October 10, at this writing.
And you know what that means.
It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas.
But, let's forego the predictable, traditional, seasonal ho, ho, harping about having to climb over the floor displays of tinsel and tree toppers and lights (oh, my!) to get to the friggin' fun size Snickers to give away to the little ghosts and goblins..three weeks from now.
Let's even go so far as to put our charitable money where our mouths are and cut retailers the slack of understanding that a lot of them make their entire year's profits with their holiday sales, so, if they need to put a stack of canned flocking next to the stack of WD-40 in the old aerosol cans section three months out to keep their families off welfare, so be it.
By the way, it's worth mentioning that you need to take care that you don't confuse the flocking with the WD-40......screw that up and either the tree will be too slippery to hold the ornaments....or your front door will still squeak...and it will be all flocked and shit.
Let's leave the decoration debate to the Do It In December Debbie Downers and, instead, sing a different tune.
Ah! The sounds of the season.
And why Christmas music in October is a lot like actually getting to participate in an orgy.
Too much, too often, going on for far too long and, ultimately, your enjoyment of it is inevitably replaced with a passionate desire for it to be over as soon as humanly possible.
Not only that, we got medical evidence that....you know that joke about too early Christmas music actually making people crazy?....yeah, turns out it's no joke.
In other words, when it comes to holly jolly, too soon with too much holly ain't at all that jolly.
Linda Blair is a British clinical psychologist, columnist for the Times, the Guardian and the Daily Mail, as well as the author of several books on mental wellness, including Siblings, Birth Order and The Key To Calm.
Not to be confused, of course, with the Linda Blair who played the demonically possessed kid in "The Exorcist" and, besides being the antithesis of mental wellness, will most likely, when the time comes, leave behind an obituary that somewhere, somehow, includes the words "pea soup."
The un-possessed Blair writes, recently, that the "constant barrage of Christmas tunes too early in the season" forces people to remember all the things they have to do before the holiday. The songs are, Blair says, a reminder to buy presents, prepare and/or cater parties, organize travel, brace for the family gatherings and all the more stressful, mind numbing, nerve rattling, psychotic breakdown causing tasks and burdens that are such a delightful part of that most magical time of the year.
Meanwhile, hearing the same songs over and over and over and over day after day after day make store workers "struggle to tune it out" and, Blair says, they become unable to focus on anything else.
"Christmas music", Blair sums up, "is likely to irritate people if it's played too loud and too early.
This is one of those things in the long list of things in life that seem like insightful, even helpful and/or useful, analysis but are, in fact, nothing more than just potato, patahto, tomato, tamahto....
...let's call the whole thing off.
Or more practically, let's just resign ourselves to the fact that some people don't want to hear Christmas music starting twenty four hours after the Labor Day beach weekend is over, some people would be delighted if Christmas music showed up in their everyday routines more often than misspelled, garbled grammar Tweets from the garbled grammarian in-Chief and some people treat Christmas music like so much, daresay, too much, and too many things are treated these days.
Whatevs.
If the "immatura nimis" harping traditionally hurled at the traditional holiday harks of herald angels has any real case to make, it can be offered that too much of anything that's too loud and/or too often, too early or not, is likely to irritate people.
Couple of random thoughts at this moment:
First, "immatura nimis" is Latin for "too early, too much" It's included in this piece for the benefit of our NPR level readers, not only to ostensibly class the place up a little, but, also, to offset the weariness of enduring a culture that takes a break from "trolls" by rubbing up against "bae" to do a little "Netflix and chill".
Not to mention everything, and anything, that is whatever it is...AF.
Second, for those, either fer me or agin me as a rule, who are poised and ready to pounce on what they perceive to be my inevitable connecting of the "anything that's too loud and/or too often is likely to irritate people" to anything and/or everything that has to do with Trump, stand down.
I've decided to take a break from that inevitability this time around. Because when it comes to dissing he who, on the hour, most hours, "breaks the Internet", even I get weary AF...no matter how "on fleek" the diss.
None of that, by the way and obviously, has anything even remotely to do with Christmas music.
Whose too loud, too much and too early arrival, and the accompanying debate/discussion/piss and moan about that arrival, has actually, ironically, become as traditional as the music itself.
Hmm. There's a point to ponder.
Perhaps even sufficient material for an in-depth dissection and discussion.
Let's get together right back here, say, Dec 4th or so.
When we're all giddy with the dual adrenaline rush of both anticipating what Santa is going to bring us this year.....and the sugar rush of that Valentine's Candy we just scored....
....stacked up right behind the flocking and WD-40....
....across the aisle from the Easter Peeps.
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