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Spotted Valentine's Day items
Spotted Valentine's Day items at TJ Maxx at Mass. and Newbury a few days ago. What made it extra annoying was that this year TJ Maxx didn't bother to stock toys for kids as they did last year for the holidays. Trying to shop Boston brick and mortar, but can't buy items if they don't even bother to make them available.
This happens all over now
This happens all over now and has for some time. People should stop acting surprised. There are really no individual holidays as such any more, just one perpetual "season". It is depressing though to see all the Christmas merchandise tossed and crowded onto a discount bin or shelf, in careless disarray, starting two weeks before Christmas. They force Christmas on us starting in September and then pull it out from under us before it even arrives.
Yes
I went to buy a Christmas tree skirt last week (Dec 11-15) and everywhere was sold out. I had to order some Christmas stuff online because by December 1, all of the stores were also sold out.
I understand that Christmas stuff is seasonal and stores try to order enough that they aren't stuck with tons of unmoved inventory on December 26, but stuff is selling out so early it's ridiculous.
Yup
I'm getting tired of this too. Tired of needing something seasonal last minute and can't get it because it's sold out. I get that they don't want inventory left over, but still... sell it for deep discount after the holiday. It will move quick. I myself just brought up the several bags of gift card boxes I bought last year cleaning out CVS a few days after Xmas.
But I digress. I agree. Im tired of needing a fan or swimming trunks in Late August and only being able to buy a space heat and a ski parka.
"Last minute" gift ideas
All the Christmas merchandise is gone two weeks before Christmas. And two/three weeks before Christmas, ads start taking about "last minute gift ideas". When did giving something two weeks lead time become "last minute"? When I was growing up in the 60s/early 70s we STARTED all Christmas activities two weeks before. Now one is expected to be finished well before then. I feel sorry for all the people, and they are in numbers, that fall for this and let themselves be tied up in knots. This is why we hear all this nonsense that the holidays are "stressful". Not if you don't let the hype control you they're not.
Reminds me of my days at Fire
Reminds me of my days at Fire Island. I'm old school from the 70s.
Just like in Brazil (the movie)
Where everyday is Christmas, gifts all the time, and senseless violence is de rigueur.
Someone I know of is pushing things even further
Lenten things. Not kidding. O.o
Point of Christmas?
I still try to understand the point of Christimas since I don't subscribe to the idea that it is somehow a sacred period.
Pretty decorations? Get that. Except that one of the most important decorations - colored lights - is not turning into just more white lights. Sterils, boring and really nothing different than street lights spread across a tree.
Wreathes and Xmas trees. Nice change. Rootless at this point though being just decoration.
Cards. Don't send or receive.
There is the overtly religious elements. Songs that are theologically dubious if not just plain dumb.
So why bother with Christmas? Why not just jettison the moment if its purely secular at this point?
So here's a reason: The entirety of the customs and traditions point to something different. We don't know exactly what if a person is not religious and Christian. What then? They point to a reminder that we can be like children. Full of wonder, full of openness to a moment of where kindness, generosity, even love in as pure a sense as any can express, priviledged at a level of society as a whole over the usual state of mind and feeling toward each other.
So why not let that spirit be spread over the year? I have a friend who gives gifts throughout the year instead of on December 25th. He tries to take that Xmas or Holiday spirit (for secular folks) and express it throughout the year. Therefore he doesn't rush to guy gifts, decorations or get stressed out from Thanksgiving to Christmas. I guess in a sense he does try to turn the entire year into a holiday season.
However anyone spends their time, I wish a better new year to the everyone.