Debbie Downer Does Dallas (for Xmas)

Exactly.

Annually, folks just like you and I spend countless hours, usually starting in early October, lamenting over the impending doom that I like to call "The Holidaze Season." 

This looks embarrassing on your kid.

Body parts begin to get puffy (because Texans can't handle moving anything if below 40 degrees outside), Christmas music blares on strip mall speakers before the little ones can even begin to decide between which commercially beaten-to-death, dried up and ugly, plastic super hero costume they need Mom and Dad to buy for $30, and every end-cap at the grocery store plugs some sort of hideous list special:

Personally, Id rather eat this.

"Buy (this hydrogenated product made out of plastic and sugar) to go on top of (this other thing that starts with a stick of butter, and ends with a lifetime of sorrow-filled eating habits) and we'll give you a free can of fried, dry onions to go on top of the lard-laden dish that's no longer a vegetable!" Here are some of my favorite one-off alternatives to the above suggested sludge, made out of real and fresh ingredients:

• Lightly blanched kale with salt n' pepa.
• Mashed sweet potatoes made with Almond Milk and Earth Balance.
• German Pancakes made with mostly egg whites and agave nectar, topped with fresh berries and warm, natural maple syrup.
• Turkey Tortilla soup with blue corn chips, Hatch green chiles, and black beans.
• A tall glass of Firemans 4. Always fresh. Should always flow. Period.

Then begins the obligatory "savings plan" for obligatory gift-giving and the ideal that "Black Friday" contains some sort of actual, magic coupon that actually saves you tens of percents off.  It does! And it can be great, perhaps if and only if you've always wanted that coveted, singular item that's usually expensive, but at 4 a.m. it lies on the shelves of the Big Blue or Red Box for half off, but the name of the game is Impulse Overspending.  Guess what? This just in:

Does this even need a caption?

No one really "saves" a dime on Black Friday.  

Shoppers pour every last cent of their hourly wage checks and unemployment monies into foreign-made plastic, even on plastic credit they'll never payoff, largely at discount or bargain stores filled to the brim with stuff. Just stuff. Full of stuff.  Stuff the kids grow out of and won't appreciate anyway.  Stuff that one woman said to another woman,"Bitch, get out' my way, it's fuckin'   CHRIMMAS!" as she plowed her down while waddling through the doors of a 24-hour retailer, that actually attempts to employ a geriatric door greeter for minimum wage.  Stuff out of an obligatory, utterly Americanized tradition that could stand to change its tone--not the Americanization of Christmas itself, but the tone of voice and malignant actions committed by holidazed shoppers on shit-covered shopping sprees.

Why not make the film selection below required viewing for anyone who remains bull-headed in regards to their Holidaze habits.  All are available on Netflix:  

• Maxed Out
• Wal-Mart: The High Cost of Low Price
• A State of Mind (for perspective on what life is like on another planet from yours).
• And coming soon (featuring several friends and neighbors from Austin) Handmade Nation
• Thirst (perhaps stop watching closeted, hipster, Mormon propaganda vampire films).

Rory Skagen of Blue Genie makes art.

There are folks out there who have no clue as to how much DIY, American-made, beautiful artisan crafts and gifts line their downtowns, and their strips.  No clue that healthy groceries shouldn't be a luxury item.  No clue that the point of the spirit of "this time of year" gets lost in the point that we should behave in a giving, loving regard at ALL times of the year in the first place. Giving a friend the gift of knowledge about things like The Blue Genie Art Bazaar, Farmer's Markets, perhaps even Go Local cards, and even daily deal site getaway bargains, yields more possible joy and local economical stimulus than a bag full of plastic, slave-labored, major brand embarrassments from a notoriously hideous, monopolizing and abusive retailer.  Spend on one meaningful, locally-carried toy or game, over ten of them that clutter the house and the pocketbook with debts.

Have a look sometime.

