Navigation & Music Control
 [ BACK]  [NEXT]                       Issue #071 - 12/21/1997

CHRISTMAS LITE!

All the stories, and less filling, too!

Attention Last Minute Shoppers!
     Hi, all!  OK - This must be the "Stealth Christmas."  We
didn't see it coming until it was too late.  Oh, well...  All
the Christmas packages will get there - by February.  For now,
the panic sets in - have to go and SHOP!!!  It's still kind of
fun to see the department store Santas, even though you know
they're not the REAL Santa.  An English teacher friend of mine
calls those guys "subordinate Clauses."
     And of course, you can see all of the Christmas movies and
TV shows at this time of year.  There are so many really good
Christmas movies, of course, but there are also a few truly
rotten movies that play on Christmas.  Maybe the worst is a show
called, "Santa Claus Conquers the Martians," a dreadful mix of
fantasy and science fiction, and one of the worst movies ever
made.  To give you some idea of how poor a film it is, Pia Zadora
is the best actor in the film.  It's the kind of movie that would
have been used in less enlightened times to make criminals
confess.  Oh, please...  Anything but that!
     Thanks this week to SUNFUN Santa's helpers: John Wallner,
Kerry Miller, Jodi Miller, Jerry Taff, Peter Adler, Akiko Ogino,
Arlen Walker, Sarah & Jeff Morsman, Vic Parrhysius and Libin He. 
And a special thanks this week to my favorite editor, Carol
Becwar.  Happy Holidays to all, whether your favorite celebration
is Christmas, New Year's or Chanukah, or all of the above!
     Have a Great Christmas!

--:-)-----:-)-----:-)-----:-)-----:-)-----:-)-----:-)-----:-)--

MERRY WINTERTIME!
----------------
     One of the more peculiar trends this holiday season is to
note how few of the stores and products have real 'Christmas'
decorations anymore.  Instead of Santas and reindeer, most of the
store bags have generic winter scenes and snowflakes.  I thought
it was just my imagination at first, but it turns out to be a
real trend in retailing.  "Nobody puts Merry Christmas on their
shopping bags anymore," says Ann Pinkerton, spokeswoman for
shopping bag maker Continental Extrusions.  Archway cookies has
dropped its traditional bells, wreaths and candles with "a more
generic look of winter scenes."  Coors Beer is even replacing the
red and green on its Winterfest beer with gold and silver.
     So why is Santa getting the bum's rush?  Simply so the
products don't look out of date on December 26th.  Having a
winter scene makes the product last - well - all winter.    (Wall
Street Journal / Reuters)
          [ So let me get this straight...  We've gone
          from Christ's birth to a fat guy in a red
          suit to "Happy Holidays" to a generic
          'All-Purpose Winter Consumption Season?' ]


--:-)-----:-)-----:-)-----:-)-----:-)-----:-)-----:-)-----:-)--

S. CLAUS, PHD...
-------------
Ever wonder what Santa does the rest of the year?  Consider the
following:

   - You never actually see Santa, only his "assistants".

   - Santa keeps his job until he decides to retire.

   - Santa doesn't really do the work; he directs a bunch of
     helpers to do all his work for him, but he's the one who
     everybody credits with the work.

   - Santa doesn't work anywhere near a 40 hour week.

   - Santa travels a lot.

     Ah-HA!  That settles it...  Santa is obviously a senior
professor with tenure at some university!


--:-)-----:-)-----:-)-----:-)-----:-)-----:-)-----:-)-----:-)--

AND HOW DID YOU SPEND CHRISTMAS?
-------------------------------
     Last Christmas Eve, lawyer Daniel Goldberg was going through
the contents of a safe deposit box at the Wells Fargo Bank in
downtown San Francisco.  Apparently unaware that Goldberg was
still in the bank, the staff closed the bank early at 3PM and
shut and time-locked the vault, trapping the 81-year-old Goldberg
inside.  Forty hours later, when the vault was opened, Goldberg
was - fortunately - none the worse for wear, having spent the
time writing and thinking.
          [ Yeh...  Thinking about filing a lawsuit
          that could easily make it 'Wells Goldberg
          Bank' by next year... ]


--:-)-----:-)-----:-)-----:-)-----:-)-----:-)-----:-)-----:-)--

SANTA'S STUCK IN THE CHIMNEY...
----------------------------
     Not sure if he's the real Santa Claus, but 33-year-old
Dwayne Terry of Baltimore, Maryland was found stuck in the
chimney of a convenience store last Christmas morning.  Since the
police found no evidence of reindeer, Terry was arrested and
charged with attempted burglary.  He told police he was hungry
and thought he could get into the store through the chimney. 
(AP)
          [ What!?  No milk and cookies? ]


--:-)-----:-)-----:-)-----:-)-----:-)-----:-)-----:-)-----:-)--

SCRUFFY SANTAS GET THE SACK...
---------------------------
     A member of parliament in Ireland has proposed a rule
setting minimum standards for store Santas in order to weed out
some of the more Ho-Ho-Hopeless guys in red suits.
     "It is the quick buck merchants who spoil what should be a
wonderful experience for children," said M.P. Michael Moynihan.
     He urged the Irish Consumer Association to get tough on
bogus St. Nicks in "tacky beards and scruffy red suits who can't
give a decent Ho, Ho, Ho."  (REUTERS)


