Al's Blog-o-Sphere

In keeping with my contempt of the commercialism of Christmas, I bring you the worst Christmas song ever…

At least it’s not a commercial!

One of the shows I have been DVR-ing and watching pretty regularly is CBS’s Undercover Boss.

The first show I saw had so much promise. It was the episode featuring a CEO of Hooters. When he found a manager who was mistreating his female employees, and exposed him for the misogynist he was, I thought the show had a future. Besides the fact that I would have dropped my cover and fired him on the spot, if I was the boss, it looked like the show would be interesting.

But ever since, it has gone downhill. I just don’t get much out of watching it anymore. Here’s why: Continue Reading…

I wrote this post two years ago, but for some reason didn’t post it. It sat here in my Drafts folder ever since. But things haven’t changed a bit, they may have gotten worse.

This year, the neighborhood chain drug store was pushing the Halloween candy aside to make room for Christmas goods a week before Halloween.

Black Friday used to mean the day after Thanksgiving and the big kickoff to the Christmas shopping season. This year it seems to mean anything at all and has started already. Let’s just call it Black November. Originally, it was supposed to have gotten it’s name because it was the day most retail stores “went into the black.” The year up to then covered overhead and the holiday shopping was the profit. Not what I’d call a business plan…

Anyway, here’s my two-year-old post…

I got a Twitter tweet yesterday from a friend. It said: “…at Home Depot … Where it is apparently already Christmas.” It’s barely a week after Halloween, but it’s starting already.

Within a few minutes, I saw a commercial on TV – I don’t even remember what it was for – with Santa Claus and Elves in it.

Today, they’re running those annoying Garmin commercials with the Carol of the GPSes – gotta-gotta-gotta-get-a-Garmin.

I wrote about this last year, and, inevitably, it’s here again with a vengeance. Just once, I wish I could get to Thanksgiving without being sick of Christmas already…

I’m sure that, with the economy in the toilet, retailers are just short of in a panic. But must they strong-arm us out of every dime we can’t afford this soon? Don’t they know we’re hurting too? Or is it a case of with so many people being laid-off or losing their jobs, they just want to get their cut before it’s all gone?

A note to retailers: I’m really not in the Christmas mood. Not now. And every early-season commercial I see, just puts me off of that mood a little more. You are making me less likely to spend money on Christmas gifts, not more. Stop treating me like a pre-schooler, showing me tasty commercials to get me to run to Daddy, Mommy and Santa to ask for whatever you show me. I’m too old and cynical for that anymore.

Maybe that’s what I resent the most about this phenomenon – it’s ruining a beautiful season, making us all cynical and resentful, when we should be enjoying it.

So here we are, two years later and not a thing has changed. I still feel like businesses feel that we are put here to be pandered to and squeezed out of every last dime, and that Christmas was invented to make selling a lot of junk possible.

Is it asking too much to let us have the illusion that it might be our own idea to go out and spontaneously buy gifts for our loved ones? Without being guilt-tripped into it by endless commercials? I thought gift giving was done out of love, not some obligation. Silly me. I guess I just don’t get the American Capitalistic model.

Merry F’in Christmas…

Once again, NY State and the Seneca Nation seem to be headed towards a conflict over collecting taxes on sales made on the reservation. I don’t know who’s right here, I can see both sides and don’t see a mutually agreeable way out.

I have the utmost respect for the Native American culture and beliefs. Unfortunately, I don’t see where exploiting a situation where certain commodities prices have become high, in part due to taxes, should be exploited for the profit of a few Native Americans. That’s not what we should learn from their culture. Maybe it’s what they’ve learned from ours…

And just what is a “Native American” anymore, anyway? I was born here. My parents were too. So were my Grandparents. I don’t know how many generations I would have to go back to actually find an ancestor from Europe. Am I as much a “Native American” as some blonde-haired, blue-eyed person who has a Great-great-grandmother that was born on a reservation? Continue Reading…