by Jeremy
Ah, the Holiday season. It’s that special time of the year, where for seemingly 8 months in a row, we are bombarded with an almost constant stream of Holiday jingles, commercials about ULTRA MEGA HOLIDAY SALE #66712 of that month, and at least several bowels full all the Holiday Spirit you can handle. Yep, it’s November and December. Better known around my underground cave as “eeeuuuuugh”.
It didn’t used to be like this! As far as I can remember, there used to be a time when the very mention of Christmas did not bring with it a guttural sound that resembles a moose in its dying throes. There used to be a time when it was genuinely EXCITING when Christmas rolled around. And it didn’t seem like it was that long ago, either. So what the Hell happened? Well, I think I know. And today, I’ll let you in on just how easy it is to make Holiday suicide that much more of a viable option to the rest of us.
Christmas Decorations. In July.
Nothing says “OH GODDAMNIT” quite like strutting out Christmas merchandise and decorations while the rest of the country has barely put out the 4th of July fires. Now I genuinely have nothing against Christmas junk. I understand it is going to happen regardless, no matter how many times I threaten public nudity. Christmas is Christmas. BUT WHAT THE HELL IS THIS SHIT:
WHAT IS EVEN HAPPENING
C’mon, man! It’s like all any store is ever doing is creeping out the Christmas stuff earlier, and earlier. It never stops. To me, this just completely RUINS whatever current Holiday it is that I’m trying to enjoy. Personally, I love Halloween. It’s my favorite Holiday. But it’s just about goddamn impossible to give a shit when I’ve got JOLLY BLOW UP SANTA YARD BALL PIT sitting right next to a few cut-out skeletons that the staff appeared to blow out of the stock room with a depressed fart.
And don’t even get me started as to what happens the instant, THE INSTANT, that Halloween is over. Literally the next day, it’s goddamn Christmas Armageddon. In the span of what I imagine to be five total seconds, every store in America is transformed into a damn Christmas wonderland. Complete with personalized soundtracks, decorations from the ceilings, and sales ads featuring Santa hats on EVERYONE. What the fuck happened to poor old Thanksgiving? It’s just become that meal you eat before you go Christmas shopping. Meanwhile the rest of us are just trying to hold out for 30 more days. At least until the Christmas in January sales start.
Christmas Specials At All Hours
You know what was fun when I was a kid? Waiting until the week before Christmas when all the great Christmas specials came on TV. I’d hear about Charlie Brown coming on at 8PM on ABC, and by God I’d clear my schedule. A schedule that mostly involved playing with He-Man action figures, but regardless. THAT was that night’s event. And if you missed it, well you better sit your ass down and wait for next Christmas. Because it wasn’t coming back on until then.
Watch Jack Frost like it was the first time again! For the twentieth time this month!
Fast forward to current day. Where it’s not even halfway through November, and I have seen Elf on TV at least six times. Yes really, Elf. Besides that, there’s no reason to clear schedules to see other legitimate Holiday classics. Rudolph will be on ABC Family at least 30 times before Thanksgiving. The Grinch generally sits his ass down every other weekend on whatever channel will take him. And the most painful of all, Charlie Brown, a tale about how Christmas means nothing anymore and has sold out, will mean nothing and be played out by the fifth or so time you see it in TV Guide. None of these special shows seem special anymore. Not when you can’t go two nights without seeing one for two months straight.
Oh, and speaking of ABC Family: Fuck you. Fuck you for your 28 days of the worst Made for TV Christmas specials any human has ever seen. Don’t believe me? Start on December 1st and see how long you last. I’ll keep the gun loaded.
The Burden Of Being Around People That Actually Enjoy Christmas
You know them. We all do. As soon as the clock strikes 12:01 AM on November 1st, the transformation begins. The next day, these seemingly normal people will be turned into slaves for Santa Claus. Relentlessly speaking about Christmas, wearing little jingly bells somewhere on every outfit, pushing out Christmas crafts at a dangerously fast pace, and generally making everyone around them wish that spontaneous human combustion was something that could be caused by the amount of times you sneer at someone. It can get ugly.
KILL IT WITH FIRE
And it’s not so much how every day these people seem to come into the office festooned with every stupid Christmas thing Hallmark has. It’s mostly the attitude. The constant, CONSTANT announcements of just HOW MUCH they love Christmas. It’s their FAVORITE TIME OF THE YEAR. Oh sweet Jesus how they love it. EVERY minute of EVERY day. Turning to you at lunch break just to let you know that they’re “starting Christmas shopping early this year.” Don’t you dare feign interest and ask her why, either. Because the next hour of your life will take every ounce of willpower you have to not cut her brake lines the second she leaves.
