Is the Rose Parade airing today on NBC, ABC? Talking the ‘never Sunday’ rule
There are a few television traditions that we do tend to consider relatively synonymous with New Year’s Day, and one of the biggest ones is getting a chance to see the annual Tournament of Roses Parade out of Pasadena. It’s a beautiful display of artistry, and at the same time a stunning reminder that there are that many roses that even exist in the world.
What you may be surprised to learn today is that the Rose Parade is not necessarily a New Year’s Day tradition at all; instead, it’s a start-of-year tradition. The big difference there is that there is a longstanding rule that if the holiday falls on a Sunday, the Parade is not held until the following day. With “never Sunday” in mind, there’s no parade broadcast today, and it will air starting at 8:00 a.m. Pacific time (11:00 a.m. Eastern) across ABC and NBC on Monday.
As for whether or not it’s a good rule in 2017, we don’t have any issue with it. It allows more religious-minded viewers to not deviate from their own traditions, and it also adheres well still to the schedule of craziness that is going to be going on throughout the first week or so of the year with an abundance of college football all over the place. In other words, nothing’s getting messed up because of it.)
Here’s the unfortunate downside when it comes to the Parade on this particular year: There’s a reasonably good chance that there is a little rain tomorrow, whereas the forecast for this morning is calling for reasonably cloudy skies and that’s about it. Odds are, this would have been the perfect day for the Parade; we know that as a viewer, there’s something fun about starting off the year with a sunny sky and getting to see a ton of beautiful flowers. This of course mattered more when we were spending New Year’s in snowy Toronto. Hooray for proof that it wasn’t miserable everywhere weather-wise at the start of the year!
One thing worth noting — per the video below, the city is planning higher security than ever for the Parade this year. With the contested climate of the country (not talking about weather this time), it makes sense.
We’ll be back tomorrow morning with full coverage of the Parade over at the link here. Be sure to come back for some hot-takes! (Photo: Rose Parade.)