**CANDY, FOOD, AND PRESENTS!
AND LOTS OF THEM!** 
-Holidays mean accepting insincere wishes for well-being.
-They mean that most everyone is going to assume that I am Christian.
-It means increased frequency of “Clapper” and “Chia-Pet” commercials on TV.
-It means that many people that I know are going to spend more than they can afford on gifts for people that they don’t really care about.
-It means that I am going to have to listen to people bitch when their credit card bills come in.
Halloween - making the annual drive to Kentucky 3 weekends in the month of October to work in the Haunted FOrest and raise money for LeBonheur Children’s Hospital. I do this for my 4 year old cousin Ryan, whose already had 5 open heart surgeries.
Thanksgiving - not much attached to this holiday except football games and eating so much turkey, stuffing, cranberry sause, and mashed potatoes that you have to unbuckle your belt to breathe easier.
Christmas - my dad reading the Night Before Christmas on Christmas Eve. My sister and I bugging him and my mother to let us open just one present early - PLEEASE?
And my father’s birthday, which is December 25th. Growing up, my parents didn’t want my sister and I getting Christmas and my dad’s birthday confused, so we used to throw a surprise party every year for him a week or two before Christmas. It soon became a game with us: my dad would try to figure out when we were going to do it and us trying to figure out how to catch him off guard for the nth year in a row. (He sniffs it out about as often as we surprise him.)
Thanksgiving is at my parents’ house these days with 40-50 of our extended family members. Cajun fried turkeys, rice dressing, Grandma’s oyster dressing, every type of pie and side dish imaginable. After the huge dinner the house gets really quiet, as the house is littered with sleeping bodies. After the nap the domino tournament takes place. We are a big 42 family and play until early the next morning.
Christmas is a three day affair. There is a dinner on Christmas Eve at my parents’ house, followed by the candle light church service, and then opening presents at home. Santa then tells us that she is exhausted and would we like the presents now or tomorrow? (I am 27 and Santa still visits me) We usually demand them right then. The next morning we check our stockings, then drive to my grandmother’s house for the big family gathering (larger than the Thanksgiving outing) where we eat another huge dinner and open presents and have another domino tournament. The day after Christmas, relatives are still trickling in visiting, eating, opening presents.
Traditions Every year a few weeks before Christmas we go to all the cemeteries where we have relatives buried to place wreaths on their graves. My grandmother and great-aunt make these wreaths every year. They also take flowers/wreaths for Easter and the birthdays of our dead.
Every Christmas night I go out with my aunt (she’s 1.5 years older than me) and we have a good drunk together - reliving childhood memories, catching up, etc. Not a very healthy tradition, but one we haven’t broken.
For the big family gathering, we draw names for presents. We either make the presents or we have a white elephant auction.
actually the Christmas gig is the only thing that I do like that. Hopeless housekeeper, for example. But yea, it’s a standard joke around Fourth of July “got your Christmas shopping done yet?”. This year (promise not to tell) it’s trivets with him as a sumo ballerina captioned off “tutu hot”. He ** will ** be seriously annoyed.
** Missy ** I’ve got an e-mail in my outbox re: your question. however, for some unknown and odd reason I can’t e-mail out (can GET mail), have called the appropriate person, but haven’t gotten a response. it’s still in my outbox, so as soon as my system gets back online, it’ll be off to you.
I can never remember whether a present was given me for my birthday or Christmas. My birthday is New Year’s Eve(GREAT day for a party). When I was a kid I never missed having a birthday in the middle of the year, because all my gifts came so close together and it seemed like more than my sister’s goodies. Guess I was greedy.
I was born less than two hours before midnight and the joke in my family is that Dad wanted Mom to hurry up so he could have the tax deduction.
My family is Christian but when we were very little my parents would take us to visit Santa Claus, and would pretend he came. I was not quite six though when I learned he didn’t REALLY exist. You see, we opened our presents on Christmas Eve, but it was AFTER we had been to the children’s program at church, so Santa came during that time. On this particular XMas Eve we got in the car to go to church, but suddenly Mom “forgot” something in the house and had to go back. It was dark outside and when she turned on the lights in the kitchen I could see her through the crack in the curtains, and what I saw was her putting away the cookies and milk, to make it look like Santa had eaten them. But I never said I knew it, because just in case I was wrong I didn’t want to not get anything. I figured the Easter Bunny and the Tooth Fairly weren’t rreal either, but so what. Mom says, but I don’t remember, that when she tried to break it to me about Santa, I simply said, “Oh, I know THAT.”