I’m not even being a Grinch here, either. It’s okay to let people know you enjoy the Holidays. But please, don’t think you can force us to love it just as much based solely on how many times you feel the need to remind us. Trust me. It does the exact opposite. The worst part is that they seemingly have no idea how much they make everyone else miserable by doing so. Unless they actually do, and that’s just sadistic.
This Year’s HOT Toy/s
I’m sure you’ve all noticed how each store magically gains at least five more aisles dedicated to toys during the Holidays. It’s not uncommon. After all, kids toys are one of the biggest money-makers for decades. And every year seems to have that one toy every goddamn kid wants. From Elmo, to Pikachu, there is always something parents will lose all of their dignity to fight other grown people for.
I don't even know if this is supposed to be popular but it scares the shit out of me.
The last few Christmases has seen an interesting pattern emerging, though. Stores will actually try to TELL you what the Big Toy is this year. It’s just about everywhere now. Ads plastered everywhere declaring that SUPER OPTIMUS BARBIE PRINCESS or another shitty electronic Elmo playing YET ANOTHER instrument was this year’s MUST HAVE TOY. ALL THE KIDS WILL WANT IT. YOU WILL LOOK LIKE A DAMN FOOL ON CHRISTMAS MORNING IF YOU DON’T HAVE IT. BUY IT. Guess what? It doesn’t work out like that. Those ads are made for schmucks. You know who ultimately decides what toy is popular for Christmas? Kids. You remember last year when every store on Earth was promoting Transformers and some fucking drum kit as that year’s hotness? Remember when they weren’t at all? Remember what ended up actually BEING the most popular toy? Hamsters.
Fucking hamsters.
Kids are assholes.
The Complete Dismantling Of Thanksgiving
As mentioned before, Thanksgiving is probably the biggest tragedy of it all. What is meant to be a few days when we can all eat dangerous amounts food in the relative peace of what we call families, is now just a giant vehicle to make you go shopping for more Christmas shit. The latest salvo by stores to make Thanksgiving even more meaningless is to have just about all the major retail store now open BEFORE midnight on Thanksgiving. That’s right. These stores are having PRE Black Friday opening hours. Meaning that these poor souls working in these stores don’t even get the decency to spend a day with their family before the black days of December start to destroy their will to live. Retailers are essentially telling America to fuck Thanksgiving. Who cares. How long is it gonna be before these stores are open all day on Thanksgiving? Not too damn long if this is anything to go by.
Happy what?
With the way things are going, the Christmas Season is starting to take on a literal meaning. Because at this point it seems to last as long as Winter itself. A never-ending cascade of Christmas for months. And now with Thanksgiving on its last legs, we may as well rename it as “Christmas Shopping Brunch.” It’s a sad state of affairs. And all those years I spent as a kid genuinely enjoying Thanksgiving as a Holiday seems like a million years away at this point. I guess I’ll have to eat twice as much this year to show my anger.
Who am I fooling. I was going to do that anyway.
So this is just a few examples of how Christmas is ruining itself for everyone. I am currently hunkered down behind the sandbags, dodging endless barrages of Christmas Music, Christmas Decorations, Christmas Sales, and Christmas TV Specials. And to think, I actually made an honest effort this year to try and get into the Holiday spirit. Fourteen days in, and I’m done.
Maybe next year.
Excel Saga may well be the dumbest thing I have ever watched. Don’t get me wrong, that’s not exactly a bad thing. I mean, there’s stuff that’s “dumb” in the way that it actually makes you feel like you’re losing brain cells just from sitting in front of it. And then there’s the “dumb” that just makes you sit there slack-jawed through the entire thing, wondering just what the Hell you watched after it’s over. Excel Saga easily finds itself sitting in the latter group. I have never seen anything that elicits so many “What?”s, or “Why?”s from me in any given episode. It is truly, truly dumb. And maybe more than a bit mad.
Hey guys this is a comic with MY VERY OWN MOTHER in it!! 
Well holy Hell, it’s already November. This year has flown by. Seems like it was just a few months or so ago that I was rapidly sinking into depression at the thought of having to deal with the Holidays from last year, let alone this year. At any rate, let’s pop our heads into the OMGJ Funtasmic Labs, and see what’s cooking inside. Besides meth.
