A Nice Hard Slap is dead. My blog is taking a new shape, though I don’t assume it’ll get any smarter or more worth a link in your interoffice email forward list because of the change.

What I promise is simple, frank, and oftentimes annoying opinion. I’ll probably contradict myself and seem like a dick, burn bridges [preferably Beau], and further ostracize myself from the middle but what the hell. Life’s too short.

What compels a person to wear a big red Christmas sweater/sweatshirt/nightmare with a gigantic embroidered Santa or Snowman on it? Is it to be festive and cute? It isn’t. It seems to exist to serve as a cheer golem, something to do the seasonal work for the individual rather than serve any purpose other than to uglify a family.

Aunt Martha’s colorful Christmas sweater saves Aunt Martha the trouble of being a nice person.

I’m not a total Scrooge, plentiful evidence to the contrary notwithstanding. I love giving folks gifts, cooking, and hanging out with people that matter to me. I like going into crowded malls and looking at all of the fabricated stress and unneeded busybody nature people adopt, knowing good and well that it’s not going be a big deal at the end of the day.

I was walking at an outdoor shopping center the other day and came across a group of large, roly-poly older women all decked out in these uniforms of empty cheer and they looked only slightly less thrilled than victims of apartheid. I hadn’t even rolled for wandering monsters.

I’m of the belief that fall and winter clothes are the coolest, most rich, and best of the bunch. I love cold weather and the way the chill hits you just right if you’ve chosen well for the day. Clothes like this are the Kryptonite to that great time of the year, a virus to the autumnal palettes and classy styles.

Now, I spent Christmas day at the in-laws and there were some of these kinds of clothes in attendance and I’ll give these folks a pass but I still give my wife shit every time she succumbs to the disease of wearing this kind of stuff (in her defense this year she only wore one somewhat classy snowman pin and a ring with Santa on it) and hope that one day we can live in a world where our own identity and style (or lack) of is enough to suffice during the holiday season.

Today’s Moments:

  • My daughter’s addition to Wall-E has taken the viewings of the film to Rocky Horror Picture Show levels, what with her acting out moments and having bizarre little Pagan rituals on the coffee table as she watches. It’s actually quite phenomenal.
  • Our Christmas CD, Christmas is Fucked, is starting to trickle out there online in various venues. If you’re brave and not easily offended a hard copy can be got HERE and it’s available for cheap download at Amazon HERE.
  • My 360 got a red ring and went to the cave with Jesus. I’m swapping it intentionally three days later so it resurrects and goes for another 2000+ years without anyone being mean to it.
  • The Flying Biscuit is the only way to spend breakfast on December 26th.
  • I saw Benjamin Button on Christmas night and was astounded to be driving down Highway 400 at 2 in the morning all by myself. It was as surreal as driving can get in this congested little Souther metropolis.