A-Rudolph the arf arf arf arf! Was a very arfy arf!

 The church I went to as a kid was an architectural marvel in it's day. No, it really was.  Take a look:

St. Johns Catholic Church, Milwaukie, Oregon. The tall swoopy-uppy thing is the church proper. Underneath that tall swoopy-uppy thing is the huge, huge sanctuary. The ceiling really does go all the way up into that spire.       

 

 

To give you some faint idea of how huge this place is inside     

People used to come in from all over Oregon to attend mass here just to say they had, it was that famous. Infamous, really, as every older person still able to piss dust hated it with every atom of their being.  I thought it was cool as heck and I still do.  It looks like it was built by Klingons.  I say boring baroque decor might be good enough for other Catholics. We in Milwaukie were Swanky Catholics and very modern indeed. Qapla!!

As hard to love as this interior is, my very favorite Christmas memory took place there.  It was a High mass, and I was about seven years old, and the pomp and circumstance had just about worn me out.  Suddenly all the lights went out. No warning. It was completely silent. At first people gasped. After a few moments more, they'd begin to shift and whisper.  And then the candle above the tabernacle was lit, one tiny little point of light shining in the middle of this immense church.  Then the priest began to sing 'Silent Night', and hesitantly the congregation began to join him. He took a taper and lit it from the tabernacle candle, and he went around and lit all the candles on the altar. The sacristans took the light from him then, and went around the whole sanctuary, to all the votives and all the devotionals and lit them.  At the end of the song he simply said "Christ is born."

It's my favorite Christmas memory. And it's of Christmas - not fake Happy Holidays Christmas, where people get in fistfights over Playstations and send 34,000 cards and dash around to visit people they don't like. I left fake Christmas behind and I am better for it. 

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I am probably the only American who hates the Christmas Classic 'Rudolph The Red-Nosed Reindeer'. I hate the song, and I hate the holiday T.V. special. I do.

For some reason my dad was really taken by the song, but he'd just go around and yodel the words "Rudolph the red nosed reindeer!  Had a very shiny nose!" at random. Starting two months leading up to Christmas. And he'd change the words. "a-Rudolph the Red-Nosed Hoosegoooooow!  Had a ve - hry shiny schnooooo!" And he thought this was utterly hilarious, particularly when my mother got sick of hearing it fifteen times a day and began to yell. Then he'd just do it more. "Rudolph the woof woof a-reindeer!  He had a very shiny nose you know!"  

Now this may sound like fond holiday hijinks, but honestly by the week leading up to Christmas mom and I were ready to shoot the guy. It was demented. He'd answer the phone like this. He'd chase me around the house singing this.  I hid in our basement once, iot got so dumb, and I could hear him prowling around upstairs looking for me going "Rudolph the Goose nose a-honk honk! Had a very goosey goose! Are ya here?  Rudolph the Red-Nosed Red Nose! Was a very rainy day! Are ya here?"

"SHADDUP!" My mom would shout. 

That was the sound of the holidays at my house until my mom took the record off the player one day and broke it over her knee. My dad howled like she'd bit him. Honestly, he's lucky she didn't.

Now as for the T.V. special, let's just say it's a matter of taste. If you like this, you have no taste.

"OK OK so this is a good one, Rudolph. Guy walks into a theatrical agents office. 'So you wanna work in Vaudeville, huh? the agent asks. What kind of act ya got?'  OK OK now, and the guy goes 'Well, first my wife comes out and pulls a sweet potato straight out of her..."

Stop-motion animation has always given me the heebie jeebies. Clearly those things are dolls. Am I supposed to believe they're magic dolls that move and sing?  What weird reality is this? And why does it suck? 

I can trace my dislike of this saccharine offering to the vocal talents of Burl Ives. Burl Ives ruins everything. (Wow, I am desecrating all the holiday traditions, huh?  Look at me go.) I think the UK term for his sound is 'treacly'. Yes. Burl Ives was treacly.  Now he is dead.

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So I began this post with a very gentle Christmas reminisce, and now here I am at the end and I've nearly written down the text of the dirtiest joke in the world (The Aristocrats) and it wasn't on purpose; I'm just writing down this and that.  I think I better leave it at this, OK?

Merry Christmas to all!