Important Seasonal Announcement

Please note that this year, owing to the demonstrable risks posed by the presence of

• swans, swimming (7)
  
• geese, laying (6)
  
• birds, calling (4)
  
• hens, French (3)
  
• doves, turtle (2)
  
• partridges, roosting (1)

the Days Of Christmas have been reduced to six.

In response to popular outcry, however, the pear tree will be made available after the appropriate quarantine period. Please complete the appropriate application form (XM-A5) and statutory Declaration Of Need For Cheer (H0-H0H0), including medical documentation of Vitamin C deficiency or Seasonal Affective Disorder.

Grated Seasonings

Or Season's Greetings, whichever is the more appropriate to your state of inebriation.

On this Christmas Day, let us remember the words of the conservative that George W. Bush could never be:

Ill would it be for us this Christmastide if we were not sure that no greed for the land or wealth of any other people, no vulgar ambition, no morbid lust for material gain at the expense of others, had led us to the field.

- Winston S. Churchill, White House, 25 Dec 1941

Looking for loathe in all the wrong places

I'm not going to bother with any links since it's all over the fargin' place. I'll just say "War on Christmas" and everyone will know what I'm talking about.

It is, of course, the most ridiculous beat-up of a story imaginable. Everywhere else, nobody gives a shiny shit about what to call it. It's Christmas, and nobody of any sense gives it second thought, whatever their religious sentiments. The only fulmination over the season is concerned with the rampant, crass commercialism that pervades the whole exercise like a particularly eggy fart in an elevator.

Only in America does this happen: first, some fluff-brained do-gooder decides that "Christmas" is exclusionary language and perhaps "Holiday" would be a kinder, gentler term that should be encouraged; then some dull-witted sanctimonious prig twists this into an Eeevul Seckuler Lie-beral Plot To Destroy All Christians. From here, watching them play the victim, it's all laughable nonsense.

The real joke, though, is on everyone, and the punchline can be found in any dictionary.

holiday n., & v.i. 1. n. a day of festivity or recreation, when no work is done;
[...]
[OE haligdæg (HOLY, DAY)]

HOLY DAY. Wakey wakey - we never even left the spot.

P.S. Bill O'Reilly is an arse.