robin laid an egg
I think I have determined that I would like Christmas better if it were a workday. Still, you understand, keeping a lot of the cultural overkill in the run-up to it - but in my mind, the real holiday is December 24, because that's the actual height of anticipation, and the holiday itself will be spent in our pajamas, eating, if we are so lucky as to have extra food, or outside having some purposefully industrious Outing, or possibly being lonely and depressed and achingly bitter. I am pretty willing to partake in a lot of the depersonalized traditions involving rich food, horribly overplayed music, presents, numerous days off the dayjob and heightened inclination to give to charities, but as I'm not Christian, the significance of the big day is very much wasted on me, and the Victorian-inspired schmaltz is one big, bewildering collective party, already completely abstracted away from the idea of the birth of a god.
Perhaps it would be more logical for us heathens to abstract Christmas still further away from "Jesus, Lord at thy birth, Jeeeesus Looooord at thy birth", recognize the foregoing month as pretty much cultural foreplay, steal the New Years tradition of some big countdown to a grand orgasm finish, smash a crystal ball at midnight on the 24th, and spend the next day (or two, for Crimbo-observing countries, of which we totally should be one) refreshed and being extra-friendly and extra-badass at whatever we normally do anyway. Observing Christians should be entitled to take the day off, like it's Yom Kippur.
Perhaps I just think this because I'm not a big drinker, and have forgotten the festivity-extending qualities of eggnog and mulled wine. Clearly someone should bring me some frickin' eggnog.
In other news, I am massively sensitized to idea-fail as expressed by magazine cover design today. If the rag in question weren't already folding for lack of funds, I would be sending them a cranky letter for posing 4 employees of some random company with the white hipsterish dude standing beatifically over the black and white women, arms spread like a portrait of a 17th-century patriarch. Dammit, guys, that's not how it's done... but you're going out of business anyway.
Perhaps it would be more logical for us heathens to abstract Christmas still further away from "Jesus, Lord at thy birth, Jeeeesus Looooord at thy birth", recognize the foregoing month as pretty much cultural foreplay, steal the New Years tradition of some big countdown to a grand orgasm finish, smash a crystal ball at midnight on the 24th, and spend the next day (or two, for Crimbo-observing countries, of which we totally should be one) refreshed and being extra-friendly and extra-badass at whatever we normally do anyway. Observing Christians should be entitled to take the day off, like it's Yom Kippur.
Perhaps I just think this because I'm not a big drinker, and have forgotten the festivity-extending qualities of eggnog and mulled wine. Clearly someone should bring me some frickin' eggnog.
In other news, I am massively sensitized to idea-fail as expressed by magazine cover design today. If the rag in question weren't already folding for lack of funds, I would be sending them a cranky letter for posing 4 employees of some random company with the white hipsterish dude standing beatifically over the black and white women, arms spread like a portrait of a 17th-century patriarch. Dammit, guys, that's not how it's done... but you're going out of business anyway.