Now watching "White Christmas"

That's all. (I'm under the impression that I'm on Facebook or Twitter.)

Stay tuned for more updates on everything I'm doing ... too bad I don't have a mobile device so I could post while driving ... I'm not going anywhere closer to Boston than Malden.

Happy holidays to you all

It's Christmas Eve and I'm settled in at 7:45 a.m. watching "A Charlie Brown Christmas." It is the last on my yearly watching schedule of stuff I have on VHS or DVD. The other stuff is "A Christmas Carol" (the one with Alastair Sim from 1956), "Miracle on 34th Street" (the one with a tiny Natalie Wood), "It's a Wonderful Life" and of course "A Christmas Story."

I have to try and squeeze "White Christmas" in there today, somehow ... and although I tried to watch "How the Grinch Stole Christmas" on network TV last night, I was distracted by the discovery of a whole bunch of broken links on NBPT Biz.

This year I haven't had much time to think about Christmas. So I kind of feel as does Charlie Brown.

Think I'll find some Christmas spirit before tonight, when my family celebrates en masse in Gloucester?

Merry Christmas all you people that celebrate the holiday and thank you for your support.

Go see the wreaths

These are a couple of the wreaths that are on (silent) auction at the Custom House Maritime Museum. It's really cool to go in there and see all the wreaths hanging on the wall and up the staircase.

Proceeds from the auction, which marks the end of the Holiday House Tour this Saturday, will go towards exhibits at the museum.

I've never taken the house tour, but I know it's very popular. The wreaths were made by all kinds of people - doctors, businesses, kids, professional florists, a fly fisherman - it's very cool. Even if you don't need a wreath, it's pretty cool to look at them.

My fave is the patridge in the pear tree one. You can't tell but the partridge is all hand-made hooked. And the other one - well, I like the fact that the Christmas tree is reflected in the balls.

The bidding starts at $25.

Can the Christmas trees

Better late than never, right? Besides, the city has not collected the trees yet.

Christmas trees and the beach do not mix; at least not on the PI beach (Daily News report).

Under ordinary circumstances, ye olde used Christmas tree helps trap sand on a beach. I hear that in Gloucester, they use them to retard erosion on Wingaersheek Beach (don't you love that name?). I can't find any evidence online of this, but it's what I heard.

From About.com, regarding recycling Christmas trees (I use them for #3, the bird habitat):

Christmas trees can be used to help reduce erosion on shorelines of oceans, lakes or rivers. The branches and trunk provide barriers that help lessen the amount of sand washed away by the water. They can also help rebuild areas, especially after hurricanes, by collecting sand deposits.

Check with your state's Department of Natural Resources to see if they have a need for your Christmas trees.

Thing is, we got big old sandbags on the beach now, and the engineer who had them put there said that the important thing now is to keep debris off the beach so the bags don't get ripped open. The bags are full of sand ... but that's not the point.

Another Christmas story

Every Christmas Eve we would drive to Aunt Sylvia and Uncle Bud's house. It was the tradition - and the way we exchanged gifts with my dad's family (sister Sylvia and other sister Mildred and families).

It wasn't very far, but every year I would worry that someone would break into our house and steal all the really good gifts under our tree, at home.

Isn't it just too cool that my Christmas memories involve worry?

Anyway ... we'd get to Aunt Sylvia's, where it was always about 85 degrees. I think we wore shorts and T-shirts.

She always had these gigantic trees with equally gigantic ornaments and lights. I recall a string of some kind of plastic cylinder with a whirlygig inside that rotated with the heat from the light. It was kind of fascinating, actually.

She was also the first person in the family to get a color TV. Well, she and Uncle Bud (he was the one who shot his dog in the ass while hunting, from some random story I told months ago).

We always had overcooked turkey and scalloped potatoes from Aunt Mildred that had unidentifiable black bits in it.

Aunt Mildred had 3 children who turned Jehovah's Witness. At first they would appear on Christmas Eve and lecture us about the fallacy of the celebration. Then they stopped coming altogether, which was a drag in one way but not in other ways.

Aunt Sylvia died a few years back - on Christmas Day.

We hadn't had the Christmas Eve get together for years because she and Uncle Bud had moved 'up north' (northern Michigan) and then my immediate family all moved out here. Uncle Bud had died a few years before.

But I do remember a later Christmas Eve, at Aunt Mildred's house. All I remember is watching a video of The Nutcracker ballet featuring Michail Baryshnikov, and Aunt Mildred commenting about his ... well, let's just say it was surprising, but hilarious.

P.S. No one has sent me a Christmas memory. I'm going to have to start making them up soon.

Writers rule, man

What do you actually know about this dude Santa Claus? Do you believe, like many people do about marriage, that he has been around forever?

