December is rolling along, and we are edging ever closer to the Holiday. I am starting to talk to some folks who are in a dead panic about what to get from old Uncle Fred or Joe in the office for Christmas this year. I find it somewhat silly that we celebrate what was originally a pagan holiday to have one last party before the worst of winter set in has become the biggest shopping season of the year and pretty much keeps retail alive in the developed world. The Catholic Church adopted the winter celebration of Christmas to keep newly converted pagans in the fold. The December blowout was the chance to get in on the last party before winter, what with its hungry wolves, low food supplies and snowstorms bought a good chance that some of you would not be for the big Spring blowout and the pagans wisely refused to give up the good times.
Today wolves are pretty much banished to a few remote part of the country and what with grocery stores and furnaces Winter is nowhere near as life threatening as before. In spite of that, we still refuse to give up the party. Now, I hate winter as much, if not more than the next guy. Winter is one the big reasons I live in Florida. I love a good party, and we have a big one every Christmas Eve. However one of the smartest decisions we ever made was to stop the gift exchange between adults. We are very fortunate in that most of our family and circle of friends is doing pretty well in life and if we need or want something during the year, we buy it. This one decision took 90% of the stress out of the holidays. We ...
