Happy Holidays!

[Talisman]

--- In the_old_crowd at yahoogroups.com, in response to Gatta, ewe2 
<ewetoo at ...> wrote:
> Hear Hear, Miaow Miaow, and a merry xmas penguin Eek likewise :D

Talisman responds:

Eek indeed!  

It's a fine thing when one comes along,--minding one's own business, 
I might add--and finds a couple of uppity sun-bunnies dominating all 
the Holiday well-wishing.  

Trying to show the rest of us up are you?  Think you're better than 
the thermally challenged?  Well, I won't have it! 

Happy Holidays to you too!  

So there.  

And to the rest of you slackers, as well.

Actually,  few weeks back, I was setting up activities to help a 
young person further appreciate the tilt of the Earth--charting the 
shrinking days, and that sort of thing--when I had the regrettably 
insular epiphany that it's really a rather steamy time down there, 
for our Ewe.  

It seems the Aussies are unwilling to comply with the upcoming 
Winter  Solstice.  Oh, no, in spite of the fact that the calendar 
clearly says December, they're going ahead with summer.  I even hear 
(though I trust true geeks would resist) that it's customary to have 
Christmas "on the beach!"

Well, I suppose Australia *proper* is closer to the Equator than 
Antarctica--but the same can't be said for that unruly Bendigo 
region, where there is good evidence of penguins among the populace.

Under the circumstances, I was  stunned by a vision of our flippery 
lad, all slathered up in sun block and topped with a sprig of holly.

Then came a wave of compassion; I thought wildly about the 
possibility of creating "season zones," sort of like "time zones," 
only ...um...seasonal... To allow the poor souls in that  "other" 
hemisphere a proper holiday.  

Unfortunately, I think time zones are moronic artifacts of the 
twentieth-century, so--in all good conscience--I had to abandon the 
plan.

::sigh::

Ewe, darling, if you *must* hang your stocking from a beach umbrella, 
I guess I can bear it, but if I hear you're smuggling warm eggnog out 
there in your Speedo...

Merry Everything!

From,

Talisman, in the unseasonably warm Great Lakes Region, where it's 
pomegranate-champagne cocktails and a blazing fire on the evening of 
the 21st, whether the snow cooperates, or not.