The radio station that my wife and I tend to listen to in the morning has started to play Christmas music and nothing else. It’s Fucking November!!! I can understand why they are talking about Christmas events and parties that will be going on, but moving Christmas this far forward is ridiculous. I thought the run up to Christmas did not start until after Thanksgiving but apparently I was wrong, I must have missed that memo :rolleyes: What’s next, Christmas starting in August, or maybe June. Hell, why not just start the run up to Christmas in January so that we have a nice long lead in.
This just pisses me off.
I usually don’t mind Christmas songs at Christmas or an odd one or two in the weeks before, but two bloody months.
I’m trying to regain the vitriol I felt this morning but it just ain’t there, what can I tell ya.
At Border’s the Christmas books had begun to accumulate in August. By mid-September we had to stop putting them on the rolling shelves in the stock room; they were boxed and stacked. A week before Halloween when there were four six-foot stacks of boxes we started putting them out.
We’ve been getting Christmas music on each digital music update that’s arrived since the start of October. Every day a new Christmas album becomes available for us to inflict upon our customers; every day a new Christmas album to destroy our minds with. You do not understand horror until you’ve had to hear Harry Connick Jr. sing “The Happy Elf” ten times a week.
In a couple of weeks, I’ll be in between semesters for my post doc, and I have the option of working a seasonal job in
a well known shop in a huge shopping mall that offers $10/hour pay, 30% discount, and a 20% discount on 5 or 6 other rather nice shops in that same mall
a hard 12-hour/day stint in a student bookstore doing massive inventory and shelving.
Store 1 is already playing Christmas music non stop.
Store 2 lets employees bring in their own cds and sock them into the sound system; Christmas music is verboten.
The shopping center that houses the only grocery store within walking distance of my house put up their decorations the day after halloween. The halloween candy disappeared that same day and the shelves were chock full of christmas candies. WTF happened to THANKSGIVING?? What about Hannuka (sp?) and Yule? What the hell is so fucking great about christmas anyway?!?!? :mad:
Are you in the Detroit area? There’s a local station playing 24/7 Christmas music here, too. My sister and I were riffing on the songs MST3K-style the other day, and realizing “oh yeah, we’re goin’ to Hell.”
I’m guessing it’s a Clear Channel station. Their easy-listening format station in Dallas (Sunny 97.1) started right after Halloween. And since Clear Channel is every-freakin-where, there’s probably one near you! :rolleyes:
Hey, it could be worse. You could work in a country-western-themed steakhouse with a jukebox. A free jukebox. Every day, you could be treated to such wonderful hits as:
I Love This Bar
I Love This Bar
American Soldier
I Love This Bar
The Pledge Of Allegiance
American Soldier
I Love This Bar
Don’t Take The Girl
Have You Forgotten
I Love This Bar
It’s an absolute joy, I tell you. Day in, day out, every day. And the employees play this crap! Hell, even if there were a Tears For Fears CD in there, I’d still play some obscure country once in a while just for a change of pace. We did have some fun last time they updated the selection; they included a Greatest Modern Hits album that contained such classics as Korn’s “Freak on a Leash”, and Kid Rock’s “Bawitdaba”. Try playing that at a restaurant full of 50-year-old southern women. Hilarity ensued. The jukebox was gone and replaced within a week. Can’t imagine why.
(Sorry about the slight hijack, but the point still stands…things could be worse.)
Rhubarb, my wife thinks the station may be a Clear Channel station but I have absolutely no idea.
Jenaroph, that’s kind of scary. Yes, we live in the metro Detroit area.
I generally don’t mind Christmas songs, but only around Christmas time. My parents own a few Christmas albums and we use to get them out and listen to them while we were putting up decorations and cleaning the house and things, but only a week or two before Christmas.
The breakfast show host does a bunch of other things which bug me too, but it is one of the few stations we can get in the house and it is better than most. Yesterday he was talking about “Love Actually” and saying it might be a good film to rent for your kids but
There is a plot line about two people who meet on the set of a porno film. They are regularly shown mimicing sex acts (sometimes clothed, sometimes not) so the film crew can set up the shot. Not so kid friendly really
This morning he took it back and said he was mistaken, which was a good thing to do, but he makes mistakes like that all the time where he thinks he knows more than he does and just starts sounding off.
They have all their Christmas decorations and ornaments down in the Lawn & Gerden department, across from Hardware. They also carry Christmas CD’s in this section. There is a kiosk display of CD’s that features panels you can press to play three ten-to-fifteen-second selections from each particular CD.
When I work in the cash wrap in that area, all day long I hear the selections from each and every one of those CD panels. It would be okay if they played the whole song to completion, but no, they cut off right when you get into the song. It’s maddening. And every freaking time a customer passes that kiosk, they just have to stop and push every panel there. If I hear Louis Armstrong cut off in the midst of,“Let It Snow!” one more time, I am going to take all of those CD’s for a little field trip to the microwave section.
Related to this rant is the fact that the toy department (a seasonal thing) is also located in this area. And there is a toy that plays the first fifteen seconds of, “The Lion Sleeps Tonight” when you push a button. Good Lord Almighty, do those kids like to push that button over and over and over again. Little crumb snatchers.
I happen to like Christmas music. (Ow! Stop throwing stuff!) But I have an Xmas rant anyway.
The theme colors for Christmas are red AND GREEN. Not just red. No wonder people hate Christmas nowadays! If all you see is red, red, red, of course you’re angry! Stop making the stores look like an explosion in a blood bank!
I Feel Your Pain.
I used to work in a mall department store…right next to the “seasonal” area. So from October through…oh…end of JANUARY, I had to put up with those stupid “singing Santas” and “singing lightpoles” (yes, they really had one. Don’t ask. It was horrifying.) and my LEAST favorite of all: the damn Christmas light-strands that play HORRIBLE Christmas MIDIs and blink in time with the songs. And of COURSE we couldn’t turn them off; they were supposed to be a DISPLAY ITEM.
Then as soon as the Christmas stuff got cleared out, it was time for Easter stuff! Including those chirpy little chicks that chirp when they sit on your hand! (Evidently that completes a circuit or something, because they didn’t chirp when sitting on glass, but would if sitting on a metal plate.) And the sheep that went BAA (same scenario). And the chicken (Note: NOT a rooster, a CHICKEN) that went “COCK-A-DOODLE-DOO!” when the circuit was completed. And of course they had all these cheeping, baa-ing, and crowing things sitting on a metal plate “For Demonstration Purposes” constantly. I wish I had read the Discworld books before then; at least I could’ve amused myself with the concept of a dyslexic rooster.
Four. Freaking. Years. FIVE. Freaking. Christmas. Seasons.
I do not go into malls anymore between Thanskgiving and Groundhog’s Day. And I certainly do not go into That Store anymore.
