We both then spent much of the afternoon working on our gifts for the Bead Factory Christmas Party (which is tonight) as well as Early Christmas (which is tomorrow). I took a shower and then helped Carrie to make one of the Early Christmas gifts. I suppose I shouldn't say what it is yet.
Carrie made a really good Arroz con Pollo dish for an early dinner, then I went down to perform the Fools Play Christmas Special(s). Taisha was at the show this week! Hooray! We did (as always) two Rankin/Bass-style Christmas specials. The first one was called "Decorate the Halls" and was about the origin of Christmas decorations. Plot synopsis follows:
In the north Atlantic there was an island so remote that it had never even heard of Christmas. It was ruled by an evil Miser who lived in a manor on the edge of a volcano. He was superstitious and lacked common sense (as did everyone who lived on the island). Fearful that the volcano might some day erupt and destroy his manor (as well as the town below at which the volcano was aimed), the Miser had his Chief of Police (unfortunately named "Phallus") collect everything pretty in the town and throw it in the volcano to appease it. Therefore the town was a very drab place.
One day a fisherman from this drab island caught something strange: a magic fish that could turn anything into valuable and beautiful gems and precious metals. Realizing that he couldn't take the Fish back to the Drab Island (for the Fish was so splendid that it would be thrown in the volcano right away), the Fisherman rowed away to parts unknown.
The Fisherman soon came upon the home island of the Fish, where it could talk and sprout legs. They realized they had to somehow stop the Miser from destroying everything beautiful, and they decided to set off to find some help. They rowed into the Forbidden Fog and got quickly lost.
Soon they stumbled upon an island populated by boring, nerdy scientists, who believed in reason. Realizing that his people had no ability to reason (why else would they think throwing stuff in a volcano would keep it from erupting?), the Fisherman and the Fish gathered Dexter Clayton III and they decided to go back to Drab Island, where Dexter's reason would conquer the Miser's superstition.
However, since they had to pass through the Forbidden Fog they got lost again and ended up at the North Pole. It was so beautiful there that the Fish's ability to make things prettier didn't work; there was no way to make it any prettier! Dexter Clayton III stumbled upon Santa's workshop. Santa was surprised to see anybody because it was still 10 months until Christmas. Dexter explained the predicament, and after inspiring Dexter with the Christmas spirit, Santa gave him, the Fisherman, and the Fish a sleigh ride back to Drab Island.
Meanwhile the Miser and Phallus had run out of pretty things to throw in the volcano. Miser realized that the island was still covered in trees, and they were pretty, so they proceeded to chop them all down and throw them in the volcano. All of the trees except for one, that is. There was one tree near the center of the island whose trunk was so thick that there existed no saw long enough to cut through it. The Miser decided to use explosives to fell the tree, but he and Phallus had so little common sense that they kept on exploding the bombs early, damaging only themselves and not the giant tree.
Just then Santa dropped our three heroes off at the island. Dexter Clayton III realized that he could use all those explosives to make a breach into the volcano's magma reservoir, so that when it did erupt all of the lava would spew harmlessly out to see instead of all over the island. He and the Fish stole the explosives and did just that. When the Miser saw that his manor and island were saved by reason, Dexter was able to convert him away from superstition and over to the side of reason.
The Fish then made the giant tree to be covered in gems and baubles and beautiful things. And then in turn the Fish made the entire island just as splendid to behold. It was so beautiful that the islanders decided to decorate their island just like that once every year. Since Santa was the one who delivered Dexter, the Fisherman, and the Fish to the Island, they decided to decorate every Christmas in his honor. Also, they ate the Fish because it was being really annoying and kept randomly turning people's body parts into heavy metals.
Then every year the islanders would go to another island and teach them how to decorate for Christmas. And that island in turn would tell two more island, which would each tell two more islands, and so on until the whole world knew how to decorate for Christmas
When I type it out like that, it sounds frighteningly accurate to a real Rankin/Bass special. Except for the Police Chief being named Phallus. And them eating the fish at the end.
Then Mike did an Island of Misfit Toys bit, which are always rather funny. This is when Geoff showed up from his Nutcracker performance. I briefed him on the second special and he performed in it. It was a cautionary tale about how you should beware of the other holidays that happen around the same time as Christmas. This one was about watching out for Solstice:
A very Christian father tells his increasingly homosexual son about Solstice: A long time ago, the moon didn't wax and wane as it does now. It was always full.
Since only idiots don't worship Jesus, a whole bunch of them banded together to form a Council of Idiots to decide what to worship instead, and they eventually settled on worshiping the moon. A Roman Centurion overheard them, and ran and told Yum-Yum the Christian-Eating lion. If these idiots succeeded in converting people to their pagan worship of the moon, then there would be no more Christians for the lion to eat! So the lion set out to stop them.
The idiots made their way to the moon by way of a tube, though exactly how was never really explained. They asked permission from the moon to live on it and worship it, and it said that'd be okay. They were idiots, though, and they were worried that Yum-Yum might find them, so they asked the moon if it could disappear. Slowly, in phases. Also, they convinced it to hide behind the earth on the longest day of the year so it would be hidden for the longest possible time.
Yum-Yum noticed the moon slowly disappearing and made his way to the moon via the tube (somehow), and attacked the pagan idiots there. Being idiots, they all threw themselves in Yum-Yum's mouth. But since Yum-Yum was a Christian-eating lion, the pagan idiots were like poison to him, and he vomited them up and was defeated.
And that's why pagans celebrate solstice, in remembrance of when a bunch of idiots defeated a lion on the moon during the longest day of the year. And six months later the shortest day of the year happened, and since they were idiots they celebrated then.
Whoo! That one was not at all like a real Rankin/Bass special, but it was very, very funny. At one point the Father and his Son sing this song:
When a fork touches a spoon down there
It gets embarrassed
And that's what we call
Buffoonery soup!
Good times. Afterwards we all went out to Rib Eye as usual. Some people were saying they still didn't have power, like Leia & Kedar.
Since Taisha isn't going to be at the show next weekend, I gave her her Christmas gift early. I gave her a Ghostie Pint Glass. She lubbed it! She gave me one of those Kinder Eggs. It had a samurai monkey inside. Tiare also gave me a gift, a light-switch frame with raw chickens doing Olympic sports, and a couple of cool magnets.
Labels: Fools Play, Life