--:-)-----:-)-----:-)-----:-)-----:-)-----:-)-----:-)-----:-)--

THE REAL SANTA CLAUS?
--------------------
     A construction company owner in Mundelein, Illinois, who may
have seen the movie "Miracle On 34th Street" once to many times,
tried to get the Post Office to deliver all mail addressed to
Santa to him, just because he has legally changed his name to
"Santa Claus."
     No way, the U.S. Postal Service said.  Unlike his namesake
in the movie, this particular Santa Claus has not been able to
prove to the postal authorities that he is the one and only Santa
Claus.  According to them, he's just another pretender.
     "It would be like someone named John Smith wanting all the
mail addressed to all the John Smiths.  That's why we have legal
addresses," postal service spokesman Tim Ratliff said.  The Post
Office told Mundelein's Mr. Claus has been told to get a post
office box or publicize his private address.  In any case,
Mundelein Postmaster Mary Cardwell said, they haven't received
even a single Santa letter addressed to the Santa at the
Mundelein address.  (Reuters)
          [ Maybe if he moves to North Pole, Idaho? ]


--:-)-----:-)-----:-)-----:-)-----:-)-----:-)-----:-)-----:-)--

TWELVE DAYS OF ACCOUNTING...
-------------------------
     A bunch of bored accountants in Philadelphia figured out
that the price of a partridge in a pear tree from the old
Christmas song went up 64% last year.  It's not the bird that's a
problem -- they are the same $15 as last year, but pear trees
jumped from $13.50 to $30 this year.
     Also up this year were the eight-maids-a-milking, who would
command $41.20 for an hour of milking, because of this year's
rise in the U.S. minimum wage.
     The ten-lords-a-leaping is also more expensive this year,
though I doubt whether ten authentic lords could do much leaping. 
Most of them look like fat, old guys wearing uncomfortable
underwear, but the accountants say that $3,309.87 will get them
hopping for you.
     The rest of the gift list held steady this year, bringing
the Silly Christmas Song Inflation Index (SCSII) up just 1.12%
this year.  That doesn't mean that all those gifts come cheaply,
though.  The whole list from the "Twelve Days of Christmas" song
(with repetitions) will set you back at least $55,086.26, not
including cleanup after all those birds...
          [ Maybe it would just be cheaper to 'Deck the
          Halls,' after all... ]


--:-)-----:-)-----:-)-----:-)-----:-)-----:-)-----:-)-----:-)--

SO, WHAT DO YOU WANT FOR CHRISTMAS?
----------------------------------
     Have somebody who's just impossible to shop for?  You could
try one of these items from the upscale magazine, "The Robb
Report:"

   - A one-of-a-kind Cartier necklace, diamond and ruby with
     matching bracelet and brooch -- $1.5 million.

   - A Mercedes-Benz CLK-GTR sports car.  Part of a limited run
     of just 25 cars, it comes equipped with a 6.9-liter, V-12
     engine, a six-speed sequential transmission and a double
     wishbone suspension -- $1 million.

   - How about a little Christmas party for 10 of your closest
     friends with gourmet fare prepared by a team of acclaimed
     chefs from the James Beard Foundation in New York City and
     accompanied by rare wines -- Only $200,000.

   - A Diamond Crown, Queen Anne-style Chairman cigar humidor. 
     The humidor comes stocked with 15 boxes of hand-rolled
     Dominican cigars -- $7,500.

   - A limited-edition Movado Watch, custom designed by pop
     artist Romero Britto -- A bargain at $1,000.

          [ Oh, heck...  Just send 'em a fruitcake and
          be done with it. ]


--:-)-----:-)-----:-)-----:-)-----:-)-----:-)-----:-)-----:-)--

CHRISTMAS LITE...
--------------
     The City Council in Derby, England managed to get a real
bargain on second-hand Christmas decorations from the town of
Cleethorpes.  Derby city workers put up the fancy lighting just
before Christmas, and all of the politicians were there in the
town square to accept congratulations on a job well done in
saving all the tax money that would have gone into buying new
decorations.
     Not that they got much in the way of compliments.  When the
lights were turned on, the politicians had to explain why the
Derby decorations spelled out a huge, red and green, "Welcome To
Cleethorpes."  (London Times)


--:-)-----:-)-----:-)-----:-)-----:-)-----:-)-----:-)-----:-)--

AT LEAST HE'S EASY TO PLEASE...
----------------------------
     Some time back, the British Ambassador to Canada got a call
from a local television reporter asking what he wanted for
Christmas.  Thinking that the reporter was offering him a gift,
the ambassador decided to think small, so he wouldn't be accused
of accepting a bribe.  "A small box of crystallized (candied)
fruit," he replied.  The reporter seemed a little confused by
this answer, but accepted it.  Imagine the ambassador's horror
when the Candian Broadcasting Corporation ran the story on the
day after Christmas:
     "Before Christmas, we asked three foreign ambassadors
     what they wanted for Christmas.  The French ambassador
     said that he wanted world peace and an end to
     suffering, the German ambassador said that he wanted a
     cure for cancer, and the British ambassador said that
     he wanted a small box of crystallized fruits...."

          [ And a $15 partridge in a $30 pear tree... ]

./:-)>--./:-)>--./:-)>--./:-)>--./:-)>--./:-)>--./:-)>--./:-)>-

          MERRY CHRISTMAS FROM THE SUNDAY FUNNIES!

./:-)>--./:-)>--./:-)>--./:-)>--./:-)>--./:-)>--./:-)>--./:-)>-
© 1997 by Bill Becwar. All Rights Reserved.