Narrator, [Monk casting spoiler for tonight's episode] Sarah Brown (Real!Carly Manning) is going to be on Monk, tonight. It's on USA at 9:00pm/8 Eastern. I've never watched it, but I might tune in, to see that performer.

History is written by the winners of course. Maybe they should've asked the kids to write papers on Someone Else's Holiday Stuff, for diversity's sake. And to avoid exoticizing Chanukah too much.

Unless they're personal gifts other than company gifts.

They weren't company gifts, so I'm guessing personal. I've received company gifts before, but never gifts from my supervisors. I didn't know! Now I feel like a horrible person for not having gifts for them!

Did you get them for being a great person or a great employee?

Ha! Um. I guess they like me since they want to hire me, but I don't particularly think I deserve gifts for my performance on this job.

So my mother is going CRAZEE with the stockings. She's making extra.

And now I need to call my brother because he just warned us to be careful opening a box due soon. Heh.

but what they do on Christmas is totally divorced from its origins

I agree with this. We rarely hear anything about the Pagan origins of our Christmas traditions. It's like a war on Juleltid.

Characterization of the Hoho2 gene (pdf)

A genetic analysis of Santa....

In this paper we unequivocally identify and characterize the genetic determinant of the famous white beard of Santa Claus to be the ortholog of human KRT6B. The newly discovered gene is named Hoho2 for Human ortholog for hair ougmentation 2. The Santa gene Hoho2 is synthesized and codon optimized for codon expression. Successful heterologous protein expression is shown in three separate systems; E. coli, reindeer, and human. We further show that the bearded phenotype is tissue specific in mammalians, but not in prokaryotes. A Hoho2 specific RNAi knockout was constructed and shown to specifically disrupt the facial beard phenotype. Trans-complementation of the gene could be achieved using a synthetic RNAi resistant variant, indicating that the phenotype is truly a direct consequence of the Hoho2 gene and not due to indirect or off-target-effects on the phenotypic display.

A little over my head....

Cindy, I'm sorry if we were talking past each other to our mutual aggravation.

Mick Jagger and David Bowie are dancing on my TV - it's the best x-mas ever!

I agree with this. We rarely hear anything about the Pagan origins of our Christmas traditions. It's like a war on Juleltid.

I'm with Rick on this one. For all the talk of the "real meaning and origins of Christmas," just once I'd like to see it included that Christmas was the Yule or midwinter celebration long before it was Christmas, and when the pagans and other rabble refused to quit celebrating it, the church decided that was as good a time as any for a birthday party and BOOM. Everybody's now celebrating the birth of Christ with their midwinter festival they didn't want to give up.

One of the energy generating thingies (magnetron?) in my microwave burnt out. The others still work. Can I get away with using it until after the holiday rush? Or is it dangerous; should stop using it now?

OK, 'fess up. Who asked for a directional microwave Death Ray for Christmas?