I love the period from Thanksgiving to New Years. Other seem to think of all the busy-ness, but I don’t mind, to me it’s fun. Christmas is the fun holiday, and I don’t think God minds the fun, as long as we remember that it Is His birthday. Easter is the solemn holiday for me, the most holy. I’m always greatful that Someone cared enough to die on my account. I adore Halloween because I love to costume. That’s another reason I like sci-fi conventions, the role-playing and the costuming.
Christmas? Well since I’m not married, don’t have any kids, and have no girlfriend; I guesss I’ll just sleep a little late, watch some vids, and later see if I can find a diner or something that’s open so I can have Christmas dinner. (Who would have thought Denny’s would be closed??? Thank the gods for Norm’s.)
I always have a big party for Halloween and New Years.
The others I don’t celebrate.
Thanksgiving - had some friends over for dinner
Christmas - this year will be just my son and myself, so I’m still contemplating going somewhere.
New Years - supposed to be heading out to see a friend and go to a party.
I’m a party animal as you see 
In past years on Halloween, I have helped children make costumes (and once made a ladybug costume for my turtle; it sat on top of her shell and didn’t bother her). One year my step-grandson and I wore matching frog costumes. And we put a big bowl of candy in the entryway and sometimes wrote down all the different costumes, and how many of each. When I was a child, Halloween was a magical time of passing silvery costumed trick 'n treaters in the dark, and smelling the remnants of leaf fires when people still burned them in town.
Thanksgiving when I was a child meant watching Gramma sew the turkey shut after she stuffed it, and waiting for the Macy’s parade to come on television. Later all the relatives would arrive, and the little cousins would all get to sit at a little card table with our own fancy tablecloth (not enough room for all of us at the big table). Now I think of it as a time for family to get together, and for the past several years, the family Thanksgiving has been at my house.
Christmas actually starts around Thanksgiving for me. I absolutely love Christmas carols, and any Christmas decor. I love snow on Christmas and making paper snowflakes. One year I made all the decorations for our tree, and lots of them were snowflakes.
A tradition that has developed at our house is that everyone who comes here on Christmas day gets at least one gift. Since it never fails that someone nobody was expecting shows up, we always have spare gifts wrapped and hidden, enough that we usually can find something to suit just about anyone. When I was married to my second husband, his pregnant daughter was on complete bedrest the first Christmas we were married, and she lived with us. So when his ex-wife came to our house for Christmas, she received four gifts that we quickly figured out when we realized she would be able to come.
I love to have New Year’s Eve parties. We rent movies, play board games, have radios and/or CD players in the background, and watch the ball drop at Times Square on television. We usually buy pop and sparkling catawba juice and have toasts and hugs and kisses at midnight, all while wearing silly hats and blowing or swinging noise makers.
I wish there were one more holiday to tide me over till Valentine’s Day. Sometimes January seems a little bleak after all the festivities are over.
Halloween - I have absolutely no idea what I’m going to be doing this year. I might be going to a friend’s party, but I might not if she doesn’t hold it. I might go trick-or-treating wiht some buds but I don’t know if I feel like getting lost in a Cleopatra costume. (I’ve lived in this stupid town for twelve years and I’m lucky if I can direct somebody to my house.) I might stay home andhelp hand out candy, but that probobably won’t be a good idea since I’ll eat it. Sigh.
Thanksgiving - A turkey taking up room in our impossibly small freezer for a month comes to mind. Stuffing myself until I’m comatose, as well. (Not that that’s a bad thing, mind you.) Hanging out at my grandmother’s house the entire afternoon, waiting for the turkey to roast, the whole housde warm and full of people talking and laughing above each other. I like Thanksgiving.
Channuka - It’s not really a big thing in our house. Don’t get eight days of presents like QuickSilver’s kids, only one. (Talk to DAVEW007 about that, wouldja?) We light the candles every night, and it’s always very beautiful. It’s kind of sad that that’s the only Jewish holiday we really observe.
