santas against commercialization

From Reuters:

WELLINGTON (Reuters) - Forty drunken Santas rampaged through central Auckland, stealing from stores and assaulting security guards, the New Zealand Herald reported on Sunday, in a protest against the commercialization of Christmas.

Police said some of the Santas threw beer bottles, one tried to climb the mooring rope of a cruise ship and a security guard was punched during the fracas.

"They came in, said 'Merry Christmas' and then helped themselves," convenience store staff member Changa Manakynda told the Herald, which reported the Santas also attacked a Christmas tree.

The event organizer, Alex Dyer, had warned the antics would only stop when someone was arrested, said the Herald, which linked the incident to "Santarchy."

Santarchy (www.santarchy.com) and online encyclopedia wikipedia (www.wikipedia.org) record protests going back around 10 years in the United States, with participants marking Christmas in anti-commercial manner involving street theater, pranks and public drunkenness.

Police said identification was a key issue as they tried to sort out which of the 40 men and women had done what.

"With a number of people dressed in the same outfit, it was difficult for any witnesses to confirm the identity of who was doing what," Senior Sergeant Matt Rogers told Reuters.

the perfect card

courtesy of SHG

shoppin' for Christ

over on Very Opioniated...

Putting the "Christ" Back Into Christmas.

Over on By the Bayou...
Putting the "Christ" Back Into Christmas. Well....

commercialization in relatiation to the evil liberal plot to destroy christmas

if you have not already, read this over at SHG's.

frost on the pointsettias (x-posted on txyankee & merrythanksgivoween)

This morning we had a first frost here in Houston, reminding us that even if the days are in the 60s and 70s, we are definitely in Autumn. It was not a hard freeze or a killer frost - just low lying gullies, and north-facing roofs - only surfaces not warmed by the sun the afternoon before. But a frost nonetheless. October, November, and most of December are great times of the year here, with nearly perfect weather. These cold mornings watching the pups running out on the bayou, with all the dew splashing up around them like water from puddles, reminds me of fall back home. On the other hand, you can put poinsettias outside here for some striking displays of color during the holidays, and they're fine unless there is frost, in which case you just put them in the garage or cover them with a sheet. Anyway, fall is here, December 1 is Thursday, and the holidays will be permitted to begin, in my mind, then. In the mean time, I need to enjoy what is left of the two weeks of Autumn.

let the decorating begin in earnest

Well, the home-decorating for Christmas has begun here in Houston, both inside and out. When I was a kid, about 135 years ago, lights went up outside about 1-2 weeks before Christmas, on the 2nd Sunday before, or the 3rd Sunday of Advent. The tree went up that same Sunday or the next one, on 4th Advent. Here, things seem to be a little accelerated by people, which bothers me. While walking the dogs out on the Bayou today, I could already see people's trees through their windows, and there are already houses with their lights up. So, is this an extended period of veneration, or dilution of the season?

From a practical standpoint, if you do not buy your tree here by Dec. 5, you are not going to get one, or you will get a Charlie Brown Tree. But that does not mean you have to put it up right away - toss it in a bucket of water in the back yard! I think perhaps some of it stems from our warmer weather, and the need for the decorations to make us feel festive, to get us going. When it is not cold you don't have the same warm-fuzzies for this time of year imparted by Curier and Ives and the goal of a White Christmas being a great Christmas ingrained into the American psyche by the northern tier of the country and our earliest European ancestors and modern cultural cousins. So, I guess I can understand it. But that does not mean I like it... it just feels to early to have my tree and lights up today, 25 November.

And then there's crap like this, spotted by SHG. Ugh.

leveraging for Christ

The radio station KSBJ in Houston, known locally as the God Listens station, generally drives me insane with their self-righteous attitude towards the Christification of the world, or at least Texas, rather than humble evangelism.

 

They're going to be playing all Christmas music from the day after Thanksgiving through Christmas Day, like a couple of other stations. Now the other stations will have it all straight up Frosty, Bing, and (that bitch!)  Anne Murray too, with lots of commercials to rake in the dough (not the flaky pie-crust kind). KSBJ on the other hand is doing it as evangelism, mixing it up with classics, contemporary, and I hope true ecclesiastical, though I could not figure that out on their website. Anyway, all with no commercials. KSBJ is listener-funded, so they can manage it. Good for them. They may drive me nuts, but at least their basic capitalization off of Christmas is spiritual. Now, those new listeners and true disciples of Christ they reel in will hopefully donate to the station, so it's a pretty good marketing strategy for the survival of their "ministry".

 

So, how are they rake in the converts? By having current listeners spread the word of non-stop Christmas music with no commercials is capitalizing off of the over commercialization of Christmas.

 

Twisted, huh?

Christmas Kudzu

While in Calgary this past week for work, I stayed at the Palliser. It is the oldest big hotel in Calgary, the old Canadian Pacific Rail hotel, and really a grand, beautiful hotel. I love staying there, we have a great rate, and the place is just awesome for business travel.

Anyway.

When I arrived, the had a few decorations up for Christmas, all very tasteful. And over the five days, it just grew and and grew and grew. When leaving this morning, pretty much every nook, cranny, ledge, arch, doorway, etc., was swaddled in greenery. It was like it was Christmas Kudzu. All very tasteful, but a bit much.

In Calgary all the Christmas as decorations are very tasteful and wintry - rather than gaudy with mechanical hip-swinging raunchy Santas.

