Drunken Ramblings of a Jew on Christmas / Christmas Eve into Christmas Morning Open Thread

When I started writing this, it was in the wee hours of Christmas Eve Eve, when the nerdy kids are checking NORAD’s Santa Tracker, the kids that bully those kids are starting to sweat a little, and I’m enough cocktails in that I’ve just started throwing some new combinations together in this gently used coupe glass while watching Psych reruns. Did you know that peppermint schnapps can go in more than hot chocolate? Like for example, whiskey. A few dashes of chocolate bitters go a long way, too. Yeah, that orange peel from a gin cocktail hours ago adds something.  ANYHOODLES….

For some reason, despite how FREAKING LONG this 3 day work week has felt and how much work I know I need to do before Monday beckons the semites and antisemites alike back to their zoom meetings, I find myself thinking about–and therefore writing about–Christmas.

If you’re perceptive, you likely know that I’m a J-O-O.

The stereotype goes that I should be celebrating every Christmas with Chinese food and a movie, possibly while tightening the grip on the banks. HOWEVA, we never did that growing up, and I don’t think I did that for the first time until my late twenties. I get the logistical appeal but don’t quite associate chow mein with December.

Growing up, we actually celebrated Christmas (and Chanukah), but without any religious basis for the former. My mom just loved the festivity, so we did the whole shebang–a tree, stockings, hell, we even had a goose and/or a ham, but no church. It wasn’t until I started asking the tough questions–“hey, we’re Jewish, why the fuck are we doing this?” that we ditched the regalia (much to my siblings’ chagrin) and retreated to the “normal” for those that don’t believe that Mary was a virgin.

It’s funny, though, because whether you believe in Santa as a kid or not, and if you put up a Christmas Tree (or a Hanukkah Bush) or not, if you aren’t Christian, you still feel like you’re missing…something on Christmas.

And then there’s Christmas 2020. It’s hard enough to know what fucking day of the week it is, let alone to note the demarcation of a holiday you don’t observe. When the house is decorated with a tree, people baking more types of cookies than Trump’s acts of treason, and non-LDB Xmas music blasting, you know it’s the season. When you’re not….you don’t.

But even if you don’t celebrate, it’s worth taking a pause and trying out a tradition (even if it isn’t your own).  We finished up lighting the menorah last week, but we’re still going to do some gift opening with the nieces and nephews via zoom this week.  I took a stab at making these abominations today, and hell, we may even order Chinese food tomorrow to fit in with our ancestral people. The important part is to find a way to slow the fuck down and have something that’s yours/your family’s/whatever you need. ESPECIALLY this year.

And btw, if you are alone on Christmas, that’s cool, too. I found this thread really interesting/positive, and it isn’t too late to still celebrate Christmas and/or yourself by yourself tomorrow. So if it’s your first Christmas or your 40th or your first alone, crack open a beer, throw open the door, and enjoy the holidays!

 

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BrettFavresColonoscopy
BFC is a Chicago native transplanted to our nation's capital and transplanted again to the mountain West, then to SoCal, then back to the mountain West, and then again back to our nation's capital. He enjoys football, whisky, and the oxford comma.
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Brocky

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yeah right

For non traditional Christmas fare: Chicken pot pie.

And a bottle of La Crema pinot noir.

Don T

Feliz Navidad to almost everybody. Ti folks on FF finals,
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Brocky

don’t hate me because I’ve lucked into good fortune twice in like a six year span

Rikki-Tikki-Deadly

I’m just glad that you are not a local Titans fan. Some bad shit is going down.

ArmedandHammered

Merry Christmas all. Going to be a fun day of reading, lasagna and cookies, plus the football game later.

Brocky

so my dad’s idea of a Christmas morning tradition is playing call of the wild on the big screen causing the shih tzu to bark at the sled dogs

like he keeps rewinding and going back and forth

Duchess

Well hell I didn’t know Chinese and a movie was a Jooish Christmas. That was my Christmas tradition during my more single years.

BaldingSpiritually

Thanks to my doggo having cancer and us fearing he could go at any moment we celebrated Christmas the weekend after Thanksgiving. Thanks to chemo he’s still here but we’re thinking at best it’s a week or two after New Years when he’ll go.

So I’m thankful I can give 2020 the finger while screaming they can’t have my buddy.

Brocky

damn thats awful. keep your buddy comfy for us

litre_cola

Red wine at 8 am? Well I don’t want to be rude to the hard working vintners out there.

Last edited 3 years ago by litre_cola
King Hippo

I was told by a non-Imaginary Friend (back in law school) that it was bad luck for a Jew to have a Xmas Tree. But that a Hanukkah Bush was totes fine.

