Merry F@#!king Christmas

I hit the daily double this Christmas. Not only was I wished a Merry Fucking Christmas but I was also called an idiot, all in the space of 12 short hours and by two different women. Normally I try to be proactive enough to ward off any potential holiday problems. I know how she is and after 20 years of eggshell walking at this time of the year I've gotten pretty good at anticipating when I am about to touch off a Christmas Apocalypse. Christmas Eve, the grandchild was sleeping, visions of ipods and nintendos dancing in her head, and I popped the Death Race dvd in the player and was sorting out my 10 thousand or so stocking stuffers when she and the child's father came in the door. Right away I offer to turn off the movie and put on some sort of sappy Christmas music.

"No, no. Go ahead and watch your (as opposed to our) movie."

Uh oh. "Um, ok." (I paused it anyway, I'm not completely stupid)

She walks in the kitchen, walks back out with the digital camera and proceeds to replay the hundred or so pictures she took during the Christmas festivities at Granny's house. Now, in my defense, I was there only two hours before and I even remembered what everyone looked like. Not being a fish, I was unable to keep one eyeball on the camera and one on Death Race without tipping her off. She is the Christmas Queen, after all. She knows when I've been bad or good and particularly when I am feigning interest. Turning off the camera, she stomps out of the room wishing me a

"Merry Fucking Christmas!"

"But I paused it........"

The boy laughs and laughs and laughs. Yeah, real funny.

The second incident occurred at my Dad's house during Christmas dinner. My sister-in-law was trying to make some point about the empty chair of Elijah (although I hardly think that setting aside a seat for God's invisible dick shortening enforcer is appropriate for Christmas dinner) but she made the mistake of framing it as some sort of question.

"What do the Jews do during seder...........?"

" I think they start out with the Feliz Navidad prayer."

"You idiot!"

That hurt. It hurt bad. I was just trying to help.

Holiday Tip

Do not say, "For Christ sakes, it's only a tree!"

Happy Birthday Bro

All these years have got me to reflecting:

Things I am sorry about:

1. Shooting you in the chin with an arrow.

2. Hitting you in the head with rocks (all occasions)

3.Talking you into taking your tricycle down Dead Man's Hill

4. Not talking you out of wearing those plaid pants in high school or combing your hair like Michael Caine on crack

Things you should be grateful for:

1. Setting the bar so low that you could shuffle over it on your life's journey.

2. Teaching you a valuable lesson: Don't ever, ever, ever listen to anything I tell you.

I do not regret jacking your jaw and launching you into the skittles table at the Otesaga Inn. If it did count, it shouldn't have. You had it coming and don't pretend you didn't.

The Christmas Magic Continues

I didn't particularly care for having my artistic efforts derided as retarded. Although my wife has backpedaled somewhat and told me that what she meant by retarded is that I was full of the spirit. WTF? How does that make any sense at all? That's like saying what I meant by calling you stupid is that your shoes fit well.

This constant criticism has only served to motivate me further and I have redoubled my efforts to put on a wholesome and tasteful Christmas display and make this the best Christmas ever.
What's Christmas without a manger scene? I realize mine is a little, well, mangy, as over the years the stable has gotten sat on a few times and most of the original figurines have disappeared. I think the only originals left are 2 sheep, the camel and Baby Jesus (or Baby Genius as my grandson calls him). I was short two Wise Men this year and the only ones I could find at Dollar Tree were a little, uh, tall. I think they bookend the display nicely, don't you?

My favorite is a little something called Bruce the Spruce that I picked up a few years ago. He's motion activated and unless I'm mistaken, made by Amish craftsmen.

My Very Special Christmas

Very special as in very retarded. That was how my wife characterized my outdoor display after I spent all afternoon freezing my ass off on a rickety step ladder. Just trying to please her. She's since tried to take it back, changing it to "design challenged". But once the R word is given, it cannot be taken back. Last year was my Blue Period. All blue, all the time. That didn't go over too well, so this year I tried to mix it up with a little color. I left the blue perimeter lights up. That was a lot of stapling so I doubt if they are ever coming down. The rules for outdoor ornaments: they have to be cheap, on sale and with instructions written in Chinese. Christmas is no time for retail. I think I outdid myself this year. Check out the display above in all its glory. Pretty sweet.

