I don’t know how it is where the rest of you live, but here in Massachusetts it seems as if everyone waits for the Easter Bunny to take down their Christmas decorations.(My thanks to Pepper Mill for that observation.) Around here there are still a LOT of houses with Santas and Reindeer and Snowmen. Brown wreaths and “kissing balls” hang forgotten on doors and porches, just waiting to catch fire.
Don’t people REALIZE this? After all, they had the sense of decoration and timing to put these things UP in the first place. Don’t they knew they’re rotting on their doors? Don’t they care?
My favorite is the house in East Cambridge that has the Santa Claus up. It’s had that Santa Claus up for at least eight years running, and God knows how long before that.
In Southbridge, Mass. the Square in front of the Police Station still has Christmas Bunting, Christmas Lights, and Santa and his Sleigh up.
Actually, we took down our tree lights on Friday. It was the first warm time when me and my brother were home to do it. The lights on the bushes and house came down earlier but they don’t require as much work. Usually, we take them down earlier but time and weather didn’t cooperate this year.
Some leeway can be given for keeping up Christmas lights. Lights staying up past Easter though is just being lazy. It makes homeowners look as lazy and apathetic as not mowing the lawn for three weeks. It just looks messy.
Well, I didn’t get my lights down until late February. blush
That said, I think one could argue that there is nothing wrong with leaving up lights. Winter (around here anyway) is pretty goddamn bleak, and if you want to adorn your shrubbery with some twinkling good cheer throughout the cold season, I’m all for it. This doesn’t have to be a Christmas thing.
HOWEVER, Santas, reindeer, sleighs, nativity scenes, penguins bearing gifts, carolers, elves, giant flashing misteltoe, and signs saying “yule” “noel” or “merry christmas” in any language are clearly seasonal. Get those damn things put away before the crocuses start poking through.
Lights that are not lite and come down in the spring are fine. I’m about to remove the reindeer from a neighbors house though, but it kind of goes with the car parts, broken furniture, broken cars, and appliances they’ve collected in the yard for the last four or five years. They never rake the leaves or mow the lawn until it’s at least twelve inches tall. They dump their trash out in the yard to blow across the neighborhood. The wife is a forger and drug user. I did manage to get three vehicles removed from their yard. I will be working on the rest all year until they leave or everything is cleaned up.
I suppose we beat the rush. We never put anything up.
When we do, we’ll have a difference of opinion as to when to put Christmas stuff up and to take it down. My family always put the tree up the day after Thanksgiving, and took it down on January 6. Saint Zero, however, would put the tree up a week before Christmas and take it down the day after.
I really couldn’t care less. I hate nosy neighbors.
Neighbor: Why do you have that on your house?
Me: Cause I damn well please, SCRAM!
You do whatever you want with your house whenever you want. Just as long as it ain’t noisy and you keep it on your side of the property line, be all means, go ahead and do it. You pay/payed for your house, you deserve it.
Not calling Cal nosy here. I just don’t like people who tell me what to do with stuff I own.
Understood, and I’m not being nosy, I think. But if yor friends and neighbors won’t tell you…
You can leave your icicle lights up all year if you want, it’s your business. But having a needle-shedding totally brown wreath or “kissing ball” on your door or porch is just ugly. It’s the holiday decoration equivalent of a rusting car chassis in your front yard. And the thing is that the house owner knew and cared enough to put it up fresh and new only a couple of months befoew.
