Cupcake Christmas

I didn't have as much time as earlier in the week this morning - I worked at noon- so I just made Swirled Candy Cane Cupcakes while running a few movies and specials. The cupcakes actually came out pretty well...but I overfilled the muffin papers, so they're huge. One top came off when I tried to move them. The others are good enough to be given away to several people, including Dad-Bruce, Andrew and Linda, and the Dorias.

Muppet Family Christmas tells of how Fozzie invited the entire Muppet gang in the mid-80s to his mother's for Christmas. Ma Bear isn't happy; she's had to cancel her holiday plans in Malibu. Doc and Sproket of Fraggle Rock are even less thrilled. All they wanted was peace and quiet! While Robin meets the Fraggles and a turkey tries to dodge the Swedish Chef, Kermit worries about Miss Piggy, who is still out and about in a huge snowstorm.

This is a total blast if you can find it. Thanks to the Fraggles, the Muppets, and the Muppet Babies all being owned by different companies now, YouTube and other online services may be your best bet. Oh, and "watch out for the icy patch!"

Switched to It's a Wonderful Life as I finished the cupcakes and made leftover chicken soup for lunch. George Bailey is a man who thinks life has past him by. He's beloved by his friends, family, and most of his small town, but his business is missing money, and he's afraid of being broke and arrested for fraud. He's on the verge of suicide when a little old man (Henry Travers) stops him, claiming he's an angel. When a frustrated George wishes he'd never been born, Clarence gives him his wish. George discovers how the town has changed without him, and he finally learns that the man who is truly wealthy is rich not in dollars, but in friendship.

One of the most famous holiday-themed films of all time is a favorite of mine, but it's not for everyone. If the pro-community sentiment doesn't jive with you, it probably won't be your cup of Christmas-spiced tea. There's the "Pottersville" sequence, too. Filmed like the mysteries in vogue in 1947, it's so unnerving that I was 12 before I would watch this movie straight through.

The best thing about the movie is the wonderful assortment of character actors. In addition to Stewart and Travers, we have Donna Reed as Stewart's patient wife Mary, Beluah Bondi as his mother, Lionel Barrymore as the nasty Mr. Potter, H.B Warner as the drugstore owner, Thomas Mitchell as forgetful Uncle Billy, Ward Bond as Bert the cop, and Frank Faylen as Ernie the taxi driver.

Wonderful Life ended just in time for me to hurry off to work. Not surprisingly, given we're less than a week from Christmas Day, the Acme was very busy all day long. We were short on help, too. Our sales start on Friday, and a lot of people who normally would have been bagging or working on the front end were posting new sales tags on items.

Needless to say, I was very happy when my relief, one of the college-age boys, showed up right on time. I did need to get Cool Whip on the way out. It's for the pudding pie that's going to be my last food gift. I would have waited until tomorrow to get it, but Cool Whip was on sale for $1.49 this week, and it was ending today.

When I got home, I made honey-glazed carrots and a cheese omelet and watched one of the odder Rankin-Bass specials, Rudolph's Shiny New Year. The second of three Rankin-Bass Rudolph stories takes the little scarlet-nosed reindeer into the world of Father Time (Red Skelton). Rudolph has to find the wayward Baby New Year, who ran off after he was teased over his big ears. With the help of clock-toting whale Big Ben (Harold Peery), he travels to the Archipelago of Last Years, meeting up with a wacky assortment of former Year Rulers, as well as screechy Eon the Terrible, a bird who wants to stop his death by stopping time.

Not as good as the first special, but certainly better than the ridiculous Rudolph and Frosty's Christmas In July. If nothing else, it has one very touching number early on - Skelton describes the passing of time to Rudolph in the thoughtful "The Moving Finger Writes."

As busy as we were, I'm glad I did work early today. It was partly sunny this morning when I worked on the cupcakes. The sun was still out when I went to work, but clouds were on the horizon. Thank heavens it waited to pour until around 9, by which time I was long online and out of the shower.