Xanax...er...Xmas Season is upon us

This being Thanksgiving, at least in the United States, I’m taking the obligatory what-I-have-to-be-thankful-for inventory. Tops on the gratitude list is having the Rev in my life, of course. (I’m also thankful that he and his son are both supremely talented in the kitchen, and they’re doing all of the cooking for today’s feast.)

I’m thankful as well for my George W. Bushisms calendar, with its daily quotations from W. In honor of Thanksgiving, today’s offering is from a speech W made in Miami in 2001:

…I’m so thankful, and so gracious – I’m gracious that my brother Jeb is concerned about the hemisphere as well.

I’m gracious that we have such a thankful president. I’m also gracious for the recent election results.

Not least of all, I am profoundly thankful for the gifts I get in my email every day, including the one I received just yesterday. Here, just in time for the holidays, is stunning proof that angels exist:

The angels are the round splotches of light in the picture. I'm pretty sure that the floppy-eared entity in the lower left-hand corner is also an angel. Anyhow, we can thank Certified Angel Therapy Practitioner™ Lisa Genevieve of League City, Texas for this astonishing proof. What’s more, you too can demonstrate angelic existence, and all you need is a digicam. "Angels are among us!" Lisa writes. "Try this yourself with a digital camera. Angels and light beings show up as orbs around us in photographs. This is my daughter and her best friend one night in the spring. There were an extraordinary number of light beings that showed up for this shot!"

Lisa, who says she has her greatest success receiving information from the spiritual realm via automatic writing, sells Soul Readings from the Angels for only $77.00 US. For an extra $33.00, you can get a message from a departed loved one.

Now if you’ll excuse me, I have a couple of holiday CD mixes to burn, some of the Rev’s cooking to sample, and some TV to watch. I’m really not in the mood for our local Thanksgiving parade, which, for some reason, can no longer be called the "Thanksgiving Parade." It is now officially named the "Holiday Parade" (well, after all, Thanksgiving is a U.S. holiday, and I suppose the parade organizers didn’t want to offend any non-citizens or foreign terrorists who might be living in the Bayou City). In lieu of the parade, I’ve been watching a delightful late-1990’s Brit rendition of Alice Through The Looking Glass, starring Kate Beckinsale. It has been criticized by some as being too "drugged-out," which in my book makes it much more faithful to Lewis Carroll’s original tale than all those other cutesy remakes. And so far, it’s making a lot more sense than most of the emails I receive. Every time I check my email I go a little further into the looking glass, or down the rabbit hole...

Happy Turkey Day to everyone who celebrates it. To those for whom Thanksgiving is too Americentric, Happy Late Autumn Holiday. Not to give short shrift to those in the Southern Hemisphere, for whom this would be a Late Spring Holiday (like Jeb Bush, I too am concerned about hemispheres). And to those who plan to celebrate the coming Winter (or Summer) Holiday, that season of Bright Shiny Objects (Bling Crosby, anyone?)... be sure to take your Xanax before heading out to the malls tomorrow. Or, better yet, take it instead of heading out to the malls. You’ll be much, much happier.