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You are here: Home / Open Threads / Merry Christmas Open Thread

Reader Interactions

134Comments

  1. 1.

    Duane

    I intend to fight the Republican’s attempt to steal Merry Christmas from all of us. Damn crooks steal things that are tied down. Merry Christmas, everyone!

  3. 3.

    joel hanes

    Great-Aunt Marion had a large beautiful full Nativity, acquired over many years,
    carved from olive wood in Italy and subtly colored.
    All the pieces: camels and wise men, sheep and shepherds, angels, donkeys.
    She also had a horrible, spiteful white Persian cat, who one year apparently made off with the baby Jesus from the manger.

    Years passed, Marion passed, and when we cleaned out her house before selling it we found the Jesus figurine under the refrigerator, where it had unfortunately become permanently stained by mildew. We restored it to the set, which was passed on to a new generation, but we love to tease the new owner about Moldy Baby Jesus in the manger.

  4. 4.

    justawriter

    I found this interesting, apparently someone calculated how much Bob Cratchit in A Christmas Carol and the couple from O Henry’s Gift of the Magi would be in in 2017. Remember that these are characters who were scraping by just a hairsbreadth from poverty. Their current income would be between $25,000 and $26,000 a year.

  7. 7.

    Eric S.

    Joyeux Noel!

    A week or so ago I was watching Rick Steve’s Christmas in Europe special. The French family he visits is shown making a beef tenderloin baked in a pastry. I declared, mostly to myself, that I’m going to do this.Turns out it is basically Beef Wellington. I didn’t know. But I remain undaunted.

    My family has an aversion to mushrooms. Because of that I found an alternative walnut filling. I completed making the filling and herb butter today. Now, can I successfully make a puff pastry tomorrow?? I purchased my first rolling pin yesterday.

  8. 8.

    Jager

    I called my buddy Nick, a horse owner, asked him to box up some horseshit so we can drop off another “gift” at Mnuchin’s house.

  10. 10.

    Feathers

    Realizing that the hardest thing about going home for Christmas is the caffeine deprivation. And buying coffee out is a reckless and wanton expense.

    Sighs and good tidings to all.

  12. 12.

    SiubhanDuinne

    @justawriter:

    hairsbreadth

    Thank you. A day or two ago, Digby committed this sentence

    “We are a hares-breath away from it being true.”

    and it’s been troubling me ever since.

  14. 14.

    Rex

    While we were getting the Christmas stuff out this year, my 6 year old daughter excitedly remembered the “Jesus action figure” set and was looking forward to playing with it.

  15. 15.

    SiubhanDuinne

    @Feathers:

    Realizing that the hardest thing about going home for Christmas is the caffeine deprivation.

    Clearly you are not a member of my family. Coffee fanatics one and all, we are.

  18. 18.

    japa21

    I’ve been following Santa’s journey on NORAD. Have to admit I was a little nervous when he crossed into North Korea, but he made it out without getting shot down.

  22. 22.

    MikeS

    @Feathers: Trader Joe’s instant coffee (by the jar) is pretty good and even the Starbuck’s instant (littlepacket tubes in a box) is ok. Both are far better than going without coffee!

  24. 24.

    Sister Golden Bear

    Reposting since the thread downstairs is pretty much dead…

    Sister Golden Bear
    December 24, 2017 at 12:50 pm
    At the airport, off to do my daughterly duties once again. No word from the cousins, so it looks like it’ll be just me and Mom this year.

    Being the spinster daughter, I’ve spend every Christmas with Mom for as long as I can remember. (Not just Christmas, it’s always a multi-day visit.) Just wish I could have a Christmas of my own for once.

    Bah Humbug; no that’s too strong!
    ‘Cause it is my favorite holiday.
    But all this year’s been a busy blur
    Don’t think I have the energy
    To add to my already mad rush
    Just ’cause it’s ’tis the season…

    So deck those halls, trim those trees
    Raise up cups of Christmas cheer.
    I just need to catch my breath;
    Christmas by myself this year

    Merry Christmas; Merry Christmas
    But I think I’ll miss this one this year

  25. 25.

    Roger Moore

    @japa21:

    Have to admit I was a little nervous when he crossed into North Korea, but he made it out without getting shot down.

    His sleigh is far too maneuverable to be shot down.

  28. 28.

