Category: Holidays

In the interest of peace on Earth and Good Will toward Men (Women, Other, Confusing Pronouns) I suggest that we put aside politics, social (whatever this is called) and put on our pretty clothes to enjoy the season with people we love and who love us.

Let Aunt Edna make whatever pronoun choices she’s able to make. Let Uncle Rudy get a little tipsy and talk about whatever craziness he’s on about this year.

Don’t waste your time annoying them by correcting their gaffes. Call it a Christmas Present to them. Allow your Mom & Dad to have a “traditional” couple of days without adding to family strife. 

Take a step back, put down your protest signs and social warrior agendas and take a breath.

Your families love you regardless of what you wear, how you identify, which bathroom you want to use, or what your political stance is. Turn off the news, put down your phone and actually be with the people you’ve chosen to spend the holiday with. Have a drink, tell a joke, go to the traditional family church service. Eat well and be present and accepting of your loved ones.

In other words, take a break from all the insanity of the world for a day or four. Watch  family movies together.

In my family there’s been a tradition of watching “A Charlie Brown Christmas“, “How the Grinch Stole Christmas“, “National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation“, “Die Hard” (Yeah, I know Bruce Willis says it’s not a Christmas Movie), “The Bishops Wife“, “Donovans Reef“, “Operation Petticoat”, “A Christmas Story”, and we’ll often end Christmas Day with “Lethal Weapon” or “Alien” (Don’t ask!)

We eat leftovers, make popcorn, have beer, watch a few games, and enjoy each other. The children are running around with their new toys, and the technologically proficient among the assembled family members are setting up toys and new devices for the youngsters.

All this is Joyful chaos and it’s as much what isn’t said, as what is. Car keys are exchanged among the men and we take each other’s cars for spins around the neighborhood. We’re all comparing and contrasting the features of vehicles and there’s joy in the camaraderie. 

In my youth, this family gathering moved from home to home. At some point in the festivities, one by one, the men drifted out to the garage. Then magically, things that needed to be fixed at the host home were fixed. Timers, circuit breakers, pool filters, sprinkler systems, painting, stucco, you name it.

The projects that took time, get handled by the men because that’s how we showed each other we care. Many hands make light work.

Even today, each of our “Tribe” brings our respective skills to the table and give the gift of those skills or our hands. The  children, intrigued by what the fathers, grandfathers, and uncles are up to come out to “help” in the process they learn how to do some of these things for themselves.

By default, the host homes were more often the elder members of our family. So for them, gatherings were a double gift. They got to have the whole family under one roof and the chores that they had a tough time completing got done without fuss and without asking.

These are the things I count as blessings of not coming from an “affluent” family. We valued each other and understood actions could be expressions of love and caring.

My family is smaller now. Many of the elders aren’t with us and my generation is becoming the elders. The difference is that we’re spread all over the country and don’t get together as often as we should.

It occurred to me that we often “create” families where ever we are. I miss the family gatherings. Maybe it’s time for my family traditions to be expanded and “rebooted”.

Maybe if we all brought the best of our family traditions to our communities we could spread a little joy that would last through the year.

Well, I’ve dug the snow out from in front of my neighbors homes. (They weren’t home when the storm hit) They’ll have a easy drive to their homes when they get back.  

I’m thinking some fresh baked cookies might be a nice touch for the holidays…

I hope your time with your loved ones is a time of making good memories and showing them that you love them. We all need to know we’re loved.

Although it looks more like Christmas than Thanksgiving.

It’s funny for years we’ve always been able to count on Thanksgiving being cold maybe a little snow, but generally cold and clear.

This year we’ve been thrown a curve. 

It’s snowing like it’s January. And it’s showing no sign of letting up. We can use the water. But once again a lot of this water falling as rain at the lower elevations is running right into the ocean.

Probably not a bad thing since all the crap from the coastal cities that gets washed into the ocean will need a lot of water to dilute it. But there’s the other part of me that says perhaps it would be a better idea to have the ability to capture and store some of that water for periods of drought.

The California political leaders don’t see it that way and continue to mis-spend too much of the tax revenues on “Soft” things instead of infrastructure.

But that’s another discussion for another time.

It’s thanksgiving. I ‘m home safe and warm but will be doing a lot of work with the snow shovel today.