Christmas Eve - A holiday on it’s own right in our family. My aunt, grandmother and mom trade off each year whose house sees Christmas Eve and Christmas day. First we go to the church’s Family Service. Then haul everybody over to whoever’s house for cider, cold cuts and, since my uncle was born on Christmas Eve, birthday cake! Huzzah! We talk and laugh and eat until a little one (my 7-year-old brother now) gets overstimulated and cranky. At home, each of the four of us gets to open on present. We leave cookies and milk out for Santa, carrots for Rudolph, and pennies for the elves. And then we go to bed. At least the kids do, mom and dad have to stuff stockings and then go to bed. I’ve made it a private tradition to stay up to around midnight, sneak into the living room, and light up the tree without any other lights on. It’s a pure moment and I think that’s when I really celebrate the meaning of Christmas.
Christmas - see Thanksgiving, add presents. And there’s always one present that’s forgotten or lost or a little late.
New Year’s Eve - Not much. My family stays together and each picks out one movie, and one personal sweet treat, cruncy treat, and soda. We’re usually too into our movies to notice midnight.
A very disjointed ramble …it isn’t pretty…Welcome to my Dante’s Holiday Inferno Going on Since 1976.
I look forward to Christmas about as much as a bikini wax in January.
Depression usually starts mid-November, just before my birthday, but not related to the age thing, and does not go away until Mid January.
It is all related to one simple factor. The holidays are the same fucking dull dull dull goddamn borefest what-ja-get-me glut-o-rama-thons that I personally, could live with out. Did I mention that my Dad died on Christmas day when I was nine? Yeah, that blew chunks for a couple of years, but I ran that excuse dry in my teens and it took me years to figure out why I just don’t like the holidays.
It’s much ado about the totally wrong idea. I like getting together. I like the tree, the singing ( which no one does anymore) but it is like being trapped in the same I LOVE LUCY episode where she is stomping the grapes. You know. You laugh the first time you see it. Put it on a loop and after the tenth viewing, you aren’t even smiling anymore.
Everyone is afraid to try soemthing different: Food. Location. Saying no to the parents or inlaws. When you offer suggestions, they look at you like you nailed Jesus to the cross yourself.
Having said that with no rancor (snort)I must explain in a way that does not make me come off as a spoiled greedy child. ( We all are.) Every year of my life, the presents from my family are the cheezy crap fest gifts that are in the Under $10 Last Minute Shopper Bin. Sausage Logs, Makeup kits for teenage whores with perfume to match. I got very good at returning things without receipts. By the time I was 13 , I could return a White Elephant. (Ask my husband, I’ve returned office equipment that we’ve used for months and received a full refund.)
It wasn’t the crappy gift that bothered me, it was the waste of time and money involved. I (we) were raised frugally. I am more offended by a waste of money. No matter how many times I said, " Instead of a neon bathrobe that cost $12 ( price tag still in pocket and was most certianly marked down to probably $3-4) why not get me a gift certificate for the same amount leaving me to chose what I want." Naturally, this fell on deaf ears. By the time I was 15, I started my annual Xmas campaign of " Gift certificates or donate what you would have spent on me to a charity of your choice." This has never happened. They don’t get it and I haven’t given a present to anyone in my family save my mother for years.
Then I meet my husband. The happy family. If I said all I want is a red turtle neck shirt. That’s it. I would get every color and (ugh) print turtle neck shirt out there. In a 1x. ( I am a medium.) No problem, I’m a whiz at exchanges, except the turtle necks in stock are picked over and the crappy colors and out of my size.Because I will not return anything until January. So I buy something practical, like underwear.
It is a complete reversal of what I was raised with and I see (and view it )as a persons chance to either try to buy my affection (not my husband, but his family in general) or as a general absolution for someone’s stupidity during the year in hopes that I will forget their bone headedness.
I have to change my attitude, I am told, so I can raise my children to act like crack addicts with a severe case of the Gimme’s on the 25th. What I would like to teach them is that their Momma and Daddy love them very much and bought them X amount of toys. And Santa thought they were very good and bought them one or two special toys and just have the grandparents kick into the Santa Slush Fund for a big mega kick ass toy.