    Raoul

    One of the crappiest Christmases in several years just got even sadder. One of our dearest friends, who has had a rough several years, lost her dad this morning.
    She was going to join us in the mountains for New Years – a break we were all really looking forward to. Now she and her sibs are in funeral planning mode and she has had to cancel our quiet little friendly New Years eve.

    This on top of my best friend moving to (eghad) Arizona in a week.

    Bah. Humbug.

    C’mon, 2018. Just gotta get through the next 7 days…

  30. 30.

    Mnemosyne

    I’m having a grumpy Christmas Eve because I foolishly decided not to use the driveable cart at the grocery store yesterday and now my bad knee and my right elbow are both sore, plus my asthma is acting up and trying to trigger a migraine. Bah, humbug,

    But I do have to get up and shower soon because we have to go pick up our chocolate banana cream pie at Republic of Pie that is our contribution to tomorrow’s Christmas dinner.

  31. 31.

    SiubhanDuinne

    @Raoul:

    I’m so sorry. Losing a loved one is always painful, but it seems especially cruel at the height of the holiday season.

  32. 32.

    Brachiator

    One fun thing about Christmas in California this year is that we are inching closer to legal cannab#s effective January 1 (not sure if that is a banned word).

    It will be curious to see the impact on the state.

    ETA. I imagine that a few New Year’s Eve parties will have something to smoke to go along with the champagne when the clock strikes midnight.

  33. 33.

    chris

    @Sister Golden Bear:

    Something in me resists the calendar expectation of happiness. Merry Christmas yourself! it mutters as it shapes a ghostly grin.

    —J. B. Priestley

    This always runs through my thoughts as I buckle up for another holiday season.

  34. 34.

    Roger Moore

    @SiubhanDuinne:
    My problem with Rudolf: if Santa knows who’s naught and nice, didn’t he realize Rudolf was being bullied? Why didn’t he do anything about it?

  37. 37.

    MattF

    @SiubhanDuinne: FWIW, Rudolph is the subject of today’s NYT crossword puzzle. I won’t spoil it much further, but the puzzle itself has a pretty original concept.

  38. 38.

    joel hanes

    @Feathers:

    caffeine deprivation

    Every time I buy plane tickets to go home to Iowa to live with my Mom for a week, I also order a couple pounds of coffee from Jeremiah’s Pick in San Francisco, drop-shipped. She subsists on Folgers when I’m not there, but when I’m home, we make true Mocha Java or Sumatra Mandeheling.

  41. 41.

    Major Major Major Major

    Well, I’m up and at ’em, all checked in for my 7:30am(ugh) flight to London-town tomorrow. Drinking some coffee and trying to finish my short story draft before I start packing so I can print it out and take it with me to work on it.

    I did Thanksgiving with my parents, who are in Grand Cayman now with the rest of the nuclear family, and saw the in-laws yesterday, so, family, ✅, time for vacation!

  43. 43.

    Roger Moore

    @Feathers:

    Realizing that the hardest thing about going home for Christmas is the caffeine deprivation.

    You could always see this as an opportunity to kick the habit. My personal experience is that getting over caffeine withdrawal takes about five days to a week, but after that you’ll be as effective without coffee as you were with it before.

  48. 48.

    Fair Economist

    @Brachiator:

    One fun thing about Christmas in California this year is that we are inching closer to legal cannab#s effective January 1 (not sure if that is a banned word).

    It will be curious to see the impact on the state.

    None, I think, because it’s already de facto legal. It’s trivial to get a “doctor’s prescription” for it. There are pot equivalents to “pill mills” (“pot spots?”) which give a prescription to anybody.

  51. 51.

    randy khan

    We’re way behind, so I’m baking cookies today. I am hopeful that everything actually will be done by the time the Christmas dinner guests arrive (although the cat who pounced on my lap as I opened up my (not-actually-at-the-moment) laptop has other ideas).

  54. 54.

    zhena gogolia

    @MattF:

    They delivered the paper without the magazine, so I’m in a very grumpy mood. I only subscribe in order to get the Sat-Sun puzzles.

  55. 55.

    Walker

    It is 8am Christmas morning here in New Zealand (visiting the in-laws). Off to start the prep for Christmas dinner.

  56. 56.

    Steeplejack (phone)

    @SiubhanDuinne:

    Jeez.

