Merry Christmas, All!
Well, it's happened again. Santa snuck up on us when we
weren't looking. Hard to believe that Christmas is just around
the corner, even though the calendar makes it clear just how late
we are. Could we be seeing evidence of Santa's double life?
Consider that you have a guy who is capable of a few hundred
million break-ins in one night every Christmas. Undetected
break-ins. Kinda makes you wonder what Santa does to keep in
practice the rest of the year for that night of trespassing,
doesn't it?
The answer is pretty sketchy at this point, but consider the
news from Switzerland, where two banks in Zurich recently decided
to bar Santa Claus from entry this holiday season, for fear that
the bearded guy in the distinctive suit might be a robber. Both
the UBS Bank and Raiffeisenbank said the St. Nick, who also uses
the Swiss alias "Samichlaus," may be supported by one or more
helpers, who may be elves or just short guys. Yup, the Swiss
Santa traditionally travels with a gang. The banks are afraid
that Santa might take more than milk and cookies.
Could that be how Santa affords the presents every year?
So, here we are with what might turn out to be the scandal of the
millennium, and nobody seems interested in pursuing it. Just
where is Ken Starr when you really need him?
And that's just one of the mysteries about the Christmas
holiday I'd like to see investigated. The one I REALLY want
answered is the mystery of Egg Nog. As much as I love the stuff,
it makes me wonder: the egg part is obvious, but just what the
heck is "Nog," anyway?
Thanks and Happy Holidays to all of our friends and
supporters, especially: Kerry Miller, Kathleen Beckman, Laura
Hong Li, Carol J. Becwar, Jerry Taff, Nnamdi Elleh, Diana Lee,
Anna Macareno, Jan Michalski, John Peterson, Tim McChain,
Meredith & Yasmin Leischer, Lydia Cheong Chu-Ling, Bruce Gonzo,
Fumiko Umino, Ron Brown & Jan Cutler-Brown, Beth & Jim Butler, R.
J. Tully, Junji Taniguchi, Joshua & Anna Brink and Steve Smith.
Time to run out and do some last-minute shopping... Merry
Christmas, Everybody!
Have A Great Holiday!
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HARVARD BUSINESS SCHOOL HOLIDAYS...
--------------------------------
The Wall Street Journal has some business advice on how to
handle stress during the holidays for those of you who haven't
yet come to view your family as an extension of your corporation.
"Try looking at it as a management problem", they suggest,
especially when dealing with "unproductive relatives".
Jim Down of Mercer Management Consulting tells his clients
to think "How do I re-engineer the process of the holiday
season?" If the "endgame" of the holidays is a pleasurable
experience, experts say you need to make use of "automation, cost
benefit analysis and contingency planning" in your gift buying
process.
The other key, says Lance Ealey of McKinsey & Co., is to
"get the concept right so that you are not constantly changing
during the production process or the holiday process." Before
the first present is bought, says Mr. Ealey, "we've defined our
concept."
Hope you take their advice and re-engineer a happy holiday
process. (Wall Street Journal)
[ "I'm sorry Uncle Ed, you've been downsized
and your position as goofy uncle has been
eliminated. ]
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BARBIE WORLD...
------------
If the 900 million Barbies that have been produced since the
1950's could form their own government, they would be the third
largest nation in the world.
[ Think that's what AMAZON.COM stands for? ]
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HE'S MAKING A LIST, AND CHECKING IT TWICE...
-----------------------------------------
And he's going to find out who's naughty or nice. No, it's
not Santa this time... It's the police superintendent in
Norfolk, England.
Noting that crime often rises just before the holidays as
burglars target cars and homes to steal gifts, the police decided
that the appropriate response was to expand their Christmas card
list. They have sent nearly a hundred cards to known criminals
with the happy holiday greeting:
"Wishing you a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year.
Norwich Police will be actively targeting known
burglars and car thieves this Christmas -- but we are
thinking of you throughout the year."
The force's superintendent Les Parrett has personally signed
all of the cards.
"I wish the vast majority of law abiding people living in
Norwich a very happy Christmas and New Year. But the message to
those individuals involved in crime is that Norwich police will
do all they can to spoil their Christmas activities," he said.
(Reuters)
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CHRISTMAS CAROLS REVISITED...
--------------------------
OK... The stresses of the season get to people sometimes.
They don't function as well as they might, or maybe have
difficulty coping. Need proof, listen for the following symptoms
in well-known Christmas songs:
PARANOIA - Santa Claus is Coming to Town (to get ME!)
