Dysmey Post Archive > Pages for 2003 > Christmas 2003 Edition
Christmas is here, and for those of you who have forgotten (if you ever knew) what the holiday is all about, read this.
Today few Americans in truth celebrate Christmas, even though they believe otherwise.
Most people celebrate XMas: the holiday for shopping and spending, for decorating living rooms, for draping lights on the outside of houses, for street lamp decorations and luminaria in parks, for overwhelming the postal service with XMas cards, for Santa Claus and reindeer and elves, and for lots of gifts on XMas Day (and ungrateful brats who don't like theirs). C.S. Lewis wrote two essays on the nuisance of XMas in Britain, which is so much ahead of America in cultural foolishness.
I will not waste any time this year on those fools, who can't tell the difference between XMas and its Christian counterpart, except to point out the folly of living with one's head up somewhere dark and moist and calling it 'principle'.
Anyway, this year I got a lot of new clothing, a couple of CDs, and a steak lunch. It was a nice break, but not much of one: I still did laundry, as I do every Thursday.
I will need to get something inexpensive for my sisters as belated XMas gifts. Given my current financial status, the only XMas gifts I got so far were for the cats (some fake mice) and the folks (a copy of PC Annoyances from O'Reilly).
Merry Christmas for those of you who believe in the reason for celebrating it; Happy Hanukah for the Jewish folk (it's still going on); and Merry XMas to everyone else. Oh, happy New Year, too, and try not to flinch when the credit card bills come in.
This coming Monday I am going to my first job interview in over eight years. I am looking forward to it: I get to vie for a job at the place which (next to the bank) had employed me the longest and with which I am very familiar.
The position is a six-month part-time job at Ball State's Bracken Library doing work for its IT department. There's programming in it, but from the description the job will involve talking to library folk to work out what it is they want out of their project. The programming and testing come after that. I know I can do this, and the interview is my chance to explain why I know.
Speaking of the bank, I watched one of its commercial on Muncie public television. One of the people in those commercials left the bank even earlier than I did! (She left of her own accord after having a baby.) The bank's marketing department really, really needs to get on the ball and make some new commercials.
I got a new suit a couple of weeks ago as an XMas present, and a good dress shirt and belt to go with it. I found it interesting that the pants fit with its 42-inch waist. My exile from the vending machines, the restaurants, and all those carry-ins at the bank have done me just as much good as my walks to the grocery and the post office.