    I’m trying to forget this in the Guardian story downstairs about the Syrians on the Scottish island:

    [. . .] some media coverage which sought to sew fear and foment division.

    That’s not a blog, it’s a copyedited newspaper of record. (And, yes, I know about The Guardian‘s reputation for typos.)

  57. 57.

    Roger Moore

    @Ruviana:

    This does prompt the question why would you want to do that?

    I find it’s very convenient to be able to get up in the morning and start functioning without needing a cup of coffee to get me started. And when I do feel like I need some help waking up or staying awake, one cup of coffee is plenty to do the trick.

  58. 58.

    James E. Powell

    @randy khan:

    I did my cookie marathon yesterday. Nearly everything worked out well. Only problem was I made gingerbread men for the first time. Last night when I was decorating and noshing on the broken ones, the taste & texture were perfect. This morning, they’re hard as rocks. I don’t think anyone will eat them.

  59. 59.

    Brachiator

    @Fair Economist:

    It will be curious to see the impact on the state.

    None, I think, because it’s already de facto legal. It’s trivial to get a “doctor’s prescription” for it. There are pot equivalents to “pill mills” (“pot spots?”) which give a prescription to anybody.

    Hmm. I think I disagree. Yeah, you could say it is de facto legal, but there may be a significant convenience factor in not having to do the prescription dance.

    On the other hand, regulations are still being worked out with respect to where retailers can be located.

    Also, you cannot smoke where you cannot smoke tobacco.

    I’ve talked to a couple of business owners and none of them have thought much about reiterating employee rules related to smoking on breaks, etc.

    And during a couple of doctor visits, I was asked about drinking alcohol and using tobacco, but not about using cannab#s.

    Maybe no big deal, even though Attorney General Sessions is promising a crackdown.

  60. 60.

    SiubhanDuinne

    @Roger Moore:

    Why didn’t he do anything about it?

    Well, in a way, he did. He rewarded Rudolph by honouring him with the much-coveted position of Lead Reindeer. What could be more humiliating to Olive and her pals?

  61. 61.

    Steeplejack (phone)

    @MikeS:

    Yes! I’m not a big coffee drinker—one cup maybe 4-5 days a week—and Trader Joe’s instant (in the jar, as you said) is pretty good coffee, not just good instant coffee. Of course, I load it up with real cream, so that helps.

    Definitely would be good enough for someone suffering in a coffee desert.

  62. 62.

    Brachiator

    @Cheryl Rofer:

    On the cuter side, this is the family that featured in that BBC interview where the daughter came marching in, with her brother not far behind

    I remember that story. The kids were a couple of cuties.

    The family’s response is low key and gracious. Internet fame can be a pain.

  64. 64.

    Waratah

    We are having Chilies Rellenos Jose and tamales, a tradition I introduced for Christmas Eve dinner and the family loves.
    My sister in Australia boarded a cruise ship yesterday in Sydney for an eleven day cruise.
    Should be fun for Christmas and New Year with a bunch of fun loving Aussies.

  66. 66.

    Roger Moore

    @Fair Economist:

    None, I think, because it’s already de facto legal. It’s trivial to get a “doctor’s prescription” for it. There are pot equivalents to “pill mills” (“pot spots?”) which give a prescription to anybody.

    I think there will be more effect than you realize. There are plenty of people who are interested in occasional recreational use who haven’t been willing to go to a doctor to get a prescription. Those people are going to buy a fair amount of pot. There’s also the whole thing about non-violent users having a chance to have their records wiped clean, which should help a lot of people’s employment prospects.

  68. 68.

    Josie

    @Feathers: When i travel, I always take my coffee setup with me – coffee, cream in a chiller bag, a drip funnel for one cup, a mug, and #2 (small) filters. I set it up in hotel rooms, other people’s kitchens or wherever I go. My kids have dubbed it The Coffee Shrine. I only drink one cup a day, and I want it to be quick to fix and really good.

  70. 70.

    debbie

    Just finished a brisk but very nice half-hour walk. Nothing beats flannel-lined jeans (with a Starbucks peppermint hot chocolate chaser) this time of year!

  72. 72.

    A Ghost to Not

    Bah humbug! Arrestivus for the rest of us. The Airing of Grievances can recommense any time, Bobby Three Sticks.