What say yeeeewwwww, my MoT Imaginary Friends??

Rikki-Tikki-Deadly

Is it just me or does the text of this comment get distinctly darker (like, change color) at the beginning of the word Hanukkah?

Is this some kind of code from Q? Is it finally time? What are my instructions, sir?

ArmedandHammered

I see it as well. Please don’t break WordPress.

King Hippo

I cut and pasted from BFC’s text and it sent out the bat signal to REEL MURRIKA.

Don T

As Bart said, Xmas is a time when pepple of all religions come together to worship jeseschrist.

litre_cola

Good morning lads and ladies. Decilitre is 3 and change an got so excited this morning he ran to the bathroom to vomit. He needed to chill and reset. During this time daddy went and smked a bowl as I slept for 3 hours and got very drunk outdoors last night.
Merry chill day to you all. Have your fave cocktail or vice, relax, and be safe.

blaxabbath

I can’t get my kid to go to the bathroom to piss, let alone barf….

scotchnaut

I made it through the LDB Challenge, my earholes unscathed. Oh, and bfc, if you’re still a JOO this morning could you talk to your friends about some outstanding bank charges I have on my checking account?

ballsofsteelandfury

I worked remotely on Christmas Eve. It was surreal how different the day was this year. It wasn’t until about 9 PM when my nieces came over that it really felt like Christmas Eve.

Being 6 feet apart while giving presents was weird though…

Bloody Lethal
Bloody Lethal

On bourbon, on vodka, on scotch, and on gin.

Bloody Lethal

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FdHr6jdQyTM
sorry this means Christmas to me.

Bloody Lethal

Hey the message of love does not die.

Bloody Lethal
yeah right

I’m quite certain that those 3 gun shots that I just heard were celebratory and not retaliatory. It being Christmas and all.

yeah right

No sirens, so?

yeah right

Definitely celebratory. They’re launching fireworks for Jesus!

This fucking town and their fireworks.

God be praised!

yeah right

Something that needs examining: when is the next time you’re going to feel comfortable in a big crowd?

I bought tickets to see the Black Crowes at Red Rocks over a year ago and those tickets are good for a show in August of next year.

You concert goers stay with me here: When are you going to trust someone handing you a joint or a beer that they took a sip off of to prevent spillage?

I was going to see Rammstein at the Coliseum before this shit went down.

When are you comfortable doing that again?

Gumbygirl

Maybe never? I mean it, the thought of strangers being closer than 6 ft to me gives me palpitations. I don’t know if or when I’m going to be ok with that.

yeah right

I’ve got a wide selection of fashionable masks and I’m not afraid to use them.

yeah right

That being said I’ve also got a cancellation option. It’s been a lot to work through.

This entire fucking year!

King Hippo

Yeah, NEVAR works for Hippo.

ThePirateSloth

I’m looking at NFL games next season:

  • are they going to require proof of vaccination to enter? If so, would there be different entrances for pre-screened/documented proof for season tickets vs the general public and/or no proof? What a planning nightmare that would be.
  • What do they do about seating? Will they have to spread out current season ticket holder seats to an empty seat between each guest? As well as figuring out the remaining open seats for the general public? Again, planning nightmare.
  • Masked or not? Masked for no vaccine proof? How is that enforced once in the stands? A maskless/proof of vaccine vs masked up/no proof sections? Again, planning nightmare.
  • Food/Beverages – no more HOT DOGS HERE, clearly. But what about all the stalls, bars, and carts? And yet still – proof/no proof… planning nightmare.
  • Bathrooms… ugh. Nightmare.

The thought of going to an NFL game with things like this seems… well, it really would suck the life out of the entire experience, on top of the crippling fucking anxiety I’d be feeling just being in the open, around a shit ton of people.

litre_cola

I miss live futbol a lot, but I can’t see myself in my jam packed Supporters end this summer. They can have my season ticket money, if it keeps them afloat.

Rikki-Tikki-Deadly

I think once I’ve been vaccinated I’ll feel okay.

blaxabbath

Could see it taking til this time next year to really be comfortable. Need a few rounds of, “wow — no way I could have done THAT last year,” before realizing the past is the past. But, as someone who probably could have been more keen on personal hygiene “before all this”, the world does seem a lot more disgusting to me now and I doubt that recognition will go away.