The only real concern I have is the accumulation on the roof. There’s a vent pipe to the furnace that can get covered. If that happens, the furnace will shut down and then it will get mighty cold in here.

I can use the fireplace as long as the wind isn’t too strong. This fireplace doesn’t draw very well and strong winds causes the smoke to blow right back down the chimney.

So I may have to get the ladder out to clear the roof around the furnace vent. I’ll dela with that when it gets a little brighter. Right now it’s twilight outside, due to the cloud cover.

We’ve got multiple winter storm warnings. It’s COLD! Last week I was running around in a t-shirt during the day it was in the upper 60’s. This week the high is predicted to be 30.

Reminds me of Kentucky. If you don’t like the weather… wait an hour.

The plus side is that by the time this clears I expect all the plants in the front yard will be asleep. Which means that I can do a little surgery and pot some portions of some of them for a friend.

We were worried that it would be another dry winter. It might be, evidence notwithstanding but typically lots of snow around the beginning of December means it’s going to be wet and rain/snow may last until March.

I’m glad I had no plans to go anywhere. It’s nice to sit here watching the snow and have my feet up. I’ll be cooking a small thanksgiving dinner and then maybe later I’ll bake some cookies.

Ok so this one is a bit late.

Happy Thanksgiving anyway. I hope that you and your family had a lovely dinner.

Happy Black Friday then!

For those of you heading out to begin your Christmas Shopping…

May God have mercy on your soul!

I used to enjoy going to Malls on Black Friday. I’d go with friends and we’d shop the day away, it was a good time and while crowded, it was just the right amount of crowding.

Then about a decade or so ago, Black Friday shopping crossed a threshold where it simply wasn’t any fun anymore. People aren’t into the holiday spirit, they’re into finding the deals FOR THEM. No-one says Merry Christmas anymore, they say Happy Holidays or Thank you and that’s it.

Christmas decorations have become more and more “Politically Correct” and protesters of various stripes are to be seen at shopping centers. The combination has bled all the fun right out of the season.

I used to like going to malls during this season to see how each mall decorated. Their creativity or whimsy was a joy to see, and much like the old Macy’s / Gimbels rivalry, attracted people to the malls to shop and enjoy the decorations.

Now, it’s all homogenous. Everything looks the same, one mall is like another so what’s the point of making a trek to a mall that’s 20 miles away when the one that’s 5 miles away is exactly the same. It probably doesn’t help that many of the malls are owned by the same consortium. 

My point is, politics, special interests, and “Political Correctness” has taken what used to be a fun season and turned it into a hollow, insincere, boring, and in some cases tasteless, version of itself. I am less and less interested in the season and even now one day one, I look forward to it being over.

Last year, most of what little Holiday Shopping I did was done online. I tried shopping once at a mall, not on Black Friday and it was so awful with parking, crowds, and bad tempered people that I simply left the place empty handed. Spending money shouldn’t be a scrimmage line activity, it should be a pleasurable experience.

When you give a gift you should be thinking about the joy it will give someone, not the nasty people you had to endure to obtain the gift.

I think that’s why so much commerce is being done onlline. It may not be about the deals, it’s about not having to interact with assholes. 

Shopping in front of my computer is a hell of a lot easier than fighting for parking. (I also don’t have to get up early, get dressed, or deal with traffic.)

Which brings me to my second point. In a season that’s supposed to be about peace on earth and good will towards men (generically meaning mankind, everyone, all homo sapiens) we’re separated by commerce and our technology instead of being happy and uniting.

I suspect this means in the future we’ll see much more bad behavior, simply because we’re all forgetting how to interact in a reasonable way with each other. 

I honestly don’t know what the solution is. If you stopped e-commerce there would surely be riots at malls across the country. However, it appears that as I’m writing this mini-riots are breaking out over children’s toys.

I know it’s a kinda of a dystopian view but I’m calling it as I see it.

So if you’re out shopping, try to enjoy yourself. Remember that you’ve got about a month to find that perfect gift in the store, and failing that, you can sit naked in front of your computer and have that perfect gift drop shipped from China directly to the recipients door.

Try to enjoy the people you’ve chosen to be with this holiday weekend.

Remember, This season is supposed to be about kindness, and family.

Just my two cents…