My Merry Christmas

My wife and I are on vacation, just winding up things here in New York City before we head home tomorrow. Today we disembarked from the cruise ship and there to pick us up was JayIsh, our designated driver from all points in Brooklyn and, of course, our programming director at Merry Christmas Radio.

Two years ago Jay and I met for the first time after years of associating together here on MMC. It was a thrill then and a thrill again today.

This is the second time Jay has done this for us. In fact, I think I'll make it a point, every time I visit the New York area, to have Jay drive us around. He is just a joy and a delight to be with.

He took us to a local Christmas shop, where we kicked tires (ornaments?) and talked business here for a while. But really it was a choice couple of hours to just visit and get to know each other better.
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The brilliant sun-kissed afternoon of a summer’s day in swanky Newport, Rhode Island is hardly the backdrop you would imagine for the latest chapter in an ongoing Christmas story.

It happened today, the first full day of a cruise my wife and I are on up the New England coastline. As the early evening approaches and we are now “out at sea”, swaying gently back and forth as we move on now to Boston, I am feeling a sense of Christmas not commonly felt outside of Christmas Eve itself.
Today was the day and Newport was the place where I finally met an old and dear friend I had up to that point only known online, a relationship born right here on My Merry Christmas.

The only downside I can see to running a community on the Internet is the fact that I may never get to actually meet, face to face, those I share Christmas with. But there are a few like-minded...

Last week we celebrated the 50th anniversary of my Mom and Dad. They never had a wedding. So my siblings and I got together to throw them a party, complete with cutting a cake.

It was a big deal, especially since my Mom suffered two strokes in May. There was considerable doubt as to whether we should even try to hold such an event but the doctor insisted that we go for it. "Your mom needs to have something to look forward to and it will help her meet her rehab goals", he told us.

Indeed, he was correct. In the last few weeks before the party Mom made significant progress.

Her strokes were did not leave her conventionally disabled. Most stroke victims show left side weakness or paralysis but Mom's was particularly cruel in that it affected the parts of her brain that control memory and personality.

We quite honestly were grieving in May, thinking Mom...

I get the itch every year around this time. It is a season fraught with tradition and precision -- everything has to be done "just so".

I'm not sure which is greater: going for the kill or just preparing for the hunt?

No -- not the deer hunt. (I did that once, city boy that I am, and can testify of the legendary tales told by the campfire and likewise the less-than-legendary acts committed while on the prowl). Frankly,I don't have the stomach for killing animals and have never again done it.

The hunt of which I speak is the yearly search for the Christmas ornament I will send to my yet-unkown ornament exchange partner.

After doing this for a few years I've decided there is real art in the hunt for an ornament. It is not like you can go pick out Martha Stewart's best and send it off feeling good about yourself.

No way. The ornament exchange is an intimate deal. You have to get to know your trading partner...

It has been a year to forget in the outside world of professional Santas.

It was about a year ago we had to deal with a group of traveling Santas who thought it was a good idea to visit a brothel museum dressed as Santa.

Then we endured a Santa & Mrs. Claus couple who ran a Santa convention. They hosted a big event then skipped town with all the money -- stiffing vendors, fellow Santas and the City of Gatlinburg, Tennessee at the same time.

And now we endure, as if on schedule, the yearly rant from a man who legally changed his name to Santa Claus in Lake Tahoe, California.

Last year this guy -- a monk, no less -- put out multiple press releases about a state-by-state capitol tour he was engaging in to scold state govenors about pushing more money towards children's issues.

Ok, we're good with that.

But we noticed that all his efforts seemed to be about him. He never raised a dime for kids and...