TomD77

For decades I've found that the real fun on Christmas AM is in the giving.

But, fantasizing, if current Christmases were like those of many decades ago in which you got stuff wildly beyond your ability to provide, we could still have problems getting to sleep, especially with the Ferrari waiting in the driveway or the 64 foot Bertram at the marina!

xizangstan

Oh, and Merry Christmas.

stapfam

Got to the age where I have trouble thinking of what the family are going to get me. And in the period of austerity--we have gone over to secret Santa for the family. One present to buy and a limit of $15.64 for that one present. How can I buy my son-in-law a new set of Michelin Pro race 3's for $15.64? So he got two tubes and a repair kit instead.

I am welcoming this change in cost this year. Leaves more funds for the January sales (That started last week by the way as no-one was buying anything from the shops)

Happy Christmas and if you must drink too much--Make certain you are sitting down when it hits you. Less distance to fall.

Wogster

Ferrari, when did they start making bicycles?

Just remember there are people where stuff wildly beyond their ability to provide for themselves, would include a $15 tire for their rusty Schwinn, which would be great, because then they could ride to the mission for Christmas dinner.

Retro Grouch 

We pretty much just exchange home made gifts at Christmas time. One of my daughters does things like calendars with all of the appropriate birthdays and such marked. The rest of us lean rather heavily toward edables. I make and freeze Dad-the-Bad chili for everyone, Mrs. Grouch is giving pumpkin bread and granola. The grandkids and great-grandkids (20 in all) are all getting socks with either cash or a cash-equivlent tucked into them.

lphilpot

My 13 year old daughter and I went to a couple of dollar stores yesterday, since she was disappointed she'd not been able to put anything in her mother's Christmas stocking. Those few little cheap "stocking items" we bought made her (daughter) smile more than a lot of other things have recently. Now whether or not she'll smile even more when she unwraps her new iPod Touch after lunch today (there's church this morning) remains to be seen...

Bob Nichols

I wrote this a little earlier this morning:

I just woke up and came downstairs, sitting in the den by myself – well our cat, Holly, is sitting beside me. I’ve been thinking of all the past 66 Christmases. When I was a child I remember the excitement on Christmas eve, how hard it was to go to sleep, and then coming into the living room on Christmas morning to see what Santa left under the tree. I remember visiting my grandparents on Christmas and wondering if Santa would find me

Then it seemed like a flash of the eye and we were the parents. We experienced the joy of seeing the excitement in the eyes of our children, the anticipation that had getting ready for Christmas. I remember the joy of attending the candlelight service as a family. I remember the joy of trying to find that special gift for each family member.

Now we are the grandparents and we see this excitement in our grandchildren. All our grandkids were here last night, except Andrew, and what a joy it is to have them around. Probably won’t be long before we’ll be the great grandparents and have little ones around again.

Each Christmas is different and we all have different memories of Christmases past, but one thing has never changed – the celebration of the greatest gift ever – when God gave his Son for us. We experience joy by giving gifts, but can you imagine the joy He experienced by doing this for each one of his children.

So MERRY CHRISTMAS to all and remember that God always wants us to experience the joy.

Artkansas 

Thinking about my niece and nephew. The last Christmas at my grandmother's. I was flush for the first time in my life so I played Santa. The niece got a new purple Jamis girl's bicycle, the nephew got a pedal car in the shape of a Japanese bullet train engine and a both got a lot of smaller presents.

Flash forward 26 years, and the niece is now celebrating her first Christmas with her husband, and the nephew is an Iraq veteran with PTSD trying to get his life back on track. Sometimes you wish you could protect those little kids.

byte_speed

Difference in Christmas now & in the past?

Every time I hope for a bike under the Christmas tree, it happens.
Being old does have a few advantages.

Dudelsack 

With time comes many grandchildren (if you're lucky, or blessed, or whatever).

With many grandchildren comes ridiculous spoilage by grandparents, which leads to the purchase of many gifts (and I'm not even in the money-sucking 1%), which means I'm sitting on the sofa, right where I should be, listening to the Christmas music, and my wife is yelling at me to get busy wrapping presents (it's almost 11AM, for goodness sake).

And this is after the traditional "Let's keep the Christmas spending down this year, what do you say?" that gets traditionally ignored.

If I were a millionaire and billionaire sucking the very marrow out of the bones of the working class, it wouldn't take me three months to pay off the credit card bills.

unterhausen

subterfuge doesn't always work. I was getting my son a new computer but didn't want to tell him. So I asked my son what case I should get for my new computer, and he picked one out, but then he started crying. So I had to spill the beans.

