Un-Christmas 2011: When the shitter was full

By Michael J.W. Stickings

It feels like I'm under assault. It's only December 2 today, but already Christmas is upon us. In fact, it's been upon us for some time now, and it seems to be getting earlier and earlier every year.

Our local Santa parade was almost three weeks ago.

My kids are all about their advent calendars and counting down the days.

Our tree will likely go up this weekend. Try as I might, I just can't hold out much longer.

The Starbucks I go to downtown has been decked out in holiday decorations, adult-contemporary Christmas music polluting our ears, for a while now. I assume this is true of all Starbuckses. (Yes, I caved and got myself a gingerbread latte last week. It was okay.)

Black Friday was last Friday. Even more rampant and irresponsible consumerism than usual was unleashed. TV ads are telling you you're a bad person if you don't spend rampantly and irresponsibly on various things you surely don't need.

And Richard informs us that he's going heavy on the Christmas-related posts this holiday season.

Look, don't get me wrong, I like Christmas. Or, rather, I like Christmas without the Christ in it, the traditions that we have developed without any religion in them at all. Which is to say, I like the holiday season. It's nice. Especially when you have kids. And I'll get in the spirit eventually.

But let's push back a little. Let's respond to all this way-too-early Christmasification of our lives with some blatant irreverence.

I happen to think that the best Christmas movie ever is Bad Santa (specifically the unrated version, Badder Santa). My buddy Robert (also known as our occasional International Sports Reporter) argues that it might just be Christmas Vacation (which I find amusing but generally mediocre). They're both certainly irreverent, including this admittedly amusing (Robert finds it absolutely hilarious) scene from the latter -- watch it below.

I'll post something from Bad Santa soon. Let's keep the irreverence coming. We need an antidote to all the Christmas spirit.

Enjoy: