When the River Meets the Sea

I started off this morning with a series of holiday specials. A Charlie Brown Christmas is the tale of Chuck's quest to find meaning amid the hurly-burly of holiday commercialism...and how a rather sad little tree and a speech from his best friend made him understand what makes Christmas special. The 1980s follow-up It's Christmastime Again, Charlie Brown is less linear. Peppermint Patty, Franklin, and Marcie get to join the fun in this series of skits revolving around various Yuletide events, from selling wreaths to seeing the Hallelujah Chorus.

I then went into two lesser-known Rankin-Bass specials. Frosty's Winter Wonderland is a 1976 follow-up to the original 1969 Frosty. Here, he gains a wife, Crystal...and an enemy, a jealous Jack Frost. 'Twas the Night Before Christmas is a tad bit more creative. When a brainy little mouse writes a letter to Santa calling him a "fraudulent lie," he rejects the entire town's letters. The town clockmaker tries to restore Santa's faith in them, but when his clock fails, can the little mouse set things right?

Switched to Hanna-Barbara as I worked on Christmas cards. In The Flinstones' Christmas Carol, Fred is playing Scrooge in a local production of the famous story...but he gets a tad too carried away with his role and forgets presents for his family and to pick up Pebbles at preschool. Wilma is fit to be tied. Not only is she the stage manager, but she has to deal with several other roles too, thanks to a flu bug that's going around. It takes a couple of ghosts - onstage and off - to remind Fred of what really means the most to him.

Fred's not the only bumbling dad who lost sight of the spirit of the season. Papa Bear also gets carried away with his tree hunt in The Bernstein Bears' Christmas Tree. He and the Cubs want to find the perfect Christmas tree...and like another famous 80s dad, they're determined to do it in the wilderness, not some overpriced lot. Every tree they find seems to be the home to some animal or the other. Not to mention, there's a blizzard brewing that may make the search even more difficult. Unlike Clark Grizwald, they never do find a tree, but the animals they spared have an even bigger surprise waiting for them at their house!

I did a few things online after getting my mail. I looked up a few ideas for a new coat at L.L Bean and Land's End's sites. I found a present for my Secret Santa at Amazon. After I got bored, I decided I was tired of everyone fussing over the baking. I made Banana-Chocolate Chip Cupcakes and ran Emmett Otter's Jug Band Christmas, my family's original copy taped off HBO sometime in the mid-late 80s.

Headed to work right after Emmett ended and the muffins came out. Work was steady for most of the night, up until about 7PM or so. After that, I mostly shelved candy and washed registers until it was time to head out. Needed sugar, too - the Acme's generic brand is pretty cheap.

(Oh, and I saw the very last of the Army-Navy Game in the back room. The Navy just barely pulled off a win, 17-13.)