And, please, all I want for Christmas is no more politics (I can make that happen for myself, but I don't like it)

Dudelsack 

Speaking of class warfare: all the grandchildren are here. It's the social equivalent of the storming of the Palace by the angry Bolsheviks.

CraigB

I'm older now.

Dudelsack 

The house is so totally trashed that if I wasn't the one who clean it up, I'd be laughing. I think the Bolsheveks would have been tidier.

John_V 

For me, the biggest difference in Christmas pasts and today is the ability to share with others in the true meaning of Christmas. I grew up in the projects with my father being the only working parent. Whatever it was we got for Christmas was something my brother and I were extremely grateful for, even the used gifts we got when my father couldn't afford anything else.

Since then, life has been pretty good to me and, thanks to my wife (who grew up dirt poor on a farm), we have made some very good decisions over the years. This Christmas, my wife and I split the cost of a present for the two of us. We limited the amount of money that we were going to spend on the kids and grandkids but the most expensive purchase was clothes and toys for homeless families and those that are not homeless but less fortunate than us. I wish that we had these type of organizations when I was growing up. It would have made my dad's Christmases a lot happier.

Gravity Aided

I live in a ranch style house, no staircases for the Bolsheviki to go charging up . I got a film and slide scanner for Christmas and now I'm scanning all sorts of 40 year old negatives and slides

rydabent

I remember the the Christmas I got my first bike with 24 inch wheels. I was small for my age so that is why the 24 inch wheels. We lived on a farm, and the little one room country school house was a mile and three quarter away. That bike sure was a lot better than walking!!!!!

How ever now that I have turned 73 Im back on my recumbent bike and trike as much as I can. I live in Nebr, so I dont ride much in the winter and really hate it. The more things change the more they stay the same.

xizangstan

Big difference: We used to all wish one another "Merry Christmas". Even my Jewish friends would wish me Merry Christmas. But now, it's taboo to say that. The ACLU can get a restraining order against you for saying that at work or in a public place.

Everyone wants the legal holiday, but nobody's allowed to refer to it as Christmas. But the next day, December 26th is Kwanzaa. So now instead of wishing everyone Merry Christmas, we CAN wish everyone "Happy Kwanzaa", and still be politically correct.

HAPPY KWANZAA

mikepwagner

Utter nonsense! Balderdash! Poppycock! Horse pucky!

Please specify one case where the ACLU has obtained a restraining order that prevents any individual acting in a private capacity from wishing "Merry Christmas" to anyone!

The ACLU has properly obtained restraining orders to prevent government resources (employees acting in official capacities, tax money, publicly funded facilities, etc.) from being used to endorse any particular religion or religious holiday - as specified in the US Constitution.

Retro Grouch 

Yup. The ONLY thing that the ACLU does is to defend the Bill of Rights. While it's true that when you do that you sometimes have to get into bed with some pretty bad actors, the ACLU is objectively a very conservative organization.

Anybody who wants to gets to say "Merry Christmas" except the government.

Artkansas 

That is very respectful of them. And did you return the favor and wish them Happy Hannukah? Many of my Jewish friends celebrate Christmas by going to a Chinese restaurant.

Of course you can call Christmas Christmas. When I ride my bike in the holiday parade, I'm shouting "Merry Christmas" and so are the people on the sides of the street. The point of the Holidays, is that it's inclusive, not exclusive. People of all types have holidays about now, Christmas, Kwanzaa, Hannukah, Buddha's Enlightenment Day, Winter Solstice, sometimes Ramadan and I'm sure there are more. The only time you need to worry is if your Pastor starts having Holiday Eve services.

Dudelsack 

According to my NPR station (classical), today is Boxer Day. No one knows how they came up with that word, but evidently it marks the Feast of St. Stephens, a time during which well-to-do families were to commit acts of kindness to those that are less fortunate. I don't know how or if it's celebrated today, because I'm a low church Anabaptist.

So, have a Blessed St. Stephens Feast.

Bikey Mikey

Not nit-picking, but it's "Boxing Day."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boxing_Day

JanMM

Even a Hoosier knows that it's Boxing Day. (I googled it yesterday.)

BluesDawg

In the past there weren't a bunch of paranoid people inventing the idea that there was some massive conspiracy to stop using the word Christmas.

This agnostic and/or atheist backslid Baptist hopes you all had as great a Christmas as I did.