Christmas Countdown Day 5: Christmas Shoes

I'm not a heartless man. I think it's that very reason that I hate with a capital H A T and E the Christmas Shoes song.

If you haven't heard this song yet you haven't been listening. It's a bout a little boy who is trying to buy a pair of shoes for his mom for Christmas because she's going to die any minute and he wants her to look pretty for Jesus. He doesn't have enough money so the guy behind him in line, our gullible singer, buys them for him.

Let's forget the fact that this could easily be one of the greatest Christmas scams of all time! Let's forget the fact that the kid waited until Christmas Eve to get her the shoes so his mom would look pretty when she died, which could be any day now. If she kicked it before Christmas Jesus might send her to hell, what with not having the right shoes on.

Let's forget all of that.

I don't think I have ever in the the history of my life heard a Christmas song that is designed specifically for the purpose of masterbating our heart strings. This song is the blow up doll of carols. The dildo of yuletide tunes. The Fleshlight of Holiday Cheer. There's no heart in this song, whatsoever. It makes me cry that this song makes people cry.


In preparation for this write-up I checked out the video on Youtube. It consists of clips from the CBS special staring Rob Lowe and one guy singing while the rest of his band sits around, obviously disgusted that they're part of this tripe.


But the best part is that the premise of the song is that the kid wants to buy these shoes for his mom so she looks beautiful when she dies and sees the Baby Jesus in heaven. So he goes and finds what could possibly be the ugliest shoes I have ever seen in my life, thinking that that oughta do the trick. HA!

The moral of the song is that it is supposed to remind us what Christmas is all about... buying shoes. Kelly was right.

Christmas Countdown Day 4: Backdoor Santa

It's not that I don't respect Bon Jovi. I do. You've gotta respect the Jovi. It's just that sometimes he makes it really really really hard to. Really. Let's take Backdoor Santa for example.

Now Backdoor Santa sounds like it should be a Wham! song, but it's not. This is a song about a guy who always gives it up for a touch of the younger kind. (My Sharona... ma-ma-ma My Sharona)

I'm actually at a loss on this one. With lines like "I keep the little girls happy while the little boys are away." and "I kept that door open, in case anyone smells a mouse." Sure you MIGHT be able to interpret this song as a guy who dresses up as Aanta and goes around fucking married women. which only makes the song mildly more palatable.

When I hear this song I envision a guy dressed up as Santa scanning MySpace profiles for "sexy" 13-Year olds. He finds one, PrtyPnyGril94. They talk for a while and eventually end up setting up a sex date at her place.

Our santa, who goes by BckdrSnta69 arrives at the little girl's house and is led to the backyard wehre she has made some frozen lemonade. He sits down as asks if she wants to sit on his lap. She giggles and says "Hold on, let me go change into my bathing suit." BckdrSnta69, laughs a jovial "Ho Ho Ho. And says that she had better hurry or she'll go on his naughty list." She laughs and calls from inside the house, "I thought you want me to be naughty!" "Yes... Joy to the World! That'd be wonderful!"

Then Dateline's Chris Hansen comes around a corner. "Hi there. "

"Oh shit," would reply our predator. "You're fucking Chris Hansen from Dateline! I knew it!"

"Can I ask what you're doing here?"

"I, uh, I came to visit my friend, but, uh, he's not home yet so his daughter let me in."

"Uh huh... let's see what you have in your bag..."

"Oh christ..."

Chris Hansen opens up Santa's sac and finds, amongst other things, condoms and lubricant. "You aren't here to see a friend. You're here to have sex with that girl. Let's see what you said in the chat? 'I want to slide down your chimney while your sleeping and eat your cookies.' What does that even mean?"

"I just..."

"She's 13 years old."

"I... I screwed up. I really did."

"I just want to tell you that I'm Chris Hansen and you're being videotaped for To Catch a Predator. You can leave anytime you want."

Backdoor Santa would leave and be immediately arrested by authorities.

The fact Jet thought this song was good enough to cover makes me want to vomit kittens

Christmas Countdown Day 3: Last Christmas

There are many time-honored Christmas traditions. Mistletoe, family dinners, snuggling up with a loved one by the fire. Today I'm going to touch on the less popular tradition of re-gifting.

The song today is about that very subject, Last Christmas by Wham!.

The chorus talks about how last Christmas George Michael gave some dude his heart but the very next day (boxing day to my Canadian friends) he gave it away. Someone re-gifted George Michael's emotions like it was a fruit cake. So one day George Michael is fawning over some guy on Christmas, goes to bed and then wakes up in love with someone else.

We've all been there. We've spent Christmas with the family and had to leave to go to another party. Before you leave you find out that everyone else is bringing a gift. You were certain the e-mail said no gifts, but if everyone else is doing it you don't want to seem like a cheapskate. But it's Christmas and every thing's closed. You frantically look around the house for something to pass off as a gift. It has to be something new in box or it'll just seem like you grabbed the pot off the stove and wrapped it up.

Well, with the exception of all the new gifts nothing really fits that description. So you begin to go thorugh the gifts to see what you could do without. Not the Atari (it's the '80s, mind you)! Even one of the games would seem okay but you waited so long for the ET game to come out you're NOT going to just give it away. And the Chia Pet always looked cool in the commericals and you really want to see what the big deal is so you can't give THAT away.