Cut down.  Trim the fat.  Literally, get moving.  Make the gift of free fitness with your family, like talking a walk with your Dad.  My father, who's entering the fledgling stage of his golden years and was just asked to retire before he was good and ready to do so, has recently been diagnosed with a particularly upsetting, yet manageable disease:  Parkinson's.  Instead of crumbling inside while we interface during those infrequent times we get to actually share the same space, I've decided to educate myself and my other family members about life after diagnosis.  I am going to cherish these moments, starting yesterday.

Walk and talk. It's free.  Try this instead of that cramped car ride to that chain restaurant, where you can't have that conversation, because your jowels are stuck together from all of the hidden mal-nutrition. Eat a delicious piece of fine chocolate, or a truffle made from a local chocolatier, and not a bag of M&M's.  Get your pre-teen hipster a book on handmade, DIY crafts, or even a membership to an affordable gym like Planet Fitness, not a "Team Edward" shirt, so that she may be able to actually make the team when tryouts come around.  Go inward, not Edward.  Spending time with people you love, spending money on quality items over quantity crap,  makes more of an imprint to the soul and less of one in the wallet, in the long run. 

The 10 Greatest Xmas Movies...Ever.

Just a hunch, but most everyone has possibly seen many or all of these films, and several times at that.  If so, congratulations!  I re-gift you the very best Xmas movies of all time--and guess what?  They're all American Masterpieces:

10.  DIE HARD (John Mc Tiernan, 1988)
Who says baby Jesus's birthday can't be chocked-full of badass machine guns, sexy German terrorists, and two times too many "Yippie-ky-yay-motherfuckers!" coming out of Bruce Willis's mouth?  Co-starring Bonnie Bedelia, who bears a striking 80's resemblance to Donna Reed and is also Macaulay Culkin's aunt, Die Hard is a Christmas miracle.  Brotherly love, family values, and a ton of hideous one-liners make this classic action fest, pertaining to the holidays, a legitimate Xmas-time forerunner.

"Now I have a machine gun...Ho-Ho-Ho."

9.   GREMLINS (Joe Dante, 1984)
Who knew that Corey Feldman would make it into a beloved movie top 10 list?  After the success of E.T., every little girl and boy wanted a Mogwai.   There's a band named Mogwai.  Gizmo has been revered as one of the cutest and most popular movie icons of all-time.  There is a reason for the season, and that is Gremlins.  The 70's and 80's were the years of The Speilberg and Friends domination over cinema, and Gremlin's-lovin' makes the cut with serious high marks.  While this film tends to scare some young viewers, the good news for the rest of us is this: Phoebe Cates remains as hot today as she was then. 

8.   ONE MAGIC CHRISTMAS (Philip Borsos, 1985)
Reach for some Kleenex if you're a pussy like me, this Canadian sleeper has been a favorite since childhood and most people have never heard of it.  If I told you Harry Dean Stanton portrayed an angel named "Gideon,"but played the character of, well, Harry Dean Stanton would you go for it?  Look out for the introductory role of Sarah Polley as a tiny, sweet poor girl, and a gloriously portrayed Christmastime skeptic by Mary Steenburgen, this film is as depressing and dare I say as significant as It's A Wonderful Life. 

7.   SCROOGED (Richard Donner, 1988)
What's better than Charles Dicken's A Christmas Carol, at Christmastime or anytime?   Just about everything.  I can't handle reading that miserable required middle school reading, but out of all portrayals of the classic, nothing tops Bill Murray as "Scrooge" during one of his many career spikes.  From the director of mega-cool movies like Superman, The Omen, and The Goonies,  comes a hilarious Xmas parody of a most overrated classic.  I've always revered Carol Kane as a runner-up Madeline Khan (R.I.P.) even though their career paths ran alongside each other, but nevertheless she plays a hell of a Ghost of Christmas Present.  Also contains another great score by that fabulous redhead, Danny Elfman. 

6.   NATIONAL LAMPOON'S CHRISTMAS VACATION (Jeremiah S. Chechik, 1989)
Juliette Lewis's debut role as part of Clark and Ellen Griswold's third set of children in what may arguably be the very best of the Vacation series, Christmas Vacation was piss-pants hilarious in 1989.  Yearly, I re-scan this film at the obligatory family movie DVD-used-to-be-VHS gathering at some point during my visit, and still guffaw at key points in Chevy Chase's demise.  Highly quotable, and seriously talented cast, this remains the very best slapstick family holiday film.  Check your shitters and fix the newel post, it's National Lampoon time!

