Christmas Truce

The Christmas Truce in World War One, The War To End All Wars.
Exhausted and bloodied British and German troops lay down their guns, come out of their trenches, and meet in No Man’s Land.
They come together to share rations, drink together, and play soccer on the broken ground.
And they sing carols together.
Word reaches the generals, miles back from the front in their mansions-turned-headquarters.
They give the order to fight.
Messengers nod, get in their cars, thinking it over.
Perhaps a little engine trouble, maybe a flat tire.
Something to give the boys a little more time.

Rudolf’s father

Santa asked Rudolph to guide his sleigh through the fog.
As the elves put the harness on Rudolph, the crowd surrounding them cheered.
“I knew that nose would be useful some day,” said Rudolph’s father proudly.
This was the same reindeer who was ashamed of the glowing red nose.
The reindeer who made his son cover it up, no matter how uncomfortable it was.
Drove his son to tears, into exile.
And now, he was proud?
Fucking liar.
“Put him on the venison list,” whispered Rudolph. “Or I don’t fly.”
Rudolph’s father had been a jerk.
Now he was jerky.

Santa thieves

Twas the night before Christmas, Bob, Joe, and Ray stole some Santa suits and a van, and they went package pirating out in the suburbs.
They managed to get a pretty good haul, and they didn’t get caught. Twelve days in a row.
After scrubbing the van down and abandoning it, they checked out their haul.
Most of it was the usual cheap crap, groceries and stuff, but there was some jewelry and electronics and computer stuff that they could sell on eBay, or fence through their flea market pals.
“Merry Christmas!” they said, tapping their cans of beer together.

Santa downsizing

As Santa farmed out more and more of the operation to the big tech companies, the elves had less and less to do.
The traditional jobs of cookie-baking and shoe-making had also been automated.
Their ancestral forests long cut down.
And there are so few jobs for mall santa assistants, what, with the malls dying out because of the big tech companies, too.
Idled and furloughed, the elves turned to crime and underground fight clubs.
Bloodied drunk midgets, stumbling the streets at night, stealing hubcaps and hood ornaments to fashion into weapons and drug paraphernalia in their alleyway craft shops.

Gingerbread town

Every Christmas, Sandy has made a gingerbread house.
She bakes the walls and roof, and little people to put in the house.
Then, she mixes the icing to put it all together.
Assembling the house and decorating it wasn’t hard for her to do.
So, she made it fancier each year.
Bigger houses, electric motors, LED lights, and toy trains.
Soon, she had a whole village built.
Full scale.
You could walk into the houses.
You could live in the houses.
The year she died, we buried her in a gingerbread coffin.
In the gingerbread cemetery.
Outside of Gingerbread City.

Chocolate Santa

When you eat a chocolate bunny, do you eat the ears first or the feet?
What about the tail? Do you eat that first?
I remember a comedian who said that he bit out the eyes and screamed at it.
But that’s crazy.
Because nobody bites out the eyes of their chocolate bunny.
They do that to their chocolate Santa Clauses.
Or they bite out his crotch.
I mean, after all the kids who sat on the laps of mall Santas, especially the ones who were child predators getting off on it?
And the worst part?
They were paid to.

Christmas lawyers

Every time I hear someone say “You’ll be hearing from my lawyers!” I never hear from their lawyers.
People tend to just say that when they’re frustrated and know they’re wrong, but just want to intimidate you.
Lawyers never actually show up and do things.
Except this one time.
It was Christmas Eve, and there was a knock on the door.
Foolishly, I opened it.
And there were the lawyers.
They sang some wonderful Christmas carols at me.
Now, when people say I’ll be hearing from their lawyers! I say “I look forward to it.”
And make the figgy pudding.

Come to Jesus

I remember one manager who kept saying that we needed to have a “Come To Jesus” moment.
Never mind that I was Jewish.
So, I came to Jesus.
“Hi,” said Jesus.
“HI,” I said. “What’s up?”
“Not much,” said Jesus. “How are you?”
“I’m okay,” I said. “But my boss is an asshole.”
“Try working for your father,” said Jesus.
So, I went back to my boss, quit my job, and went to work for my father’s company.
It totally sucked. And I quit that job too.
I went back to Jesus.
“I’m not very good with sarcasm,” said Jesus.

The carrier

At first, they blamed the Chinese food markets and poor sanitation for the pandemic.
I mean, that’s where Bird Flu came from, right?
Researchers traced the migration path of the virus and discovered that it closely matched another migration pattern.
Santa Claus’ Christmas Eve flight plan.
It seems Santa picked up the virus somewhere and that’s how it spread so rapidly.
And being good enough for Santa doesn’t always mean washing your hands or covering your face when you sneeze.
Santa survived the plague.
Now, he stays up late at night, drawing lines through so many names, good and bad.

Kobe’s beef

Sure, it was bad weather that brought down Kobe Bryant’s helicopter.
Because of all that fog, Santa Claus couldn’t see where he was going.
Even with Rudolph’s red nose lighting the way.
Because Santa’s sleigh doesn’t show up on radar.
No radio or flight plan, either.
So when some rich former athlete ignores the tower’s weather warnings and just has to get his ass from here to there, well, God forbid there’s a jolly old man taking his sleigh out for a test run.
Oh, kids. Don’t worry.
Santa’s fine.
Just don’t ask him for a Kobe jersey for Christmas.