Merry Christmas everyone!
It’s Christmas eve here, evening time to be exact. In true procrastinators form, I did the last of my Christmas shopping today, 24 December, probably paying more than I should have for the S.O.’s big gift ( A Yamashita 9.75mm pearl pendant…..). She better like it! Certainly I payed enough for it.
Also, in a means only a woman can engineer, I paid for my Christmas gift from the S.O.; a home theater system. Since I can shop at the exchange, and they had a 100 dollar off special on the system, I bought it on the promise from the S.O. that she would give me the money equal to the value of the gift. Me, I would be just as happy if I could get the gift in trade…;-) , but I don’t think the S.O. is going to give it up in the quantity required…sigh.. ;-0 .
I did, however, watch something unique today. On NHK this afternoon they had “Rudoplh the Red Nose Reindeer” animation special. Its the original from 1965 dubbed in Japanese. I watched it as good Japanese listening practice, plus I did not have to struggle with the translation so much, since I have seen this show probably 30+ times in my life. Nonetheless some of the Japanese interpretations were interesting. For example, the song “We are Santa’s Elves” was translated as ???? ?????????????( “We are the people santa likes” ). “Bumbles bounce” was translated as “Bumble jump!” . Not quite the same, methinks.
That got me thinking about why it has been so hard for me to get into a Christmasy spirit this season. Part of has to deal with worry about the future and what do with: my job, the S.O., and where to live., However, more of it has to do with the lack of change from the normal everyday routine. The TV Christmas specials have something to do with that I think. Usually during a “normal” Christmas season I will (try to) watch:
Its a Wonderful Life ( several times…at least until the little bastards at TBS bought the rights!)
A Christmas Story
White Christmas
A Charlie Brown Christmas
The Grinch who Stole Christmas ( Cartoon version, not the crass movie ripoff!)
Rudolph
Miracle on 34th Street ( the original B&W version, although the remake is not too bad…….this movie is also known as the story of my sex life!)
Donovan’s Reef (Don’t ask me why this is here, I just like it!)
Holiday Inn
The Santa Clause………(just the original, not the useless sequel)
About Last Night…( No Christmas connection here, just an excuse to watch….Unless you count Jim Belushi walking through the snow saying, ‘Tits and ass, Tit’s and ass, bonnie blue, bonnie blue, bonnie blue!’)
Which one is the best? That’s easy. A Christmas Story is without a doubt my favorite Christmas movie. The story is well told, tastefully done, genuinely funny, and original. While most folks focus on the “BB gun” piece of the story, for me it is the description of the boy’s father ( “My old man was the connoisseur of using the “F” word”; ” Over the years I got taste many kinds of soap in my mouth, I found Palmolive to be the best….” .
They don’t write stuff like that anymore. I sure wish they did…………..
Merry Christmas!
Froliche Weinachten!
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Be careful out there!………..
And of course its good to be at the top:
