I'm sorry, is it Christmas?

The local police station had tinsel wrapped around its verandah rails in September. I was about to go in and complain about it when I discovered* it was there to draw attention to a local fund-raising effort.

Otherwise, the post office put up its decos on 1 Nov. They are very tasteful.


*by reading the sign tied to the tinsel

Nah, the locals out here in the boonies don't go all commercilised wacko-jacko until December's arrival. I imagine slaughtered carols are hollering out of the speakers in the Seoul cafes, though. The locals like the music real loud.

Most stores had Xmas out precisely one nanosecond after Halloween midnight. Many had holiday decor on the shelves long before that.

As for decorations, they had a lit Xmas tree in front of a drug store since early/mid October.

Overall, though, I've been mostly disappointed with the offerings this year. The craft store's holiday stuff is so dull it actively negates inspiration. (We're waiting to see if Target out-dulls last year's bland stuff.)

I saw workers replacing Halloween stuff with Christmas stuff when I went out Halloween afternoon looking for a decorative Halloween thing on the cheap.

The local news had a little segment with their guy who does amusing segments wandering around looking at the Christmas stuff all already up in midtown. He was ranting about what happened to Thanksgiving and why can't we just enjoy Fall for two seconds without having all the winter/Christmas stuff shoved at us already. Also on the news the same day? Footage of workers cutting down the Rockefeller Center tree (they have staff who go around the local states looking for a suitable tree on someone's property and then negotiate or whatever they do and it's a whole thing - 'this year's tree is coming from the X family, in Utica, where it's grown for however many years!' Insert interview with some family member talking about they're excited their tree will be at Rock Center. Then they show workers cutting it down, then driving it to the city, putting it up, putting the lights on, etc., before it's lit first week in Dec.)

I went clothes shopping today (sandals and summer clothes for this kids - argh!) and Myer was full of Christmas decorations and gifts. I know its way too early (and still weird for me on a 38 degree day!) but I loooooove Christmas so I was a little bit excited too ..... Yes I am cheesy cheesy cheesy : )

I assume from the summer clothes thing you're in the southern hem. so by 38 you mean...

Shops here are christmassy now, and lights have gone up in town. I don't mind the lights, clusters of small white ones enlivening otherwise dark wall space. Its dark by half past four now and the commute home, inching through the clogged streets in ceaseless icy drizzel needs a little uplift.

The long build to Christmas though, destroys Christmas. Our office party is at the end of November, we should have booked it before last Christmas apparently to secure a venue at actual Christmas. I do yearn for a simpler time when Christmas was special and magical, but that magic came from being skint, and mince pies being a luxury we could ill afford most of the time. Not sure I want a famine just to make the feast taste better.

Two of my local supermarkets had Christmas stuff out on their shelves at the end of September. September!!! There should be a law against doing this. TV commercials, with the jolly holly jingle bells music started about three weeks ago. And it's only going to get worse. They do this every year, so by the time Christmas arrives, I'm heartily sick of it.

GailD said:

Two of my local supermarkets had Christmas stuff out on their shelves at the end of September. September!!! There should be a law against doing this. TV commercials, with the jolly holly jingle bells music started about three weeks ago. And it's only going to get worse. They do this every year, so by the time Christmas arrives, I'm heartily sick of it.

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Yup.

I agree. I snapped on some people on Facebook a while back because they were posting Christmas crap. To them, it's a way to trigger a joyful memory, and they like to swim in those emotions because they can't generate them themselves. The problem is, the holidays for a lot of us mean depression and anxiety. I bloody hate the holidays.

There's another problem with it, too--retail companies keep trying to extend the holiday shopping season to increase sales. Part of this mental game is to connect buying presents with emotional well-being. The more you give, or the more expensive the gift, the more joy you will experience. This is a horrible thing to do because so many of us live close to the poverty line. There is no way we could possibly afford these products advertised anyways and the anxiety over having that linked to our happiness can be a bit much.

I agree that holiday decorations and advertising should be limited to a few weeks leading up to Christmas, not a few months. It's stressful enough in the month of December, extending that stress into November and October is just wrong.

The exchanging or gifts and the pressure to partitake is especially irksome. Dave Gorman did a good piece on the difference between a gift and a present. Basically, a present is something you give which has some inherent value, that will certainly be used, and likely something you would like for yourself. A gift isn't.

My family is big on gifts. I recently learned the budget allotted to the boys for Christmas presents. I said this was far too much, but if that's the budget, better to spend it on one really good present I know they will love but can't afford to buy for them myself, than the boot full of tat I will inevitably be shipping across the country on Christmas eve. Deaf ears I feel.

My family aren't rich by any means, but they have everything they need, and can afford a good standard of living. I don't see how buying them something they don't need and i can't afford is good for anyone, but the suggestion that we don't do presents is blasphemous.

I look forward to Christmas day, I do a big dinner and entertain, and the message has finally been received that ancient single whisky is good. Then there is Doctor Who too, but the pressure to take part kills the joy of the season.

