• cute [animal/small child/old person/magician] is [sick/growing up too fast/angry], and [believes/is recently doubting/never believed in] Santa’s existence, and [protagonist] goes on a crazy caper which saves Christmas, and proves Santa is real in the process.
• [protagonist] is a [cute child/bumbling adult/cartoon character/muppet/angry hermit] who [finds out Santa is sick/finds out Santa is in trouble/accidentally injures Santa/un-does all of Santa's work] and goes on a crazy caper involving a unique but belittled talent, which saves Christmas.
• [protagonist] is [home for Christmas/someone who never understood Christmas/haunted by three ghosts/a disgruntled relative of Santa or Rudolph/sent to an alternate world where he had never been born], and is driven by a dysfunctional but ultimately well meaning [self/family member/group of friends/unwitting arch-nemisis] to go on a crazy caper in order to save Christmas, and thereby remembering the meaning of Christmas in the process.
• [protagonist] is [looking for the perfect gift/concerned someone's list didn't make it to Santa], but doesn’t have any money, so he goes on a crazy caper where he [sells his favorite possession to get the money/earns the money through some crazy scheme/steals the present/builds the present from scratch] and even though the [attempt/gift exchange] is ultimately unsuccessful, he remembers the true meaning of Christmas and [Santa/intended gift recipient] saves the day.
• [protagonist] is disilusioned by the commercialization of Christmas when he [goes on a crazy caper/directs a school pageant, often with repetitive dance moves] and thereby remembers the true meaning of Christmas.

i’ve run through a list of 54 christmas specials and movies, and each one falls into at least one (if not more) of these five buckets. if i am missing a storyline, i can’t come up with it …

the weather down this way has been crazy. in the last month, we’ve had just as many days above 60 as we had below freezing. it’s rained, it’s typhooned, it’s snowed, it’s blizzard-ed.

i wouldn’t be surprised to see dennis quaid snowshoe by, murmuring about having to save Jake Gyllenhaal (tho, to be frank, i would toss Jake back and focus my attention on saving Emmy Rossum).

i digress.

the lady sparkler and i are spending the long weekend on the coast of Delaware with Lighting Chick Knits, whose sister happens to have a house out here with a spectacular view of the sound (pictures of the view on facebook).

much as her blog would suggest, Lighting Chick Knits, well, knits. and, being the Renaissance man that i am, I couldn’t pass up the opportunity to add another tick to my “wide, not deep” resume of skills, probably best symbolized by my musical skills (guitar, bass, piano, violin, and harmonica) or my interest in foreign languages (russian, arabic, spanish) — all of which i can “do,” just none particularly well.

and so it is with knitting … i am neither exceptionally good or exceptionally bad. knitting fits nicely into my need for immediate gratification, but my skills are no where near the point they’d need to overcome my internal demand for perfection.

we’ll see. so far, i’ve made it through 20 rows of a scarf, which is just enough to make smallishly-sized bookmark … which seems like a just reward for annihilating the last remaining shred of my masculinity.

so, it’s officially January now, and the lady sparker and i have yet to send out our (mostly) annual holiday card.

it’s funny. thanksgiving snuck up on us this year, as did christmas and now new year’s. i guess it’s only fitting that sending out the card snuck up on us as well.

so, it’s going out this weekend, but just in case yours gets caught up in some super aggressive spam filter, you can view the card online right now.

as for timing, we’ll do better next year … i *promise.*

working in online fundraising, the fact that the end of the year is coinciding with the complete and utter collapse of our economy is casting a bit of a pall on what would otherwise be a festive time of the year.

this minor set back (alone) could have be taken in stride … but, when our philanthropy department neighboors started getting all up in our grill about how they were going to out “festive” us for the holidays, it was game on.

i mean, we can handle trying to compensate for the decline of western civilization, but to be called out for decorating supremacy was just a bridge to far.

we responded to this tyranny with resolve. we raided our collective attics, mobilizing all sorts of lights, ornaments, bows and garlands towards the decorating war effort (photos of the mobilization above).

but, in the end, it was over before it really even began … and philanthropy surrendered before we had the chance to get much past the “shock and awe” stage:

ok ok, you guys win this one. you really went above and beyond. I apologize for the trash talk and concede the title to you guys.

i’m a tiny bit sad they caved so quickly, because we had one more salvo of decorations we could have deployed had we needed the reserves to secure our merriment objectives.

i love the smell of trash talk in the morning.

well, the season has officially begun … the season of Christmas programming.

we actually kicked it off over thanksgiving when special host jojo-pumpkin helped the lady sparkler and i toss out the ceremonial first “charlie brown christmas.”

we go into each year with a list of 60+ movies, cartoons and holiday specials to watch, and we are usually pretty happy if we make it through a third of them. this year sorta snuck up on us, so i’m thinking i’ll be happy if we get through even a quarter.

anyone up for a little, healthy christmas special-watching competition?

