Isn't it a Bit Early to be Sick of The Christmas Season?

It drives me bonkers that Christmas decorations go up earlier and earlier every year. Case in point: In college I was frustrated when Christmas stuff hit the stores a few weeks before Thanksgiving. In grad school I recall complaining that Christmas stuff was in the stores the day after Halloween. This year, Christmas stuff hit the stores the day after Labor Day. What the??

To make matters worse, most of the Christmas stuff is cleared out the make way for Valentine's stuff on Dec 26. That's right, the "First day of Christmas" is really the First day of Valentine's shopping. Uh, Hello? The Christmas Season lasts until Epiphany. I have a sinking suspicion that the worst culprits of all are the turkeys who boycott stores for having Happy Holidays in their windows. Because for some reason they hate sharing December with anyone else's religious holy days, but they probably take their trees down on the 26th. But I have no proof that this is the case.

I just saw 2 things on the news that made me bristle, and so I thought I'd share them with you.

First: Our local Macy's, which is new, is trying to establish itself in a city where the Old is sacred (kind of like New Orleans, so I can't really knock it). Macy's recently displaced (bought out) a local department store that was something of an institution (think D.H. Holmes or Godchaulk's in NOLA, but Raleigh-flavored). So, to endear themselves to the locals, they're having a "Macy's Holiday Parade." Come on out and join the fun... this Sunday, November 5. They could at least have the decency to wait until the weekend before Thanksgiving or something, but no. The weekend before Election Day is close enough to the holiday season for these guys. I'm already sick of Jingle Bell Rock.

Second: This is totally unrelated to the holidays, and it was a few days ago, but it friggled me so it fits into the current post theme. I was watching some drivel on the cable channels up in the hundreds, something like a biography of Bela Lugosi or a 25-year-old British comedy or a documentary on the city of Jericho or somesuch. Anyway, the Emergency Broadcast System BRAAAP BRAAAP BRAAAP comes over, and a banner across the bottom of the screen tells me that:
"The North Carolina department (of something-or-other) has issued a Child Abduction Warning for the following counties..... until this evening at 20:45"

That was all it said. Not information on who the abductors might be, where they might be, what to do to find more information, why they were interrupting a brilliant interview with a Harvard epidemiologist, nada. There was nothing on any of the local news stations, and no other warnings were issued. So, um, I HAD been thinking about putting e-baby in her stroller out at the corner with her little thumb sticking out and a sign saying "Mexico or Bust" but NOW, with that warning in place, NO WAY. Thank goodness for the NC Dept of something-or-other. Since e-baby wasn't abducted that day, I'm sure it was all because of that excellent implementation of the Emergency Broadcast System. Hmph.

But today is Friday, and tomorrow is the BONFIRE! and so I'm pretty stoked (pun intended). Tonight Peace and Fuzzy will come over with the printout of Parliament and some poster board. Armed with glue sticks, frosting, gumdrops and about 2 gallons of salsa, we will have a craft project to keep us entertained for hours.