Am I dreaming?

As the song suggests, I do dream of white Christmases.  Something about Christmas with no snow on the ground just doesn't seem right to me.  Maybe it's from my time growing up in Washington and Oregon and pretty much always having snow for Christmas.  This year we got lucky, we had a good snow storm on Christmas Eve leaving a nice cold 4" blanket over everything.

I think Santa appreciates it too.  It must be tough to try to take off and land a sleigh meant for snow where there is none.  Oh sure, he can just use magic but it's not like magic grows on trees.  I have heard rumor of a possible magic shortage in coming years.  The world's population continues to increase, more and more people believe in Santa all of which interprets to more magic.  More magic to keep track of the naughty children, more magic to prepare the presents and more magic to deliver them.  It's a vicious cycle.

If you love Santa you should give some serious this issue, and if you don't live somewhere it will snow for Christmas you should really give some thought to doing exactly that.

Merry Christmas to all, and to all a better night's sleep than last night.

Is this the end?

So in case you haven't heard, the world didn't end yesterday like the Mayan calendar seemed to predict.  So you can stop stockpiling toothpaste because Crest is still around.

So what happened?  Remember Y2k?  It's the same thing really.  A bunch of people learned and think they are wise start trying to give ancient civilizations more credit than they deserve.  The fact the the Mayan calendar went all the way to 2012 is pretty amazing when you consider that the collapse of the Mayan civilization happened around 1000 AD.  That would be like you having a desk calendar that went to 3024 and somebody finding it 900 years and assuming that the fact that it doesn't keep going must mean some wold calamity will take place.

My favorite is that NASA was getting inundated with  phone calls and e-mails to the point that they had to make an official statement about it.  It's good to know that the highly paid scientists employed at NASA had to tell us that.

I have a theory about the whole Mayan calendar.  Imagine if you will a young lad, a Mayan lad.  One day the king is in town.  The king walks up to the lad and asks him what day it is because he has a sacrifice that needs to be made by Friday, but he can't remember if that's today, or if he has a few more days to find a virgin.  But the lad doesn't know, because he is just a farmer.  The king becomes furious with the lad and throws him in prison.

Nobody knows how much time passed because nobody knew what day it was, but one day the king visited the overcrowded prison.  When he came to lad he asked him "What day is today?" to which the lad answered "Today is Wednesday your grace."  The king was so pleased to know it was Wednesday that he let the lad out of prison

But not long after that the king forgot the day again.  So he traveled back to the lad and asked him "What day is today?" to which the lad replied "Today is Wednesday your grace."  And the king was pleased.  On the way back home he had a thought, I need some sort of carving where I can track the days myself so I don't have to travel 3 days to ask this lad.  So the king summoned the lad to his city and told the lad that he must carve a day tracking system onto a rock so that he will always know what day it is.

Years went by (we know this because of the calendar) and the king forgot about the lad and soon he was an old man.  Every day he would go up to the Mayan calendar and continue his work.  On "bring your son to work day" (according to the calendar) he brought his eldest son with him and showed him his work and told him "one day you will take over when I die."

One day the old man died and his son picked up his father's tools and went up to the calendar to work.  He looked at the calendar to determine where his father stopped and found that is was done through 12/21/2012, over 1000 years in the future.  He thought "This is dumb!  Surely somebody will add on more days when we get close to that day, so he went home and never went back.

Well nobody ever did continue the calendar and that's why we ended up worried about that particular day.  And all because of some lazy teenager who didn't want to do his job.

Which gift to give

If I could change one thing during this season I think it would be these damned commercials.  You know the ones.  The diamond ring commercials that play on people's insecurities to sell glittering rocks and shiny metals.  This will make her love you, or forgive you, or make her child accept you as their new daddy.

The other commercials you may not know so well unless you watch SpongeBob SquarePants (said 3 times) like I do.  It's the toy commercials targeting young children and yours truly.  Yes, I too want a Furby (the new one not the old junky one), a Y Fliker (pronounce carefully) and an Amazing Spider-Man Mega Blaster Web Shooter w/ Glove.

Who could have predicted that those three well meaning travelers from the East (probably more west for us) would start a tradition that would fuel the materialistic hunger we now see today?  Is your child's love so dependent on what is under the tree that it's worth throwing an elbow in Walmart to get it?

Every once in awhile I hear a quote that sticks in my head and I ponder it for awhile as if to explore every nuance.  This happened this week and yes, I would like to share.  The American poet Ralph Waldo Emerson once said "Rings and jewels are not gifts but apologies for gifts.  The only true gift is a portion of thyself."

