leopold Bloom's peregrinations? apparently because that's the day that Joyce's muse & wife Nora Barnacle first agreed to meet for a date.