Some Things I Actually Enjoy About The Christmas Season

Six Things I Actually Enjoy About The Christmas Season
by Rob Cottignies

Believe it or else, the point of Christmas is to celebrate the life of Jesus Christ.

When he was born (likely months after December 25^th), three wise men brought him gifts.

Somehow, this holiday has gotten so mangled that we must now get gifts or at least a card for each person we have ever known for more than twelve seconds.

I have been called Grinch, Scrooge, curmudgeon, and probably other colorful names due to my Christmas-time (and all-the-time) grumpiness. I have never tried to ruin the holiday for anyone but always met it with unflappable contempt.

But enough humbuggery.

As the title spoiled, this article describes some things related to this season that I actually enjoy.

Yule love it!

Snow

(I took this picture)

I enjoy looking at, playing in, and shoveling snow, though I certainly will not remove it from your stupid property so don't even ask.

Everything looks glorious, the big flakes make for great pictures, and sometimes you can witness a fool slipping and getting hurt. Everybody wins when it snows!

It also makes me smile when people whine and complain about snow as if it doesn't happen every Winter in all of its magnificent flaky whiteness.

Unfortunately, people my age (currently 41) like to say they have “outgrown” snow because now they must shovel instead of playing in it.

I say do both!

Jump off a porch into a fresh pile of snow and I dare you to not enjoy it.

Christmas Eve (Sarajevo 12/24)

This song was made popular by the Trans-Siberian Orchestra, who released the original version on their 1995 album Dead Winter Dead. You may have seen the popular video featuring holiday lights that blink in rhythm to the song.

Unfortunately, something compellingly sad inspired this great tune.

A cellist (cello-player) who had left Sarajevo, the capital of Bosnia-Herzegovina, returned years later (in 1992) to find the city in ruins and still at war.

Amid the fighting and bombing, he climbed what was left of a fountain and began playing his cello to show that not all beauty was lost to destruction. He imagined both sides enjoying his music had they bothered to stop fighting for a moment.

This idea is represented in the song by the orchestra and heavy guitars “doing battle” with each other.

Each day for 22, he played a piece by composer Tomaso Albinoni to honor the 22 civilians killed on that spot while waiting for food hand-outs.

The hope for ending fighting failed, but his story lives on in this and many other songs written about him.

His name is Vedran Smailović.

Krampus

In Germanic folklore, Saint Nicholas brings gifts to good children every December.

Bad children, however, get to deal with his partner, a goat-like Hellbeast named Krampus. This creature arrives with a whip and chains to stuff bad kids into a bag and bring them to his lair of punishment.

It has been suggested Krampus stepped in because bratty kids were no longer afraid of a jolly man bringing them coal.

On the fifth night of each December (known as Krampusnacht), parades are held all around Europe (and other parts of the world) in which drunks dress up as insane goat-men and terrorize children into behaving well.

It is a wonderful reminder that Christmas can be both joyous and horrifying.

If you would like to learn more about Krampus and his exploits, start with this website.

(To note: The 2015 horror film called Krampus was entertaining but lacked ties to the traditional story.)

Bad Santa

Though I grew up admiring anti-heroes like Ebenezer Scrooge and the Grinch, I was always disappointed when their stories ended with the characters being nice. Sure, people can change, but those complete-180s never struck me as believable.

I would watch about ­two-thirds of the films then gleefully imagine my own unhappy endings.

But in 2003, a drunken Billy Bob Thornton stepped in to save the day.

I watched with joy as his Santa would get drunk, vomit, get drunk, steal things, get drunk, pick up questionable women, and get drunk, all while saving some time to get drunk.

I laughed and loved it but was saddened by the thought of the tale ending “nicely”.

Without ruining anything, the story finished in the most negatively happy way possible.

How could anyone not change after hanging with Thurman Merman for a few weeks!?

Add this film to your holiday list, but you should probably watch it without kids around.

Christmas Date Rape

Apparently, the actual name is this tune is ‘Baby, It’s Cold Outside’.

Frank Loesser, who wrote songs for popular plays like Guys & Dolls, would perform it with his wife, who cherishingly referred to it as “our song” until Frank greedily sold its rights for financial gain.

The song is about a woman who is trying to leave a man’s house but he keeps trying to convince her to stay with increasingly aggressive and creepy rebuttals. Lyrics such as, ‘Hey, what’s in this drink?’ clue the listener in on the guy’s nefarious intentions.

While I am no fan of date rape, the subject being so overt in a popular noel amuses me greatly.

DMX Owning Rudolph

We all know that DMX- the heavy metal of rap- can make any situation better.

But could he possibly improve a beloved decades-old holiday tune? Well, see for yourself.

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I hope you appreciated this possibly-unexpected list of Christmas-related things I like (and the odd paragraph alignment, which I had no control over). Perhaps you now have some insight to my view of the holiday.

For a more-expected list, here are some things I do not enjoy about the Christmas season: eggnog, parents lying to their trusting children, greed, people who insist Die Hard is a Christmas movie, increased traffic, obligatory gifts, commercials that use the melodies of carols to sell their stupid products, icicle lights, and the murdering of oxygen-giving pine trees.

Happy Holidays, you filthy animals.