Oh hey look what still exists…

I’m gonna start today off with a joke that a friend of mine told me a while back to set the tone for this next song. What did the little orphan get for Christmas? Cancer. Now that you are extremely uncomfortable, I want you to take that joke, and write a song about it, except the song can’t be a joke. It has to be completely serious. If you managed to do that, congratulations, you have written the second most depressing Christmas song of all time, because nothing, absolutely nothing, can top this:

What is this? Why? Apparently this song is for the parents who subscribe to the “You’re lucky you got anything at all!” approach to Christmas. I still vividly remember the first time I heard this song on the radio. I kept waiting for the uplifting message about giving. I got really hopeful when the speaking part in the middle came up. I was waiting for the “Even though Santa forgot this little boy, doesn’t mean we should. We should use the opportunity that the Christmas Season gives us to reach out and help all those less fortunate in the spirit of giving.” It never came. The best I can figure is this song just wants you to feel bad about ever being happy.

Ah, the War on Christmas. Of course it has its place here.

Now, I consider myself a decent Christian. I am also a Christmas nut. I love this season. It is my favorite time of year despite the deathly cold. I just really, really don’t buy into this “War on Christmas.” Everywhere I go I hear people flipping out about how Jesus is disappearing from their Christmas. “WHERE IS HE!? WHERE IS JESUS!? IT IS CHRISTMASTIME! WHERE DID HE GO!?” I think maybe the problem isn’t that he is disappearing. I think that perhaps the problem is you are looking for him at the mall. Jesus isn’t at the mall guys. He never was. It isn’t his scene. I think that if you feel like Jesus is missing from your Christmas celebration, that says more about you than it does about everybody else. I never feel like he’s missing. He is always front and center in my Christmas. I know he is because I put him there. A line to see a guy dressed up like Jesus at the mall is a terrible idea. Am I the only one who sees the mixed messages that is bound to give children?

Out of all the songs in the world to be “the” song everyone listens to at Christmas time, would someone please explain to me why this one was chosen:

First of all, let’s get this out of the way, the title isn’t even grammatically correct. It should be “Jingle, Bells!” The whole song is solely devoted to riding around in a sleigh with bells on it. Practically nobody does that anymore. They need to add another verse to the song to say “I’ve got these sleigh bells all over my house because it is the 21^st century and we don’t drive sleighs anymore, but because of this song I have to have something to jingle at all times. It’s a Christmas tradition.” I bet we could trace the commercialization of Christmas straight back to this song. It has nothing to do with Christmas, and not once is Christmas mentioned in the song, or anything Christmas-y for that matter, but we love it so! Now I admit that I might be a little biased considering Nathan has been listening to this song since April, but then again that is precisely my point. Take away the Christmas magic and you realize it is a terribly annoying song. I think that just goes to show that this song is a parasite, latched on to Christmas to maintain its unnaturally long life.

This next song is another classic and I’m sure I would get a lot of crap for mentioning it if anyone actually read this:

This next song wasn’t on the original list. My parents introduced it to me:

Now this is not a terrible song. It is on the list because it is not a Christmas song at all.

This one might be Oprah’s fault. She always had that “Favorite Things” special at Christmas. Other than that I don’t understand how this happened. I guess someone was watching “The Sound of Music” and heard the word “Snowflakes.” That’s the best I can come up with. I guess it talks about winter and packages and says sleigh bells too. There must be a rule that if a song mentions more than 3 “seasonal” words, it is automatically added to the Christmas canon. If you watch really closely in the movie, you might be able to notice that the song is sung during a rainstorm in the middle of summer. These are the facts guys, I don’t make them up. In fact the Von Trap family spends most of their Christmas season running and hiding from Nazis. Definitely not one of their favorite things.

So you know how Santa has that one Donkey exclusively to deliver toys in Italy? No?

CHINGITY CHING! According to the song, Santa keeps Dominick around because his reindeer can’t handle the hills in Italy. Santa’s FLYING reindeer. The reindeer that FLY over housetops, mountains, oceans, and EVERYTHING apparently lose their crap once they see the hills in Italy, so Santa has to drag out this donkey like a spare tire. This Donkey speaks Italian and dances with the kids, because apparently Santa abandons his whole secrecy kick once in Italy, busts out his donkey, and parties in the streets. Good thing he doesn’t kick, right?