Coal for Christmas

Listening to: Hank's killer holiday(?) mix

If visions of sugarplums danced in the heads of the munchkin mafia, I heard nary a word of it. While X had the lil's Christmas Eve, I sat in a bar drinking 5 Barrel Pale Ale, listening to an ostensible "rave" DJ spin stale vinyl and looking at how many low-slung sets of jeans revealed satin thongs. My own visions of sugarplums much less tasty, agreed?

My stocking ended up with no digital camera. A bit disappointed but considering that extent of my gift giving amounted to toilet paper rolls with GW's face on each sheet, I should have expected as little (I will, however, post pics my GW-fan folks shot and, I hope, saved).

The kids got what the ether deemed was theirs and they never waned in their enthusiasm, of course. The day was spent ripping Barbi from some marketers version of bondage and Thomas the Tank Engine's version of cheap Chinese finger puzzle. The children's version of heaven amounted to my notiom of hell, with with me building this and chopping that out of its wired up cardboard dungeon, me tring to figure out how to fit 'Slot A' into 'Figure B' while they rolled around in cardboard boxes giggling and oblivious.

Christmas can be too much. As night fell, we wandered up to the zoo for the "Electric Safari" and dammit, had Marlin Perkins been there to shoot my little ones up with a tranquilzer dart or two, I'd have bought him a drink. I eventually had to negotiate with the wee ones that they'd go straight to bed if they got what they wanted (a ride on the merry-go-round). That seened to be sufficient but it doesn't hurt to have some dude with a rifle loaded with tranquilizer darts in your corner.

Not that I needed that card in my hand: by the time we got back here, they were all passed out, the day's excitement all the tranquilizer I needed. In that regard, Santa had served me well.

Unfotunately, as far as Santa was concerned, my name was in the 'bad' column when it should have been in the 'dad' column.

To be fair, the delicious and saintly (and soon to be sainted - I carry a lot of weight in the Catholic church, shee-it) Mamacita sent me gorgeous handmade stockings, Christmas disks, lots of love, and a copy of Jasper Fforde's The Eyre Affair (which I've been dying to read) while another latest crush (and oh, what a huge crush!) sent me a copy of Orhan Pamuk's, Snow, ticks off my Amazon Wish List that will satisfy me until February (my birthday).

I keed, I keed - I am grateful, so grateful for my internet friends.

If Santa had considered screwing me, it was do to some lip-service from Jeebus do to this, the 2nd disk Melina got (goddamn, I apologize my sweet):

Thurl Ravenscroft, You're a Mean One, Mr. Grinch, he was the voice of 'Tony the Tiger' singing one of the coolest Christmas songs, a song I forced my band to cover. From the cartoon, not the sorry-ass Jim Carrey movie.

The Vandals, Christmas Time for My Penis, because we all know how much my penis deserves a good Christmas.

Fear, Fuck Christmas, a negative song by the most negative hardcore band, hands down. I was never a Fear fan and I'm not inclined to give them any slack at Christmas.

Mr. Hankey's Christmas Classics, Merry Fucking Christmas, so un-PC it simply must be sung at every Kindergarten pageant.

Bad Religion, The First Noel, also un-PC but in a different way; what did you expect from a band with this name? Are you loopy?

Stiff Little Fingers, White Christmas, the best Irish punk band rocks out on a song that needs rocking.

Bob Rivers, I Am Santa Claus, I play this song to scare my kids which, during the Christmas season, is as useful as Nembutal in milk.

Jimi Hendrix, Little Drummer Boy/Silent Night, if anyone thinks Jimi was an angel, they need to listen to the wretched knock-off High, Live and Dirty and give up their illusions of Jimi's sainthood. He wasn't fucking around on this.

Patti Smith, We Three Kings, scary, truly scary, which is what I think Patti had in mind - prior to becoming a mush-mouthed Nader apologist.

Dandy Warhols, Little Drummer Boy, simply weird and the song that turned me onto the Dandy Warhols.

The Who, Christmas, by far, the most brutal song on this mix and I'll do time in Purgatory simply for including it; I assume Pete Townsend* has done his bid.

Ween, Suzy Snowflake, a truly twisted, paranoid nightmare of a song (what else would you expect from Ween?) but no worse than, "he sees you when you're sleeping, he knows when you're awake, he knows when you've been bad or good, so be good for goodness sake." In these dark days when our rabid cur of a president can wipe his ass with the Constitution, a topical little tune.

Trans-Siberian Orchestra, Dance Of the Sugarplum Fairies, you know, not that fucking bad but it rocks so... so what, merry fucking Christmas, asshole.

Yellowman, We Wish You a Reggae Christmas, dude, if I'd received a sticky green bud of killer ganja as a gift, this rant would be soooo much more mellow.

The Singing Dogs, Jingle Bells, utter fucking genius. For anyone who has had to strip away essentail muscle in order to undo absurd anti-theft wires or dig up unavailable batteries to make shit hum or attempt to follow directions from half-literate sadists, this song makes total sense.

Elvis, Merry Christmas, Baby, yeah, OK, it was on my other mix, sue me, I was probably drunk.

Chuck Berry, Run, Rudolph, Run, I think the intent was there to make a decent Christmas song (and the Rolling Stones covered it thinking the way I did) but it sounds like you're giving Rudolph a ten-second head start before you pull the trigger on that AR-15.

Sonny Boy Williamson, Sonny Boy's Christmas Blues, blues songs are the best for creating bad Christmas karma; "Lord, I tried to trust religion, but the devil won't let me pray; that's why i got to stay drunk boys, all Christmas day;" mmmmm hmmmmm.

Amos Milborn, Let's Blame Christmas Merry, Baby, "I want to slide down your chimney, baby, fill you stockings full of toys" - nuff' said.

The Chipmunks, We Wish You a Merry Christmas, see the Singing Dogs; annoying is annoying.

P.D.Q. Bach, A Consort of Christmas Carols, if you don't get P.D.Q. Bach, I must assume you only get me on my slapstick level. Fair enough. Merry fucking Christmas.

Yeah, you'll get pics of my kids, big-eyed and happy, if I can get my tech-challenged parents to trust me with their digital camera
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* I'd change that assessment had I included The Residents, Santa Dog and/or Skinny Puppy, Tin Om on this disk.