I do like a good moan about Christmas though.

mccardey said:

Where are you? I do love the shifts in seasons

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I'm Lancashire, in Northern England, It rains a lot.

mccardey said:

Ah - rain! I remember that. We had rain a few years ago...

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Years!

We do get the odd white Christmas here every now and then too. Snowed in with a Christmas Day blizzard is great, when there's no where to go and the house is toasty because of the turkey roasting all morning. Can't buy that.

Yep Cornflake southern hemisphere - Perth, Western Australia. But I'm Irish and lived there most of my life. I miss the cold sometimes - really miss a cozy fire. But have adapted and I really don't miss having rain most days!

re the present thing, I really think over-indulging kids is a very bad thing. It destroys their pleasure in special things and ultimately leaves the dissatisfied and wanting more more more. We've screwed up that way ourselves in the past, but in the last year or two we've really turned it around, and honestly, our two are much much happier kids.

TedTheewen I'm really sorry you've got shitty Christmas memories. That's rough.

Writerdude I agree re the presents for extended family thing. It just gets crazy, doesn't it? We changed it to secret santa after a few years of nuttiness, and eventually (as everyone got older and had kids) knocked it on the head and changed to secret santa for the kids instead. Basically each kid gets one cousin one small thing (strict financial limit) and that's the end of it, which seems reasonable enough.

TedTheewen said:

The problem is, the holidays for a lot of us mean depression and anxiety.

There's another problem with it, too--retail companies keep trying to extend the holiday shopping season to increase sales. It's stressful enough in the month of December, extending that stress into November and October is just wrong.

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I agree with this. Holidays are hard enough without retail companies trying to extend the shopping season in an attempt to increase the amount of money we spend. The local Walmart(s) here in town have had Christmas stuff out since early September--before they had Halloween decorations out. Because Christmas stuff sells better than any other holiday. I've basically decided to boycott the whole thing.

If I didn't have children still at home, Christmas wouldn't be a thing at my house. As it is, I think kids these day tend to have way more than they need anyway. I'm not religious so there's not significance to the holiday, other than tradition. But tradition doesn't have to include spending money you don't have on things you don't need, often for people who won't appreciate it anyway. I try to keep things really simple. I tell my kids, you can have a 'big' Christmas, but then I won't buy you anything else all year. Or, you can have one reasonably priced gift and I'll consider buying you other things during the year (like that PS4 game I know you're going to cry about not having come March).

I don't teach about Santa, either. If I'm going to work my ass off all year long to afford stuff for my kids, no way am I giving credit to an imaginary man in a red suit. These gifts are from me, period. We don't do our kids any service by making them think that if they make a list of things they want, a magic man will grant it to them. I think it sets them up for a hell of a lot of disappointment later on. I realize Santa is a tool used by some adults to get kids to be good (so they'll be on Santa's Nice List), but I'm not going to manipulate my kids into behaving correctly. They'll do it because it's expected of them by me and there are real consequences if they don't. And I expect it all year long, not just in December.

I do enjoy seeing family (when the chance arises), I do enjoy the spirit of giving, especially when people give to charities, the homeless, Sub For Santa and things like that. I don't think the holidays are a total waste, I just think that we lose focus and allow ourselves to be manipulated by retail companies and it's unfortunate. I do enjoy that my kids get time off school, for no other reason than it means I don't have to drive carpool and worry about homework (purely selfish reasons, I know). I do have good memories of Christmas as a child and try to create some with my kids, too, but those memories do not center around gifts.

I went on a beach vacation late September/early October, had to buy a few things we'd forgotten. When we stopped at a nearby Belks, the Christmas trees and displays were up and gleaming.

I've been seeing it in stores since late Sep/early Oct, which is earlier than I'm used to. Not hung up for actual decorative purposes, though.

I have mixed feelings about it. We don't celebrate Christmas and Christmas stuff in general is likely to get some unpleasant rants from my husband that I'm tired of hearing every year. You're the Grinch. You hate Christmas. We get it already. But, my kids squeal over the loveliness of it and I do enjoy looking at Christmas decorations a whole lot more than Halloween decorations. Something about the color orange really sets my teeth on edge; not sure why.

At least they haven't started cycling through the same twenty insipid Christmas songs over and over on the radio, yet. They usually wait until the day after Thanksgiving for that.

It's like retail has made the decision that Halloween and Christmas can be monetized, but not Thanksgiving (at least here in the States). So, the end result is that Thanksgiving is summarily ignored.

Sad...

I kind of sort of just came back from buying a bunch of decorations and supplies for diy decorations for my yard. I'm the kind of person who will vomit the holly jollies all over the place if left to my own devices. I just really like the lights and showering my tiny family with gifts.

I promise not to put anything up until after Turkey Day, though.

It's the business side of Christmas that wears me out. As soon as it hits Boxing Day it's all about bargains. There are supposed to be 12 days of Christmas. Instead some begin to take their decorations down before New Year. After such a silly build-up I find that rather annoying.