Some of you may remember my averse reaction to the most morbid Christmas ornament ever to grace this planet, the Disembodied Santa Head (Of Death). For those of you who are unfamiliar with this abomination, it is a depiction of Santa’s head, “wearing a cheery grin and jolly blue eyes” (which stare glassily ahead, while the open mouth lolls emptily). This thing has a motion sensor in its hat, so whenever someone walks by, it will bellow “HO HO HO!! Meeeerrry Christmas!!” and then burst into “song”, i.e. a tinny rendition of one of 12 Christmas carols. I cannot explain why I dislike it so viciously. I only know that it is a vile thing, and I hate it deeply.
My 11-year-old little brother, Tauri, on the other hand, finds the St. Nick of Satan hilarious,and also rejoices in my hatred for the ornament. Because of this, a sort of silent war has developed between my brother and I; every now and then Creepy Claus will surface in some weird place and I will be forced to throw it out of the nearest window. Tauri will then recover the head and store it for future attacks upon my sanity.
Now, however, it has gone too far. I awoke this morning at around 9 am. The house was empty, seeing as my brothers had dispersed to their respective schools, my father had gone to work and my mother had gone down to the university. Strange, then, that I should hear a strange, persistent, tinny noise in my still-not-quite-awake ears. Listening to it, I began slowly to recognize it for what it was, and my heart sank. Pulling on my dressing gown, I hoisted myself out of bed and made my way towards the noise. It was coming from Tauri’s room. I opened the door and damn near screamed.
The last time I had come face to face with the Disembodied Santa Head, the batteries were running out, turning the “HO HO HO!!” jingle into a sort of hoarse, throaty, mostly unintelligible garbling that sounded like Kris Kringle had a stroke which paralyzed half of his face, then decided to celebrate the fact by downing about 35 eggnogs. Now, however, the batteries had been replaced, and a ringing-tone-like rendition of “O Tannenbaum” was blasting away like nobody’s business from within the Head, which had been propped up against a table lamp.
This was not, however, the worst part, as I quickly realized why Santa kept going on and on with his repertoire and would not shut up. Placed conveniently on the table, about 10 cm. from the Head, was a motion-activated dancing Coca-Cola can. I remember one of these from my early childhood: a Coke can wearing sunglasses, made of (rubber? plastic? something bendy, anyway,) that responded to any noise by starting to twist around until the noise stopped. Tauri has probably bought this thing from the flea market his class held last weekend (and when I find out from whom it was purchased, they will pay), and had kept it hidden just for this moment.
The Santa Head is turned on. It starts going through its horrible “HO HO HO!” number. The Motion-Activated Dancing Coke Can (Of Death] responds to the sound by starting to twist and flop around like an epileptic spermatozoa. The Head reacts to the motion by continuing its song. The Can continues dancing. My 11-year-old brother has created an infernal perpetual motion machine. Of Death.
This means war. I will bury both Santa and Cokey in the back yard. In an unmarked grave. Then I will have my revenge.
Silly? Why would this be silly?
