Take your festive special and shove it...

Dear readers,
I love you so, but consider this a warning. You will be safe as soon as I see pretty little flowers blooming out of the ground, so please bear with me, but this time of year turns me into a blubbering pile of mess.  It usually begins once that first television commercial hits the airwaves. 



As soon as I see that commercial I bawl my friggin eyes out.  Never mind the atrocious acting, it's just that holiday commercials (such as the one above), while may not even be that sad, just turn me into a blubbering fool. 

When I see these commercials I am reminded of the happy times such as the first Christmas I remember where I truly believed in Santa Claus and there was a rock with little googly eyes glued onto it in my stocking and I was certain it was made by the elves or the time I got a Nintendo for Christmas but was disappointed in the game that Santa brought me with it (Cobra Circle...I still remember that game!) so my mom packed it all up and took it over to Canadian Tire (that was open on Christmas...WTF?) and bought me the Mario pack instead which came with Mario AND Duck Hunt.  The videos my parents used to take of us on Christmas where our dad would video tape the house all quiet and lit up beautifully only by Christmas lights at like 3am and then come and wake me up and say that Santa had come and get me all riled up, and then tell me to go back to sleep.  Of course I would never go back to sleep. I usually ended up staying up at that point playing with the toy I got to open on Christmas Eve and then I would wake up the rest of the house at a more reasonable hour of 5:30.  The memories of mom going shopping over the border and bringing back things that we just didn't have here like Addams Family Cereal (that came with an Uncle Fester flashlight!!) and Fruit Stripes Gum.  More recently I'm reminded of the time when someone did something for me on Christmas that I will never forget, which kind of makes that commercial sting a little more.

On top of all that good stuff, I also think of the bad stuff at Christmas like being alone with no family anywhere around me for the whole holiday season, struggling financially to make sure everybody gets a gift and shopping for hours and hours, even though I know deep down that anything I can afford to get such person will only be ridiculed later.  It happens, unfortunately. I even think about the times when we were kids and we were given $100 for Christmas...and nothing else.  I'm not complaining, $100 is awesome, but when you're a kid what are you going to do with $100 on Christmas Day? Not a whole lot, unless Canadian Tire was actually open.  I think about my first Christmas as a parent, and then my second Christmas as a single parent. 

I even think about the fast approach of the new year.  I wonder what good things have happened to me in this past year, and unfortunately as of late it hasn't been anything, which is my fault because I do set goals, but I fail miserably.  Next year's goal is going to be something like, I will only wear white socks on Tuesdays or something petty like that because this whole goal of becoming a millionaire, falling in love and losing weight just isn't working out too well.  Besides, have you tried to type 2010 yet? It's horrid! I hate typing that year and as a typist who does reports, I have to look forward to typing in that year, well for a whole year and that scares me.  It hurts my pinky finger to type in that year.  2010 2010 2010 (getting some practice in now...it's not working out so well). 

Don't get me wrong, there are a lot of things I love about this season (minus the snow...), but my mind always travels back to my bank account statement, buying presents for people and people who are jerks this time of year.

It's just never a good thing for my emotions once this season starts, I try to think of the good things, but all I can think about is the things that have gone so wrong in these past few years and it makes that commercial, although really not that sad and kind of corny, seem like I'm watching puppies get thrown off the roof of a tall building. 

So you can't say that you haven't been warned.  If I'm a little more complainey, I'm sorry.  If I call you stupid or mean, I apologize.  I just get a little worked up once those commercials start rolling. 

and because I'm such a nice person, here are a few Christmas commercials to warm you up for the season of depression commercialism:


*sniff*



(okay that's not sad, that's creepy!)


(W...T...F?)


(I know you will enjoy this!)

Okay, I'm done, going to watch Survivor, with Kleenex as I know that damn Swiss Chalet commercial will come on at least four times.