MULTIPLE PERSONALITY - We Three Kings Disoriented Are
DEMENTIA - I'll Be Home For Christmas (if I can remember
where it is)
DELUSIONAL - Hark The Herald Angels Sing (About Me)
KLEPTOMANIA - Silver Bells
MANIC - Deck the Halls and Walls and House and Lawn and
Streets and Office and Town and ...
PERSONALITY DISORDER - You Better Watch Out, I'm Gonna Cry,
I'm Gonna Pout, then MAYBE I'll tell you why.
SCHIZOPHRENIA - Do You Hear What I Hear?
OBSESSIVE COMPULSIVE - Jingle Bells, Jingle Bells, Jingle
Bells, Jingle Bells, Jingle Bells, Jingle Bells,
Jingle Bells, Jingle Bells, Jingle Bells, Jingle
Bells, Jingle Bells, Jingle Bells, Jingle Bells,
Jingle Bells, Jingle Bells, Jingle Bells, Jingle
Bells, Jingle Bells...
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BY THE CHIMNEY WITHOUT CARE...
---------------------------
Looking to solve one of life's mysteries, a ten-year-old boy
in Lincoln, Nebraska decided to spend the night sleeping on his
family's living room floor. He woke up last Christmas to find
that someone had visited the family under mysterious
circumstances. Not down the chimney though. This someone had
broken in through the second-story windows before tripping over
the boy. The kid screamed and the intruder fled.
Police caught up with the suspect a short time later.
"It wasn't Santa," said Police Chief Tom Casady. (AP)
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WE KNOW WHAT SHE WANTS FROM SANTA...
---------------------------------
Two things about the holidays - we all rush around more than
usual and we enjoy all of the good things to eat. One person who
might have slowed down to enjoy the food this year is an unnamed
75-year-old woman in Witham, England.
Last year, she appeared at the post office to announce that
she had been in such a hurry to send the pile of Christmas mail
that she'd accidentally mailed something along with her cards and
packages.
"She just came in here and she posted her teeth, so she
reckons," said astonished postman Dave Lee.
Postal authorities still haven't located the 170-pound
($280) teeth. (Reuters)
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LIGHTING THE WAY...
----------------
It must be Christmas time. Not only because of the presents
everyone is buying and the pictures of Santa everywhere, but
because Mervin Whipple is ready for his annual January electric
bill.
The Killingly, Connecticut farmer turned on his annual
lighting display the other day, which features a three-and-a-half
acre collection of 380 animations and over 108,000 lights -
possibly the world record display. Tourists come from all over
New England to see the light show, which requires the assistance
of students from a local technical school to put up each year.
And Whipple has been doing this for 32 years.
All those bulbs use a fair amount of power: 233,000 Watts.
Enough to light up a fair-sized subdivision. (AP)
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I think the only reason people buy fruitcakes is
because they just can't pass up any food that comes
with a five-year warranty.
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PSEUDO-SANTAS REBEL AGAINST HOT HAT...
-----------------------------------
Even though Christmas comes in high summer down there, no
one has ever accused Brazilians of not having the Christmas
spirit. Temperatures near 90F (30C) don't stop folks from
putting out sleds with reindeer and artificial snow in front of
many homes and businesses.
But some mall employees have drawn the line at the malls
plan to have all of them wear the traditional, red Santa hats.
With the hats on, they "felt ridiculous." Complaining of heat
and allergy, the workers got the Brazilian Labor Department's
support to boot the hats. (Reuters)
[ Actually, Santa looks pretty cool in his
new serape, sandals and swimming trunks... ]
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If you've been following Funnies for very long, you know that we
don't often do reruns. But for this item, I'll make an
exception. I sent out a version of this in the very early days
of SUNFUN - before most of you were along for the ride. It still
seems like the best kind of SUNFUN Christmas card:
YES, VIRGINIA...
-------------
Until you were 7 or 8 years old, you knew with absolute
certainty that there was a Santa Claus. Then, before another
Christmas passed, some cynical child spoiled your world, telling
you that you were silly to believe in such childish things.
Stunned with too much adult reality all at once, you had to face
the possibility that Santa was make-believe, a myth, a wish, and
no more. It is a moment of terrible truth for a small child.
The strange, small doubts start to worry you. It is a first
step into the grown-up world of cynicism and doubt.
One bleak November day in 1897, little Virginia O'Hanlon of
New York City came up against this disillusionment. Trying to
resolve her fears, she went to her father for advice. Dr.
