In high school, I had a friend who would refuse to leave the house for an entire month each year. If you called her to hang out or invite her to a party, she would simply scoff and respond “It’s August.” Then she would hang up the phone. If pressed, she was known to tersely explain, “Nothing good ever happens in August.”

While I’m sure that hers was an opinion based mainly on personal issues, I couldn’t help but look back at my own memories of Augusts past and wonder, what is it about August that makes it such a dud on the euphoria scale?

According to Google, August is the worst month of the year for sports, child-birth, and turf grass. Comic book sales tend to decline more in this month than any other, which some could argue is a sign that childhood joy and whimsy is stifled for some reason. CNN ratings dwindle that month, possibly due to the fact that politicians–clever and devious as they might seem on TV–lack the imagination and stamina to keep up the scandal for more than nine months or so.

Even more telling than these little tidbits is the fact that August used to be named Sextilis, which sounds a lot more sexy but really means “six.” (This is because in the Roman calendar, circa 450 BC, it used to be the sixth month instead of the eighth.) But that’s boring, so let’s go back to the sex thing. Personally, I’d be more inclined to enjoy a month that sounds like a cross between sex and some magical tropical flower, or maybe a fancy blended drink with a pink umbrella in it. Especially when the alternative is a month whose name starts with the same sound most people make when they’re giving birth, or going number two. (BTW, when I say “most people,” I mean everyone but myself because as we’ve previously established, I don’t poop. But I digress.)

Anyway, the moral of this little jaunt into research turns out to be that my friend was probably right. It seems that not a lot of awesome stuff happens in August. But why waste an entire 30 days on TV when there’s still a bit of warmth left in the world, am I right? Not to mention some pretty good back to school sales.