Naturally, this has been poo pooed all the way home.
I cannot tolerate the overspending on crap I/We/The Kids do not need. What I need. What My husband needs. And what my kids need is nothing no one will spend that kind of money on. I would prefer a couple of smaller gifts for the kids and the rest put into a college fund. This, too, is looked down upon.
I also vigorously campaign in the Save The Earth, READ my LIPS " No More Christmas Paper". Instead, use up all the grocery bags and decorate them with the 3000 bows and ribbons that you stock piled from your weddings and baby showers that you never seem to use. BECAUSE every FUCKING YEAR you all bitch about the truck load of wrapping paper and boxes that is shoved into the garbage bag. We are family. It’s ok to do this. We don’t have to suck ass to anyone. Save the nice paper for the true butt kissing.
But my campaign of No More Gifts To Anyone Over The Age of 18 has finally been approved by the House. Still working on the WHY DON’t We Eat Pizza Instead OF THE SAME FUCKING TURKEY DINNER EVERY YEAR? Which has been an on going battle since 1978.
I have come to view all gift giving time periods as this:
No one gives you something without expecting something or asking for something in exchange.(This is followed up by " No one gives you something for free that runs too well.") I can only pray that that I don’t pass this along to my kids and at the same time, do hope that I do.
Great thread. Christmas has come early now and I am depressed.
End rant.
It means that the weather here in Southern California will be a lot better. There’s nothing like a cool winter in California.
Thanksgiving: We will enjoy some good chicken. All of us hate turkey.
Christmas: Yay. Money!
New Year’s: Ah Las Vegas. How I have missed you so…
Oops…I guess I wandered into the wrong thread. I shall take my melancholy elsewhere…
[Eeyore]Sometimes people talk about the super-terrific gift that they wanted, and got, for Xmas, or the super-terrific gift that they wanted and didn’t get. They ask me “What did you want that you didn’t get?” and I say “Love”. Well, that’s being dramatic, but it’s true. I didn’t want any material thing for Xmas or my birthday anywhere near as much as I wanted a family; Dad not sulking, Mom not drinking, sis not coming home with the crisis du jour, and no one screaming and ranting at anyone else. My gifts were mostly thrown at me, like “Here’s the big-ticket item, the bike/dollhouse/stereo/etc.; now you are to stop all this depression crap and stop glooming around just because we make you an outsider in your own home.” And what really burned me was that the gifts were essentially junk. The fur coat was fake, the bike was unloaded on us by a neighbor, the stereo was from K-Mart. So the fifteen minute cease-fire during which I opened the stupid presents that they had to get me to shut me up didn’t make me happy, and of course, that meant I was holding out for more and costlier stuff. And it never occurred to them, if work schedules didn’t permit having the big shebang on 12/25, to have it a few days later. No, they just fulfilled their obligations by buying me stuff.[/Eeyore]
Man, am I bitter. But I broke the pattern, anyway. Last year, I told Mr. Rilch, “Every Xmas I had with my parents was miserable. Every Xmas I’ve had with you has been wonderful.” And that is also true.
I trust you will make enough for all of us.
Man, that sounds TASTY!
All holidays mean to me is overtime at work. My company runs 24/7/365 and I *clean up[i/] at this time of year.
One of these days, I’m gonna get that italics thing right.
Oh well,…I’m an idiot.
Holidaze? They’ve just gotten so predictable:
Halloween - Nobody will Trick or Treat in my neighborhood, but I’ll have to go out and buy a big bag of Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups just in case. The next day, after I realize that no one is coming to my door, I’ll eat the entire bag of candy myself because I just can’t have candy lying around my apartment. Shit calls my name. Even from inside the freezer.
Thanksgiving - My aunt will insist on having a big celebration at her house, even though she can’t cook. My mom and my other relatives will waste half the day and the entire day prior making dishes to bring. When we all get to my aunt’s house, we’ll find out that she called a caterer.