  73. 73.

    debbie

    @zhena gogolia:

    Jeez, I hated when that happened. I would call the delivery place and make them deliver a second copy. I wouldn’t mind if they had missed other sections, but never the Magazine!

  74. 74.

    scav

    My preferred typo of the day was in a recipe for houska where I’m supposed to punch down the dough with a lightly floured fish.

  78. 78.

    chris

    @Brachiator:

    Maybe no big deal, even though Attorney General Sessions is promising a crackdown.

    Here in Canada we’ll be watching with great interest as we prepare for legalisation next July. US border guards are already refusing entry to those that admit to smoking the evil weed, dog knows what will happen when the whole country becomes a den of iniquity.

  81. 81.

    Brachiator

    @chris:

    Here in Canada we’ll be watching with great interest as we prepare for legalisation next July. US border guards are already refusing entry to those that admit to smoking the evil weed, dog knows what will happen when the whole country becomes a den of iniquity.

    Wow. That’s just crazy, a pointless harassment of travelers.

  82. 82.

    Kitty

    I have the same tiny wooden angel band, mine’s a little worse for wear, missing wings, faded paint etc. I remember them from childhood, I’m 60! So nice to see them.

  85. 85.

    Brachiator

    Oh well, we close out the year with some bad science writing about Neanderthals. Nearly everything in this story is confusing, a wrong headed over simplification or just goofy. For example.

    It’s difficult to imagine why our early ancestors would have mated with them. Neanderthals were a different species to us after all, and the thought of it seems distasteful to us today.

    We are learning that Neanderthals may have looked much like any other early modern human. They would not necessarily look out of place in modern society. And the author of the article doesn’t understand modern ideas about species.

    A link from my mobile device.

    https://knowridge.com/2017/12/neanderthals-didnt-give-us-red-hair-but-they-certainly-changed-the-way-we-sleep/

  88. 88.

    Mnemosyne

    @Suzanne:

    It apparently was a big thing on local news last night, and the big reveal happened on live TV. ??

    I could drive 2 miles away and get as much horse manure as I wanted because the LA Equestrian Center is right in the middle of the Valley, with zoned-for-horses houses and apartments all around it. It’s not going to be easy to figure out exactly where that load of horseshit came from.

  90. 90.

    CaseyL

    Happy Birthday to all Juicer Christmas babies!

    I’m going to the neighbors today to watch football, and going to the neighbors again tomorrow for Christmas Open House. We have decided that they are my “local family,” since my actual family is geographically all over the place, and none anywhere near here.

    I should take something, but for some reason I can’t bear the thought of cooking – and in any case haven’t got much food in the house, having neglected to go to the store. (In a strange mood today: despondent for no apparent reason.)

  98. 98.

    trollhattan

    @Cheryl Rofer:
    We’ve been practicing for the part for years/decades!

    “And lo, from the east appeared a pack of jackals in Bethlehem, singing ‘Louie, Louie’ unto he heavens. Amen.”

  104. 104.

    trollhattan

    @rikyrah:
    I suspect it’s being grievously over-estimated but one thing for sure, since the legit growers, distributors, dealers etc. can’t use the banking system, we have a literal cash problem on our hands. Envision them all going to city hall to pay their dispensary taxes and permits, in cash.

    Gonna be an interesting year.

  105. 105.

    Ruviana

    @Brachiator: Peeps like the exotic at times. What would’ve been more exotic than flame-haired folks from a variant species? Neanderthals represent!

  110. 110.

    Fair Economist

    @trollhattan:

    I suspect it’s being grievously over-estimated but one thing for sure, since the legit growers, distributors, dealers etc. can’t use the banking system, we have a literal cash problem on our hands. Envision them all going to city hall to pay their dispensary taxes and permits, in cash.

    Hunh, a legitimate use for cryptocurrency. Is there one not subject to wild valuation swings?

  112. 112.

    Fair Economist

    @Ruviana:

    Peeps like the exotic at times. What would’ve been more exotic than flame-haired folks from a variant species? Neanderthals represent!

    I’m not surprised that red hair isn’t Neanderthal because I recall (hopefully correctly) an analysis of gene variation that indicated it was a fairly recent mutation.

