Merry Christmas Eve Eve...

So, here it is...Christmas Eve eve...also known as Festivus in certain circles.

So, in keeping with the spirit of Festivus, let us all gather around the aluminum pole and air our grievances...

KennyG is on my XM Radio, playing a soulfully painful rendition of my favorite Christmas song, Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas. It's my favorite song, because it's tinged with sadness...and yet it's so hopeful. Kind of like how I view the holiday. It's long been documented that I'm not much of a Christmas person. I try to avoid whatever I can. I don't go to parties. I don't participate in "Secret Santa's". I decorate my house as much as I can, hoping against hope that merry decor will somehow fill me with the Christmas spirit and un-scrooge me. No such luck. Humbug! Humbug I say!

I'm grinchier than the Grinch himself. I bake and I cook. I shop and I wrap...all with a grimace and a scowl. I am not merry or bright. I'm more sour than bad eggnog. I find no joy in this time of year.

Yet, somehow, I always think "Well, maybe I'll feel differently next year".

But, I never do.

This year is last years next year. And I'm even humbuggier than I was last year.

I had a small sparkle of hope tonight...hope that perhaps next year will be better...but, why do that to myself? I ought to know by now that next year is never going to be better than this year. It only gets worse. I get older, more dour, sadder and lonlier. I sit and feel sorry for myself, that I have less of a life than I want. I have no one to kiss under the mistltoe. That I only want one simple little thing for Christmas that I never get.

Tonight, I found myself yelling at my TV Box. Seems the single and childless Shepard Smith is off for the holidays. Working in his place? The very married with children Trace Gallagher. That's right. TGallie has to work while Shepard is off relaxing. I remember back in the day, on Christmas Eve, Kathy Levin of QVC, who was Jewish, always took the last shift of the night, so that hosts who celebrated Christmas could spend Christmas Eve home with their families. The network would go off the air for the holiday when she signed off (generally with her dog) and not come back on until after Christmas. I guess that sort of spirit just doesn't exist anymore. TGallie has to work, while Mrs. Gallie and the two little Gallies celebrate without him. Humbug, Shepard Smith. May you be visited by 3 spirits to learn the true meaning of Christmas. Maybe I need to be visited by them as well...

But next year will be better...but only if I skip Christmas and go to DisneyWorld...

/end grievances

So, to you, dear Constant Reader, I bid a Happy Festivus...the holiday for 'the rest of us'...