During the meal, various relatives will continue to glorify younger cousins who play high school and college football. Nobody will comment on my little sister’s kick-ass graphic design job, but they will reminisce about when she was a freshman in college and played on the softball team. When it’s time to talk about me, people will say “He never really played sports, did he?” and they will have to be reminded that I was on the tennis team and the golf team in high school over 10 years ago. I will be reminded that I am not a true athlete because I didn’t play football in high school or college, get hit in the head one too many times, and end up a drooling retard.
After the meal is over, men and women will separate. The women will stand around in my aunt’s kitchen and talk about the personal lives of anyone who didn’t show up: cousins, aunts & uncles, close family friends. The men will watch football and talk about business. Everyone will ask me, “What do you do, again?” I’ll explain and they still won’t understand. They will, however, make the association between me and computers, so I will continue to get “help desk”-type calls from relatives over the course of the next year.
Christmas - My mom will have the entire extended family over for XMas Eve. Uncle Larry will show up two hours early. Uncle George will show up two hours late. 56 billion young cousins, all between the ages of 2 and 12, will ignore the toys and crap we bought to keep them occupied and will amuse themselves by running around the house. Invariably, one of these kids will trip, hit his head on the corner of the coffee table, and have to be taken to the hospital for stitches.
Mom will have cooked an awesome meal, having put two full days of effort into the event. We will eat buffet-style, so that everyone can eat in front of the TV. At some point while everyone is watching the football game, my grandfather will make a comment about my weight and I’ll decide to ignore him for the rest of the day.
Kids will open gifts. My mom will clean up the 12 metric tons of wrapping paper left on the floor. My sister will receive clothes that she will invariably return for much-needed cash. Someone will buy me a gift certificate, which I will throw in a drawer and never redeem.
After everyone’s done opening gifts, I will pour myself an immense whiskey sour or vodka martini. I’ll then join relatives in complaining that “we never get together as a family anymore.” My cousin will apologize for never returning my phone calls. My uncle and I will make plans for him to come to the city to visit me, which will never come to fruition.
After all the relatives have left, I will take a plate of cookies and a big glass of warm milk upstairs to my old bedroom in my mom’s house. I will read a book, fall asleep and have pleasant dreams about the cool things I will do in the week between Xmas and New Year’s. In the morning, I will awake with a hangover, exchange gifts with my sister and mom, and make arrangements to visit with my dad.
Dad will pick us up at Mom’s house. He won’t actually come in the house, he’ll just pull into the driveway and honk the horn for us to come outside. My sister and I will go with him to whatever restaurant happens to be open on Christmas and we will exchange gifts right there in the restaurant. Divorce sucks.
After this, I will be dropped off back at my mom’s house, where I will veg out all day until it’s time for me to go home. I will silently congratulate myself on making it through another holiday season and remind myself that it’s not over until the credit card bills are paid off.
Halloween is nice…
It used not to be celebrated over here - however this year the shops are already full of helloween stuff.Ghosts, skeletons, masks, all that stuff…
When I was like 13 me and a friend of mine dreamed of immigrating to the USA (for the mere reason that we loved Roseanne - Darleen was our hero) so of course we had to celbrate Halloween. We had to make our decoration ourselfs, cause you couldnt get it anywhere and we would make all kinds of food that looked somewhat like blood, poked out eyes and any kind of creepy little beast. Madness…
Once we even went to toiletpaper a house…
What a secret mission…
X-Mas… typical about x-mas:
- Dad sitting around in the living room watching the kid channel
- Mom and me decorating the x-mas tree, me eventually colapsing to the floor and munching some cookies instead of helping her.
- Soup for lunch
- fish for dinner - tons of cookies inbetween meals
- mom, dad and me, under the x-mas tree unpacking the presents.
I like the smell of the x-mas tree - and oranges… eating nuts by the open fire… vewy nice…
New Years Eve…
I ll never forget that wicked new years eve of 2000.
I had got new pajamas on x-mas and mom told me, that when she was little she and her sisters got new pajamas every x-mas. What they used to do was running around the house barefoot. Through the snow. You know.
That new years eve I did the same— 3 times.
I was in my pajamas (with snoopy on it) and ran around the house barefoot - the snow was so high I was stuck in it up to my knees. It was fun and not as cold as one might think.
ho ho ho!
b dodgy
Since my aeronautical charts (“sectionals”) expire, I use the old ones as wrapping paper.