Phillip O'Hanlon, her father, was a consulting surgeon to the
N.Y. Police Department. He was also too wise to tackle this
great question by himself. As Virginia herself recalled in an
interview years later:
"Quite naturally, I believed in Santa Claus, for he had
never disappointed me. But when less fortunate little boys and
girls said there wasn't any Santa Claus, I was filled with
doubts. I asked my father, and he was a little evasive on the
subject.
"It was a habit in our family that whenever any doubts came
up as to how to pronounce a word or some question of historical
fact was in doubt, we wrote to the Question and Answer column in
The New York Sun. Father would always say, `If you see it in The
Sun, it's so,' and that settled the matter.
"`Well, I'm just going to write The Sun and find out the
real truth,' I said to father.
And so, young Virginia sat down and wrote her parents'
favorite newspaper.
Her letter found its way into the hands of a veteran editor,
Francis P. Church. Son of a Baptist minister, Church had been a
war corespondent for The New York Times during the Civil War and
had labored as an anonymous editorial writer for The New York Sun
for 20 years. Church was a very direct and humorous man and,
with his background, usually got the all of the difficult
religion and theology questions.
Now, he had in his hands a little girl's letter on a most
controversial matter, and was burdened with the responsibility of
answering it.
"Is there a Santa Claus?" the childish scrawl in the letter
asked. At once, Church knew that there was no avoiding the
question. He must answer, and he must answer truthfully. And so
he turned to his desk, and he began to compose the answer, and
what he wrote was to become one of the most memorable editorials
in newspaper history.
Editorial Page, New York Sun, 1897
We take pleasure in answering thus prominently the
communication below, expressing at the same time our
great gratification that its faithful author is
numbered among the friends of The Sun.
Dear Editor-
I am 8 years old. Some of my little friends
say there is no Santa Claus. Papa says, "If
you see it in The Sun, it's so." Please
tell me the truth, is there a Santa Claus?
Virginia O'Hanlon
Virginia, your little friends are wrong. They
have been affected by the skepticism of a skeptical
age. They do not believe except they see. They think
that nothing can be which is not comprehensible by
their little minds. All minds, Virginia, whether they
be men's or children's, are little. In this great
universe of ours, man is a mere insect, an ant in his
intellect as compared with the boundless world about
him, as measured by the intelligence capable of
grasping the whole of truth and knowledge.
Yes, Virginia, there is a Santa Claus. He exists
as certainly as love and generosity and devotion exist,
and you know that they abound and give to your life its
highest beauty and joy. Alas! How dreary would be the
world if there were no Santa Claus! It would be as
dreary as if there were no Virginias. There would be
no childlike faith then, no poetry, no romance to make
tolerable this existence. We should have no enjoyment,
except in sense and sight. The external light with
which childhood fills the world would be extinguished.
Not believe in Santa Claus! You might as well not
believe in fairies. You might get your papa to hire
men to watch in all the chimneys on Christmas Eve to
catch Santa Claus, but even if you did not see Santa
Claus coming down, what would that prove? Nobody sees
Santa Claus, but that is no sign that there is no Santa
Claus. The most real things in the world are those
that neither children nor men can see. Did you ever
see fairies dancing on the lawn? Of course not, but
that's no proof that they are not there. Nobody can
conceive or imagine all the wonders there are unseen
and unseeable in the world.
You tear apart the baby's rattle and see what
makes the noise inside, but there is a veil covering
the unseen world which not the strongest man, nor even
the united strength of all the strongest men that ever
lived could tear apart. Only faith, poetry, love,
romance, can push aside that curtain and view and
picture the supernatural beauty and glory beyond. Is
it all real? Ah, Virginia, in all this world there is
nothing else real and abiding.
No Santa Claus! Thank God he lives and lives
forever. A thousand years from now, Virginia, nay 10
times 10,000 years from now, he will continue to make
glad the heart of childhood.
Francis P. Church's editorial was an immediate sensation,
and became one of the most famous editorials ever written
anywhere in the world. The New York Sun published it every year
just before Christmas until the paper went out of business in
1949.
As for little Virginia O'Hanlon, she grew up and received a
Bachelor of Arts degree from Hunter College at the age of 21,
then a Master's from Columbia a year later. In 1912, she became
a teacher in the New York City school system and later rose to
school principal. She married, becoming Virginia Douglas, and
had children of her own. After 47 years as an educator, she
retired, living to be 81 years old.
During all those years, she received a steady stream of mail
about her famous Santa Claus letter. She replied to all her
correspondents by sending them a nicely printed copy of the Sun
editorial.
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MERRY CHRISTMAS TO ALL, AND TO ALL - A GOOD NIGHT!
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© 1999 by Bill Becwar. All Rights Reserved.
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