Blue Monday ??

Given it’s the third Monday of January, it’s supposed to be ‘blue Monday’. A depressing title for what is purported to be the day of the year when we are at our most miserable.

But this is tosh. The term was, just like the reason we are ‘supposed’ to spend a month’s salary on an engagement ring, made up by a marketing department. You know the story, that in the 1930s, when De Beers (the diamond people) wanted everyone to spend more on their engagement rings (around valentines day, no doubt) they came up with a PR campaign that implied only a month’s salary would be befitting for one’s true love.

This is still generally thought to be the pinnacle of clever PR, and other companies have tried their darnedest to create a similar such buzz for their products. So, in 2004, wanting to sell more holidays, a psychologist came up with a ‘formula’ for the January blues for Sky Travel. The complex maths (including weather, debt, salary, time since Christmas etc) has since been disputed and derided for being nonsensical pseudoscience. But the idea still runs. And no doubt is probably being talked about more this year due to lockdown.

But we don’t think blue is a depressing colour – we reckon it’s one of the brightest, most positive colours to have in the workshop or garage. In fact, we have a term in the Tinker and Fix household about whether it’s a blue-bird day. We picked this up from one of our snowboarding trips to Lake Tahoe in the States – when the radio would declare it to be a ‘blue-bird day’ and brilliant for being on the slopes. The term has stuck for us; so it’s the best kind of weather you can have – and we think of blue as a positive colour as a result.

So whilst we (unfortunately) couldn't take a picture of a blue-bird sky today, instead, here’s a positive shot of some of our ‘happy blue’ tools and kit.

*And yes, this post is the same as last year - and no doubt will the same next year!