Sven Sundgaard charms all of Minnesota by playing "Duck Duck Grey Duck" and drinking "pop." I still think Sven is incredibly uncomfortable with the "unscripted friendly banter" portion of the local news show, but he's not without hope. He'll never be Ron Burgandy, but perhaps he'll never again be that frightened little boy who looked helplessly into the camera and said "I don't really know what to do right now."
As I wrote below, I don't like Santa Claus and don't want little Pacifist Viking to believe in him. If you'd like to read more about why Santa Claus sucks, see "War on Santa" by Philip Kovacs.
You might read that and ask, "So, do you hate Christmas?" in petulant sarcasm. No, I'm not joining any fictional "war on Christmas" (read about that farce here).
But I don't like Christmas time. Not much at all.
It's a holiday that has been turned into a celebration of capitalism and materialism. It's covered with festivity, family, and religion, but all Americans know the true spirit of Christmas, and it involves a credit card and a mall.
Christas gift-giving, besides using materialism to show relationships, is fraught with OBLIGATION. Giving gifts to people I love? That's a good thing. Giving a gift to somebody that I rarely see because that person gets a gift for me? That's silliness. I hate the sense of obligation that comes with gift-giving. For some amusing takes on gift-giving, see this month's The Rake.
December is a busy time of year for me. I spend fair portions of it grading papers. Before that, I spent fair portions of it writing papers. So all the Christmas festivities and fakery is dull to me.
Now, I've never actually not enjoyed Christmas. I like my family and we have fun times when Christmas actually comes. There are a lot of good Christmas movies. And I do like this Jesus fellow being celebrated. I even put out lights on my house.
But Christmas now is a month of lame music, big spending, materialistic glee, and obligations.
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I agree. Sven has come a long way.
ReplyDeleteI am also glad to hear you 'like' your family. I will pass the message along to your unborn child, so he/she may feel the love I am warming myself in right now.
Everybody "loves" their family, but some people don't like to spend time with the family during holidays; actually "liking" your family means you enjoy spending time with them. I cherish the times that I do the Times crossword while you watch "Heroes"!
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