Post Christmas Post

I hope everyone had a good Christmas. Or a good December the 25th. Things went OK here. Kind of low key. I got some jeans. I needed them. Now I can put off laundry for 2 more days!!!

This is always good. Anytime I can put off having to do ANYTHING it is good.

But some things you can not avoid. Like cat box scooping. Got to scoop that box! Or else bad things happen. Presents are left in the sink. Or bathtub. Presents nobody wants. But they get left there anyway!!

Now according to my magical all holiday calendar, today is Boxing Day. Now I have known about Boxing Day for a long time. But for whatever reason it is not a big deal at all in the USA. For a long time I thought it was some kind of Jewish thing. Really. It was on the calendar, but nobody paid any attention to it. Like Sukkot and Tu BiSh'vat. Whats that??? Got me.

Later when I was told that it was somehow connected to Christmas I used my impeccable logic and reasoning skills to deduce the meaning of the day.

Boxing Day was the day set aside to box up all the crap you got but did not want or was the wrong size/style/color/whatever - and bum rush the stores for credit or exchange.

But just now I remembered I have access to Wikipedia! So I looked up Boxing Day to solve the mystery once and for all.

FROM WIKIPEDIA!!!

"Boxing Day is a public holiday in the United Kingdom, Australia , Canada, New Zealand and countries in the Commonwealth of Nations with a mainly Christian population"

FROM ME!

OK - so far so good. Seems to be a holiday in the UK and nations associated with the Commonwealth. But not the USA! So why not? I know about the American Revolution and stuff - but we mostly kept a lot of stuff from the old country. Like the ridiculous wigs. And the hairstyle that emulated the ridiculous wigs. And the system of common law.

But not Boxing Day. So I investigated further!!

WIKIPEDIA

"It is based on the tradition of giving gifts to the less fortunate members of society"

AH HA!!!! I always knew that this was just another communist redistribution holiday! Giving what to less fortunate members of society???? Gifts?? What do you buy for the homeless person who already has everything? Another shopping cart? Maybe a shopping cart I have pimped out by spray painting it gold?


But alas, the "tradition" did not last into modern times.

WIKIPEDIA:!

" Contemporary Boxing Day in many countries is now a "shopping holiday" associated with after-Christmas sales."

SEE!!?!?! Told you!!! It IS a day when you box up all the crap you did not want and take it back for store credit. And if you are lucky, the value of the item boxed up (bought before Christmas) was not on sale! So you can exchange it for store credit and get some better crap that IS on sale!

So again, my logic and reasoning skills proved themselves to be reliable.

But as I continued reading, I encountered something very confusing.

WIKIPEDIA:

"This day is historically England's name for St. Stephen's Day - St. Stephen was the first Christian martyr, being stoned to death in Jerusalem around A.D. 34-35 - 26 December, which is a public holiday in most countries in Europe and many countries around the world with predominantly Christian populations. In the Eastern Orthodox Church, St Stephen's Day is celebrated on the 27th of December, although in Greece the Greek Boxing Day (Synaxis Theotokou, Σύναξις Θεοτόκου) is also celebrated as a public holiday on the 26th of December and is not related to the English version."

OK follow me here. St. Stephen. Stoned to death. December 26, 34 or 35 AD. Public holiday in many countries with a mostly Christian population (except the USA).

So where the hell do we get boxes from this? Why not call it "Stoned Day"?

Ill tell you what - "Stoned Day" would be FAR MORE popular than a holiday where you give stuff to the less fortunate. And how did the whole presents thing get started anyway? Was Mr Stephen handing out gifts to people in violation of the law or something? Maybe he was giving away crap gifts and the less fortunate stoned the guy to death?

Who knows.

But now that I think about it, we already have a "Stoned Day" holiday. April 20th. 4/2o!! Dude. So maybe that is why the holiday was named after either a sport where two people beat the stuffing out of each other, or after cardboard containers. Again, who knows.