What's Good about Christmas?

Now, that’s a hardball as I’m so not into Christmas because (a) I am not a Christian and (b) I think that as a lifestyle choice doing Christmas, as Judith Butler might put it, ranks somewhere between listening to Nickelback’s music and watching Eric Rohmer’s films. However, squeezing my neurons a little, I managed to come up with the following:

General: Days off work.

Altruism: Charitable giving increases during Christmas time, and I bet that’s not exclusively a substitution effect. It would be interesting to see whether the bystander effect is reduced around Christmas.

Gift ever received: Receiving the Playmobil pirate ship made me the coolest kid in my ‘hood. Until it broke.

Classical music: J.S. Bach’s Weihnachtsoratorium is one of the few pieces of classical music I thoroughly enjoy.

Pop music (song): “Merry Christmas (I Don’t Want to Fight Tonight)” is one of the Ramones’ best.

Pop music (album): A Christmas Gift for You from Phil Spector, with various artists executing the master’s wishes. I particularly like “I Saw Mommy Kissing Santa Claus”, performed by the Ronettes.

Film: Smoke has a rather lovely Christmas episode in it.

Painting, Short Story, etc.: Help me out here, people!

Despite what I said above, there’ll be no new posts before the 28th. Merry Christmas, Happy Holidays or whichever you prefer.