To be truthful, my wife is not very high maintenance. She drives a 10 year old car (OK, 11 years old) and we live in a 100 year old house stuffed with a mishmash of, uh, period furniture and within spitting distance of a major rail line. She puts up with my 5 year remodeling projects and my Dr. Seuss construction techniques. She doesn't spend a lot on clothes, or her hair, or pedicures or any of that stuff. Her only vices, besides Starbucks and making fun of me, are high end electronics. Makes it easy to buy for her every year. Right now in her purse are an iphone, kindle, digital camera and GPS locator. She carries around more hardware than the Space Shuttle. So life as a married man is pretty easy for me except for this particular time of the year when she turns into the Christmas Queen and I am her incompetent subject. I just can't get anything right.

For five years now she has been bugging me to get an artificial tree. I've always been a natural tree kind of guy, I like the way it smells (at least until the dog pees on it) and I like the fact that it keeps the tree farmers in business and encourages more open space. Maybe pesticide and herbicide soaked, but open nonetheless. We had an artificial tree when I was a kid and as my dad was an OCD engineer, the tree had to be erected practically needle by needle in a precisely defined and methodical way. A real pain in the ass Christmas tradition. I swore I would never do this to my family. I lied. She finally wore me down this year. I'm too old and tired to put up the good fight. Why she tasked me with this purchase and sent me out solo, I'll never know. She has only herself to blame. So at Ollie's Bargain Outlet I found a 9' kinda real looking tree with, yes, fiber optics! Not only that, the base is an MP3 player. I set it up, loaded the MP3 player with the Carpenter's Christmas Album (yes, I know, it makes me want to purge, too - but she loves it) and surprised her when she came home from work.

Why does she keep looking at me like that?

Every Day is the End of Days

Obviously, someday, somewhere, somehow someone is going to get it right and actually predict the time and place when it all comes to an end, at least for humanity. The trouble is, when it does happen, there won't be anyone around to say I told you so. Revelation reads like the author (John the Whoever) expected it to all come tumbling down in some sort of blood soaked revenge fantasy. He had real issues with women, not to mention the Romans and his fellow Jews. Apparently a combination of paranoid schizophrenia and never getting laid can put a hurting on one's mental stability. John fully expected the end of times in his life and must have faced his own personal apocalypse a bitter and frustrated man. Since then, every semi -charismatic psychotic with a hair up his ass and a gaggle of weak minded followers has been predicting the Second Coming. From Savonarola to David Koresh, so far, no dice.

Which brings us to the problem with this way of thinking. It becomes us against them. When the "other" is excluded by God's will, anything that happens to them is also God's will. If you're chosen you make it, if not, well, you just burn forever. Although the planet would be a better place if the wingnuts that believe this sort of stuff raptured off into the heavens and left the rest of us alone. Maybe they could take the Islamists, Moonies and Scientologists with them. What is more disturbing is that we have had two presidents and one vp candidate who have ascribed to John the Revelator's fever dream. Now I'm not sure these religious beliefs influenced policy decisions but they couldn't have helped. I might be alone in this but I prefer my government leaders with a least of veneer of rationality. According to Jonathan Kirsch in A History of the End of the World Ronald Reagan was batshit crazy even before the alzheimer wagon came to pick him up sometime during his second term:

"That's a sign that the day of Armageddon isn't far off, everthing's falling into place. It can't be long now"

Thanks, Ron. No wonder you didn't give a shit about going toe to toe with the Soviets. You figured you'd drop your pants and ascend to heaven before the first nukes went off. And arms for hostages? Why not? Whoopee, we're all going to die. And your buds were as batshit crazy as you (by the way, blogging a personal note to a dead president is eccentric, not crazy):

I have read the Book of Revelation and yes, I believe the world is going to end - by an act of God, I hope- but everyday I think that time is running out."
Caspar Weinberger - Secretary of Defense

"I do not know how many future generations we can count on before the Lord returns."
James Watt-Interior Secretary

Explains a lot, doesn't it? And we have the current, soon to be former, occupant of the White House who has done his best to usher in a period of Tribulation. And, of course, Sarah Palin, demon free since 2005, proclaiming the need to move our embassy to Jerusalem. We Apocalyptitians know what that means. You betcha.

So, in my preparing to believe, I'm going to have to leave this whole Revelation thing on the back burner. I think I'll do it last in my traipse through the Bible. Which is as it should be, I suppose. I just can't get past the seven headed beasts coming out of the sea and I certainly can't, uh, swallow that whole thing with the Big ole Babylonian Whore with her cup of fornications. Just too gross.