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Kirk Hiner's  "When thinking
differently just isn't
different enough." An Absurd Notion Christmas Special By Kirk Hiner
Yeah, that's just about enough of that. See, it's Christmas, and... Oh, wait. I suppose I should apologize up front. I'm a Christian, so I celebrate Christmas. It goes with the gig. I always feel guilty wishing people happy holidays, because I feel like I'm trespassing on their territory, you know? I don't celebrate Chanukah or Kwanzaa--indeed, I'm not even sure I can spell them--so I have no idea what would be required to make them happy for someone. Sure, I could educate myself, but that'll have to get in line behind learning to speak Japanese, getting better with Macromedia Flash MX and figuring out how to fix the plumbing of my kitchen sink. Also, isn't it a bit greedy to celebrate the "holidays?" Shouldn't it be "happy holiday" in the singular tense? I mean, pick one and stick with it. No one likes a holiday whore, always mouching off other people and cultures' celebrations. So, for me, it's Christmas. This means it's time for my yearly, super-special Christmas article. Normally, I try to cook up some unique angle for this, usually game related, but I'm having trouble this year. I guess it's a lack of creativity on my part, but it's also partly because I'm tired of seeing the same old thing all over the Mac web year after year. Heck, this even goes on outside the Mac web. Take, for instance, " 'Twas the Night Before Christmas." This is actually a Christmas tradition in the Hiner family. Each year after the Christmas Eve service had ended and we'd finished driving through the rich section of town looking at all the pretty lights, we'd come home and dad would put Louis Armstrong on the beat-up, stereophonic hi-fi. Dad had (and still has) an old 45 of Satchmo reading " 'Twas the Night Before Christmas," the flip side of which is "When the Saints Go Marching In." Every year, dad plays the 45, sits in the same chair, and snickers gently at the same parts. The nostalgia I have for this poem, therefore, is part of the reason why I hate all those dorky knock-offs we see at this time of year (usually in Christmas articles, sometimes in SPAM). The other part is meter. For once, I wish that someone who felt the need to mimic this poem would actually have a good grasp of poetry. It's much, much more than just rhyming words. Anyone can rhyme words. You also have to pay attention to how those words relate to each other; how they flow. To me, reading a poem with bad meter is like watching a play while someone hits my face with a rake (this is the only way I can sit through Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat). Speaking of bad meter, or--more precisely--speaking of bad, when will they finally pass that law banning "Grandma Got Run Over By A Reindeer?" A lot of what I write here at Applelinks is a matter of opinion, but here are some cold, hard facts for you: That song was never good, and it was never funny. If you disagree with me, you are wrong. Now, I see they've turned it into a cartoon. It appears to have gone directly to video, so I guess it's as bad as the song itself...or at least as bad as all those DTV soft core porn and horror movies. I did read the back of the video box, though, and apparently some kid has to solve the mystery of what really happened to his grandmother. What a disappointment. The only thing that interested me about "Grandma God Run Over By A Reindeer" is the fact that this old woman got trampled to death by Santa's sleigh team. Now, there's not even that. What's next? The Little Drummer Boy actually blew clarinet? Frosty's eyes were made out of shale? And hey, Santa's supposed to land his sleigh on rooftops, right? What was grandma doing on the roof? I hate comedy based on a faulty premise. Anyway, back to the Mac web. Aside from bad poetry, now's also the time of year when people make predictions for Apple's year. I guess this isn't so bad. Have fun, everyone, but why anyone would want to attempt this is beyond me. First, there's rarely any rhyme or reason to what Apple does, so you may as well be playing Pin the Tail On the Donkey...only the Donkey has to be moving and the tail has to have no pin. But, I guess it's fun to look back and say, "Whoa, see, I was right!" and even more fun to say, "Whoa, see, look how far off I was!" Be careful, though. Your predictions may be regarded as rumors, and it won't be long before Apple legal stuffs your stocking with a cease and desist order. Oh, hey, about stockings. I don't know about the rest of you, but my stocking was always stuffed with some candy, an orange, a couple nuts, and a new Christmas ornament (always an airplane). Every now and again, I'd also get a new hand held electronic game or superhero figure. If you go to the Apple gift guide, however, you'll see that--under the phrase "Hello, Stocking"--Apple has listed the iPod ($299.00), iMac ($1,199.00), AirPort Base Station ($299.00), HP DeskJet 5550 Printer ($149.00) and Mac OS X v10.2 Jaguar ($129.00). Okay, we'll forget for a moment the logistics of stuffing a stocking with an iMac box and focus instead on this whole price thing. I'm worried that perhaps, yes, Apple actually believes that everyone on the planet makes so much money that we can afford to stuff stockings with $300 iPods. I barely spent that much on my entire family. Does Cupertino have its own economy, completely separate from the rest of the United States...and, indeed, the world? Actually, I guess Apple does have the Christmas spirit. I mean, the word Christmas is quite often shortened to Xmas. So, if X = Christ, then I guess Apple's new operating system is actually Mac OS Christ. Christ Jaguar, actually, which now makes me question the potential divinity of Jet Jaguar from Godzilla vs. Megalon. It completely throws out my previous theory, that being that Jet Jaguar was gay (at the end of the movie, Godzilla and Jet Jaguar did shake hands for an uncomfortably long time). Does this article make me seem bitter? I'm not. Amused is more accurate. Amused and annoyed. I mean, aside from the birth of Jesus, there are many things that do fill me with the Christmas spirit. Candlelight Christmas Eve church services, Robbie the Reindeer (the British version, of course), the jingling bells of the Salvation Army volunteers, snow, Emmet Otter's Jug Band Christmas, John Denver and the Muppets, etc. Oh, and of course, Louis Armstrong. So, Merry Christmas to everyone. If you don't celebrate Christmas, happy whatever it is you do celebrate at this time of year. It's all good by me. And, if you don't celebrate anything and have no reason to be happy about or thankful for anything on this jolly, blue marble, then...uh...Happy Michael Newdow day.
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