Mainlining Christmas

Oh, what a long, strange year it's been. Lindsay and I now find ourselves in a new city and a new time zone. And, thanks to a ridiculous number of clearanced CDs we found used and a few targeted purchases from Amazon, we've got a healthy serving of new Christmas music. At the time I'm writing this, my playlist of new music includes approximately 1000 songs (an exact count would be extremely difficult, since there are likely duplicates appearing on various compilations). Keep in mind this is in addition to the music we had last year - all told, we're now over 2,000 tracks of holiday cheer. Last year, I went through my music collection alphabetically by song to make sure I got to experience the love and joy inherent to each and every one of those goddamn songs. Ah, the memories. This year, I thought I'd try something a bit different and try to go through the new music album by album. This... might take a while. Album: An American Christmas Artist: Folk Like

The Twenty-Four Days Before Christmas Madeline L’Engle, 1984 Premise: Vicky Austin is always excited in December, but there’s a lot more to be excited about this year, since she’s been cast as an angel in the Christmas Pageant, although her Mother is very pregnant, and who knows whether she’ll be home for Christmas! This little short story was.... fine. Cute, even. It’s all from little Vicky’s perspective, so the drama is very small and the solutions are very black-and-white. Oh, no! Mommy might be in the hospital over Christmas! Oh, now she’s being sensibly reassured. Oh no! Vicky is too clumsy to be an angel! Oh, Mom just taught her how to walk with a book on her head, so she’ll be fine. Well, good thing there wasn’t any tension. The title alludes to the Austin family’s habit of doing something “special” every day leading up to Christmas. However, since some of those “special” things are as simple as opening Christmas cards and there isn’t even a list of all the activities for ki

Day three of "25 Christmas Eves" appears below. Every day between the 1st and 25th of December, I'm posting new genre fiction. Today's is a short piece entitled, "Mistletoe." By: Erin L. Snyder It’s bitter cold, but that doesn’t stop Patty from staking out the door, mug of eggnog in hand, to greet each new arrival as they enter. Wendel’s the next to show up, gift clutched tightly (yet another bottle of wine, wrapped in metallic green foil), and he practically runs into Patty, who stops him with a wry smile. “Wendel,” she says pointing upward. “Mistletoe.” She grabs his tie and pulls him into a kiss tasting of sweetened alcohol, sugar cookies, swedish meatballs (courtesy of Beth, who’s been eying Patty’s greetings, and may have just mouthed something uncomplimentary beneath her breath about her former roommate), candy canes, and a single bite of Jacob’s fruit cake that Patty had indulged in “just to see if it’s really as bad as they say” (much to he

Oh. Oh wow! I forgot all about this show, but it all came rushing back at the first notes of the opening music. This is a holiday-themed short based on the Paddington books. I love Paddington, and I especially love this Paddington. There’s a dry British wit at play here, as well as copious amounts of charm. The animation is the real star, though. Paddington himself is a three dimensional stop-motion bear, and some of the things he interacts with are three dimensional, but all the people and the backgrounds are two-dimensional cut outs. The use of color is very deliberate, and all the voices are done by the same narrator. In all, it’s very evocative of reading a picture book. The story of this particular short is just a straightforward account of Paddington’s experience with Christmas, with little jokes about his gifts and special note of all the tasty food. It’s sweet, and amusing, and well worth tracking down just for the unique style. Here, it’s only five minutes: http://ww

I can't remember ever hearing of "Bump in the Night," but Lindsay swears it was popular in its day. It was a stop motion series from the mid-90's about a monster named Bumpy and his friends. We wound up getting the hour-long Christmas special on the "Christmas Cartoon Collection" DVD Lindsay found for six bucks at Toys R Us. Calling this bizarre is an understatement: it's one of the strangest Christmas specials I've ever seen... and that's saying something. Bumpy sets out on a quest to steal Santa's sack of gifts from the North Pole. On the way he manipulates others into assisting him by promising them presents. The animation is impressive. It's warped and twisted, as is the writing. The jokes are farther apart than I'd have liked, but most are clever (some were exceptionally so). Ultimately, we're left with something mixed. It has an amazing tone thanks to a shockingly dark sense of humor, but the pace is way too slow. Th

Ah yes, the olden days, when Christmas was a time of mingling between the upper and lower classes, and the lords and the peasants sang together unless the peasants were pissed off. Early Britain: a time of terribly inaccurate costume choices and horrible child acting. This was a very odd program. It must be in the public domain or very cheap, because it’s on two of our collections of Classic TV Christmas episodes. Like most of the programs I’ve seen from this time, there is little-to-no visible indication of snow, winter, or nighttime, even when it would seem that those things would be relevant. The “acting” is all around ridiculous and the production values are trying to be better than they are. In any case, this story follows an annoying young peasant lad, Davie, who has a lilting soprano and an unnatural affection for a goose who he’s decided is his only friend. When the new local manor lord objects to Davie gathering mistletoe in his game preserve, Mildred the goose darts u

Every day at midnight between December 1st and December 25th I'll be posting new genre fiction about Christmas Eve. Today's a short horror story called "Heirlooms". By: Erin L. Snyder The box was gold, decorated with pearl-white ribbons and silver beads, many of which had fallen off over the years. Teresa took a handkerchief and wiped off some of the accumulated dust from the outside before continuing. “Alice. Alice, dear,” she said. “Please come sit with me.” Her daughter came over and sat cross-legged on the floor. “No, Dear. Up on the couch.” Teresa never raised her voice around her daughter. Alice was special. She was smart, but there’d always been something different about the girl. She didn’t see the world quite the same way as other children. A few years earlier, Teresa had taken Alice to see an old college friend of hers who taught psychology at the University. She’s not autistic, her friend had said, somewhat apologetically. At least, I don’t think sh