Happy short, bitterly cold early winter festivals season!

The cat wanted to participate in this year's seasonal-greetings thing, but I'm a little suspicious of his motivations. (You might need to click on the above image to see just what I mean.) I have a feeling he's possibly been using my computer when I haven't been looking, and just last week I received Opening Cans Without Opposable Thumbs For Dummies from Amazon, a book I don't recall ordering or see much need for at the moment, though it's possible I ordered it while my wrist was broken and it was on backorder all this time.

As secular and irreligious as I am, I have concerns with the cat's commercially-themed message, too, but I'll let it pass. Ignorance can be bliss, and if I don't know what he's up to, I won't have to lie about it later, right?

But seriously... I expect to be away from the blog the next few days, doing Xmassey things with family, so happy whatever-you-celebrate this time of year, or have a nice day if you celebrate nothing. It's all good, y'know? If there was indeed a historical Jesus, it's often been pointed out there's no possible way that shepherds would have been doing shepherdey things in December--if some sort of holiday miracle occurred, it would have happened in the springtime. The early Christians adopted the pagan solstice holiday and pagan customs like putting up a gear tree and getting drunk a lot because in those days Christians actually had worse holidays than we atheists do. Meanwhile, the other prominent winter holiday this season, Chanukah (or however you'd like to spell it) is a bit of an oddity, a celebration of a Jewish civil war that's been turned into a sort of alt-Christmas for various reasons.

But nevermind the history, which you likely know. I guess what I'm trying to say is, have an adequate Festivus, and don't forget to tell your loved ones how much they've disappointed you this past year.

Or defenestrate a friend for Ookymaas, it's all good.

Peace.