Honestly, my biggest hurdle in renormalizing is going to be parting with my money. I’ve held down overpaying, overtipping, underexpecting, WAITING, and routinely feeling pinched in every transaction because, hey, even I am not going to bitch about people trying to work/live through this. But I am not paying a premium today to “help workers” just to have the prices go up another 25% “because now we have to offer more services” or “yeah, since Covid, we require visitors to request each day they want room service” and other cash cow corner cutting. I know I sound old and grumpy — and I am. We’re going to be a year into this fucking thing and the middlemen like Uber and AirBnB and Amazon who underpay their people are reaping all the rewards, not taking care of their people, then casting them back to the social safety net (which we then all go, “BUT WE HAVE TO PAY OUT UI TO PEOPLE WHO ARE CONTRACT LABOR EVEN THOUGH CONTRACT LABOR ISN’T COVERED BY UI BECAUSE THAT’S THE RISK OF WORKING AS CONTRACT LABOR!”) — who will, in six to nine months, be buying up distressed real estates for pennies on the dollar while the rest of us look around and go, “Oh shit! Our broke-ass neighbor losing his house is going to hurt values in the neighborhood!”

Fuck. I won’t care. I’ll be at the dive bar the day they open.

Unsurprised

I’m watching The Abyss. How the Hell did Cameron make this without killing anyone?

Horatio Cornblower

Cute that you think James Cameron couldn’t bury that news deeper than that abyss they were supposed to be in.

Unsurprised
Unsurprised

I also topped off the Softcore folder.

h

ttps://pixxxels.cc/gallery/16XMGkX

Unsurprised

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ThePirateSloth

Happy Holidays everyone! I hope everyone here that I’ve somehow sorta known for 15+ years of internet dick jokin, charmslinging, sex cannon’d, beer drinking, disagreeable rapscallions, and all around world class kommentors are as safe as one can be in 2020.

Enjoy a festive gif.

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ThePirateSloth

It’s not giffin! What the gif! This site sucks! I’m going to Deadspin, where the REAL sports are!

/takes glitter and goes home

Here’s the slow motion video the gif is from to make up for the not gif.

Last edited 3 years ago by ThePirateSloth
Unsurprised

It gifs when you click on it.

ThePirateSloth

I swore never to fall for that line a thir….teenth time.

yeah right

Good for all of us who have survived this far.

We’re so fucking close!

I may be in the next tier of vaccines and I’m gonna blog the Shit Out Of That!

Be well everyone.
Be safe.

Best to you and yours.

yeah right

Toss me a bottled water and grab that oar.

We’ve got some paddling to do.

Fronkenshteen

Happy Christmas! Love, love, love to Moose & BC Dick if they’re lurking. Hope 2021 showers you all with success and GLOREEE!!!

Gumbygirl

Merry Christmas everyone!

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Gumbygirl

When I hit the big lotto I’m buying a farm with them, and llamas. Maybe a few goats. And those little horses.

Game Time Decision

Watching yet another Tim Allen Xmas movie. Gah

Horatio Cornblower

Well said, BFC, even if you are a shifty…environmentalist electric car type.

We will be celebrating my first Xmas in 51 years where I don’t have to go anywhere after opening gifts tomorrow morning. Of course, we’ll be doing this because of a combination plague/hellstorm hitting the East Coast tomorrow, putting down 1-3 inches of rain and likely knocking out power, so it’s at best a mixed blessing.

Nonetheless, as I knock back the last beer of the evening and watch, for reasons beyond my own comprehension, the Montgomery Bowl, I did want to stop in and wish you all a Happy Holiday season, success in the War on Christmas, and what I hope to God is a better 2021 for all of us than 2020 was.

Senor Weaselo

So I was out this afternoon at the Pierre Hotel. It was a last-second call for a proposal. (She said yes.)

The back channel thought I was the one proposing. So I’d like to take this time to confirm that I have not proposed to Senorita Weaselo.

Merry Christmas you bonkers lizard people you.

Senor Weaselo

The girl for the couple whose proposal I played?

ThePirateSloth

Did he go to Jared’s first?

Rikki-Tikki-Deadly

We spent pretty much the whole day today in our off-brand Snuggies and watching terrible television. We’ll do much the same tomorrow except instead of having an Impossible Whopper for dinner (courtesy of T-mobile!) we’ll be having Peking Duck. It’s gonna be awesome.

Game Time Decision

Since you asked, order in

Gumbygirl

Since it’s just the two of us, tomorrow we’re having surf and turf- ribeyes and langoustines. Tonight we did smores for dessert, instead of Hershey bars we used slices of one of those chocolate oranges. Highly recommend!

ballsofsteelandfury

From that place in Monterey Park?

Rikki-Tikki-Deadly

Yup, Duck House. We put our order in about a week ago.

Mr. Ayo