Then you see it, out of the corner of your eye. Is that? Oh that'd be perfect! George Michael's heart! You re-wrap it and throw a tag on it marked to: ? and put it in the present pile at the new party. Who ends up with this gift of George Michael's heart? Why it's senator Larry Craig! Glory hole! Glory hole! Hallelujah!

Seriously though, I'm not entirely sure why this song is played so frequently on the Christmas station. Because let's be perfectly honest here, it's not a Christmas song. It's a song about how George Michael got dumped, disguised as a Christmas song. It's really rather pathetic. And to think Andrew Ridgeley had a hand in it.

Christmas Countdown Day 2: Dominic the Donkey

At the risk of offending my Italian friends and readers (I have readers?) I have decided to poke fun at that adorable little mobster of a donkey, Dominic. Be warned, this bit of rabble-rousery contains many Italian stereotypes, but so does my bashing of it. Dominic opened the door, I just walked through it.

So anyway, this little Christmas jingle jangle is about an Italian Donkey named Dominic (Dominique?) who helps Santa out when he goes to Italy because the reindeer are unable to climb the hills there.

Are you kidding me? I may be off on my Christmas lore but can't Santa's reindeer fly? Is that the whole point of him having those particular reindeer? My theory is that the reindeer, what with their ability to fly, can handle the hills of Italy just fine. Santa actually owes a favor to Dominic's cousin, Mario, the Italian Christmas Plumber. Maybe Mario saved Santa from Bertoli DiGiorno, the Italian Christmas Pizza maker. In return, every Christmas Santa has to pretend that he needs the help of Dominic so he can feel special.

Verse two, we find that Dominic actually is the one in charge of the little town on the hill. He wears the mayor's derby is just another way of saying he's got the local government in his back pocket. It goes on to say that one of the gifts he brings is a pair of shoes for Louie. What it doesn't tell you is that these shoes are, in fact, cement, as Louie is meant to sleep with Fredo, Sergio and um, I don't know, Wario the Italian Christmas Fishes as well as Michelangelo, the Italian Christmas Ninja Turtle.

Verse three, we find that the kids speak Italian to Dominic and he understands. What this is in reference to is not so different from that scene at hhe beginning of the Godfather where people go and petition the Godfather on the day of his daughter's wedding while wishing that their first child is a masculine one (it's okay if it's a girl, so long as she's butch.) Dominic can't refuse any petition made to him on Chrismas. It's a strange tradition, but it's 100% true. I looked it up.

If I offended any of my Italian Christmas Readers out there I'm very sorry. I think I'm still a little upset at the ending of the Sopranos and am taking it out on Dominic.

Christmas Countdown Day 1: Christmas Wishes

Today marks my 3 weeks until Christmas countdown. What am I going to do for this quaint little series of posts counting down to the yuletide? I'm pretty sure that I just gonna make fun of Christmas songs. I was riding around in the car with the Christmas carol radio station blaring out the window and actually thought that there are a number of songs that I would like to dissect and make fun of.

Today's song in our 21 Songs of Christmas is Anne Murray's Christmas Wishes.

This song is about what Anne Murray would wish for if the fabled Christmas Genie decided to grant her three wishes.
What might these three wishes be, I hear you asking by using my super-hearing granted to me by the fabled Christmas Genie last year?

Wish one:
Anne Murray wishes for peace on earth, good will toward men and love in all that we do.

Noble enough, but unless my counting skills have failed me that's all three wishes right there. Now I know that this SHOULD really count as one wish, but I also know genies don't work that way. Wording is always always always important when dealing with genies, especially those of the Christmas variety. Most genies would count this as three wishes and she'd have spent them all on, essentially, one thing. Assuming she finds the even more fabled Christmas Genies that doesn't take every wish you make so damn literally she moves on to her second wish. I learned that the hard way when I wished for an autographed copy of Doctor Faustus. Now I have a copy of Docotr Faustus that's been autographed by the elusive Christmas Genie.

Wish two:
She then wishes it would go on forever for people like herself and the person she's singing to. Probably some dude.

Anyway, she only wishes that her first wish goes on forever for people like her. Everyone else can go fuck themselves. Her second wish is that people who are not like her get a taste of peace on earth and have it violently ripped away from them like so much old wallpaper. While this is not what she meant, she is dealing with a genie, who will take her words literally. This is why I need to be a Canadian. That way if Anne Murray gets her Christmas wishes I won't have to worry about the fallout of the second wish.

Her third wish makes me laugh.

Her third wish is contingent on the other wishes being used up already and is simply that her third wish would be to share her wishes with the person she's singing to.

She says that her third wish would only be so if her other wishes came true aka were used up. If I was the guy she was singing to and she said "I got three wishes and I get to share them with you. At first I'd be excited until she said, "I got world peace for all Canadians. That took me two wishes and for the third wish I get to share my wishes with you."

"Oh, so you used them up." I'd say. "I don't have a say in what we wish for? Because clearly you don't know how to deal with the elusive and fabled Christmas Genie."

"But..."

"No 'buts', Anne Murray. You really screwed up this time... what was that last wish for? To rub it in my face!? Blow me, Anne Murray"

And she would have to, because that was my third Christmas wish from last year.