Wednesday, November 21, 2007

Have a Merry Christmas...Somewhere Else

I ate lunch the other day with my friend Mickki. She's a doll who put up with my singing "Oh Micky you're so fine" three days a week at the job I had a million years ago right up until the day that she reminded me that I am four hundred and twenty seven years old, and she was something like 21 at the time. I think she said something like, "I've never heard the original version of that song, I've only heard other people sing it to me." But when we're not contemplating the fact that I'm over four hundred, we're just two kooky gals who both like eating lunch at Noodles.

"I can't believe they're playing Christmas music already," she said. And it was true, the sterile Musak version of Oh Come All Ye Faithful was oozing out of the overhead speaker onto me and my strogonoff, reminding me of one of my most genius ideas: Tiered Christmases.

One of the problems with Christmas, you see, is that everyone celebrates it at once. There's no escaping it. It's everywhere. So I, Jody Reale, propose the following: The US Regional Holiday Plan. Here's the idea:

For example, we could say, "Red states, your Christmas season happens in the summertime; blue states, your Christmas happens in the winter." That way, the white Christmas enthusiasts could travel to, say, Maine Massachusetts while they're celebrating their Christmas season, and Coloradoans like me would be psyched out of their damn minds that they didn't have to risk their lives driving to the mall in bad weather the day before the big gift exchange.

Or, maybe we could say that the Eastern Seaboard, the middle states, and the West Coast are all assigned different Christmas seasons. Or each state is given its own week of Christmas time, leaving the US with two full weeks out of every year during which Christmas is prohibited. Not personal enough for you? OK, your own Christmastime could be assigned to you based on the first three numbers of your social security number, or you could draw dates from a lottery.

Think of the possibilities; the lessening of airport mayhem and travel frustration. The steady flow of consumers to stores all year-round. The potential to make what can be an anxious time of year more palatable to those of us with seasonal affective disorder. Are you on board?

I'm sure Santa's going to fight this one with every fiber, but screw him. He's had a good run all these years working one day a year. He can start outsourcing like everyone else.

2 comments:

ClaireWalter said...

Several years ago, already having been assaulted w/ Christmas decorations in stores since Halloween, I was in China for a week in early December where I hoped for some respite by the time the holiday REALLY rolled around. In the officially Communist/largely Buddhist country, capitalism and commercialism were winning. Big time. Santa was EVERYWHERE in Beijing, Shanghai and Guangzhou. Even traveling half-way around the world to what we think of as a totally different culture did not provide an escape.
Claire @ http://travel-babel.blogspot.com

amy said...

1. But what if you live in a red state and wish you lived in a blue state? Could you have Christmas twice a year?

2. If I outsourced Christmas, I would do it in Australia. Because apparently they do it exactly like us only it's summertime there, and they have koalas and kangaroos in the background.

And they say Crikey a lot.