HOLIDAY THOUGHTS

I'm definitely a holiday Scrooge, and have been since at least 1987, when EF Hutton was bought out by Shearson, which then immediately fired my spouse as a Christmas present. It probably doesn't help that my father died on Christmas morning in 1991.

But I attempt to overcome that. Every year it isn't the holiday season until we play the classic Waitresses tune, "Christmas Wrapping." I also like to watch How The Grinch Stole Christmas, A Charlie Brown Christmas (I'm so old I remember all the kids in third grade talking about it in class all day the night it first aired in 1965 -- even the Jewish ones!), and, of course, the holy Christmas movie trio, It's A Wonderful Life, A Christmas Story, and, best of all, Scrooged. And one of the great treats every year is David Letterman's show with Jay Thomas knocking the meatball off the Christmas tree and Darlene Love singing Please Come Home For Christmas. That was tonight (December 23), and on top of everything else, didn't Love look marvelous?

So I'm going to try to get in the seasonal swing this year by making one nice blog entry of Christmas thoughts. I'm going to just keep this atop my blog, so any time I change it, I'm going to delete the old comment and repost the new.

Let's start with a great page from the National Lampoon website (is National Lampoon still published?), forwarded to me by my pal, Harry Broertjes. It's The Ten Least Successful Holiday Specials of All Time.

Then there's this wonderful parody that my spouse forwarded to me. And, as she says, "Not only does it condense the story into 30 seconds effectively, but... it's got bunnies!

Fellow Legion fan Kevin McConnell replied to the above with this forward of an op-ed piece for the New York Times by Maureen Dowd. I'm sure that those of you who lean red-state are already annoyed about it, but it's for my blue-state-thinking friends and relations. (And yes, you have to register at nytimes.com to see it; make up information, they don't care.)

This Old Chestnut
(Thanks to cousin Ken.)

When four of Santa's elves got sick, and the trainee elves did not produce the toys as fast as the regular ones, Santa was beginning to feel the pressure of being behind schedule.

Then Mrs. Claus told Santa that her Mom was coming to visit. This stressed Santa even more.

When he went to harness the reindeer, he found that three of them were about to give birth and two had jumped the fence and were out, heaven knows where. More stress.

Then when he began to load the sleigh one of the boards cracked, and the toy bag fell to the ground and scattered the toys.

So, frustrated, Santa went into the house for a cup of apple cider and a shot of rum. When he went to the cupboard, he discovered that the elves had hidden the liquor, and there was nothing to drink. In his frustration, he accidentally dropped the cider pot, and it broke into hundreds of little pieces all over the kitchen floor. He went to get the broom and found that mice had eaten the straw end of the broom.

Just then the doorbell rang, and irritable Santa trudged to the door. He opened the door, and there was a little angel with a great big Christmas tree. The angel said, very cheerfully, "Merry Christmas, Santa. Isn't it a lovely day? I have a beautiful tree for you. Where would you like me to stick it?"

And so began the tradition of the little angel on top of the Christmas tree.

Tickle Me This
Thanks to Legion fan Chris Brown.

A new employee is hired at the Tickle Me Elmo factory for the holiday rush. She reports for her first day promptly at 8:00 am.

The next day at 8:45 am there is a knock at the Personnel Manager's door. The Foreman from the assembly line throws open the door and begins to rant about the new employee. He complains that she is incredibly slow and the whole line is backing up, putting the entire plant behind schedule.

The Personnel Manager decides that he should see this for himself so the two men march down to the factory floor. When they get there the line is so backed up that there are Elmos all over the floor and still piling up. At the end of the line stands the new employee. She has a roll of red plush fabric and a big bag of marbles. The men watch in amazement as she cuts a little piece of fabric, wraps it around two marbles and begins to sew the little package between Elmo's legs. The Personnel Manager bursts into laughter. After several minutes of hysterics, he pulls himself together and approaches the woman. "I'm sorry," he says to her barely able to keep a straight face, "but I think you misunderstood me yesterday. Your job is to give each Elmo two test tickles. Dec. 24


Of course, at this time of year, we are all forced to face our beliefs. Are you a Santaist?

Holiday Cartoons
Non Sequitur.

Merry Christmas, and, if you're not Christian, don't tell George Bush, or he'll send you a cruise missile for Christmas.