    I am surprised at the claim that 2% of non-African DNA in Neanderthal. I remember as recently as 10 years ago people we looking hard for Neanderthal DNA (via gene variation; Neanderthal DNA should show up as genes of relatively ancient origin absent from Africa) and very little was being found; more like 1 in a 1000, and that only possibly. Maybe the genes mostly came over from single-transference events and so had no variability in extant population to identify it?

  113. 113.

    Brachiator

    @trollhattan:

    I suspect it’s being grievously over-estimated but one thing for sure, since the legit growers, distributors, dealers etc. can’t use the banking system, we have a literal cash problem on our hands.

    Also already problems with robberies and break ins of places with a lot of cash. I jokingly tell people that armored car business might be an interesting investment play.

    Meanwhile, the state of California has set up a web site to provide assistance.

    Search for California cannab#s portal

  115. 115.

    donnah

    @joel hanes:

    The parents of my best friend in college had a traditional small Nativity set with the figures made from a chalky plaster and all painted. Every year they set it up, and every year their beagle Spunky would steal away with one of the figures and promptly bite the head off. By the end of the collection, only the Baby Jesus survived with head intact. He was apparently too little for Spunky to grasp with her evil, evil paws.

  117. 117.

    Feathers

    Thanks for all the coffee commiserations. Even the cola is caffeine free. I did just find a stash of Irish Breakfast Tea, so the immediate danger has passed. I think I will bring some of the TJs coffee next time I come, thanks for the suggestion.

    Just baked oatmeal cookies, going to wrap my siblings and nephlings presents. Found a recipe from King Arthur’s flour for almond flour brownies. Apparently my mother had plans to bake with almond flour, never did, because there are several bags of it.

  118. 118.

    Mnemosyne

    @Fair Economist:

    IANA scientist or geneticist, but I seem to remember reading that one of the reasons DNA testing for ancestry is kind of bogus is that it can only go back 1000 years at best. The Neandertals died out long before that, so wouldn’t any genetic evidence have faded out of the gene pool by now? ?

    I was kind of hoping that the “red hair = Neandertal genes” thing would pan out now that white supremacists are latching onto Neandertals as the true “white race” since red hair is fairly common among Ashkenazi Jews.

  120. 120.

    zhena gogolia

    They’re showing Christmas in Connecticut on TCM. We watched the first half the other night and will join in the for the second half today. “Just flip one flapjack, Mrs. Lane!”

  121. 121.

    Mnemosyne

    @zhena gogolia:

    It’s not one of my all-time favorites because I find Dennis Morgan to be really dull, but the supporting cast is stellar. I think the jaunty (Black) deliverywoman who brings Barbara Stanwyck’s fur coat may be her costar from Baby Face, but I haven’t been able to confirm that.

  124. 124.

    Fair Economist

    @Mnemosyne: The DNA ancestry tests look for linked gene sets – genes so close together that they are rarely broken up by recombination and can travel together for many generations. As you point out, they’re useless in deep time (and also not as precise as they pretend even in recent time, but that’s another story). The tests for Neanderthal genes in the Aughts were looking for genes where the sequence of the genes had diverged – which happens very slowly, over generally hundreds of thousands of years. Those, by contrast, would be nearly useless for analyzing human ethnicity, because there’s too few recent mutations. Different methodologies for different purposes.

    You wouldn’t be able to say much definitive about a single gene with the Aughts methods because an individual human gene can have preserved deep time variation by chance, but there should have been an anomalous high-variability not-in-Africa group of genes, and they weren’t finding them.

  125. 125.

    joel hanes

    @Mnemosyne:

    one of the reasons DNA testing for ancestry is kind of bogus is that it can only go back 1000 years at best.

    That was when it was thought and expected that DNA would degrade too extensively after a 1000 years to be reliably sequenced.

    Turned out it wasn’t true, and they keep finding better and better Neanderthal DNA samples. By now, cross-comparision has clarified the picture a bit, and it looks as if people such as myself are 2% or more Neanderthal. Also, turns out there was at least one other reproductively-isolated population that interbred with Neanderthals and humans, and contributed a bit to the genetics of modern humans : the Denisovans.

  126. 126.

    Sister Rail Gun of Warm Humanitarianism

    @Fair Economist: I assume you’re talking about the various ethnicity tests, which I’ll agree are best considered a “just for fun” application. They’re only as good as the testing company’s reference population set. A company called LivingDNA has been compiling an interesting set of reference populations, though, and anecdotally has been doing pretty well at identifying which part of Britain a given tester’s ancestry is from.

