Christmas in July

At the Lodge with my new bartender. 😏

"Christmas in July" events are now becoming pretty popular. Apparently 4 months of Christmas shopping starting in September and leading up to December 25th are not enough so people have to celebrate another month in the middle of the year JUST IN CASE they have forgotten how to be joyously merry. 😒

The Hallmark Channel has totally capitalized on this month long event. As if the constant stream of romance movies weren't enough to drive you over the edge, you will now have 33 Christmas themed movies to look forward to in the coming months. It is nice though to see that certain 80s and 90s actors are gainfully employed again. I'm sure Candace Burrell, Andie MacDowell and James Denton are happy.

Several bars in the Allentown area are having events for the faux-holiday. One bar is having entertainment and a costume contest. I hope its an indoor ugly sweater contest. I mean how many fully dressed Santas are gonna show up at a bar in summer heat? And unless you and your friends are going as elves or reindeer, there just aren't that many Christmas costume options.

But good things do happen as a result of these celebrations. I've seen many food and toy drives. Food pantries are always in need this time of year. They receive an overabundance of donated canned goods in December and then unfortunately, they are all but forgotten come the summer time.

Visit any weekend yard sales over the summer and you'll see an overwhelming plethora of toys for sale for a quarter here, a dollar there. Gee folks, here's a bright idea, just donate to these unused toys to the toy drives! I mean all that work for $10.00 profit on toys from your yard sale? Save some time, do a good deed by donating the toys, and if you must ... take a tax write-off  😕

Our community Lodge had a Christmas in July dinner which featured ham or turkey. It was very popular and sold-out. In years past, Christmas decorations were put up. Unfortunately this year, that did not occur so it was Christmas-in-food only. I blame lack of volunteerism. There just aren't enough volunteers in our communities these days. But that's another blog, another time.

I bartended that evening. I even went to the local thrift store and looked for a Christmas-y t-shirt but none were available. There were row after row of  Christmas decorations available for purchase. I settled for a SpongeBob SquarePants dressed in holiday garb to represent my "Christmas in July" spirit. He also was hired as our replacement bartender since my bud Darren is leaving the Lodge end of August. Hopefully he will be easier to train ... just kidding Darren!

I AM looking forward to decorating the Christmas tree this year. That's a favorite holiday activity of mine. I get out all the ornaments from years past, including a new one I pick up each year. I lay them all out and start deciding where to put each one. My favorite tree ornaments are my Mom's ornaments I received after she passed away, ornaments of my childhood, and various cat-themed ones acquired over the years.  My all-time favorite tree ornament has to be Bugs Bunny Carmen Miranda!

Bugs Bunny as Carmen Miranda

I read online that there is a certain way to decorate trees. Start with the lights at the top, work your way down going round and round. Then drape the garland the same way, top first of course. After that, do the ornaments, heaviest towards the inside, lightest towards the outside. OK WHATEVER. I say open a bottle of wine, beer, or whatever your favorite libation may be, eggnog included, and decorate the tree HOW YOU WANT! All I know is that Bugs Bunny goes FRONT and CENTER!

You better start shopping too, there are only 150 days left until Christmas.
You can 'Bah Humbug!' me later!