No More Humbuggery

Let the holly-jollyness commence!
I believe I've just begun
the countdown to
full festive mode.

I'm the first to admit that it takes me longer than most people to find the "spirit" of Christmas. When I see the first signs of it popping up in stores shortly after Halloween, I block it out completely. And if too many people try to smother the great holiday that is Thanksgiving with too much talk of the big day that's "only" a month away, I tightly pack spoonfuls of stuffing into my ears and refuse to listen.
(Note: Mashed potatoes work equally as well.)

Regardless of the title of this entry, or the tone of its first couple paragraphs, my middle name is not Ebenezer. I promise you that. I'm a big fan of Christmas Eve, and Christmas Day, as well. I just can't maintain the level of hype that some folks do for so many days prior, whistling carols as I work, or trying to sing like Burl Ives.

Around mid-December each year, though, there are a couple indicators that give me a jolt and tell me it's time to start Ho! Ho! Ho!ing.

The first has been occurring for more than a decade now, and it never fails to put me in the right mindset. The newspaper at which I work publishes a Children's Album each Christmas, as I'm sure many newspapers do. The middle school kids submit drawings, and the elementary school kids write stories and poems and letters to Santa and tell why they like Christmas and winter and......whether I'm typesetting some of their handwritten pages or formatting them to fit in the pages of our newspaper, it's impossible to not be inspired by some of the creativity contained within.

We do our best to leave as many of their "creative" spellings unchanged, so the reader gets to see what we see in the original. And while many of the themes are recurring...kids like to play in the snow and get cold so they can go inside for hot cocoa, or boys like to throw snowballs at their sisters, or boys like to go ice fishing with their dads and grandpas and uncles (who sure can drink a lot of beer!)...there's an originality to each kid's writing.

One girl wrote about how the snow sounds when it's falling. Didn't think that was possible, did you? Listen next time it snows, and if you hear, "Ch, ch, ch," then her writing is true. (If you just think of Jason from the "Friday the 13th" movies, then you're not revealing enough of your inner child. Dig deeper!)

Out here in these rural parts, if Santa's reindeer get a little touch of frostbite on those extra-cold nights, do you know how Santa finishes his rounds? You got it...he lands in a farmer's field and borrows some cows.

In one story, a girl writes about how everything was going wrong in the days leading up to Christmas, and one of the elves went to Santa and said (and I quote), "...our wood got broke." Luckily, things all worked out in the end. Whew!

In this year's issue, one girl was writing about Christmas candy and mentioned a bag of "likalice." I'll never eat another Twizzler the same way.

And my favorite of the year (here comes my bias) is the boy that wants a Barry Sanders jersey for Christmas. This kid was probably only a handful of years old when Barry left the league, and yet he's this boy's idol because he was so great, and so humble. And because he played for Detroit. I can relate.

— • — • —

The other outlet that gives me a Christmas boost is relatively new, as I stumbled onto it just last year. I have XM Radio in my car, and during the holiday season they play Christmas carols on several of their stations. One in particular, called Special XMAS, caught my ear last year.

This station specializes in some of the "alternative" Christmas carols, if you will. Even more obscure than, "Grandma Got Run Over By A Reindeer." For instance, just tonight I heard an AC/DC impersonator doing his rendition of "Jingle Hells Bells."

The other night, I heard the audio of Cartman singing, "O Holy Night," in Mr. Garrison's class, and every time he screwed up or forgot the lyrics, Kyle got to zap him with a cattle prod.

I've heard an ode to regifting, called, "Didn't I Get This Last Year?" (a la "Do You Hear What I Hear?") I also heard a singer named Richard Cheese (heh.) and his leisure suit-wearing band, Lounge Against The Machine, do a jazzed up version of "Christmastime is Here," made famous by Charles Schultz and his Peanuts (as he put it).

My favorite example, though, comes from last year, when I first heard "Santa Lost a Ho! This Year at Christmas." I wish I could find an audio link to it so you could hear it for yourselves, but the lyrics in the chorus go something like this:

"He used to go Ho! Ho! Ho!
Now he goes Ho! Ho!.....Oh-Oh!
Where'd the other Ho! go? Don't know!!"

(I know, I know. Simple things for simple minds.)

— • — • —

I'm going to spend some holiday family time at my sister's this weekend, and you can bet that there will be nary a single "Humbug" in my vocabulary, and my sense of humor will be set firmly in place.

However. Now that I've finally reached the preferred state of mind for this grand season of yuletide, would somebody pleeaase tell me what I can get my mom for Christmas?

"Never worry about the size
of your Christmas tree.
In the eyes of children,
they are all 30 feet tall."
—Larry Wilde