    And no, they can’t tell you what Indian tribe your great grandmother the Indian Princess belonged to.

    I was thinking that the Neanderthal DNA was identified by comparison with the ancient genomes that have been sequenced. If you’ve tested at one of the major companies, you can get a comparison with the ancient genomes easily enough.

    The databases are reaching critical mass for identifying recent migrations. I personally find the Genetic Communities on Ancestry more useful — and more accurate — than the ethnicity estimates.

    Some interesting statistics on DNA test results and recombination probabilities.

  127. 127.

    Sister Rail Gun of Warm Humanitarianism

    @Mnemosyne: I think you’re confusing the degradation issue joel is talking about with the recombination issues that plague genetic genealogists. There was a recent study that estimated that about 20% of the DNA segments of 20-30 cM are older than 20 generations. That’s a segment length we generally associate with 5th or 6th cousins, but there are Maori who match Hawaiians at that length.

  129. 129.

    laura

    @Fair Economist: None, I think, because it’s already de facto legal. 
    Got to disagree. It’s going to have a large impact. First and foremost, medicannabis is not subject to tax. Recreational comes with a 15% state sales tax. In the City of Sacramento alone, the department of Finance has received over 8 million dollars as business have pulled permits for dispensaries, grow operations and delivery services months before the first recreational sale. A medicannabis using g friend reported that his retail establishment was stacking product to the roof in anticipation of January 1st. Law Enforcement and the enforcement industrial complex are already designing equipment to determine motorist impairment.
    Unions are conducting industry organizing -which is GREAT news for workers.
    It’s going to have a very big effect-not all positive. I’m going to pay attention to areas that are prohibiting activity to see what effect the absence of green economics have on the community, and what happens in repsonse.

  130. 130.

    Mnemosyne

    @Sister Rail Gun of Warm Humanitarianism:

    And no, they can’t tell you what Indian tribe your great grandmother the Indian Princess belonged to.

    Anecdotally, I thought that a fairly large number of people have been discovering that their “Indian princess” ancestor was actually a Black woman who was passing for almost-white and got transmogrified to a more acceptable ethnicity by family legend.

  131. 131.

    Sister Rail Gun of Warm Humanitarianism

    @Mnemosyne:

    Anecdotally, I thought that a fairly large number of people have been discovering that their “Indian princess” ancestor was actually a Black woman who was passing for almost-white and got transmogrified to a more acceptable ethnicity by family legend.

    Or a mulatto who claimed to be Indian when she moved into town. Some of them turn out to be Melungeon or East Asian. *cough*Burr*cough*

    And a lot turn out to have no Native American at all.

    The stories are so common that the Indian Princess a genealogist joke. What’s not a joke are the scam DNA testing companies who claim to be able to identify a specific tribe 5+ generations back. Or a specific African tribe for the African-American community. LivingDNA is the only company that’s even close to reliably identifying ancestry at less than a sub-continental level, and they’re only working on England at the moment.

  133. 133.

    Fair Economist

    @Sister Rail Gun of Warm Humanitarianism:

    I was thinking that the Neanderthal DNA was identified by comparison with the ancient genomes that have been sequenced. If you’ve tested at one of the major companies, you can get a comparison with the ancient genomes easily enough

    Yes, that’s how they are doing it now. I’m just surprised at the differences between the divergence methodology of the Aughts (estimating very little and maybe none) and the results from direct sequencing (estimating 2%). It’s a big difference – enough to make me wonder if maybe there’s some modern contamination of the Neanderthal sequences, although a number of the identified genes have functions that at least look like Neanderthal introgressions. If it’s a matter of very occasional hybridization from which occasional genes spread by selective advantage, it could make sense.

  134. 134.

    Sister Rail Gun of Warm Humanitarianism

    @Fair Economist: Makes me wonder if it’s just a matter of the much larger databases available. It would be interesting to tabulate the origins of the people who have that 2% Neanderthal DNA vs those who don’t.

    It has just struck me that I have never seen anything about the segment size of the matches to the ancient genomes. The largest match I have (that I know about) is 5.5 cM to BR2. That’s too small to trust that it’s identical by descent.

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