5.   EMMET OTTER'S JUGBAND CHRISTMAS (Jim Henson, 1977)
Released on my birthday, and perhaps the most underrated and under seen Muppet installation comes to life every holiday at my place.  This sickly-sweet "Gift of the Magi" parable, based on the illustrated children's book and brought to life by the creature shop pre-Muppet Movie, contains some pretty ground-breaking puppetry and in true Henson form--family values as told by cuddly-soft animals.  Buy the DVD and check out the bonus features, especially the "Bloopers," with Frank Oz all over it.  As hysterical as it is tear-jerking.

4.   TIE:  PLANES, TRAINS, AND AUTOMOBILES (John Huges, 1987) / HOME FOR THE HOLIDAYS (Jodie Foster, 1995)

Neither of these films directly relate to the birth of baby Jesus, however, both of these Thanksgiving-themed screen gems outrank most of our American Xmas movies, even on this very list.  There isn't a single movie that either John Candy or Steve Martin act in, respectively, that makes me cry...except for Planes, Trains, and Automobiles. Thematically similar to Uncle Buck, this drama-dy brings the laughs, and will permanently deboss the lyrics to "Everytime You Go Away" into your skull for a good week or two.

What's more awesome than losing your job, making out with your gross boss, and realizing that your smart, teenage daughter is bumpin' uglies with boys?  Going to Thanksgiving with your hideous conservative sister and overbearing parents!  Home For the Holidays, Jodie Foster's best work, provides a kind of intrinsic joy that only the black sheep in us can truly understand.  Co-starring a coked-up Robert Downey Jr. during one of his many career peaks, this movie wreaks of what's truly valuable about families in general...the ability to argue, laugh, reconcile, or maybe not. 

3.   A CHRISTMAS STORY (Bob Clark, 1983)


Starring brilliant child actor Peter Billingsly, and Melinda Dillon from Close Encounters of the Third Kind fame, and quite possibly the very best use of voice-over dialogue in a film, A Christmas Story has earned itself a 24-hour time slot on Christmas Day on TNT.  Amazing.  Responsible for kids sticking their tongues to frozen light poles, and plastic leg lamp merchandise and tattoos since 1983, many critics believe this American classic to be the pinnacle of holiday movie bliss. 

2.   IT'S A WONDERFUL LIFE  (Frank Capra, 1946)

Starring: Jimmy Stewart, Donna Reed

It would seem obvious that I place this film at the top of this list, for it contains such an explosive level of golden age magic I can't see straight, clearly muddying the path for an open slot at the very best Christmas movie of all time.  It is redundant to say that Jimmy Stewart gives the performance of a lifetime, but achieves exactly that in Capra's very best film.  This film exhibits, in rare form for the era, so very many truthful moments regarding all of the struggles and sorrow one man must go through in order to have, well, a theoretical "wonderful" life.  In the end, was his life that wonderful?  Both gorgeous and depressing, this film poises many questions of faith, fidelity to the self, and to the family.

1.   THE NIGHTMARE BEFORE CHRISTMAS (Tim Burton, 1993)


The top space I proudly reserve for the very first feature-length stop-motion animated film, based on Burton's children's book with the same title.  Plastic-y yet fuzzy, cuddly characters of "Halloween Town" try their damnedest to bring the bright and beautiful magic of "Christmas Town" to the  Gothic dwellings of their holiday land, in a most sugary-sweet attempt.  Although the trials and tribulations of Jack Skellington, voiced by Chris Sarandon and Danny Elfman of Oingo Boingo fame, are both epic and sweet, the brutally tedious craftsmanship behind  The Nightmare Before Christmas as well as the thoughtful tenderness of the micro-mini cast members make this a most deservedly surprise classic of American cinema history, regardless of its genre status.