Christmaweensgivingstertine's Day
At the risk of spouting cliché, it really does seem to me that stores break out the Christmas regalia earlier and earlier every year. I seem to remember when I was a kid that the retail Christmas spirit struck immediately after Thanksgiving. I've been noticing around Worcester this year, though, that Christmas and Halloween accouterments are being displayed side by side. The only nod at Thanksgiving so far is that Shaw's supermarkets are having an earn points for a free turkey promotion. Nonetheless, even there I am seeing Christmas tree decorations displayed right next to the Halloween masks. It's all pitchforks and ceramic Santas.
I understand from an economic view why stores would do this. Christmas is their biggest sales driver for the whole year, so they're trying to spread it out over a longer period in the hopes that people will buy more given a greater amount of time to do so. Still, it does seem like Christmas is eating all the other holidays.
Perhaps the thing to do is to simply combine all the holidays into one and then sell stuff for it all year long. This will take a bit of clever marketing and a retooling of traditions, but it certainly could be done.
On Christmaweensgivingstertine's Day (which would last all year), one hopes to get Santa to bring more presents by making him fall in love with you. Every night, you leave a heart-shaped box of chocolates under the tree. Then you sit in the dark and wait. To make sure that nobody knows it's you, you're supposed to wear a costume. When the presents show up (which they would do once a week... say on Saturday), you show your appreciation by cooking a turkey dinner in Saint Nick's honor. If he finds this all acceptable, he'll lay an egg under your tree that you can fertilize as you see fit (but you might want to keep wearing that mask lest someone spot you doing so). Six months later, an invisible cherub hatches out, complete with bow and arrow, and hunts down a rabbit for you. Then the whole family can gather together for the traditional Christmaweensgivingstertine's Day Eve meal of hasenpfeffer, cranberry sauce, more chocolate, turkey, cream-filled sponge cake, lollipops, tofu frankfurters, deep-fried Oreo cookies, lard, Corn Flakes, Valium and Diet Coke.
People would be buying holiday-related materials all year long. They'd exchange presents constantly. We'd all wind up weighing 400 lbs. and so rely increasingly on plastic surgeons and trendy diets. That part, at least, wouldn't look too different than things do now. Profits would soar. Think of the boon to the economy!
By the way, please note that this is the first blog entry you have ever read in which the word "hasenpfeffer" appears. Consider it just the tiniest twinkling of that old Christmaweensgivingstertine's Day magic.
