Merry Christmas and Happy Hogswatch

I love Christmas, for decorated trees, families getting together, big dinners and presents, but I also mean not just "Happy Holidays," but Christ mass, the Christian holiday that celebrates a sacrifice for the benefit of the rest of us. If we take that seriously, we ought to be thinking more about what we can do for others than what we hope to get.

I don't mean to be parochial about Christian holidays. Most of the major religions have major themes and holidays focused on helping other people. But this is the one that is central to many of us, and it would be nice to reclaim more of its charitable and less commercial aspects.

Like many people, I really dislike the commodi- fication of Christmas, turning it into one more occasion to buy stuff. Granted, we bought a lot stuff for each other this Christmas, but we put a lot of effort into picking things, often rather obscure, that would really speak to and please each other, rather than responding to advertising.

One of the best satires of the commodi- fication of Christmas that I have read or seen lately is The Hogfather by Terry Pratchett. It features a Christmas like holiday in an alternative universe where a fat man with jowls and tusks drives a sleigh pulled through the sky by four hogs. There are some hilarious bits sending up people focusing on selling things and making money out of the holiday. A department store manager is driven to despair when the person doing the Hogfather's job as the department store "Santa" actually starts to give things away. (There is a book version and a made for Brit TV movie that was shown on Sky TV as couple of years ago.) We watched the film version on Christmas Eve and had a good laugh. But we also read Luke 2 for the Christmas story over Christmas dinner. Nice to keep a balance on things.

Sandy is under the weather with a cold. So I did Christmas dinner, which you can see in the photo above, along with our son-in-law Sam, me and our son Rolf (in back), and our daughter Julia, Sandy, and our son Chris (in front). Presents were fun, especially when you give someone something they did not ask for but are delightedly surprised by, but best is to sit around dinner and talk.

Merry Christmas from the family!