Bah, Humbug!

Nothing makes me more truly, deeply depressed than wheeling a grocery cart past a display of cellophane wrapped fruit baskets to the accompaniment of Jingle Bells, arranged, it seems, to sound as much as possible like the Dead March from Saul.  It happened to me this very morning.  My eyes started to tear up and I had to use every bit of my elderly will power to keep pushing the cart along. I wanted to run for the nearest exit and stagger outside to think about something more cheerful,  like the amount of arsenic there is in rice.

This is how happy Christmas music makes me.

There is nothing worse than down-tempo Jingle Bells. Except maybe the Kenny G version of Oh, Holy Night in a coffee shop.  Or  Burl Ives singing Holly Jolly Christmas from the speakers installed on the outside of the shopping mall.  Or The Chipmunks singing anything.

It's all pretty grim.  While I love sitting around on Christmas Eve singing our adults-only version of Christmas in Killarney, I find public Christmas music to be the very worst part of the very worst time of the year. The whole ho-ho-ho of it makes me feel about a thousand years old, reminding me that not only don't I believe in Santa Claus, but that I don't believe in much of anything.  Except for the laws of gravity and the stupidity of our elected officials and their minions.

Until now, the only recourse was to stay home and shop online. But because we are now living in the future,  even that may soon be impossible.  When I signed on to Amazon this morning up popped an invitation to "Listen free while you shop." As of today, it's voluntary, but I foresee a time when it will be one more non-optional media horror show, like TV screens in airports, and elevator music.

I couldn't bring myself to click through to "An Amazon Exclusive Playlist to get you in the holiday spirit," so I have no idea what the musical selections include. You'll have to find out for yourself, if you dare.

And if you think I was kidding about the Jingle Bells, it really was playing at the same tempo as the Dead March, and, frankly, the Dead March is more cheerful.