Jingle Freakin’ Bells.
November 14th, 2006 by Kevin
I feel better. It’s a wonder what a good night’s sleep can do. I am such a fucking baby when my sleep patterns are disrupted that it’s sick, really.
Regardless of sleep I do have those “fat days”, though, days in which I am just disgusted by the sight of myself and I honestly would like to blow every molecule off of my body with some napalm and watch it melt, and as self-absorbed and ridiculous as it is, it’s hard to shake a twenty-plus-year obsession.
Sometimes you just want to jump into a pint of Ben and Jerry’s and be done with it, but it’s never that easy.
I wish a law would be passed that no Christmas decoration could be erected before December first and that no strain of happy schmappy Christmas music could be played before that date, either.
Here in Chicago there is already a radio station playing “All Christmas music, all the time”, and the retailers are already losing their candy-striped motherfucking minds.
This past weekend I went shopping with the J-Man and my mother at a local strip-mall-type dealie and we decided to cruise the toy store for Star Wars action figures because, well, two of us are addicted.
(For the record, I will never, never get over the fact that my sweet-ass X-Wing fighter and primo-condition original Star Wars action figures were sold at a garage sale by my mother. For that reason alone, she will spend her golden years locked in the attic with my father subsisting on stale pretzels.)
(I had them all. All of them.)
(I mean, damn.)
We walked into KB Toys and were immediately accosted by the help, who were dressed as pointy-toed elves, the Salvation Army bell-ringer, who was escaping the rain, and a few Toys For Tots employees, who were trading plastic cups and stickers for donations.
“Santa is here!” squeed a black elf with a jingle-belled hat, placing her hands on her knees and grinning maniacally at J.. The J-Man recoiled in mild distaste.
“Don’t you want to see Santa?”
“That’s not the real Santa. That’s just some guy in a suit.”
“How do you know?”
“What?”
“How do you know it’s not the real Santa? Sure, most of these guys aren’t the real Santa, they’re just helpers, but what if the real Santa sneaks in there occasionally and then you look like a snot for being a non-believer and you don’t get any toys?”
I am a jerk. Plus, I’d like a picture.
“There’s no way that’s Santa.”
“Fine, if you want to bet your presents on it, go ahead.”
*wary look*
I know I’m going to Hell. At least I’ll be among friends.
We fought for a while in the action figure aisle (because why would you not want this cool-ass special edition Darth Vader, what the hell is wrong with you, and no, I can’t buy it for me), and then he bought a couple of lame stuffed M&M’s dressed up as Star Wars characters.
They were cheap. And I’m totally going back for that Vader.
Anyway, the whole store was plastered in red and green as if Santa himself had barfed Christmas candy all over the place, Exorcist-style.
The advent of the holiday season gets earlier every year as the stores get more and more greedy, and I am just not buying into it. I am a woman who does most of her holiday shopping through catalogues and online so as to avoid the merry throngs of holiday shoppers - the crabby-ass, overheated, squalling children and the miserly, penny-pinching, bitchy little housewives who will argue for a half an hour over ten cents, seemingly oblivious to the forty-person line ready to spontaneously combust behind them.
Also, I’ve found that since I don’t drive, parking has become even more annoying for me, since I invariably shop with my mother, who will not park unless she is three feet from the door and who consequently must drive around the lot for an hour and a half looking for a spot.
This is enough to make me wail and rent my clothing and gnash my teeth. I was the type of person who would take any old damned spot and then hoof it. Just park already.
I am also not the parent who will kick the ass of another parent in order to obtain a Pole-Dancing Elmo, or whatever the Hott New Toy is this year. My aunt, who is moderately insane, lines up outside of Toys ‘R’ Us at two o’clock in the morning on the day after Thanksgiving; so if there is something I feel my schweet wittle bebe absolutely cannot live without I might put in a request with her, but generally I feel that the Hott New Toy Madness is right up there with schizophrenia in terms of something I can’t explain very well and really don’t want.
Plus, electronic animated toys make me itch. Generally they “lose” their batteries quite quickly. This technique is starting to fizzle out as the child has discovered how to replace batteries on his own, but for a few years there, life was golden and I did not have to listen to a whole lot of beep-beep-boop, or, God forbid, the YMCA. Sigh.
I should not have to hear Grandma Got Run Over By A Reindeer until at least December first. I should not have to hear Mannheim Steamroller, ever. I should not be subjected to huge inflated fake snowglobes and giant lighted candy canes and Jesuses (Jesii?) mixed up with snowmen until there is snow on the damned ground. (Note to God: This does not mean that I want it to snow.)
I still have leaves to deal with, for God’s sake. I don’t even want to think about Christmas shopping. Christmas shopping is best done online at around December tenth, all in one day, while one is drinking a beer and wearing pajamas and thinking gleefully about all the frantic people who will be at Macy’s on the twenty-third, wired out on Starbucks and losing their fucking minds.
I think that people who are too eager to jump the gun on the holidays are people who need a hobby. Take up something nice and non-threatening to the rest of the populace, like painting or underwater basket-weaving. Don’t break out your hand-knitted red sweater with the sparkly tree and the actual ornaments sewn into it for at least another month.
And retailers, give us a fucking break. If you must display your holiday wares, then at least spare us the holiday tunes for a little while longer.
I cannot be held responsible for what I might do under the influence of Mannheim Steamroller. I’m just saying.
Happy Tuesday.
Nightowl wrote on 11/14/06 at 1:46 pm :
Heh, I am done shopping with the exception of my son. EVERYONE else is done! Done I tell you! No running around the mall, no frantically figuring out what to buy people. I am the NEW Santa Clause. I made a list. I bought things on that list. I checked it twice. I don’t care who’s been naughty, I AM DONE!
Nightowl wrote on 11/14/06 at 1:47 pm :
this thing is working. all that ranting and nothing posted.
now thats something to be depressed about.
trancejen wrote on 11/14/06 at 1:54 pm :
That’s got to be a damn relief. You can relaaaaas all through December.
trancejen wrote on 11/14/06 at 1:55 pm :
That would be “relax” for those of you who CAN spell. Jen Kant Reed Gud.
Loob wrote on 11/14/06 at 1:59 pm :
Hee! There was so much to this entry that I wanted to single out and appreciate, that I’ll just say the whole thing rocked!
I did it early because SO lucky for me, at least eight of them also have birthdays this month and next month too! Sheesh.
(Jesii. heh!)
Guess what I did yesterday? Spent several hours online and took care of the entire overseas contingent of family in one exhausting but fun hit.
I totally agree with you, online is the best in general, to avoid those frenzied crowds and queues.
warcrygirl wrote on 11/14/06 at 4:09 pm :
I don’t care how much red and green is out there, Christmas does NOT start for me until the day after Thanksgiving. Period.
Trish wrote on 11/15/06 at 3:13 am :
Sneak the real Santa in there… LOL. I’m glad that’s not for real… Right?
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Stewart…
I will dream of your poetic words tonight….
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Ted…
Good work. I am going to read some more on this….
Deb Willard-Parker wrote on 01/5/08 at 12:51 pm :
There be monsters.
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To refuse awards is another way of accepting them with more noise than is normal.
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