As I have been pondering this I have thought back on my life.  I have received my share of gifts over the years, and they have brought me happiness, howbeit temporary.  But the memories of the time that somebody took to spend it with me has brought so much more.

Take my Grandma for instance.  She passed away not long back and I think of her often.  And while she did give me many gifts over the years that is not what rises to the top when I remember her.  No, I remember staying at her house, and waking up to find her cooking breakfast for far more people than were in the house.  I remember playing Phase 10 for hours because she loved it (and cheated at it).  I remember her stories and her beautiful voice as she put on a full production just for me.  A portion of herself is what she gave, and that portion is what I now cherish.

Yes by all means, give gifts, fill stockings and celebrate Christmas but don't stop there.  Give the other half of your gifts...a piece of you.  Plan that trip, send that letter, make that call, have that party.  Share that portion of yourself with the people you cherish, and let that be their treasure from you.

Spread the word

I saw in the paper today an article that saddened me.  It was about a 15 year old boy that went missing from a beach in California.  I thought maybe if we spread the word together we may find this boy and return him to his family for Christmas.

 

This is John (Jonny) Butler.  He is about 6'1" and weighs in at about 160 pounds.  He has Brown Hair and Brown Eyes and was last seen at Newport Beach in California.  He went, like so many kids his age, to catch some waves but got more than he bargained for.  His board was found at the beach but he was not with it.  He has some scars on his face that are not included in the picture.

Upon further inspection I realized that this didn't happen quite as recently as I thought.  Included was a computer generated image of what he could look like today.

Yes, this is a computer generated prediction of what the now 66 year old Jonny would look like today.  It turns out he went missing back in 1961, so he really could be anywhere.  So please, if you see an old man walking around that looks like he could have been 6'1", 160 lbs 50 years ago please call the police and let them know.

I think that 50 years is long enough.  If we work together we can bring this kid home to his family so he can have a Merry Christmas.

Please spread the word!

Word of the day

So, I made up a new word the other day, at least I think I did.  I have never heard it before, and I do keep myself educated on the latest words that enter the English language.  At any rate, my new word is "Elfsmanship".

It is a Christmas season word to describe the craftsmanship of those little builders Santa uses to make Christmas possible.  So when you wake up Christmas morning and if you were good enough to get a present or two, take a minute or two to admire the elfsmanship.  I hope learn that you exclaim something like this.  "Oh, look at how the light dances off of the surface of this beautiful unicycle, such fine elfsmanship!"

I can't believe that it is only 13 days until Christmas.  This month has just flown by.  Luckily I got much of my shopping done online over the Thanksgiving holiday.  My Thanksgiving?  Oh it was magical.  We spent a lot of time with family.  We drove around a lot looking for signs and appraising computer components and making new friends.  We went for a long drive in the country and saw some of the sights.  We got to see couple of crazy love birds getting married a couple of days after.  It was a good time.

Unfortunately with such an amazing Thanksgiving I find myself in the slumps a bit for Christmas.  Don't get me wrong, I love Christmas, but this year I'm having trouble getting pumped up about it.  Could this be a sign that I am on the naughty list?  Oh damn, what an absolutely terrifying thought!  I guess to be honest I have never been a big fan of Christmas.  For some reason no matter how much I tried to be good, I was never able to be as good as the other kids at my school.  This is an observation based on sheer quantity of gifts and whether I received what I had asked for.

I remember one year when I was about 8 or 9 and thought I had been really good.  So I asked Santa for a car.  Not just any car, but a Corvette Stingray.  I had seen miracle on 34th street and in that case Santa had given a whole house.  Certainly a Stingray wasn't out of the question.  In an effort to increase my chances I also added the car to my personal prayers for Christmas.  I was so sure that come Christmas morning a new Corvette would be parked out in front of my house with the keys in it.  I don't remember what I got for Christmas that year, but I do remember what I didn't get.  I was heart broken.  Not only was my trust in Santa shaken, but also my faith.

Looking back I can see how silly my request must have seemed.  What would a 9-year-old boy do with a beautiful automobile like that anyway?  I couldn't even afford the taxes on it not to mention the looks I would get when I drove it around town.

Santa and I were eventually able to work out our differences.  He admitted that he didn't really take my request very seriously and I accepted his apology.  Over time what once was a gaping wound in my tender heart has slowly healed.  The once painful gash is now but a feint echo of its former self.  Now we are even able to look back on that year and laugh.

What is the lesson here?  I guess one lesson is never hold a grudge against Santa, because you will only hurt yourself.