Is anyone else alarmed by the notion that he "sees you when you're sleeping?" Why does he need to see you when you're sleeping, I have to ask myself?

A long time ago I interviewed an exchange student from Denmark who had exchanged her life in that scenic country for one year in Flint.

It was a Christmas story, but without digging out the relevant issue of East Village Magazine from a box under my bed, I only remember one thing: her family would put out some bizarre food like custard for their version of Santa, and that she said the mice ate it all.

Maybe the life in Denmark wasn't all that great if there were all those mice running about eating the custard.

I find it interesting that a lot of the things people believe, or at least lie to their kids about, come from pagan rites. (I don't blame people for telling their kids that there's a Santa Claus, by the way; I think it's a good thing.)

In the British colonies of North America and later the United States, British and Dutch versions of the gift-giver merged further. For example, in Washington Irving's History of New York, (1809), Sinterklaas was Americanized into "Santa Claus" but lost his bishop's apparel, and was at first pictured as a thick-bellied Dutch sailor with a pipe in a green winter coat. Irving's book was a lampoon of the Dutch culture of New York, and much of this portrait is his joking invention. (Source: Wikipedia)

Oh that Washington Irving - what a jokester.

Santa as the jolly old elf only became popular in the U.S. after the guy who wrote The Night Before Christmas described him, in the 19th century (1823). The word "elf" and the fact that he slips down the chimney implies that he was less than what we consider full sized (no offense intended to my elfin readers).

So if you read the entire Wikipedia entry, you could believe that good ol' Santy is actually quite goat-like.

Surprisingly, not everyone in the world "thinks" Santa lives at the North Pole. Why would you tell your kids that he lives 2 streets over? Hmmmm?

Whatever the origin, or the case, the legend of Santa Claus has become quite the advertising icon. And he's probably been around longer than the institution of marriage.

Wow, wait til you find out about the Christmas tree (if you don't know already).

Christmas stories

I'm running out of my own Christmas stories, so anyone who has a good one should send it along to me. Please?

I'll publish it anonymously, if you so desire.

"I like the Tinman"

OK, so I've got these three friends that I used to work with at New England Medical Center, in the 1980s: we are each a "Miss," although the others are - or were - married.

Miss Donna, Miss Jean, Miss Katie and me, Miss Gill.

We meet once a year, usually right before Christmas. Our last meeting was Dec. 8. I won't go into the details of my torturous trip to Bedford, where Miss Katie and her family live. Suffice it to say that proximity to Lowell seems to have inhibited my ability to find places that I've been before.

Anyway ... this year, initially Miss Donna suggested we go shopping in Newburyport, which we've done in the past (before I lived here). She was going into raptures over the neat little stores we frequented in the past when I burst her little shopping bubble by telling her they were mostly all gone now.

Instead, Miss Jean and I met at Miss Katie's and carpooled it over to Miss Donna's in Walpole.

I was only an hour late, by the way. It wasn't my fault!

And then, of course, once on our way to Walpole we spotted a liquor store advertising a wine and cheese tasting ... Miss Katie screeched into the parking lot and we entered.

(Remind me to tell you about the 5 martini after-work get together at Zoots, if I haven't already.)

The point of all this is that Miss Katie and I were one day long ago in her boss' office. Her boss confessed to never having seen "A Christmas Story." After we recovered from our shock, we gave her a quick rundown of the plot.

We then informed her that she really should watch the movie.

She replied that she thought no matter how funny the movie was, our little presentation had to be way funnier.

Ah, those were the days ... actually, they weren't ... those were the moments.

These ladies are some of the only people I've ever known for this long (20 years, at least) who have not changed. Or perhaps we're only the same when we're together.

Miss Donna suggested I write a book about our adventures, and Miss Katie suggested "I like the Tinman" as the title of one of the chapters.

Not a finga!

I would love to have A Christmas Story that is as entertaining as the movie of the same name. (Have you seen it? It's terrific.)

Sure, my parents once fooled me by putting my "most wanted" gift behind the curtains and then, after we opened presents and I was a tad disappointed, asked me to open the curtains.

It was a Beatles album.

I guess it must be a thing that parents do.

But my dad never swore at the furnace, nor did he receive a plastic leg lamp, complete with fishnet hose, as a "major award."

He did, however, 'appropriate' a sign from a Santa's village that read "Santa's Out to Lunch" because he thought it was so funny. It was forever after displayed as part of the Christmas regalia.

"Forever" means until it did not appear anymore. To be honest, I have not laid eyes on it for years. But I still recall it fondly, even though it was an ill gotten gain.

As far as I remember, we never had an Oldsmobile. And we always had - and still do have - roast beast with Yorkshire pudding and roasted potatoes for Christmas dinner. But we did have a lot of meatloaf throughout the year.

Meatloaf, smeatloaf, double beatloaf. I hate meatloaf.