tv specials A Charlie Brown Christmas A Chipmunk Christmas A Special Sesame Street Christmas Emmett Otter’s Jug Band Christmas Foster’s Home for Imaginary Friends (“Christmas Special”) Frosty Returns Frosty the Snowman Frosty’s Winter Wonderland A Garfield Christmas Special Grandma Got Runover By a Reindeer Holidaze: The Christmas That Almost Didn’t Happen How the Grinch Stole Christmas It’s Christmas Time Again, Charlie Brown John Denver and the Muppets: A Christmas Together Little Drummer Boy M*A*S*H (“Death Takes a Holiday”) Mickey’s Christmas Carol Nestor, the Long-Eared Christmas Donkey Olive, the Other Reindeer Pee-wee’s Playhouse (“Christmas Special”) Pinocchio’s Christmas Robbie the Reindeer Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer Rudolph’s Shiny New Year Santa Claus is Comin’ to Town The Story of the First Christmas Snow Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip (“The Christmas Show”) ‘Twas the Night Before Christmas The Life And Adventures Of Santa Claus The West Wing (“In Excelsis Deo”) The West Wing (“Noël”) The West Wing (“Holy Night”) Winnie the Pooh, and Christmas Too! The Year Without a Santa Claus

movies About a Boy Bad Santa A Christmas Carol A Christmas Story Christmas in Connecticut Christmas Vacation (National Lampoon’s) Christmas with the Kranks Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe Die Hard Die Hard 2: Die Harder Elf Ernest Saves Christmas Harry Potter and the Sorcerer Stone Holiday Inn Home Alone It’s a Wonderful Life Love Actually Miracle on 34th Street (1947) Miracle on 34th Street (1994) The Muppet Christmas Carol The Nightmare Before Christmas The Polar Express Prancer The Ref Santa Claus Conquers the Martians The Santa Clause The Santa Clause 2 Santa vs. Snowman Saturday Night Live Christmas Scrooge Scrooged Serendipty Trapped in Paradise White Christmas

it’s the weekend after thanksgiving, which means it’s the official start of the “get-evan-prepped-for-christmas” season. you laugh, but i have found that after 30+ years of christmases (christmi? christmasuses?) i have developed a pre-christmas routine that boarders on obsessive.

first, we have the music. i’m currently sitting on 600+ christmas songs (from 30+ christmas albums) which means i can listen non-stop for about a day and a half without repeating the same version of a song. my itunes currently features 18 versions of silent night (my favorite is a classical russian folk recording) and if you ever want to have a conversation about the definitive recording of “o holy night” then i am your man (my vote is for the new orleans benefit version featured on studio 60 last year).

but mostly, we have the movies. and television. and cartoons. it all started about a decade ago when i noticed that the more christmas “stuff” i watched, the more likely i was to have a good christmas. this has now officially spiraled out of control, and has resulted in me watching about 20 dvds worth of goodies each holiday during November and December. actually, i have taken to throwing a “christmas cartoon extravaganza” each year to help spread the love (or share the burden, as it were).

my checklist for this year has 50+ items on it. while i certainly won’t get through more than about half of what you see here, i’ve documented the whole list so i don’t have to keep recreating it every year. if by some strange miracle i have forgotten something worth seeing, please mock my omission in the comments.

Best Christmas Cartoons & Best Christmas Specials

this selction include christmas cartoons (rankin-bass!) and several live action specials including various muppets. also included are television show episodes worth re-watching during the holidays, especially aaron sorkin productions (who has a knack for christmas that i wish he could spin into the other 364 days of his work each year).

A Charlie Brown Christmas A Chipmunk Christmas A Special Sesame Street Christmas Emmett Otter’s Jug Band Christmas Foster’s Home for Imaginary Friends (“Christmas Special”) Frosty Returns Frosty the Snowman Frosty’s Winter Wonderland Grandma Got Runover By a Reindeer Holidaze: The Christmas That Almost Didn’t Happen How the Grinch Stole Christmas It’s Christmas Time Again, Charlie Brown John Denver and the Muppets: A Christmas Together Little Drummer Boy M*A*S*H (“Death Takes a Holiday”) Nestor, the Long-Eared Christmas Donkey Olive, the Other Reindeer

Pee-wee’s Playhouse (“Christmas Special”) Robbie the Reindeer Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer Rudolph’s Shiny New Year Santa Claus is Comin’ to Town Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip (“The Christmas Show”) ‘Twas the Night Before Christmas The Life And Adventures Of Santa Claus The West Wing (“In Excelsis Deo”) The West Wing (“Noël”) The West Wing (“Holy Night”) The Year Without a Santa Claus

Best Christmas Movies

some are good (miracle on 34th), some are bad (santa conquers the martians) but anything is fair game (die hard) if it happens at christmas.

About a Boy A Christmas Carol A Christmas Story Bad Santa Christmas in Connecticut Christmas Vacation (National Lampoon’s) Christmas with the Kranks Die Hard Die Hard 2: Die Harder Elf Ernest Saves Christmas Holiday Inn Home Alone It’s a Wonderful Life Love Actually Miracle on 34th Street (1947) Miracle on 34th Street (1994)

Prancer Santa Claus Conquers the Martians Santa vs. Snowman Saturday Night Live Christmas Scrooge Scrooged The Muppet Christmas Carol The Nightmare Before Christmas The Polar Express The Ref The Santa Clause The Santa Clause 2 Trapped in Paradise White Christmas

again, if i have forgotten something worth seeing, please share.

I had no idea this existed until I watched a Christmas special about it on TLC (or A&E). I’m not sure I am ready to give up Todd’s Lane, but it was great mixing it up with new material this year.

Explore the Photo Set:
Christmas Decorations, Colonial Williamsburg, Virginia

I am sure I should be out shopping, or home throwing a Christmas party, but it doesn’t look like either are going to happen this year. Perhaps it’s for the best.