An observation: I guess they start at seemingly random times, without the marked day of Thanksgiving that we have.

not so in your face here in Calgary

I am up in Calgary Canada for the week, and of course all the Christmas stuff is out here as well. But very tasteful and understated. The store window displays are all more wintry than Christmas-like, and you don't hear much Christmas music yet. However, I have not been to the big discount stores and such, so who knows what's up there. But from what I have seen, it makes you feel more like a special time of year is coming than it's time to go shop and compete.

+1 for Calgary.

Christmas as a weapon

Read this great post by SHG. The wingnuts are on the prowl, politicising, again.

I guess it's not all about good cheer and love of your fellow man, but rather ensuring that all the associated tchotcki is marketed correctly.

too early for Christmas lights

OK, Pizza Roma in Houston gets a major ding and WTF for having their Christmas lights out and on TODAY, NOVEMBER 10TH! I know you cannot see shit in the pic, it is from my phone so it sucks...

more room for presents!

These odd things that look like a pine-needle vortex more than anything else were originally designed for specialty stores to display delicate ornaments using a minimum of floor space. When I first saw these things hanging from the ceiling in a couple of stores over the last couple of years, I thought they were interesting. My ex wanted to do one that way just to do something different...I was neutral on that - sure, why not? Anyway, we never did anything about it.

But now, from the Hammacher Schlemmer catalog:

The 7-Foot Upside-Down Pre-Lit Christmas Tree: Evoking a 12th century Central European tradition of hanging a tree from the ceiling at Christmas, this unique 7' pre-lit fir is inverted to ensure a smaller footprint for less-spacious areas, and allowing more room for the accumulation of presents underneath.

Well, if that does not get my panties in a twist, nothing does. I need a sedative.

Discuss.

looks like Philly may win on early Christmas Music

By way of reddevil... Christmas music at Super Fresh! October 23! Yay!
Read here...need a free password...

holiday greenery a little, no, a lot early

Today at kroger...faux greenery over the door...grumble grumble...the fact that it was unseasonably warm did not help...grumble grumble...

I wager that the Christmas Trees arrive at the store on 12 November.

thoughts on gift giving

not my thoughts, but they run frighteningly in parallel...

no, its not your imagination

By way of Rachel from the Houston Chronicle comes this:

 

No, it's not your imagination. The advertising and marketing assault that marks the beginning of the holiday buying season has already begun.

 

Christmas catalogs are already filling mailboxes, and Wal-Mart's holiday marketing campaign was in place several weeks sooner than usual.

It may be the earliest jump on the season ever.

"Everybody is looking at the stressed-out consumer, and they're pushing the panic button. It's never happened this soon," said Howard Davidowitz, chairman of Davidowitz and Associates, a national retail-consulting and investment-banking firm in New York.

YAY.

catalogs

I like to shop from catalogs, and order on the Internet. It keeps me away from the stores and the hordes. As a result, every week during the year I get about 1 catalog in the mail, +/-.

Then Sept 15 arrives, and there's a spike.

Then Oct 1 arrives are there are more.

And Nov 1, well, forget it, if I do not check the mail every other day my poor little mailbox is shoved so full of catalogs for the holidays that I cannot find my real mail. This is not such a big problem anymore now that most of my bills are electronic and such. But still, think of all that wasted paper as I get more than one of some catalogs, and some new ones that I have never even heard of, and then some that are just CRAP.

The one that got to me, though, came in August. I tossed it, but should have kept it for this blog: All things Christmas for the house. Oh geez, the entire country is still baking in the summer heat, isn't that a bit early to be buying faux snow and nutcrackers?

we love our customers

SHG made this interesting comment on the Christmas/Holiday cards one receives from businesses. His post was about the ones your insurance company or doctor sends to you. I am thinking about the business-to-business ones. Something interesting is a trend to send out Thanksgiving cards, although I am not sure what the motivation is:

• Don't piss off non-Christians by sending a Christmas card
• Don't piss off Christians by sending a Holiday card
• Get your card in the hands of the customer before everybody else's cards begin to arrive.

I am inclined to think the last one, which from a marketing standpoint is not necessarily a bad idea. I have to deal with selecting the cards for our company, and of course a goal is to make yours stand out and have the current or potential customer be reminded that you do indeed exist - which is why we send one out that is a New Years card (in early December) than unfolds to a calendar of the coming year.

On the other hand with Thanksgiving cards, here we go, extending the calendar time of the holidays, muting them more and more...

frozen hamburgers are a few of my favorite things

G-Hopp reported this evening that Christmas Carols were to be heard over at Kroger. Yay.

Hello?? The pumpkins are not even rotted yet, and now in addition to seeing all the Christmas stuff for sale a solid 6+ weeks in advance, we get the music? Does not occur to anybody that we become completely dulled by it all after a while? That we lose whatever meaning is even left in the holiday?

Naughty on you Foster Wheeler!!

Yesterday afternoon I thought I saw something disturbing on the front of the Foster Wheeler building near my office: Giant Christmas wreaths.

The problem: It was Halloween.

It's a little early for that, isn't it?? I seem to remember Thanksgiving as a point at which commercial buildings would decorate.

Foster Wheeler gets coal in her pantyhose for jumping the tasteful decoration gun.

Some old links on Texas Yankee that are relevant here

Christmas in September

a rambling post

Minimal holiday gift-giving (lots of good discussion!)

the inspiration for the title of this blog...

merrythanksgivoween: the beginning

This is the first post to my little blog that has one purpose: To rant about the over commercialization of Christmas and how the sentiments around this time of year - not specific to Christiandom alone - are well on their way to being pretty much lost. It drives me absolutely nuts.