Holiday Season Postscript

It's been a while. I'd hoped to periodically update you with my observations of the holiday season, but since said period was busy, I didn't get around to it. So in lieu of that, here are some random statements about the Thankschrist Year's Holiday:

1) I was in a mall during the holidays. There's a huge one in Albany, NY. It was a madhouse, and I remember thinking, "I wonder if in the distant future they'll unearth this place and think it's a temple to the God of commerce?"

2) Some of the best advice I don't follow: Shop ahead of time for Christmas; as in over the course of the year as opposed to the 3-4 weeks leading up to December 25th.

3) The song says, "I'm dreaming of a White Christmas". It says nothing about before or after Christmas. Song is nice for the holiday, but as of December 26th it can go right back to low 70's as far as I'm concerned.

4) Remember when Thanksgiving was a genuine holiday instead of just the point at which it wasn't totally ridiculous to be Christmas obsessed? I swear, the local Walmart has the x-mas stuff out on Halloween night!

5) Am I the only one who gets sick of hearing how the poor vendors are taking a loss on Christmas profits? Christmas sales are like certain movies: The hype is such that anything less than "top grossing film of all time" is considered a failure...

6) When obsessing over the right gift for someone--especially the people you feel obligated to get a gift for as opposed to a genuine desire to do so--ask yourself, "Do I even remember what I got them last year? Do they?" If the answer to either is "no", then don't worry to any great extent.

7) Christmas is for kids. The older I get, the more I see that.

8) I believed in Santa until I was 12 years old. People ask me what kind of geek I had to be for that to happen, and I'll tell you: I simply refused to believe that something so good could just be an elaborate hoax. As I recall, the first words out of my mouth when Mom told me were, "I suppose the Easter Bunny isn't real too!"

9) Anyone who can stay on a diet faithfully during the holidays has an iron will.

10) Have you ever noticed how much of our culture revolves around holidays? What was it, December 27th or 28th when the Valentine's Day stuff was out on the shelves?

11) How the hell do those Christmas specialty shops turn a profit from January through October?

12) Best gift I got this year: A DVD recorder. Boo-yah!