Merry Gay Christmas!!!

All I Want For Christmas...

Merry Christmas!!!

MyTunes Monday: Zat You, Santa Claus?

Early Christmas Present (You're Welcome)

MyTunes Monday: O Come, O Come, Emmanuel

MyTunes Monday: Waltz of the Snowflakes

NOOOOOOO!!! NOT YET!!!

I'm supposed to be going to a wedding in a week and a half and I've known exactly what I wanted to wear for quite some time. The thing was that I didn't own much of what I had planned. Since I had today off, I hopped over to the next town (which is where the nearest mall is) to pick some stuff up. So I'm in this store looking for the specifics I had planned. At some point I looked up and what did I see across the store? Christmas decorations. Seriously. Christmas is just short of three months off and this store is already putting up decorations. I can't handle this. I may have already said elsewhere on this blog how I'm one of those people who despise the extreme commercialization of Christmas. I don't even like hearing Christmas music before Thanksgiving (with some exceptions...very few though).

The good news is that I found just what I was looking for, so that cheered me up. I'll be looking good for this wedding. ;)

Photologue: White Christmas (From 2010)

Since this Christmas will apparently not be a white one around here like last year, I take a look back at some photos I took outside on Christmas 2010.

MERRY CHRISTMAS!!!

MERRY CHRISTMAS TO ALL!!!

A Christmas Present From Me To You

Sounds of the Season

I've inadvertently given some people the impression that I dislike Christmas music. This isn't true, well not exactly...

The Ugly:

Pretty much any version of any song done by any pop star or, even worse, when they did an original song by themselves. All of the pretty much sounds like garbage. This is the stuff that you''l hear while shopping at the mall among other places, which is probably another reason Christmas shopping sucks (that and you go freakin' broke). I can't stand this rubbish.

The Bad:

Ever since I played "Sleigh Ride" in grade school, I haven't liked that song. Part of that is because the French Horn part (which was my primary instrument) was awful and I had to play it multiple years. I guess I hold a grudge against that song. There is also "Baby It's Cold Outside." some time last year, I actually payed attention to the lyrics and came to the realization that this song is pretty much about date rape. She wants to leave and he won't let her. He's getting her drunk. She says "what's in this drink." I'm betting it was GHB. It just sounds creepy as all Hell.

The Good:

Most of the stuff I actually listen to willingly is classical/choral in nature. There is also some Christmas jazz albums that I like too from the days that I was REALLY into jazz. There was this version of "Greensleeves" from middle school that was absolutely beautiful. I would say that my favorite song would be "O Come, O Come, Emmanuel." There is a version I have listened to since childhood that has this amazing organ solo (which is actually half of the song). A close second would be "We Three Kings." There is a great version of it by Mannheim Steamroller (wow, this paragraph just aged me about 20 years). Third Would be "Waltz of the Snowflakes" from The Nutcracker.

There actually is lots of great Christmas music out there, you just have to sift through all of the crappy stuff to find it.

Spreading Christmas Cheer

Humour Files: Christmas Tip

Woof Wednesday: Christmas Cheer

MyTunes Monday: Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas

Tim Tebow's War on Christmas

A Dark Day

I'm no fan of the materialism of the coming holiday season. Commercials for sales make me gag. The mere thought of Black Friday makes me ill. I think it speaks very poorly of our society that we begin what should be a happy season by beating each other up over cheap LCD's at Wal-Marts across the nation. It's a terrible way to start the season. I hope that this isn't the case in other countries, but I see it as a scourge here in the States. I think if those three wise men had seen what those gifts would lead to in the future, maybe they wouldn't have brought those gifts all those years ago. Maybe I should question how wise the really were (j/k).

Making the whole thing even worse this year (I didn't even know this was possible) is the fact that many retailers, including Target, Toys R Us, and Macy's, will be opening at midnight. This means that the people working at such stores will have to leave their families on Thanksgiving Day in order to attend to the unwashed masses. This is one of those things that defies words. Having worked a Black Friday or two having to be at work at 4 or 5 in the morning was pretty terrible. I can't imagine what it would be like for people who have kids, or have family in town, or anything of that nature, to have to leave them at 10:30 or 11:00 on Thanksgiving Day having to go to work and deal with hundreds (or thousands in larger areas) of greedy people, many of whom will treat you like dirt. This is why I boycott Black Thursday and avoid it like the Black Death, I don't see much difference between the two.

Before I get pegged as a Grinch, I'll have some happier holidays posts coming later this week. I just had to get this off my chest.